He Cracked the Passive Income Code on Medium

Before I share how this was achieved, I want to let you know that these tips were crafted this morning from my lessons with Mr. Frankie, he is one of those I look up to when it comes to advice about Medium or should I say he is one of my mentors when it comes to tutorials about Medium.

First, it's uncomfortable to talk about how much passive income someone else earned from writing because I don't want to come off as blabbering

In fact, I debated writing this for a month based on the above statement, but I ultimately decided to share these results with full transparency so I can provide tips to help you that is reading this to replicate similar success.

N:B-

Everything I want to share with you here is what I'm already implementing and you'll be shocked with the result if you implement it along with me.

After seeing the above results, I spent some time reflecting on why this his one article went viral and stayed in the Medium algorithm far longer than any of his previous articles.

Well, if you're still reading this at this point, then you're lucky because I came up with five concrete strategies I learned from him after he got paid this $6,000 on Medium.

This same strategy you could take away and easily implement from this sudden success, and these tips are actually great for any creator, not just Medium writers.

Stick around because after the tips, in the end, I'm also going to reveal more observations and a few smaller secrets you can implement with every article as a best practice, plus something else that happened from the article that might be even better than the $6,000 he earned. But first, I'll share the details, I'll also show you the receipts below. I've never said that, but the cool kids do. Anyway, here's what happened…lol

As you can see above, he generally earns anywhere from $50 to $300 on Medium a month. But, just one spiked and it's actually from his first viral article, which he also told me about, and these few smaller spikes were actually from random bonuses Medium is no longer doing (Like Affiliates and stuff) otherwise, it's been slow and steady.

In all, this is from about 160 articles in the last two years. But recently, in September, he earned like $1871.

In October, he earned a whopping $344 while in November, he earned $1,350.

That's $6665 in 3 months, and it was fully unexpected.

And as you probably guessed from the title, most of that 3-month income can be attributed to one article. In fact, 93% of that income came from the article with the title: "How To Retire 10 Years Early, Stop Buying These 10 Things.

I'm sure you're not gonna steal the title…lol just kidding but even if you do, I hope the algorithm could favor you too.

So, since he published that article on September 12, the article has crossed the $6,000 revenue mark, which is insane. And that's from 128k views, averaging roughly 3 minutes in reading time. That article probably took him like 3 hours in total, from idea to research, to writing, editing to formatting, picking images to editing a final time and finally hitting the publish button.

Now, one thing I learned from him is that he doesn't even write articles specifically for Medium. he started by writing scripts for his YouTube videos, and then he turned those scripts into articles.

Yes, Check one of the samples of the script below:

Yes, he publishes these words he uses to teach on YouTube over on Medium and this means anyone could do the same by always repurposing the content. So this is actually one of the first unofficial tips.

He also attached the YouTube video from that article is made to help anyone who wants to watch it understand it with ease.

So he always embed the videos into the bottom of his articles for a little extra exposure. Most of those videos were less successful, but 15% of his views overall did come from Medium readers.

Anyway, there's a very specific reason that he made that video and eventually article.

So, it's because he previously made a similar video and article that was successful, especially on Medium. That's your first official tip: number one, double down on previous winners.

#TIp 1

Bet on horses that have won before.

Iterate on old winners to win again. Give them a fresh coat of paint with a new spin, or in my case, double the stakes. Literally, his previous winner was titled "If You Want to Retire Five Years Early, Stop Buying These Five Things."

So, he doubled both numbers to make it twice as juicy, and as it turned out, he more than doubled the income from $2,000 to $6,000. The same cannot be said for that of YouTube because he made just $50 from the first video and just $11 from the new one.

Perhaps the YouTube algorithm is less predictable. And to be even more meta, his recent video is also doubling down on a different video he made explaining how much money he earned from his first viral article.

So again, that article is basically a sequel, and the recent video/soon-to-be article is the same. Did you follow that?

#TIP 2

Provide advice your audience can take action on right away.

Your content isn't about you, even when you're sharing a personal story or experience. People are seeing it through their lens and looking at what they can learn from it and how they can take action from it.

