Milestones Reached — More Than a Crumb
So, I have published 50 pieces on this amazing platform. Plus, I have offered hundreds of responses. I average about 100 or 150 views a month, which equals about 1,000–2,000 views per year(last year one article got over 1,000 views, so that was an extra bonus!). I have read, highlighted, and clapped for thousands of pieces and amassed closed to 500 followers! What wonderful Medium blessings, and I am hardly beginning!
“Wow, that’s quite a crumb,” some will quickly chime. I understand this response, especially since some amazing writers here get tens or hundreds of thousands of views per month after working to draft ten times as many pieces. But, hey, you have to count your blessings, right? Even just a crumb thrown into a pool can generate a strong ripple effect.
Some things to consider when you see your writing reach hundreds, thousands, or more views.
How many countless writers throughout history have tried to draft letters, essays, books, articles, blog entries, or other types of written works only to have their works perused by a few dozen or less? These might include the wholehearted efforts of scholars drafting dissertations or master wordsmiths attempting a breakthrough literary work.
While many thousands or millions of written works produced throughout the ages may have reached thousands or even millions, the majority of such works are lost. Some scholars have theorized that only 9% of manuscripts from Medieval Europe have survived, for instance. Even though these works are lost to modern times, they still have left a large pool of immeasurable richness and influence to humanity nonetheless. While a few thousand views online might dim in comparison to the breadth of readership from many of these historical works(and may easily someday get lost in cyberspace’s abyss), they too will leave an indelible ripple nonetheless. A piece of writing does not need to reach a set number of readers or endure a certain number of years to have a lasting impact.
Is not the reality of your writing enriching just one or a few readers out there itself unquantifiable? If your short story offers entertainment and deeper probing for just one reader, if your creative work moves just a few hearts, or if your personal motivational essay inspires just a few eyes, then your writing has immeasurably affected the greater whole!
One final point — even just a few hundred or thousand views can be an amazing foundation for future growth. If you reach a few hundred reads in one month, the next milestone may be a few thousand or tens of thousands of readers per month or more! Each new milestone is another step in the journey plus an amazing lookout point in its own right!
By the way, a little side note is that I have had views and reads in the tens of thousands and millions on another online writing platform — Quora. This is humbling, inspiring, and wonderful. If I had this many views on Youtube and was a paid content creator, I’d have amassed a nice lucrative side hustle. But numerous Quora pros will tell you the platform is about making connections, building audiences, and producing content first and making green second. To have content span to greater numbers is reaching another amazing point and milestone in the journey with numerous new milestones still to reach. Medium is a whole different beast though — as is any new platform, genre, or domain of writing!
