Ultimate Guide to High-Views Articles: Mastering Writing on Medium

Transform Your Ideas into High-Traffic Articles with Proven Strategies, Practical Tutorials, and SEO-Optimised Formats

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Introduction

In this tutorial, I will guide you through 8 sections to unveil the essential tools and strategies for content creation, helping you craft high-traffic articles from scratch. Whether you’re a novice content creator or an experienced writer looking to enhance your writing and promotion skills, this article offers practical guidance. We will start by delving into the workings and unique appeal of the Medium platform, equipping you with the knowledge to quickly establish your brand presence in this globally renowned content-sharing community.

Next, I will provide an in-depth analysis of three fundamental types of articles—News, Tutorials, and Research & Tech Intro. This will help you understand the characteristics, applications, and topic selection for each style, enabling you to accurately capture the interests of your target audience. Additionally, we’ll explore how to utilise diverse information sources to stay updated with the latest industry trends, infusing your content with a continuous stream of inspiration.

Moreover, I will share how to structure an SEO-friendly article, from crafting compelling titles and paragraph organisation to the strategic use of multimedia elements. These techniques will significantly enhance your article’s visibility on search engines, ensuring more readers discover your content organically. Finally, I will recommend some efficient tools for creating high-quality images and GIFs, allowing you to present your content visually in a refined and professional manner, making your articles more eye-catching.

By the end of this tutorial, you will not only master a comprehensive set of techniques to boost your article’s exposure and readership but also learn how to seamlessly integrate your professional knowledge with practical experience to write content that is both in-depth and capable of attracting substantial traffic. Join me on this journey to start a new chapter of creating impactful articles on Medium!

What is Medium

Medium is a modern online platform for publishing articles and blogs, designed to provide a high-quality content-sharing community for creators and technology enthusiasts worldwide. Whether you’re a developer, designer, or product manager, Medium helps you easily publish technical articles, share project experiences, and discuss industry trends. Below, we’ll explore the core features and advantages of Medium from various perspectives.

1. Platform Interface and Content Display

a. Home Feed

The left side of Medium’s interface displays a list of articles intelligently recommended based on the user’s reading history, interests, and interaction behavior. This feed not only helps users quickly capture trending technology topics but also enhances user engagement through precise content recommendations, forming a content ecosystem.

b. Article Display Page

Upon clicking into an article, users encounter a clean and intuitive page design, highlighted by the following elements:

2. Interaction Features and User Engagement

Medium’s interaction mechanisms encourage exchanges between readers and authors, fostering an active community atmosphere:

3. Article Structure and Optimisation Tips

On Medium, each article typically consists of the following components, whose optimisation is crucial for effective dissemination:

4. Data Metrics and Content Evaluation

Medium provides a comprehensive set of backend data metrics to help authors optimise content strategy from a data perspective:

It’s important to note that while these data metrics provide a basis for quantitative analysis, no single metric can comprehensively evaluate the quality of an article. High views don’t necessarily mean high technical depth, and low reads don’t imply poor content quality. What truly matters is continuously optimising content and format to attract and retain the target audience.

What You’ll Learn From Writing

Writing AI-related articles not only drives traffic but also serves as a process of self-improvement and professional development. Each writing endeavour is a deep dive into cutting-edge technology. By organising and sharing knowledge, we not only reinforce theoretical understanding but also identify areas for improvement through practice, thereby enhancing our skills. Utilising methods like the Feynman Technique, we can deconstruct and reorganise complex concepts, expressing them in a more intuitive manner. This process is both a relearning of knowledge and an optimisation of our cognitive approach.

More importantly, every article published opens a window for interaction with readers. When thousands of views and feedback culminate in affirmation, the sense of achievement motivates us to continuously pursue higher professional standards, creating a positive feedback loop where output drives further input. Thus, writing becomes not just a means of sharing knowledge but also a crucial way to foster personal growth and advance in technology.

Audience

Based on our article data from last year, the majority of our readership comes from Google search engine traffic, indicating that users are actively seeking out specific topics when they land on our articles. Our audience is quite diverse, with many readers lacking a background in computer science or AI. This scenario necessitates a focus on clarity and accessibility in our technical writing, ensuring that the content is both accurate and broadly applicable.

