Minnows & Newbies: You're No Less Important To The Steemit Community
The Power Of Your Voice
I've read or watched tons of posts that were not considered popular or set to make a ton of money but I still came away being positively impacted by them. Obviously we want people to hear what we have to say and obviously we also would love to be compensated for the work we do. So I totally get people's frustrations over not being able to gain traction Steemit.
At this point you may feel like your voice is not important. You may feel like you don't have enough Steem Power to make a difference. You may feel like giving up on Steemit all together. Well the reason why I made this post was to encourage you to reconsider those thoughts.
Reasons for using your voice, voting, and staying involved in the Steemit community:
- You may literally change someone's life by the words you speak. Remember that life and death are in the power of the tongue
- Even if you have very little Steem Power your vote can still motivate someone to continue producing content
- People will respect you for being yourself and having the willingness to provide something helpful to the community
- You can be a part of projects that are springing up all across Steemit
- You can meet so many people from all over the world
- You have the possibility of getting paid for what you have to say
- You may be sitting on a gold mine of knowledge & wisdom that other's can glean from.
Wrap Up
We all have something to give regardless of what it is. Find a way to give what you have and enjoy doing it.Steemit is not just about the top authors or those with the most influence although those things are rewarded the most. Most of us are just trying to build a healthy and mutually benefiting environment here. So please understand that what you have to bring to this platform is important too even if you go unnoticed in the process. If you can help at least one person, which you WILL be able to do, then you have made some kind of impact. Peace.
Are you a newbie or minnow?
What has been the most frustrating thing about being on Steemit?
What has been the most exciting thing about being on Steemit?
False Promises?
I've been told many times to "just keep at it. Your efforts will pay off in time" by people whose efforts have been rewarded over time but I never really know if it's true. It's kind of like Amway, or most any Multi-Level-Marketing where you learn about the ones fulfilling all their financial dreams and you are told, "Just keep at it. This will be you." But that's all based on personal anecdote, not statistics. For every one who does quite well there's probably one hundred who work and work and work for a long time and get nowhere, and the whales are banking on all that effort based on a false promise. Is it the same with Steemit? Not knowing for sure whether all this effort actually will pan out is frustrating. And if it does work out, is it only because the value of Steem has risen exponentially? Would it be a better use of my time to deliver pizza and buy SteemPower with that money instead of trying to earn it through posting in these early months on the platform and save my content for later on? There just isn't as much information as I'd like to see to base these decisions on and that's frustrating for me.
Bots In The Recipe
I appreciate your encouragement as I know it's possible to have a major impact while only getting a handful of eyes on it. My off-chain blog gets a hundred page views a day and I have no idea who they are or what they are getting out of it except for the very few that comment but at least I know it's probably going to people who are actually interested in what I have to say since most of them come to my blog as a result of doing a Google search. But if I were getting 100 views a day on Steemit it would seem like most of them are there just to be a part of this big game we play trying to eke something out of this system and if I do get a bunch of upvotes that translates into a decent payout is it because people actually benefited from the content or is it because I got lucky and got hit by one of those bots? The whole bot thing I find frustrating because it seems like they work against actual content curation.
Both very valid points. I always appreciate what you have to say. Hard work is just only one of the factors that goes into someone doing well on Steemit. It's no different than an actor who spends 15 years at their craft and never getting in a blockbuster film but someone who has never been in a film before lands a blockbuster role. Much more than hard work is at play.
The bots are heavily abused. I've seen this. Some try to get around making their content better so they just pay to have themselves in the trending sections. This is a problem. I'm not sure what can be done to alleviate bot abuse.
Election of Witnesses that pledge to do something about it. Tough row to hoe.
Brother you are very inspiring and you talk about a topic that concerns many minnows-newbies.
There were several times in the past that i was thinking to quit Steemit.
And the reason is obvious. You can’t get attention.
And you know why? Because everyone is too damn busy to promote their stuff to make money
That’s the truth. If it wasn’t for the money it would have been a whole different story.
I don’t pretend to be a saint. I want financial growth as much as everyone here. But lets be honest. No whale not even a”dolphin” as they say here won’t visit me and thousands others. Big votes,those that make difference come ang go to the same people every day. In every post.
They say have good content and you’ ll be rewarded. I agree. We must have good content. But how on earth someone knows if i have good content if he won’t open my article?
Anyway...I don’t want to discourage anyone.
