A Little Advice From a Little Fish to a Little Fish
I've been a member of Steemit since August of 2017, and I didn't start posting until last month. I certainly don't know all the ins and outs, but there are a few things I have experienced that I would like to share with anyone who may be first starting out.
On following:
When I was new, I was eager to make connections. I followed whoever followed me, whoever upvoted me, and whoever commented on anything. Well not really everyone, but I suggest you don't do this. Following people indiscriminately will fill up your news feed with content that you don't care about. You will end up impatiently scrolling down hoping to see something that sparks your interest. Instead, check out the other person's blog first and ask yourself: Is this interesting? Is this someone or something I care about? Is there the potential for great content in the future? Then make your decision. As a result of following pretty much everyone I came in contact with, I now have to go back and look through many people's blogs and do a little purge. Granted, alot of the hollow posts on my feed are from resteembots, and I'll get to that next.
On resteem services:
So you've spent some time on your content. You poured your heart and soul into it and edited it to perfection. You have chosen or created eye catching images and when you're finished, it's your baby!! You're excited to share it, and you want others to be excited too!! Then you post it...one hour goes by... two hours go by...three hours go by and you've only got a handful of votes, views, and responses. Well, of course nobody knows who you are yet! You may be tempted to use a resteeming service to get more exposure on your post. You pay them and they resteem to their followers, and you usually have to follow them too... I've tried @minnowpond, @steembot, @funadda, and several others. When I resteemed this post https://steemit.com/family/@snowpea/wedding-day to @minnowpond, there were actually people on the other end commenting on my post and upvoting!! Not really with the other services. You may have a different result trying others but I'll warn you, you'll probably just waste your funds and even @minnowpond will not be necessarily worth it. I am unfollowing the other resteeming services soon, as they fill my feed up with junk. The exception of course is minnowpond and maybe resteembot. ;)
On commenting:
Always reply to other people's comments on your post. They've spent time looking at it and they want to communicate with you!! Comment on other people's posts too, but don't force it. Comment on the things that resonate with you and if you don't know what to say think on it a little. At first you'll be interacting with strangers and it might take time to find your footing if all you know is Facebook. This is much better than Facebook in many ways. I've been told sometimes it takes time to find your place, your niche, your people, and to build your following. Don't give up!! I am a little fish too, and we're in this together!
Much love, Snowpea 🙂😘❤
COMMENTS WELCOME!
If you've learned anything or have any advice you would like to give to a minnow, please share!
That's an awesome advice little fish.
Thanks!! :)
That's an awesome advice little fish.
This is great advice! I’m glad you commented on my introduction to give me the opportunity to read this one of yours!
You're very welcome!! :)
Yes, I experienced the same thing. I also may need to do a purge to get to better content
Yes strolling down your timeline is where you want to find things that interest you. There is a mute button but I have not used it yet.
One thing I've learned is to be quite shrewd about which comments I interact with. The sad reality is that there are also bots set up to post random or triggered comments...just to collect followers and upvote Steem. And there are people who exclusively generate Steem by commenting and upvoting...without ever actually reading or engaging.
Yes, thank you for bringing that up. There are bots and people who don't read your content and I think I have to be more careful of this... it's obvious when the comment doesn't make sense like the time I posted something serious and one of the responses was, "Haha, good one. Follow me and I'll follow you." Just ignore.
What an ignorant person or programmed bot response!
Appreciate the advice. I joined steemit a couple of weeks ago and have written a few posts and I had the same sentiment.
I poured my heart out and yet no one noticed my content.
In marketing they always say that content is long but no matter how good or bad you are if no one knows you or see its content then it is useless.
Then I see some post of just a selfie getting so much votes and comments of how pretty or handsome some is and you have your post not getting any traction and you feel bad.
I know we should not compare but I have to be honest it felt bad.
So I left the notion of needing upvotes and decided that I should be writing for myself and if someone upvotes then that is just the cherry on top.
I am now following people and commenting on posts that I like. I am making an organic connection and hopefully building a relationship.
I like the community so far as I have been inspired by some great writers who wrote from their hearts.
