How To Write And Publish 1 Article Per Day
Establishing ideas, writing faster and publishing more.
Back when I was consistently earning in the top 10% of Medium writers, I was creating between 5–7 pieces a week. Were all of them successful? No. Most of them weren’t. Did that matter? Hell no.
Because I kept writing.
- The more you produce, the more traction you are likely to get.
- With each article you post, you increase your chances of going viral.
- With every piece that goes viral, you kind of learn what ‘the people want’ — but you also really don’t. It’s honestly like a confusing game of roulette.
- Consistently publishing articles ensures that you will garner readers from here and there, slowly growing a following.
- For me, one out of every ten articles was what I deemed to be successful in terms of readership and/or monetary reward. Could I have predicted which of my articles would go viral? Definitely not. Some of the pieces I was most proud of gained very little viewership. On the other end of the spectrum, I had articles that I pumped out within an hour that made me half a grand. But that’s the name of the game! It’s fun and it’s frustrating all at the same time. Just keep writing.
Develop a bank of ideas.
Writing and producing content takes a lot of energy, so I like to keep my tank full by establishing a foundation to work from instead of having to dig deep every time I aim to create something new.
You should make it your mission to create a big bank of ideas and inspiration. You don’t have to create this all at once, but keep building and adding to it every day.
Write down:
- Topics of interest
- Half-baked article ideas (you can work the rest out later)
- Quotes you’ve heard that sparked something within you
- Ideas sparked from reading other articles and books or listening to podcasts.
- Something that happened to you that day or throughout your life that could be an entertaining story or life lesson.
- Anything that you feel could make a great article one day, even if you don’t feel like writing about it right now.
Once you have established a bank of ideas (whether it’s in a notebook or on your notes app or spread amongst 1000 post-it notes), you will always be ready to start writing as soon as your bum hits the chair. No time will be wasted procrastinating over ideation, instead, you will pick the topic that most excites you on that particular day and start working.
Hot tip:
I say “on that particular day” because I find the topic I’m writing about is often dependent on my mood. Pay attention to how your energy shifts whilst you pick what to write about, because you are far more likely to pump out an article in record time if you are actually ‘feeling’ it.
Write an article in under an hour.
I have written an article about how to write an article in 60 minutes that explores this concept a bit more deeply, but here are some key points:
- Write about what you know.
Having to research a topic takes time, so if your aim is to produce a large quantity of work in a short time frame, go with what you know. - Write what you are passionate about.
Have you ever received a message that made you furious, or ecstatic? Did you find yourself typing a response at an incredible speed, fuelled by passion? I know I sure as hell have. Being passionate about what you’re writing about plays a big part in your ability to produce content quickly. If you don’t have to force your way through something, you’re going to get to your destination (in this case, a finished article) a lot faster. - Don’t be bogged down by perfectionism.
You need to understand that not everything you produce will be great, and that’s completely fine. What’s not fine is doubting yourself with every word you type, because that is how you produce work slowly, if not at all. The key here is to keep your inner ‘writer’ and ‘editor’ seperate because they are controlled by two seperate parts of the brain. So, write first — get it ALL out before you do anything else. Then edit. Never do both at once — it’s exhausting and difficult to switch between different parts of your brain and it’s a sure-fire way of producing content at a glacial pace.
Refer to headline templates.
I don’t know about you, but writing the headline is one of my least favourite parts of writing an article.
Don’t even get me started on the sub-heading.
I think it’s the pressure of knowing that a headline can “make or break” my article — that I can put my heart, time and energy into producing a piece only to fail at producing that one all-important, more luring line...
This is why I have created a bank of headline templates that I can refer to every time I finish a piece. More often than not, I will be able to find something that suits what my article needs. After a while, you will begin to notice what audiences are more attracted to when it comes to how you phrase your headlines, so keep note of what works for you and the topic in which you write.
You will find some of my examples in the article below, however some templated headlines I often steer towards are:
(#) Things (Person/Character) Can Teach Us About ___
I ___. Here’s What I Learnt.
(#) Great Ways To ___
(#) Items/Verbs That Will Help/Teach/Get You ____
(#) Quotes/Lessons In ___ From ___
If You Want To ____, You Need To ____
Keep writing. Keep producing.
If you want success, you need to keep creating. Keep producing content and keep tracking all of your ideas as they come to you so that you never run out of them.
The more you write, the more you’ll establish a rhythm and it will become just another part of your day. It may even be an enjoyable part of your day. It will get easier with every word you type.
Learning to produce content efficiently and quickly will ensure that the task of producing content daily doesn’t feel overwhelming.
Final thoughts.
30–60 minutes a day is all you need to create and produce daily content.
It’s not always going to be your best work, and you’re not always going to feel like doing it, but every time you write, you will hone that skill. Every time you put a piece of work out there, you up your chances of gaining a reader. Every time you gain a reader, you increase your chances of having an article go viral or gaining a new follower for next time.
You only need one article to take off to see your earnings rise, so keep at it.
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