Can Writers Fit In As Readers?

And can they both live in harmony in this Medium environment?

This may be a kind of a “Cowboys dance with the farmers’ daughters, farmers dance with the ranchers’ gals” thing that territory folks just do.

Speaking from the archaic days when humans used to be rule followers, here are a couple that will promote peaceful coexistence between authors and fans.

Rule One for Readers

Rule one. Fans and followers are nice. In some ways, they are vanity currencies for writers, as in “you can’t fill up your gas tank with ‘em,” but in a larger sense, they are indicative of a measurement of the immeasurable- the enjoyment of the works of any given creator.

In addition to not being able to buy groceries with them, there is a vague discrepancy between the number of followers- peeps who like to see a writer’s work, and the actual number of peeps who get to see or are exposed to the works of that author.

The poor reader who finds a writer he likes and hits “follow,” sometimes believes it will get him front-row seats for future performances, if not a backstage pass. Well, it seems it doesn’t work that way. A reader who decides to follow a writer might still only get invited to less than one percent of the future shows.

Rule Two for Readers

Rule two. If you like a writer and want to learn about all his future events (stories) slide your little cursor over to the green envelope and push it to subscribe.

I don’t believe, on a personal level, you are subscribing to a newsletter. The comparison is more like reading the Sunday paper, back when they had Sunday papers. You could go to the newsstand and pick one up every Sunday, or you could subscribe, and they would be delivered right to your driveway. So you got one even on the Sundays you slept in.

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Rule Three for Readers

Rule three is the next level. There will sometimes be a link near the bottom of an article of your beloved writer that can take you to a real newsletter. This is the holy grail of getting in your favorite writer’s pocket, right next to getting into their Twitter storm.

Steps One, Two and Three for Writers

For writers this is similar. Step One. Feel fortunate when someone follows you, you are doing something right. Keep it up.

Step Two. Encourage your readers not only to follow but also get it tossed right into the driveway by subscribing. They will then get ALL of your articles, not just less than a percent. You will see your read numbers start to rise.

Step Three. If you feel you can or want to toss in a couple of thoughts that are above and beyond just your stories, consider penning the dreaded newsletter.They are considerably easier to deliver to your readers now than they were back when they had to be drawn on the walls of our caves. But they do still require some extra work.

More Eyes

These couple of thoughts are things we writers must do to get more eyes on whatever we create. What we do with those eyes is up to us. I intend to circle back around to that conversation topic soon.

For now, thank you for your time. (my profile — Twitter)

P.S. If you liked this story, you could go HERE, leave your name, and I’d be happy to send you ALL my stories whenever I publish them. Even following me only gives you a very small percentage of these “stories.” Don’t miss out!