I have been on Steemit for about a grand total of two weeks, so keep in mind that my opinion may be worthless...HOWEVER, I do know a little something about growing something for scratch.
I believe growth is the key need here. Whatever whale may or may not take notice of what we are trying to do, or whatever economic jerryrigging may help, for sure. But growth is what it needs.
SO, we have to grow, and grow the whole pie. Every person who is making creative content has to grow their audience so that their re-posts and tags matter more.
Any social media platform I've been on so far, that means interaction and seeking people out. If we are all, often, looking through posts hashtagged comedy, or comics, or funny, or comedians, and finding new people interested in it and interacting/bringing them on board, this will count for considerable growth. This isn't the easiest platform for new people to find like minded users, we'll need to go find them.
Also, it may be time to start dragging new people onto this platform from the old ones ( instagram, FB, youtube, ect). Maybe even a timed attempt at this, like we pick a day next week and all on that day start posting about Steemit and bringing them here. A crowd attracts a crowd. Steemit is a small lake right now, we need to find every fish here that would be interested AND grow the lake (...you can't really grow a lake, it's a bad analogy but you get the point). If we all grow, everything we do for this will grow as well. The money will come, and there's better chance for the whales to take notice. That's my thoughts.