To achieve this, it is advisable to avoid overly complex expressions and obscure technical jargon in the writing process. When dealing with specific terms, abbreviations, or complex concepts, providing clear and concise explanations and background information not only enhances the readability of the article but also benefits more non-specialist readers, thereby expanding the reach and impact of the content.

Topic Selection Tools: SEO-Oriented Topic Selection

Choosing a compelling title and topic is often a shortcut to an article’s popularity and a crucial step that requires careful consideration. An engaging title can directly increase the article’s viewership and lay a solid foundation for subsequent content creation and dissemination. During the content creation process, using SEO tools for preliminary topic selection and keyword analysis is key to ensuring the article achieves good search rankings and high exposure. Below are some commonly used topic selection tools that assist in uncovering trending topics, optimising titles, and adjusting content strategies from various perspectives.

Google Trends

Google Trends is a free tool provided by Google that displays the changes in search frequency for specific terms over different periods. It helps users understand the popularity of various keywords worldwide and supports comparative analysis by region, time, and related search terms, making it highly beneficial for market research, content creation, and SEO optimisation.

Using Google Trends, you can stay updated with trending search topics and keyword trends, providing data support for content creation and helping you identify which topics are most likely to capture user interest.

Sermush

Sermush is a tool focused on keyword analysis, offering features such as displaying search volume, keyword difficulty, competitive advertising costs (CPC), potential traffic (Opportunity), and commercial intent. It also helps identify keyword gaps with competitors, providing strategic suggestions for content optimisation.

Using Sermush enables you to precisely understand the competitive landscape of keywords, helping you consider both user search volume and competitive pressure when selecting topics, and to develop more advantageous content strategies.

AnswerThePublic

AnswerThePublic is a tool that helps users understand the questions and intentions of search engine users. By analysing auto-suggest results from Google and Bing, it generates various questions, phrases, and search suggestions related to specific keywords, providing a rich source of inspiration for content creation and SEO optimisation.

Using AnswerThePublic, you can gain a deeper understanding of user search intent and uncover numerous potential topic points, providing rich material and direction for subsequent content creation.

Overall, these topic selection tools help you understand market trends, analyse keywords, and capture user needs from different dimensions, making them indispensable for SEO topic selection. By effectively utilising Google Trends, Sermush, and AnswerThePublic, you can thoroughly prepare for topic selection and title writing, attracting more target traffic to your articles and standing out in the competitive content landscape.

Three Recommended Article Genres

In content creation, I categorise articles into two main directions: what and how, further divided into three specific genres: News, Tutorials, and Research & Tech Intro. It’s important to note that these genres are not strictly separated and can indeed intersect and blend. This classification serves merely as a preliminary guide to help you better conceptualise your article framework, rather than restrict your writing. Let’s explore the characteristics and writing requirements of the News genre as an example.

News Articles

News articles focus on reporting the hottest and latest AI topics. When writing, you need to choose themes that captivate readers and help them quickly grasp developments in AI. These articles typically spotlight newly released models, products, or breakthrough technologies, with a core emphasis on being “new” and “attention-grabbing.” For instance, a news article about new technology might feature titles like:

These titles focus on newly launched models or technological products, directly conveying the latest, cutting-edge information. To ensure content is engaging and unique, consider the following points during writing:

Such outlines not only make the article content clear but also enhance the reading experience, helping the article stand out among numerous news pieces.

In summary, News articles are a writing direction that tests both your ability to keenly capture industry trends and your capacity for original thought and expression. Whether reporting on the latest products, models, or technological breakthroughs, it is essential to inject personal unique perspectives while ensuring information is accurate and timely, forming a distinctive and in-depth reporting style. This approach not only satisfies readers’ demands for fresh news but also helps establish your unique brand in the competitive content landscape.

Tutorials

Tutorials are the most important type of article in the entire content system. Here, I will explain the characteristics and writing methods of this genre in detail. Below are some excellent tutorial articles I have created in the past for reference:

Excellent tutorial articles should have the following attributes:

Based on past experience, tutorial articles often achieve higher readership but also entail higher creation costs. These articles not only require a topic with practical application value but also demand very detailed operational steps and guidance, ensuring each step has been personally verified. For instance, in my previous FLUX.1 tutorial, the article began with links to free experience sites to attract users to access resources. Each phase had distinct, independent headings, allowing readers to easily find the content they need by chapter. Any code sections must provide ready-to-use code, placed within Markdown code blocks. Operational steps can be listed using bullet points or numbered sequences. If any issues arise during testing, it’s important to document the error phenomena and solutions to help readers avoid similar problems. Screenshots are also indispensable as auxiliary tools, requiring clarity and marked with arrows or boxes to highlight key points, facilitating quick understanding and imitation by readers.

