The first rule in becoming good AM writer — start writing anything at all
AM WRITER’S GUIDE #1
The hardest part is just starting.
And there are many reasons not to start:
there’s no time for it,
there’s nothing to write about,
there’s no place to do it,
there’s no one to write for,
there’s no specific reason,
there aren’t enough skills, …
In general, it always looks the same.
First, the thought of starting to write appears.
Then comes a flood of ideas on topics worth discussing — showing our own, correct perspective. Better understanding. Much more detailed information.
Next, we imagine a crowd of people reading, commenting, sharing it further. In general — admiring it.
All we need to do to start is to start.
And… we do nothing, because of the reasons listed above.
I think the biggest block to writing is stage fright. The fear that people either won’t like it and will ridicule or criticize us, or, even worse — they’ll find our ideas shallow, insignificant, and ignore them completely.
All the other reasons serve as layers to hide this fear from ourselves. We justify ourselves with factors that are “entirely beyond our control.” We put it off indefinitely.
Meanwhile, if we don’t start writing, we won’t start writing. Simple as that.
Alright, so let me explain a few basic things about writing. Most of it will be disappointing, but if you come to terms with it, accept it, and make peace with it, it will only get easier.
Bitter pills to swallow
I will now write a lot about “texts.” By “text,” I mean anything from a 200-word post on LinkedIn, Facebook, or X (formerly Twitter) to a 1,000–2,000 word article published on our blog, company website, or Medium. A text is a text.
The first bitter pill
The first hundred of our texts will be weak. Maybe even two hundred. This doesn’t mean they won’t be readable or that they’ll be so bad that Google won’t index them out of disdain. It means that when we write our 300th or 500th text and go back to one from the first hundred, we’ll feel embarrassed at how poorly we did.
This is normal. No one is born with fully developed, outstanding writing skills — just as no one is born with the ability to play the guitar perfectly or shoot basketballs accurately.
Even the greatest writers of our time — like Stephen King — while writing their first famous novels — “Carrie,” “Salem’s Lot,” and “The Shining,” also published “Rage” and later “Roadwork” under the pseudonym Richard Bachman. They weren’t good stories…
Have you ever read Philip K. Dick’s short stories? One of the greatest sci-fi creators in literary history didn’t know how to write them. He had phenomenal ideas, but the plots he wrapped them in were thin and full of holes. Amateurish.
So, to start writing well, we need to write a lot. This way, our style and unique, personal way of expressing thoughts will be forged.
Which brings us to…
The second bitter pill
We must write consistently. Preferably every day.
Why every day? Because if we take breaks, the breaks will get longer. First by a day, then a week, and eventually, we’ll realize that while the first six texts were written in early March, the seventh was written in April, and the eighth at the end of June. The ninth and tenth never happened.
If, for some truly objective reasons, we can’t write every day, we should impose a strict schedule and adhere to it without fail.
When it comes to publishing on LinkedIn, the classic schedule is: Monday — Wednesday — Friday, or Tuesday — Thursday — Sunday.
Only in this case, there can be no deviations. And if there are — they must come with “penalties.”
When I started publishing articles on my portal — Centrum Druku 3D — I set the following goals for myself:
13 articles per week
2 articles a day on weekdays
3 articles on the weekend.
The number 13 was sacred. There couldn’t be fewer articles published in a week. It just couldn’t happen.
If I had a lot of work (during the first year of Centrum Druku 3D, I worked at an IT company and was writing articles in the evenings), and I couldn’t manage to publish any articles, I would either make up for it the next day (4 instead of 2) or absolutely ensure I hit 13 over the weekend (sometimes I had to write 5 articles).
Thanks to this “regime,” from January to the first weeks of May 2013, I created and published 100 articles.
What were those texts like? Mostly terrible… I started creating “solid” texts only in the fall of 2013. The first „good ones” began to appear only in 2014.
The Third Bitter Pill
When we start, most of the time, no one will read what we write. And even if they do, they’ll just shrug and leave no trace that they read it (no likes, no comments).
But often, something else — much worse — happens.
We publish a text, people read it en masse — maybe we even go viral!
Hundreds of likes, dozens of comments. And most importantly — everyone is saying the same thing: “You nailed it!”
It’s a wonderful feeling. That’s why we do this.
Then we write another 3–4 texts and… nothing happens. And then another 20 — and still, nothing happens. Maybe 2–3 likes, 1 comment every 10 texts.
What did we do wrong? Why did people leave? After all, we’re writing the same way. What’s wrong?
We die inside. Our souls decay…
Well, that’s just how it is — that’s how it works. Nothing can be done about it. It’s just the way things go. It’s normal.
That’s why we need to write a lot of texts. Eventually, when we reach a critical mass, people start reading us regularly. They come back. They wait for us to finally write something.
But to get to that point, we must go through weeks/months of disappointment. Writing into the void.
In May 2013, I had my first viral hit on Centrum Druku 3D. 13,000 unique users in one day. Several thousand daily in the following days.
In June, there was a second viral hit — this time smaller, with 9,000 unique users.
Then summer came, and it turned out that no one was interested in 3D printing during the holidays, and no one visited blogs and portals like mine. In August 2013, Centrum Druku 3D had 30–40 visitors a day. Many articles I published then were viewed by 2–3 people.
13,000 unique users versus 36. Yeah, it kills your motivation. Especially when you do this every day, in the evenings, and for free. But that’s the path to success.
The Fourth Bitter Pill
We have to write and publish a text even when there’s nothing to write about.
If we want to develop a career in writing, we have to be systematic and write either every day or on a consistent, repeatable schedule.
But what if there’s nothing to write about?
Tough luck — we need to find a topic. The text has to be published.
Many times, I’ve written something good and valuable just because I didn’t have any other “more interesting” topic or idea. I’d take whatever came to mind, or something that appeared suddenly on social media or another non-industry medium, and it turned into a great text.
Two examples:
The man who always liked it when it rained — I just started writing it. Sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph. The result was one of the most interesting and most commented articles I published this summer.
09–05–2013: IL REPLICATORE was founded — an Italian blog about 3D printing, on which the foundations of VoxelMatters were built — it’s a historical article describing the founding of VoxelMatters. On that day — September 5, 2024 — I couldn’t find anything interesting… I spent nearly three hours combing through industry archives trying to find anything. And then Davide Sher published a post stating that this was the day it all began… I picked it up immediately! It turned into a really great story, and a lot of people responded to it.
A writer’s work isn’t always fun. Often, it’s just a job that needs to be done.
The Fifth Bitter Pill
People forget. This is called The Forgetting Curve, and it was discovered by German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus. It means that humans forget 80% of what they learn within 24 hours.
So if we write something truly exceptional and groundbreaking, and many people read it, then… it’s very likely we won’t achieve the success we expected.
That’s why we have to write a lot. It might be about the same thing, just always a little differently. Although, as we’ll learn in my upcoming articles, considering how the LinkedIn algorithm works, writing the same thing several times can still make sense.
In summary…
To start writing, we must start writing — it sounds silly, but it’s simply true.
At the beginning, we don’t need to worry too much about style — it’ll be bad anyway; but over time, it will improve.
We must write a lot and often; this way, we’ll reach people and learn to write well.
Consistency is the key to success.
Writing for no one is the sad fate of a rookie.