Critical look at the state of Steemit marketing

First of all I have to say that while I'm being very critical of the way how marketing of Steemit is done, I'm also thankful that at least something has been done: Steem Park. Congratulations and good luck for @hitheryon!

The crowdsourcing protocol doesn't work

A couple of months ago @steemitblog introduced a protocol for crowdsourced marketing. But I think we should admit that it was a mistake. With it's current UI, Steemit.com isn't suitable for this.

  • Steemit posts are seen for a few hours and after that they are forgotten.
  • Steemit doesn't show old posts so users can't go and look what others have proposed. Oldest posts for #growth-ideas have been published six days ago. #growth-proposals shows only three posts. #growth-projects shows zero posts.
  • New users will be unaware of the protocol. It will be very hard for them to find it.
  • Tags can't be followed. When somebody posts under growth-tags, nobody gets a notification. For most users this means that it's practically impossible to keep track what's happening with the growth protocol.

The result: protocol is unusable for marketing efforts of Steem/Steemit.

We need a real collaboration tool

Because Steemit can't be effectively used for crowdsourced marketing, we need a better tool. Something that is designed for collaboration. My suggestion is Basecamp.

The easier collaboration is, the more we will get results. If the barrier to get shit done is too big, nothing happens. I'm in favor of removing barriers to let ideas flow and to allow frictionless cooperation with different people.

Focus should be online

To be honest, I'm not sure how effective local marketing projects can be. I understand that parks and other real world projects are nice and fun, but they reach only a handful of people compared to successful online campaigns. It's just so much easier to get viral and reach a big audience online.

Soon the Steem blockchain will reach million transactions in a day!

My current Steem marketing project is #tothemillion. We are getting very close to Steem processing million transactions in a day. Steem is already world's most used blockchain when measured in processed transactions and hitting the million will be a huge milestone. That's something we should make use of in marketing – this is a chance we get only once!

I've been wondering how to get Steemit.com involved in this. I've messaged @andrarchy in Rocket.chat, no answer so far. @zurvanic doesn't even seem to be there and I have no idea how to contact him. We need Steemit's help with this, at least a press release is required. Also a post from @steemitblog would help quite a lot to make everybody aware of this achievement when it happens.

How to reach millions of new users?

Steemit has indicated it wants to bring in millions of new users. But I'm really skeptical how fast it will happen with the way of how marketing is done today. If you guys really want to achieve that, I suggest you rethink completely the marketing strategy.

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Hay @samupaha,

I think the active people are getting tired to propose new changes. I feel like I am writing this for the fifth time, but it is still valid: From my point of view the Steem Devs seem to focus on the blockchain itself, which is fine actually, because due to that we are operating on great and stable blockchain technology. The sideeffect is that since I've joined steemit.com, no real update to the UI has been deployed.

What is steemit?

Is it a free portal for poeple who want to create a blog? Not really as we do not have a blogging interface. Is it a place where I can upload my photos? Not really, because I have no interface that simply shows all Images someone has posted. Is it a social media site? Not really, because some well known features are missing (scroll through posts easily, step through pics, private messages, .. ).

Instead of working on those topics which have been requested multiple times, one of the last steemitblog posts contained something about a new mobile app. We do not need a mobile app! We have one! It is called eSteem by @good-karma and is really really good! What we do not have a is a website with features expected by most of the users.

We currently have more than 200.000 registered accounts, but only a small part of that is active. So we are growing pretty good, but we loose the new people really fast and can't keep them here :( Ffrom my point of view one of the reasons are the missing features described above.

Thanks for reading and best regards,

@dez1337

Just a small disclaimer: I do not want to offend any one and I know that the Steem Devs are doing a fantastic job. I just think that it would be a good time to think again about the focus of the development.

From my point of view the Steem Devs seem to focus on the blockchain itself, which is fine actually, because due to that we are operating on great and stable blockchain technology. The sideeffect is that since I've joined steemit.com, no real update to the UI has been deployed.

Somebody has to take care of the backend development, so it's great that they are doing it. But the problem is that when Steemit is also responsible to maintain the most used UI, the development of user experience is lacking.

I've started to think that maybe Steemit.com should outsource the UI development. It would be quite logical because they have money but no time or other resources.

What is steemit?

Your observations are the same I've been doing. Not only there is lack of clarity for "what we actually are", there is the growing problem of signal-to-noise ratio getting worse because of too much users. No wonder people are not participating on the site because the user experience is so bad.

I just think that it would be a good time to think again about the focus of the development.

Yeah, this is spot on. There is no clear goal. It seems that Steemit Inc is just busy doing one thing today and next thing tomorrow, but nothing really useful gets done. If there is no goal or long-term vision, there is focus.

I've started to think that maybe Steemit.com should outsource the UI development. It would be quite logical because they have money but no time or other resources.

I think that this will happen inadvertently when Steemit itself does not start to do something. You just need to have a look at the great succes of chainBB.

I agree, this is not the time to sit back and relax. Some sort of "official" help will greatly improve the chances for Steemit to grow and succeed as a platform.

@samupaha

Thank you for the post. I appreciate the efforts you are making on behalf of the community.

This is not directly relevant to your post, but I really appreciated the discussion you participated in here over a year ago, which I only just stumbled upon:

https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,22957.45.html

I found that thread while doing some research on the HERO project and it was...illuminating. I can tell from your posts on page 4 you have at least a solid understanding of the importance of, let's call them "appearances", in marketing.

I found it very concerning that a key figure connected to a variety of projects we now are all partially invested in chose to respond to all legitimate concerns with a hand-wave, smiley face, and a disclaimer signature. Nevertheless, I consider that knowledge very important to have.

Thank you again and please keep up the good work. It's clear you are here for the long haul.

Thanks for the nice words!

Yeah, it's a pity that so much of the blockchain world is attracted to all kinds of bad ways of doing business, including marketing efforts. Too few honest people.

The website itself has a looooong way to go before it can get millions of users. There are a tonne of basic features missing (such as community pages like subreddits).

This relates to what I mean about completely rethinking the marketing strategy. When it comes to marketing, usually people think it's mostly just advertising, but in reality it's everything that the business does. All interactions between the firm (or in this case, the blockchain and it's UIs) and the users will create and maintain the brand. And the brand is a big part for marketing.

I'm all for basecamp as the main collaboration tool. Hopefully Steem Inc is watching this to take on board.

Not to mention growing the platform will be difficult when people are having a near impossible time signing up in the first place...

Yep, another of my "favourites" to complain about.

Sound good !! I'm sure steem keeping growing very fast. I met a lot of new user already. They're from difference countries. Thanks for sharing. upvoted @chanthasam

totally agree with the online bit, the internet is only awesome because of its ability to vastly reduce distances between ideas, people and content.

Awesome
followed , upvoted

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