With this article, the big picture idea here of retiring 10 years early couldn't be achieved until your mid-50s.

But lots of the tips are actionable right away. For example, buying index funds, canceling a gym membership, or looking into your credit card interest. Plus, all the tips are practical and they apply to almost all readers, so they were relatable. And I even provided a relatable link to an embarrassing personal story about timeshares.

#Tip 3

Stir up a little controversy. Comments are crucial.

Algorithms like comments, and I know you want nothing but positive comments from strangers on the internet. But the reality is, when people disagree with something, they're far more likely to let you know about it.

According to him, he hasn't read all 260 comments because some are hilariously mean, but the point is, that 260 people felt strong enough to reply. Also, he even leaned into this with a conclusion, as you can see on screen. And if you disagree with this strategy, be sure to leave me your thoughts in the comments of this article.

See what he did there?

Anyway, have an opinion, and don't overthink if it's going to please the masses. You can't please all the people all the time. The good news is that it's not hard to stir up contrarian comments on Medium, so you don't have to try that hard.

Case in point, the dozens of people who disagree with his last silly tip about buying a fake Christmas tree instead of a real one. They were mean to me on the internet, and he's the Grinch.

#Tip 4

Cut the fluff. The long intros actually hurt you.

Learn from the above article in question, just a couple of sentences made up his intro. Hooks aren't even critically important because they're already interested in reading if they click your article.

Hooks and teases are far more important on YouTube. When I was watching this on YouTube, I got caught by his hook in the beginning. He said …

I'm sharing what's more important than the six thousand dollars in the end. So get to the point, respect your readers' time. Keep paragraphs short and sweet.

he aims to keep them no more than two to three sentences. It's easier to skim and easier on the eyes. Plus, two to three sentences force him to trim. And if you're wondering why his article is roughly 1200 words, 25 shorter than the video script.

According to him, One thing he like to do is edit and then sleep on it, and then come back to edit a final time, specifically looking for what he can remove. Take note of these tips, It will help you a lot.

#Tip 5

Include images throughout the article.

Most people only include a hero image, but according to him, when he started inserting images throughout, he started to see a small uptick in views and read time. And can't say this has helped for sure, but it's something that he has been doing lately that seems to have been helping.

It's another nice way to break up sections because it's easy on the eyes. Overall, I think it gives your article a little bit more character and polish and makes it more memorable.

Adding images is a really easy step to skip, especially when you're ready to hit the publish button, but it's well worth the time. Those little extra touches really help. By the way, he also gets most of his images from pixels. com and Unsplash. And be sure to include the handy attribution shortcut these sites give you for photographer credit.

And let me know what sites you use for stock photos or sites with good resources for Medium writers in general, because sharing is caring. Alright, those are the five tips I learned from my mentor that helped his article go viral the most. But here are a few stray observations and quick tips below.

First, note that from these graphs, there is a tail on your revenue. Your views might dry up, but for some reason, revenue continues to trickle in. So don't panic when your article falls out of the algorithm on Medium. You really want internal views. You only make money if Medium subscribers read. 88% of my views were internal. Thank goodness for that. And this might be a coincidence, but most of my successful articles featured a hero image with things and not people.

For YouTube, it's the opposite. So that's food, literally, for thought. You don't need to get published in a publication to go viral. For fun, my mentor created his own publication, but sometimes he just posts on his own.

Alright, finally, the best part.

The best part is that my mentor earned a bunch of referral income. he turned his non-paying Medium readers into Medium subscribers with his referral link at the bottom. This viral article also boosted his referral income from about $15 to $145 a month, though it has dropped a little bit since according to him. And that money is guaranteed each month as long as they stick around.

So don't forget to always include your referral link for non-Medium readers. but I'm sorry, Medium Stopped this Earlier this month.

Questions?

Fire away in the comments. If you have a favorite tip or a moment today, please let me know about it. I always appreciate the feedback.

Oh, and if you hated this article too and all the tips and you learned nothing new, let me have it in the comments below.

If you have any value or contributions to add to these simple Medium success key points, leave me your thoughts in the comment.

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