Here are some tips I’ve gathered to help you create high-quality tutorials:

Additionally, I’d like to share a story about finding a unique angle. Once, a classmate and I both wrote articles about Llama 3.2. She chose a news report approach, gaining an advantage in terms of trending topics. To avoid repetition and still gain attention, I focused on Llama 3.2’s compatibility with edge devices, writing a tutorial on running it on a mobile phone. That week, my article received more views. This demonstrates that finding an innovative and unique angle can significantly enhance an article’s impact.

In conclusion, the essence of tutorial articles is to “get hands dirty”—only through personal practice, meticulous documentation, and continuous refinement can you provide readers with a truly original, meaningful tutorial that helps solve real-world problems.

Research & Tech Intro

Research & Tech Introduction articles cover a broad scope, focusing on in-depth analysis and introduction of research and technology. Unlike news articles that chase the latest updates, these articles emphasise depth, principle analysis, and building a knowledge framework. In other words, they are like an exploration into the world of technology, offering insights through paper analysis, principle discussions, and method comparisons, helping readers build a solid knowledge base.

In this category, you can write about technical principles, research methods, and paper interpretations, rather than simply reporting the latest developments. For example, you might choose to interpret a paper, exploring its innovations and limitations; compare current technological methods, discussing their pros and cons and applicable scenarios; or showcase the entire process from theory to practical application through case studies. Here are some example article titles illustrating the diversity and depth of this genre:

These articles go beyond merely conveying “who released what” by revealing the underlying technical logic, design thinking, and potential issues through in-depth analysis. Typically, these articles include the following aspects:

In summary, Research & Tech Introduction articles aim to provide readers with a systematic, in-depth, and thoughtful technical analysis. They are suitable for readers with a certain technical background and help cross-disciplinary learners establish a basic understanding of complex technical issues. Writing such articles requires the author to have a solid theoretical foundation and keen analytical skills, while ensuring clarity and coherence in expression to truly achieve the goals of “imparting knowledge, teaching skills, and solving doubts.”

Sources of Information & Promotion

In the rapidly evolving field of artificial intelligence, staying attuned to the latest developments is crucial. At the same time, effectively promoting quality content to your target audience is key to building a personal brand and professional influence. This article will introduce some common and practical channels and strategies from the perspectives of information acquisition and content promotion.

First, in terms of information sources, the following types of channels can help you stay at the forefront of the industry:

While effectively acquiring information, promoting your articles is equally important. Utilising the aforementioned platforms, you can build an efficient network for information dissemination and content promotion. Here are some promotional strategy suggestions:

In conclusion, establishing a comprehensive information acquisition and promotion system allows you to remain at the forefront of technology while ensuring that your quality content reaches more target readers. By integrating news media, social platforms, professional communities, and official resources, you will be able to quickly capture the latest developments and use diverse promotional methods to achieve both knowledge sharing and personal brand enhancement.

SEO-Friendly Format

In addition to high-quality content, the format of an article plays a crucial role in Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Considering that most readership comes from search engines, a carefully designed format can significantly enhance an article’s ranking in search results, thereby increasing its visibility and click-through rate. Here are some key SEO optimisation techniques to help you balance content quality and format optimisation when writing tech blogs.

Firstly, the title of the article needs to be concise and clear, accurately reflecting the theme while skillfully incorporating primary keywords. A well-optimised title can attract readers’ clicks and make it easier for search engines to capture the core information of the article.

Next, use a logical subheading structure (such as H2, H3) to segment the article content, which not only facilitates quick browsing for readers but also enhances SEO effects. It is advisable to embed relevant keywords in subheadings, but ensure the hierarchy is not too deep, usually staying within the range of H2 to H3.

In the main body, it is recommended to keep paragraphs short and express ideas with clear and concise sentences, avoiding overly complex sentence structures. For uncommon abbreviations or technical terms, be sure to provide the full name and a brief explanation to ensure that readers of all levels can quickly understand the content. The introduction should clearly inform readers of the benefits they can gain from the article, forming a clear guide.

