Hey! I'm also writing an article about that, it's true that a lot of the Steemit post and comments or just desperately begging for follows, upvotes and resteems, it would be better if we all just have fun on Steemit and also your suggestions sound very good:
"Be original
Fill a niche
Write from your own words, you don't need to be Shakespeare
Help others
Enjoy what you do"
So I agree with you that those things work better than begging.