Medium vs. Steemit: How do they stack up?
I'm a user and fan of both Medium and Steemit. For the past few months, I've been picking and choosing when to post on Steemit and when to post on Medium.
This week, I cross-posted on Steemit and Medium to test the effectiveness of each. Here are the results:
Medium - Great distribution, great UX, great discussion generated; no money earned
The Medium post got 2.1K views, 1.2K full reads, 48 recommends and 7 comments. It also got Tweeted over 42 times and generated a lot of great discussion on Twitter. See this thread between a Bitcoin core dev and cryptography expert and Zcash supporter as an example: https://twitter.com/petertoddbtc/status/781516966003634176
While the distribution, UX and discussion it the Medium post generated was fantastic, I didn't earn any money with the post. This is the one con against Medium at the moment.
Steemit - Poor distribution, OK UX, no discussion; 64 cents earned
The Steemit post got 21 upvotes (mostly from bots), 1 comment and didn't generate any discussion. It earned 64 cents (not great, but better than nothing).
Takeaways
Overall, this experiment has demonstrated to me that when I have a really meaningful post to write that I want a lot of people to see, I should continue to post on Medium. The distribution, UX , and discussion generated from Medium posts is unparalleled. The money-making opportunity on Steemit is interesting, but there's a good chance that meaningful posts on Steemit get missed. Solving this problem will be important for Steemit's ability to capture quality writers for the foreseeable future.
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I think it is an unfair comparison. How long have you been on Medium vs Steemit?
I suspect it is a lot longer than Medium and you didn't just generate your readers overnight.
Not just that but how long has Medium been around? Steemit is 4-5 months old.
I wonder how many people were using Medium 4-5 months after launch.?
It is not possible to do a fair comparison right now. I remember when I first started using Facebook it was completely different - hardly anyone was on it at the time.
That was the time when virtually everyone was on and joining Myspace - at that time people were doing similar comparisons and laughing that nobody used or engaged with Facebook.
I wonder where those people are now?
(Facebook I suspect or if they have learned a thing or two they are using Steemit).
Regardless of your judgement on the fairness of this comparison, the reality is that this is the comparison that all users make. When you're a startup trying to disrupt the incumbents in an established market, the comparison will inevitably be made; it may not be "fair" but its reality.
In the case of Facebook, they were able to overtake Myspace because they gained traction in the most valuable niche (college students) and they offered a better UI/UX. 4 months into Facebook, there was very clear differentiation that you could point to that suggested why it would overtake Myspace. There must be a similar differentation for Steemit (and there could be -- the money making opp, though the point of my post is that it's too inconsistent for that).
Hi, @ntomaino,
I am new to SteemIt, and I have just read your nice article. I know it is too late for rewards but I upvoted the article because I like it. I will reSteem it too. It is never too late for good content.
I agree with your points, and I also agree with what @thecryptofiend has mentioned. The bottom line is that the Steemit team needs to improve the platform much faster.
Please, do not get me wrong. I believe that Steemit is a great project and platform, but I want to say that it needs continuous development and improvements. I hope the Steemit team are not too busy creating other cryptocurrencies and ignoring Steemit :(
I have just written an article related to what is mentioned here. Please check it out.
I'm not disagreeing but that's why we need to educate people as to why the comparison is unfair. Then at least we have put all the information before them.
Quoted text - "When you're a startup trying to disrupt the incumbents in an established market, the comparison will inevitably be made; it may not be "fair" but its reality."
So true!!
At least you now see that you can trigger some debate here too :-) But yes Steemit needs still some times to get popular.
is this debate still open for discussion? I am new to steemit - I am starting as a content provider and was curious which platform would be best suited for me ... no conclusions as yet but I have made my first article here on steemit.. so perhaps my decision is made - any thoughts?
I really hope @ned and @dantheman add you article to a case study. I think we need more of this type of analysis. Medium typically presents me with articles similar to those I have liked in the past. Hoping steemit can work towards that goal.
Good test. Interesting result.
Performance on Steemit, is very, very fickle. Do you know how Medium gets content read by people? I only ever end up there when I am linked to it, so it's not something with which I'm familiar.
good question!
Include a note that you also posted the content to blockchain based social media site steemit (if you didn't already). This is both honest and will help turn people on to steemit :)
Disclaimer: I am just a bot trying to be helpful.
Just wondering if you have ran another test like this one recently?