STEEM - A Curse or Silver Lining?
STEEM seems quiet. I thought I was rather quiet last week until I saw @abh12345 league of excellence and noted I was ranked 24th. With only 4 posts for the week, I still hung in there.
There have been many posts referring to the downturn in crypto and the effect it is having on people lives and activity here on steem. Many people are returning to ‘work’ to finance the cost of living as STEEM no longer offers this to content creators from 1st world countries.
I too am no different. There have been many times over the last 18 months that I have said in posts and directly in chat to people how much I am letting my existing business suffer to invest my time in STEEM. And although I have a few rant posts about it, facts are I didn’t change. I stuck with STEEM.
However, in September of this year for my existing business the revenue was down 90% on the year before. This hit me massively hard and I have since been focusing more and more time trying to build it back up, time that I can no longer focus on STEEM.
Yet I have remained posting and commenting as much as time can afford. In addition to this I also run some data for others. I prepare two leagues for others on a Monday, one of which I also sponsor some prizes. I run the redfish power up league here on my own account on a Wednesday and on a Thursday, I run the Minnow Power up league for our witness account @Steemcommunity and I host a live chit chat show every Thursday morning.
I guess what I’m trying to say here is just because I’m posting less, does not mean I am not active around STEEM.
My investment in STEEM is growing. A few weeks back I purchase 2000 SP. I have paid for and enrolled in a course on Linux to become a more efficient witness. Till now we have financed our witness server not from witness rewards, but other funds so we can grow and power up more. My investments are a combination of fiat and time. A massive amount of time.
Personally, I don’t think things are going to get much better in terms of pricing for a while, and I would not be surprised if the downturn is not over and I need to decide on how I most effectively use my time.
We all need to eat, and if STEEM does not pay, something must. I can no longer afford the time to carry out extensive time-consuming data posts when I can earn a day’s wage doing something else. That feels shit, but it is what it is.
The Silver Lining
STEEM has developed so much, things are a lot different to when I first joined. When I came here first, I wanted to blog about Excel and Power BI, that’s what I do off STEEM, that’s where I make my money. But there was no audience interested in my content and STEEM was not a platform I was willing to tell my existing followers about. It was (and still is) over complicated, and the only UI at the time was Steemit.com. The expectations gap between what people expected to earn and what really happened was way too much and there was no way I was going to lead my followers to believe it would be good for them to follow me to STEEM.
With the advancements made on STEEM there is now a silver lining. I don’t have to bring people to Steemit. I can keep people on my blog and at the same time give them a taste of the STEEM experience and I can use my blog to post to STEEM. This has all been made possible with @steempress and its time I made things happen.
In addition to being able to keep people on my non steem blog, there is also the opportunities this downturn in pricing has. Right now, €10,000 would get me over 28K SP. Okay so I do not have this to invest right now, but if I really focus my time rebuilding my brand, I could have half of it early in the new year. I personally don’t think that will be to late. Curse me if you want, but I’m hoping the price goes down a little more. I think this will be a solid investment for my business to make, if the cash flow allows.
So, my plan is to become less active on this account and focus more of my time on @theexcelclub.com. I have gained a lot of traction on this account and I won’t be abandoning it all together. I will still be doing the set workload I mentioned above, although some of that is for others and does not generate a post from me. But remember I am still active, I am still here. My posts are making feck all on this account, what does it matter if its feck all on another account instead.
Obviously, I would love your support, but Excel and Power BI are not really the topics this account is interested in (but you could put @theexcelclub on autovote). I did try and make a move with my business when we had Dlive, but we all know what happened there and there is no point in dwelling.
@steempress-io on the other had has no control over my content, if they go, my blog stays. This is very important, relying on third parties to hold your content (and earnings) is control I want to give to no one. I’m not leaving my self at the hands of someone else’s decisions.
Business being business I can even set myself some targets. I wont be down any real steem revenue because my posts are not earning anyway. So, my steem targets are based on converting users to signing up, so they can leave comments on my blog using steem. I can do this while I focus on growing my course sales again and non steem earning. Yep, food on the table!
My current subscribers list is 51K, my target is to convert 5% into steem users that are actively engaged and commenting on my blog via steem. That’s only 2.5K people, not much really, but it’s a start.