I despite some people on the other hand that just post and want to make a quick buck. There was this group that was posting like crazy and was critizing whales and who they vote for and get jealous when they see other people earn more. When I felt l was turning like them I knew I had to leave.
Thanks again for your post and keep being awesome.
I feel you. I wrote a funny take on how to get Americans to watch Soccer (A "sport" we hate ) I put hours into it, and nothing. Not even one comment. Zero, zilch, nada. Then I did a ton of research On Josephine Baker, and another on James Dean, I migh as well have yelled into the wind! lol! I was working up to posting daily, but decided to slow my pace down, and only write when i feel something strikes me.
Writing is fun. But it's odd, the only people I do hear from, all seem to come from the same country, and have Steemit sites filled with copied material from English-speaking websites. They are getting attention. Everything I write, comes from me. Period. I do feel I'm growing very slowly, but naturally.
I do many rewrites. Finding just the right image can take a good hour. And I still wanna tinker with it some more, so I have to force myself to stop and publish.
I know if we keep at it, soon we'll reach that tipping point and leave the Minnow pond for deeper waters. Hang in there, even Whales get full eventually and may share some juicy morsels with us! :)
source
I just read your piece on James Dean. Well done!! I see what you mean as not many people even viewed it. I think I'll head over to the Minnow Support Project discord. I can have them upvote my post and they share a link if I remember correctly. It may help you and some of the other people here.
Very nice of you to do that, thanks. I just looked at it now and saw I spelled Donald Turnipseed's last name wrong and linked it! lol We'll pretend we didn't see that. Selecting that picture of Dean took 20 minutes. It had to be the right one, and not a pic that had been seen too often. I feel like I gave birth with that one! :)
Of course the bot wasn't working. Here are a couple links that may help: https://discord.gg/HYj4yvw and https://steemit.com/@minnowsupport
Yes, I think I registered with them and the bot with a "b" was the one that worked.
Same here. Oh well. :)
Yes, it's just not right to see empty meaningless posts get tons of votes just because the people are popular. Other times you see someone posting junk constantly throughout the day for the pennies to add up. I don't think there's anything that can really be done to change this, aside from people like me and you coming along and leading by example by posting what our passions are and upholding the integrity of the community where we're at. Thank you for reading my post and sharing your experience of steemit thus far!! :)
Yes, this is what I have been noticing too. Thanks.
Thank you for the advice @snowpea. I had thinking myself seriously if those resteem services worth the time or not, to be honest. Some I think have some good use like the @OriginalWorks one, although I think it isn't exactly a resteem service per se. Others like "hey give me one SBD and I will resteem" I think they are pretty useless. Thank you for sharing your thoughts about it! :)
You're welcome!! I'm glad you appreciated it! :)
The @OriginalWorks bot has determined this post by @snowpea to be original material and upvoted it!
To call @OriginalWorks, simply reply to any post with @originalworks or !originalworks in your message!
awesome advice @snowpea. I started in September and, like you, I went all out to follow everyone I could find in hopes that some would follow me back, and some did.
I created (what I thought) were some awesome posts that flashed across the screen for a few minutes before new posts bumped my posts out of sight.
The posts got a few views and a few upvotes, but for the most part the responses to my posts were very disappointing, especially when compared to when I post on Facebook where the likes from Facebook friends keep coming in for hours and even days later.
Watching my results, a couple of things became obvious. My time was better spent finding people with similar interests who posted about things I'm interested in - and - replying to their post with a related comment, upvoting their post and resteeming it and following that person so as to see more posts like that going forward.
From a self-serving point of view my time has been better spent and the benefits have been greater by commenting on more of other people's posts and posting less of my own. I've gained more solid connections, and gained more compensation.
And you answered a question I posted a couple of days ago about why some of the bigger players 'unfollow' others and have only a short list of people they follow. [here's that link -https://steemit.com/follow/@watertoncafe/golden-question-why-unfollow]
Thanks for posting this, it's some very good advice for any newbie Steemers.
Thank you for reading, and for sharing your own advice and experience with Steemit so far!! You're right about Facebook...likes and comments come in for days and it can feel a bit disconcerting when you first make way over to Steemit. :)
I just read your post @watertoncafe and I'm not sure if that really did answer the question haha! I haven't ever heard of that strategy before.