Discovering a Box of Needles in the Medium Haystack

Finding and following your community.

The Numbers Game

Not long ago I read an article by a fairly prominent writer on Medium speaking to those that were interested in gaining more followers on this venue. His method seemed legit in actually gaining following through a mere game of chasing the masses and the attrition of a few that would, in turn, follow you back.

I bought into it and simply added this practice into my normal, evening ritual of reading articles on my iPad at night in bed. Easy-peasy, right?

Actually, it was easy to do. Unfortunately, it felt very fake to me.

At first, I found myself being selective to those little plus signs as I flipped through page after page of Medium members. Not long after starting this daily routine I started being less and less selective and just mashing the “add” button without rhyme or reason.

The results were happening as promised, I was getting the low-percentage return follow from these efforts. However, I was now following members that had no connecting interests with myself, other than being on the Medium platform. I finally determined that this was a failing numbers game and lacked the spirit of why I had originally joined Medium.

Changes Ahead

I have to admit that I was still interested in gaining more followers and following more members, yet my focus and reasoning took a turn. One word kept nagging at me and surfacing during this epiphany: COMMUNITY.

The reason for writing on Medium — for me — was to find a community of like-minded individuals who would possibly enjoy my writing. Likewise, I wanted to find reading material that piqued my interest as well. This symbiotic relationship needed to be found in a community.

The Vision

I had a visual of chasing down individuals on the street and handing them sheets of my writing as they passed by, sometimes they would read my article and feign a nod, other times they would take the article so I would leave them alone, crumpling up and tossing my article to the ground as they returned to their interrupted course.

A healthier vision exists of sitting among a group of people and handing out my articles to them, while in turn receiving articles from others around me, the group taking some time to read the various articles and engage with the writer, sometimes individually, sometimes clapping would break out as several people read an especially good article. See the difference?

I still hit the “add” button quite frequently while looking through articles that mirror my interests. I even look at the list of members that have clapped for an article that we have found exceptionally insightful and well written, adding the list of other admirers to those I follow. Makes sense now. Instead of chasing people on the street, I am gathering my community around me.

Community Found!

My community is made up of a wonderful variety of individuals, as in my un-Medium world. I follow a smattering of grandparents, fathers, mothers, techies, bloggers, nomads, sports enthusiasts, productivity gurus, political ranters, artists, the shy and bold, the confident and the struggling, and the list goes on.

I find myself in a happier place in Mediumworld. You will still occasionally find me on the street speaking to passers-by, but more than likely I’m simply on my way to a community meeting and ran into someone I found interesting along the way.