FAQ: how did get into the paid program for site x or y?

I've been getting this question a lot on discord so I thought I should make a dedicated post to it as the answer is not as simple as people may think.

1.   My first paid program story is called Dead End Florals and it has been a long time since that experience.  I got that offer when Tapas Media was just starting their novel platform so technically if we use YouTube jargon, I was an 'early adopter.'  This means I was one of the first people to post quality writing content.  Not that I am really quality as I was horrible at maintaining a consistent upload schedule.  But I did get the attention of staff and I appeared in staff recommended twice on the front page of the site.  It was cool while it lasted and I got around 8 thousand views in a short amount of time, which for that site is a lot of views and I got around 1000 readers.  A metric that is really important for a company to decide whether you're worth signing is a readers to subscribers rate and this number should be as low as possible as that means that a lot of people are staying around after reading your writing.
2. For other sites, it was mainly this ratio as well as writing towards the audience of the site itself.  I would find a niche and also make friends with the community in that niche.  Next I would ask about tropes and what are things that work for trying to rise in the niche and get noticed by readers.  I made a giant spreadsheet of all the recommendations given by colleagues and friends, then I moved onto making my own take on those recommendations.  I crafted a marketable story for the site, that I then posted as regularly as I could.
3. For Goodnovel, I had an editor approach me on Instagram and I knew several author friends who said it was a good company and that I should work there.  Therefore I was open to what was being offered to me and I had some of my best experiences at that company.