Remember the Medium referral program?
If someone joined Medium using your link or via one of your stories, you would get about 50% of that person’s fee as long as they remained a subscriber.
This was a huge incentive to promote the site externally, and top writers at the time (like Zulie Rane, for example) brought in hundreds of dollars a month even before story earnings kicked in.
It was the main reason I started a YouTube channel about writing on Medium, and at my peak, I had something like 40 referred members.
Medium shuttered the program a couple of years ago, effectively surrendering the paid subs space to Substack and reducing the payout for external traffic to almost nothing.
And although Medium isn’t bringing back the referral program, it is making BIG changes to the Medium Partner Program starting TODAY to start rewarding writers for bringing in those outside eyeballs again.
Let’s discuss the changes and how they might affect your earnings moving forward.
Medium moves to reward external traffic
Yesterday, the site sent out an email announcing its intention to start rewarding writers for bringing in external traffic.
These changes will be implemented incrementally over the next six months.
Medium started by announcing that 5% of payouts would now go to stories that are shared on social media, attract search traffic, and/or are shared directly with people outside of Medium.
The goal, Medium writes, is to incentivize outside promotion of your work and the stie (something that’s been sorely lacking since the end of the referral program).
Medium also wrote that further changes would be announced in November around rewarding search traffic.
So what does this all mean for us as writers?
Initial thoughts on Medium’s big partner program changes
Anyone who went through the August 2023 MPP changes and the massive hiccups at the start of this year can’t help but be a little concerned any time Medium starts tinkering with the partner program.
I, for one, will be checking my earnings tomorrow morning with at least a little bit of dread.
But if it all goes off without a hitch this time, there are a lot of positives here.
Let me count the ways:
This is probably great for established writers: I’ve written some 600 articles on Medium and have thus established some search authority. I kind of wish I’d expanded my activities on social media a bit more over the past few years, but my presence on YouTube and Substack will help.
It will re-monetize your back catalog: Once the Medium algo stops pushing your story out, its earning power falls off a cliff … you kind of have to hope people just stumble upon it while checking out the rest of your stuff. I have noticed, however, that my older stuff still generates pretty good search traffic. Getting paid for that would be a treat.
It will incentivize evergreen content: News-driven content is great, but there’s a reason the content experts suggest focusing on evergreen for blogs and YouTube. The stickier your work is, the longer it can earn for you. How-tos and reviews could be a lucrative new niche on Medium now.
I like the commitment to transparency: If Medium learned anything from the firestorm of controversy and associated writer exodus in January, it’s that you need to clearly explain what you’re doing. If you just throw big changes out into the void, there will be plenty of people willing to fill the vacuum with anger and conspiracy theories.
I, for one, am cautiously optimistic about these changes.
Not only do I stand to earn more, but it also further incentivizes my work on Substack and YouTube.
Here’s hoping they’re rolled out more smoothly than the last couple of times Medium revamped the partner program.
What do you think?
Is rewarding external traffic a good move?
What do you like or dislike about it?
Let me know in the comments!
Publish Every Day project update: 710
I’m trying to see if I can make enough money to quit commuter life by publishing every day on various platforms and putting my earnings into passive income investments.
How much I need to retire: $250 CAD per day
What I earned this week (daily average): $136.02 (Medium) + $0.19 (YouTube) + $3.47 (Stock capital gains) + $3.03 (Stock dividends) = $142.71 average
What I’ve published recently
Medium:
My top 3 trending stories on Medium
Substack:
YouTube:
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I'm also cautiously optimistic. Time to go brush off the ol' keyword search tool...! (And I need to remember to fill in the SEO settings on Medium from now on!)