Yesterday marks the 7th day, since I officially launched @Bitopia, posting my first blog post "A Leap of Faith" on this account and going all-in and giving my full-time effort to creating content on Steemit.

I would definitely recommend anyone who hasn't read "A Leap of Faith" to give it a read:

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What was done and how much was earned

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Since that time, I have learned a tremendous amount, engaging with other Steemians, participating as much as I can, as well as publishing as much quality content as I can. Since launching 7 days ago, I have published, 6 posts on this account, and 8 posts on @Bitopia. Here are the posts and their earnings.

In total, I earned $78.39, before the deduction for curators.

@Ansonoxy earned : $70.53 from 6 posts
@Bitopia earned : $7.14 from 8 posts

The majority of the earnings came from 1 post, "Painful Beginnings", earning me $66.20 had 1 comment, which all came at once, leading me to feel like the post got picked up by a curation bot.

Nonetheless, I am very grateful for that huge boost, for that 1 post account for more than 75% of this week's earnings. If not for that, I would imagine I'd be pretty much ready to tear my hair out.

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What I've Learned In These 7 Days

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Here are some of the very important lessons I learned about Steemit these past 7 days :

Posts with a personal tone performed the best

The highest earning post, "Painful Beginnings", was by far the most personal human possible, talking about my painful past, suffering from addiction and depression.

For @Bitopia, the 2 highest earning posts were ones I posted on day 7, which I adopted a more personal tone to the style of reporting as compared to my earlier posts which were more matter-of-factly.

As such, I would say that being personal and human definitely plays a integral role in the Steemit community, and as my partner said to me when I made that point to her, yes, the word social is part of "social media" no? She has a point.

Majority of the earnings and views happen in the first 24 hours

From my observation of the statistics, it seems like, for every post made, 90% of the time, after the first 24 hours after posting, there is complete radio silence on those posts from then on..

This may just be my experience thus far, and may not be a fair assessment as of yet, but even with the post "Painful Beginnings", all of the upvotes and the 1 comment happened within the first 24 hours. In the 6 days after, it received 2 additional upvotes then complete silence.

I should have utilized @minnowbooster upvotes instead of leasing SP

This is my speculation, for what would have been a better choice for my launching of Steemit. Before launching on Steemit, I leased 1000 SP from @minnowbooster as a means of giving myself a more powerful self-vote in hopes of reaching more people straight from the get-go.

What I now realize, that it would have made more sense to have used @minnobooster upvotes instead of leasing SP, for my intention was to get more reach, and I would have got a way more significant boost in views had I used the upvote instead of leasing SP.

However, the flip side to that, would be that when I left comments on other Steemian's posts, my self-vote of $0.10 at full power would immediately shoot my comment above the fold and usually in the top 5 comments, which I did earn a few dollars from comment upvotes, the highest being $0.70.

Also, I have joined the @curie streemian trail, which will inevitably bring in much higher curation rewards.

Nonetheless, my main intention was and still is as primarily a publisher, to gain more reach of my posts especially at the crucial point of the start.

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Moving Forward

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To be honest, $78, before deducting curation earnings and the 50% earnings which go to SP which takes quite awhile to power if I intended to, is simply not close to sufficient for what I need to survive.

My funds are running quite low, and based on my estimation, I have about 2-3 weeks before I run completely out of money.

I was hoping that my impact and earnings here during my first 7 days would have been higher than $78. It is even a rather scary thought, had I not earned that much from "Painful Beginnings".

To say that I haven't had moments across the last 7 days where I really felt like shit isn't working out and I feel absolutely terrible about the situation would be a lie. What is the most frustrating moment for me this week, would have been with the post "Singapore is Shaping Up To Become an ICO Hub", which I really poured alot of effort into which earned just $0.05.

NONETHELESS

This is a decision that I and I alone made. This is a decision that I and I alone am responsible for. Who even decides to make a decision and take such a massive risk like this? I will remain solely resposible for my actions and take full ownership of it.

The honest truth is, I love where I am, I love being with my partner, I love how much effort and productivity I have been putting in and most of all, the feeling of uncertainty is both excruciating yet absolutely the most alive I have ever felt.

The good news is, there is still time, and much more effort can be put in to ramp up my earnings. I am now doubly as fired up, about seeing success here on Steemit and going home with success like I said in "A Leap of Faith"

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The plan moving forward

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A change in strategy is definitely due. My desire is to bring as much value in each and every post as much as I can possibly bring. Which I definitely feel I did last week.

It may not seem like it, but my opnion on the matter is not to blame Steemit for not acknowledging or rewarding my hard work. For a multitude of reasons, that has to be the worst mindset I could have. Rather, aside from the fact that I am basically a completely new Steemian with 0 connections and 0 exposure on the platform has definitely a big part to play. Not to mention that curation is not exactly the easiest of tasks for anyone.

There is a massive amount of great content being pumped out by well-established users on Steemit, it really isn't even a huge surprise that some good stuff will fall through the cracks, much less from a complete unknown user on the platform.

What this means for me, is simply that I have to adjust to the situation. I have to change up my content strategy and try new means and formats that would better serve me as a minnow with no exposure. Of which, a plan I do have in place.

It would mean that I would rather focus for the time being, on creating shorter form content and posting on a more rapid pace. For now, with the lack of exposure, creating longer form pieces of content, regardless of whether it holds value and is well-though and produced, simply does not get the reach.

On the other hand, I am looking towards the acquisition of short-term investments from my personal peers with by guaranteeing returns, which I will then use for the further investment into Steemit.

The earnings I have acquired from the past week, will also be re-invested towards utilizing @minnowbooster to get the critical boost of upvote value which will capture more views to my content.

My affirmation is that in 7 days, when I write my following blog post, it will be one that will be way more positive. I am still very confident in my work and will continue to strive, with even more resolve, to achieve success.

Till next week, God Speed Brethren.

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