Member-only story
Only 8¢, But it Felt Like a Lot More
A few days ago, I was notified by Medium that I was receiving a payout. I was ecstatic. I had become a member of Medium in May of 2019. I had dreamed of being a writer but I didn’t write. The payout was a surprise.
A few months ago, I made a career change. I had owned my own company for over 25 years. In the last few years, I had let my employees attrit out. It was down to just me. I was doing long term consulting with the federal government and small commercial businesses and was earning in the low to medium 6 figures.
I decided to make the move into freelancing, websites for small businesses, and writing. I set up a website to promote websites and one for blogs. Not being a marketer, I signed with Upwork for web work. I then signed up with the Medium Partner program.
I made an effort to blog on my site and Medium. I read articles on Medium, made comments, did a few claps. I started following authors and they started following me. Some that I hadn’t followed.
I wrote mostly about technical things like Upwork, WordPress, and Svelte. I didn’t have an expectation of any readers. I did have some, though.
I’m not familiar with the algorithm the Medium uses to determine payouts. Mine was $0.08. I was thrilled. The first thing that I did was go tell my wife. You would have thought it was a thousand dollars.
I’m a beginner. What I read says that I will be better with time and practice. I hope that is true. I may never be a top writer making a living by blogging. It doesn’t matter. I find some satisfaction putting my thoughts down and enjoy that some people actually read and liked what I write.
I’ll keep writing,
Rich