I’m also not to concerned about onboarding. I have a free published training course hosted on Udemy and YouTube around the basics of the STEEM ecosystem, so I already have resource in place to help train those interested in learning more.
Exciting times ahead. There are times when I do curse steem for whats happened with my existing business. But my curse is not really at steem, but myself! I’m really looking forward to making this move. I really looking forward to getting back to what I am good at, my existing brand. I’m really looking forward to growing my business and having the ability to use and be active on steem at the same time. And if prices stay low, or even drop further, I’m really looking forward in making a business investment with The Excel Club and STEEM.
Shameless Promotion
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Good post!
I think that, for most people, it is rather unrealistic to suppose you can support yourself financially on the steemit platform. It is more sensible to treat it like a place where you can blog for free and sometimes even make a little bit of money.
The things is, I never tried to 'live' off steem financial, but I did let the amount of time I spend here effect my existing business and earnings. For me STEEM is still a fantastic investment, but I dont have the time to invest like I did unless I combine it with my business.
I have to admit, when I first started reading, i was worried you were going to walk away from the platform. I have actually been following your posts for a while and have learned so much. I am relieved that you are staying and you have decided to do what you can to power up, even if that means spending a little less time. We are crossing our fingers for you and i'm sharing your website with many others.
Good luck
Ren
Hey @paulag, seems that we have almost the same posts about being away sometime from steemit. Yeah, I agree with you that it doesn't we are not active for being absent in posting. Especially you that has more activities here in steemit. I couldn't say you're leaving steemit. You already have laid a lot in your plate here. And I am guilty that Steemit is really addictive that I almost forgot my role with my 9-5 job. And like you, and everyone else, we are still active here in steemit but just needs to manage other matters too that we can't leave behind.
Let's be here to stay.
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Im NOT leaving steem for sure, Im just changing focus. hopefully this way I can have my cake and eat it.
Don't forget the wine.🍷
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I spoke about this in my scheduled post for this evening. The steem blockchain is more than a blogging site now. We do so much more that doesn't appear on the timeline.
Well I wish you good luck and hope you succeed in this venture of yours.
steem is way more than a blogging site and we dont need to be present on steemit to be active.
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All understandable! My view is that it doesn’t necessarily we need the time if the value you provid is great which I know it is so please know you have my support as I know you will continue to add value to the ecosystem with your engagement and contributions.
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thank you for your support, Im rather excited to make these changes. On ways and upwards
I told myself this hard truth many months ago when 'life happened' to me that there was life before steem and there would be life after. So, nowadays, I focus more on life off steem blockchain than on the block chain. Meanwhile, there is no plan to 'power down' soon until the value appreciates to a reasonable level. Wishing you good luck in your day job.
@maryfavour.
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oh in a perfect world I wont be powering down for 3-5 years, and if the prices stay right, I will be investing more but via @theexcelclub and to promote my brand and business
"...if the prices stay right, I will be investing more but via @theexcelclub and to promote my brand and business"
This is a good step in the right direction, @paulag. My business (a limited liability company, LLC which will be mainly into medical supplies) is in the process of being formally registered with Corporate Affairs Commission. My steem power would be used to promote that business same like you are doing to @theexcelclub. It might not be wise to inject more fiat, since I bought lots of steem that way from the beginning. I should take a cue from you to use steempress to publish instead. Hopefully, the skills to do that would be acquired soon.
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steempress is not hard to use. If you have any questions you can always ask me and they have a great discord channel.
The important thing for people onboarding at the moment, I think is not to be bombarded by posts exclusively about STEEM. We have so many writers and content producers capable of so much more.
Those that continue to persist during this perceived drought will continue to gain traction.
so now is the opportunity to gain the traction that I really want. I think most of my followers are consumers of content and not creators so thats a big plus. Exciting times ahead
Well, it does sound as though there are a few nuggets in the silver lining! I understand what excel is but not power bi. What is that? Best wishes to everyone in Steemland! I get the sense that SMT's are really going to stir-up and change the platform a lot when they roll out.
All the best to you @paulag! And, great work! Having such a huge following with such awesome accomplishments in terms of the courses you've put together and the training you are doing. It's a a powerful combo. You speak of it modestly but i want to acknowledge your awesome accomplishments! 💗
aweeeeeeeeee thank you so much @yogajill 💗
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