Moreover, using bullet points or numbers to list key points can help readers quickly capture the main information while also aiding search engines in parsing the article’s structure. Multimedia elements should not be overlooked: inserting relevant images (with descriptive alt tags), embedding videos, or charts can not only enrich the content format but also extend readers’ engagement time, thereby enhancing SEO performance.

To further enhance the article’s authority and credibility, appropriately include external links to authoritative resources. However, be mindful not to include too many links to avoid distracting readers.

Lastly, the conclusion should provide a concise summary of the core points to reinforce the reader’s understanding. Proper use of tags and categories can help search engines better comprehend the article’s theme and make the content easier for target readers to discover.

In summary, here are the key points for enhancing an article’s SEO friendliness:

  1. Title Optimisation
    • Concise and Clear: Directly reflect the article’s content and attract reader clicks.
    • Keyword Integration: Skillfully incorporate primary keywords to improve search engine rankings.
  2. Use of Clear Subheadings
    • Distinct Hierarchy: Use H2, H3, etc., to divide content, facilitating quick browsing.
    • Keyword Placement: Embed related keywords in subheadings, but limit depth (suggest not exceeding H4).
  3. Paragraph and Sentence Optimisation
    • Short Paragraphs: Avoid lengthy paragraphs to enhance overall readability.
    • Clear Sentences: Use straightforward sentence structures to reduce complexity.
    • Term Explanation: Provide full names and brief explanations for uncommon terms.
    • Clear Introduction: Clearly state the main benefits of the article at the beginning.
  4. Lists and Key Points
    • Use Bullet Points or Numbers: Highlight key points to help readers quickly grasp information.
  5. Use of Multimedia Elements
    • Insert Images: Enhance visual appeal with relevant images and alt tags.
    • Embed Videos or Charts: Enrich content formats and increase user engagement time.
  6. Appropriate Use of External Links
    • Cite Authoritative Resources: Enhance credibility, but avoid excessive links that may disrupt the reading experience.
  7. Conclusion Summary
    • Summarise Key Points: Recap core content at the end to reinforce reader impressions.
  8. Tags and Categories
    • Appropriate Tagging: Add relevant tags and categories to help readers find content, enhancing visibility.

By applying these optimisation techniques, you can not only improve your article’s ranking in search engines but also provide readers with clear, readable, and well-structured content, thereby enhancing the overall reading experience. Adhering to a good SEO-friendly format is undoubtedly an important strategy for boosting the influence and exposure of tech blogs.

GIF & Image Tools

When creating tutorials and demonstration documents, dynamic images and screenshots often convey operational details and concepts more intuitively. For this purpose, I frequently use specialised tools to record and edit GIFs, capture screenshots, and compress and annotate images. These tools not only enhance my work efficiency but also make the tutorial content easier to understand and share. Here are some of the tools I commonly use:

GIF Creation Tool

Screenshot and Annotation Tool

Image Compression Tools

It should be noted that most of the tools mentioned above are primarily for use on Windows platforms. Mac users may need to find corresponding alternative tools. However, there are many similar tools available on the market, and each platform generally has comparable solutions. I hope these recommendations will provide practical assistance in creating tutorials and demonstration materials, making your content more interactive and intuitive.

Conclusion

This guide provides a comprehensive overview of how to create high-quality AI articles on Medium, covering everything from platform introduction, article genres, information sources, and SEO optimisation to auxiliary topic selection tools and multimedia production. Each section offers practical strategies and tool support. We explored three article genres—News, Tutorials, and Research & Tech Intro—to help you choose the right expression based on your target audience and content characteristics. Additionally, by analysing tools like Google Trends, Sermrush, and AnswerThePublic, you can do thorough research on topics and title writing to effectively enhance your article’s search ranking and exposure.

Writing is not only a means of content output but also a path for personal growth and skill enhancement. Whether you are a novice or an experienced creator, through hands-on practice, meticulous documentation, and continuous content optimisation, you can accumulate experience, build a personal brand, and stand out in the competitive content landscape. I hope this guide provides inspiration and guidance for your content creation, helping you craft high-quality AI articles on Medium that are both professionally deep and easy to understand.

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About the Author

Data Scientist at Research Graph Foundation |  + posts
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