Red Fish, Blue Fish. Dead Fish, Whale Fish.

In my post My Favorite Steemit Apps : Steemit Board I pointed out that different badges that you could receive as you worked your way through the big Steemit pond and grew from a minnow to a whale. Well, the first thing a minnow needs to do, is become a minnow.

When you start out, before you can become a Minnow you need to have some Steem. If you don't have any Steem, then the icon you see is a bone fish. You are less than a minnow, you aren't even a tasty morsel to a minnow, you have no meat on your bones.

It takes 7 days before you get the first Steem or Steem Backed Dollars that were given to you via a voteup. So, don't worry, you will be on your way to becoming a minnow. But, you have to keep on making those posts and comments to attract those who will give you upvotes in order for you to earn Steem.

Recently, someone who just joined put a goal of 1 post and 5 comments per day in order to reach 200 followers in a month. The reasoning is, they saw some $1,000+ posts and noticed that the author was only putting out one every day or maybe every other day. If it was that simple, then why try too hard to have success? Well, it isn't that simple. When you see those $1000+ posts, there are two possibilities.

1. The author has worked for the last year gaining a following by posting interesting and unique content
2. The author got lucky with the perfect post that created a lot of buzz

With option 2, you need to check the rest of the author's performance. Sure, you caught them when they had just posted a $1,000+ post, but what did they make on the previous posts? What are they making on the posts that followed.

I had one post that received $100+ soon after I started. I was excited to see it on my blog timeline. Wow!! $100 in one post, I am on my way. But, all was not as it seemed. That $100 came from one upvote and that upvote of $100 even surprised the person giving it. This happened on the day of the Hard Fork 19 (HF19). After settling down to reality, I realized that I would not be earning $100 per post immediately. In fact, my posts that followed didn't earn nearly that amount, some didn't earn $0.01.

So, before you have dreams of grandeur of making a living off of Steem, make sure you plant yourself in reality as to what is really needed to succeed. You might be a bone fish right now, but soon you will be a red fish.

Keep working at it and you will make your way to become a dolphin and then one day a whale.

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Let the positive energy sing!

More Power to the Minnows!!