Reading a book is equivalent to a seven-course meal while reading a blog is similar to eating our favorite street food! Which one do you like more?

We often believe that writing a blog would be very similar to writing a book. A good author can be a good blogger and vice versa. Trust me, we could not be more wrong if we are thinking in this fashion. Not only do books and blogs cater to widely different audiences and topics, but the way both these are read is also very different.

Let me explain this difference with two scenes!

Scene — I

On a Friday night after my dinner, I sat very comfortably on my sofa with a warm cup of tea and began to read the book titled “Ikigai” — a book which helps you find purpose in your life while doing what you love to do. The light was warm, the silence was endearing, and the setting was just perfect to read a book. I loved how the book was slow-paced, and how the author was very beautifully setting the scene. Every little detail that the author wanted to portray, I was immersing myself into same.

At that moment, when I was reading the book — there was nothing else but a beautiful conversation between the book and myself, and both of us were fully committed to each other.

---

Scene — II

I am sitting in a cafe on a Monday morning for my coffee before I dive into the endless corporate meetings. In the same cafe are sitting 10 other people — one is talking on the phone, the other is watching a video without earphones, there is a random conversation going on at some table, and the server is running from table to table.

Silence does not even dare enter such places during rush hours, and this is no place to read a book. But I opened the Medium app and began scrolling through my feed to check what beautiful stories my favorite authors have weaved.

I scroll through the numerous titles and then only read the ones that appeals to me the most.

Simply put, if the headline is not screaming, I would not read it. If the first paragraph does not entice me enough, I would move on to another article.

---

We should not typecast readers as book readers or blog readers, and there is definitely a huge overlap between these two classes of readers — yet we cannot deny that there are very different characteristics required for each of these two widely different forms of writing. Every failed article of mine has driven me toward this conclusion.

Based upon my observations and analysis of my own articles, sharing below 6 key differences which every Medium writer should know!

I. A book reader is more committed than a blog reader.

When I buy a book, I have already paid $9.99 and am committed to reading it. I will allow the author to set the scene, very vividly explain all the details, and even have an intriguing subplot. Even if nothing important happens for 10 pages, I will still remain committed to reading the book.

But as a blog reader, when my feed itself has fifty articles, if the author does not engage me in the very first paragraph — I will skip the article and go to the next one.

I have not paid any money exclusively to read this particular article, and hence even if I skip this — I do not have any sense of guilt. But not reading a book, after having bought it yourself, often comes with guilt.

II. You cannot create your own characters in your blogs!

I cannot stress this enough, because I have suffered enormously when not paying heed to this. When we are reading a novel, a good author will provide us with sufficient details to help us connect with the character.

Did we all not cry when ‘Dobby’ dies in the Harry Potter series? This is because we all knew him so well!

In a blog article of 4–6 minutes, we cannot even dare to create our own characters and let readers fall in love with them. And this is also one of the reasons, why fiction stories might not do as well as other forms of writing on Medium.

But there is a trick I use to overcome this challenge, which I have learned after many failed articles, and I am sharing it for free 😃!

Whenever your story demands a character, either make yourself the character of the story or use a generic character such as a soldier, an old man, a silent monk, etc.

When we use generic characters, the readers automatically create an image of someone they know and relate to it. This makes it easy for the author to progress the story, and share the message.

Here is a link to a series of my articles based upon the theme — “When God comes to my dream, and I ask Him stupid questions”. Throughout this series, I have used generic characters even without naming them!

https://medium.com/@thesilentmonk/list/2f5c7041022c

III. The headline should scream for attention!

Even if your article is chosen as a “Staff Pick”, it still has to compete with 25 other articles to be read by a reader!

Imagine you have done everything right about an article — it has a great message, solves a critical problem, or has all the elements to make people laugh. But you made one mistake — you titled it “The Bag”! 
The outcome is that no one even opened your article, and all your messages, laughs, and problem-solving skills never got communicated to the readers.

Many times, I have written a very good article, but lost the way just because I did not pay special attention to the title!

Of 1500 words in your article, the 10 words in the title are the most important. With a book, the title is not everything. In fact, we often love books where the title does not intrigue us at all! I wonder if a blog titled “1984” will do well on Medium.

IV. The first paragraph should create the hook!

I never liked the word “hook”, but am hearing it a lot these days when trying to improve my Twitter writing and LinkedIn writing. Literally, everyone talks about “creating a hook”!

What this essentially means is that you have to create that curiosity, excitement or need within the readers’ minds, to make them go through your post or article. And this has to be created within the very first paragraph!!!

I wrote a few stories that I spent way too much time detailing in the first few paragraphs. The outcome — the readers never even reached the bottom of the article, and no one ever got to know what the actual message in the story was! No wonder this article had the lowest read ratio!

When reading a book, because we are more patient with the author, a hook is not necessary and we often love how the author gradually develops the story — chapter by chapter.

V. Blogging is community-based, while a book is not.

When writing a blog, one of the critical success elements is how much engagement that article would garner. Will the readers be prompted enough to comment or share their opinion about the article? If a user engages with an article, it is likely to be a hit.

And we are not even accounting for the fact that a higher engagement article would likely be picked up by the Medium algorithm for circulation!

With a book, it is usually a one-way communication. But an ideal blog post should be designed for higher reader engagement.

Besides, social media also plays a major part in the success of a blog. A lot of my views come from Twitter when my fellow writers share my articles on their Twitter feeds!

VI. If an article is loud, you will get more readers.

A blog can be loud and successful because often people read it when they are doing many other things like commuting, sitting in a coffee shop, etc. Hence, a loud article will only help you to gain more attention from the reader. No point in guessing that strong criticism and rants on blogging platforms are so popular!

But with a book, if the rant is going on forever, we would just conclude that the book is too loud and negative!

---

Reading a novel is like going to a five-star hotel and ordering a seven-course meal. We fully immerse ourselves in the experience and savor every flavor of it.

Reading a blog is like grabbing your favorite street food which you keep on munching while talking to your friends, or while on your way to the office! It may not have our undivided attention, yet it forms an integral part of our daily lives!

---

When I started writing on Medium, a lot of my articles failed just because I did not know these basic characteristics of a blog reader. After many failed articles, I am still learning and am beginning to understand that blogging in itself is a very niche writing style, and has its own subtle characteristics.

Even if JK Rowling has to publish Harry Potter as a blog series, she would have to change her writing style significantly to make it a success. Although as a Harry Potter fan, I am glad she is not doing that 😃!

---

I have realized that the difference between a great article and a failed article is often that one small detail that we miss!

Along similar lines, I shall also be publishing a series, “How I ruined my Medium articles?” wherein I will share examples and statistics that how I did everything right but made that one tiny little mistake that led to a failed article 😧!

As a pretty new writer on this platform, I am learning with each and every mistake that I make, and would love to share so that you don’t have to face the disappointment of a failed article😃!

If you like my articles, please do subscribe so that you never miss one!

P.S. Have you read this article that is resonating so much with everyone? Refer to the responses to this article from all the readers:

https://medium.com/@thesilentmonk/list/2f5c7041022c