Just some thoughts i make lately
Was once like you bro . I almost quit steemit too but come to think of it, it's not like when I quit steemit, I have something better Doing with my time. The problem might not be getting upvotes at all, but getting enough upvotes. But I got to realise that with time things change. As I started engaging in comments , I got to know great people like humanearl and it's been fun. Sometimes I even forget about the upvotes and just do what I love doing for fun.
It's all good.I understand completely. I honestly don't like the setup either. The attention economy as a whole is frustrating. I do my best to give back. This is why I upvote comments all the time and also push The Art of Reciprocity. I am only one person but I will do my best to make a difference.
Thanks for speaking your mind on this.
All newcomers go through the same development process. Some develop quickly, and some develop slowly. It all depends on the efforts that you make. But it is also important to have a clear goal of what you want to achieve at Steemit. Having a goal you decide on the theme of your blog and then you will have followers.
But the most important point is to communicate with other users. The best way is to find people who do things that you like.
Steemit is a growing family where you always develop. Being part of this family means helping others to become better and doing the same. For any newcomer - writing comments is the main task. It is thanks to the comments you can show yourself. It is thanks to the comments that any newcomer will have followers. But the comments should be constructive.
The most unpleasant thing that can be for everyone is to create interesting content but in return not to receive anything. That is, you spend a lot of time and energy on creating a quality message, and as a result, no one reads or comments on it. This is what many newcomers see. In this case, you need to look for exits and be socially active. Steemit is constantly growing and changing which means a chance to get what you are looking for is always there.
Thank you @humanearl. Good advice for beginners.
I agree so much with the comment idea. It is the fastest way to get people's attention and you can also earn a little at the same time.
Really strong words right there, one single word might be the difference between life and death
Hard work, success and dedication can make wonders to anyone's steemit career, i look to steemit as a game, right now i'm leveling up my character by powering up steem, the more time i power up, the more powerfull i can be and get, yes i might not be one of the early adopters of this platform but i'm still not to late, my account is just 1 month old, still i've done a lot of hard work and grind, i networked with many people, i had 1 discord server now i got about 15, and i need to spend time in all of them to network and make friends.
The first thing i learned on steemit is this, and it's the most important thing to learn on steemit: " your minnow friends of today might very well be your whale friends of tomorrow", i think i don't need to explain anyone what this phrase means
Steem is not worth much now but hopefully with time it will do really well and 1 steem could be worth over $100 2 years from now.
Let's just hope you are right! When that happens costa rica here i come, let's build a steemit only neighbourhood
Yea when i try to get people into steemit, I always tell them that steemit iant all about posting writups . I tell them that steemit is for everybody. Just bring what you got to the table and try to make it better than others.
Steemit is for musicians, actors, writers, poets, photographers name it . So there must be something you can do. Bring it on and don't be shy about it.
I also tell them not to get carried away by the trending page. Most of those guys invested on the platform and so use voting bits to get their posts to the trending page and not like many of them fit real upvotes from people to get there.
Bro that's what I say too. People get discouraged because they feel like they have to post writeups. But there's so much more to offer.
It's my 3 month anniversary on Steemit tomorrow @humanearl and I would say the most frustrating this so far has been watching people, who joined about the same time, get much further by buying delegations, using bots and self-voting. It's hard to stomach when they do much less "work"
The best thing has been all the great conversations I've had and interesting people I've met. And winning a delegation of 75 SP for my efforts from @abh12345's commenting league.
Bots and self voting can be abused. I agree. I don't think they're bad in themselves but they can cause people to do like you said and not actually do the work or provide and value.
Their use seems to be gathering momentum too @humanearl. 😢 I'm feeling close to throwing in the towel again. I will at least take a step back and reassess what I'm doing here. I'm trying to focus on the positives but I'm not feeling it so much right now.
Hope your week is full of all that you love! 😊 (I need to remind myself of the importance of that too) 😊
Yeah, i was just sharing this with someone recently. I joined steemit because i was told i could earn money from it, and grow/expose my talents too. What made me less frustrated is that the person who introduced me already told me not to expect financial rewards till about three months, but keep posting quality contents.
Well, i'm two months old on the platform and i've been encouraged by the little i've earned. This made it more interesting for me.
Actually, i don't earn much per post, but i decided to take responsibility for the minds of my readers, to constantly stun them, and my target has been to wholly reach out to just one person, who would see the light after reading.
This has made me less expectant and more creative. But by all means, i do want to succeed financially here too because it's like a full time job for me. I just want to focus more on creating a long lasting bond with the community, then see the rest as huge bonuses.
I did have my unexciting moments as a minnow, like when you take hours to put together a content, then have maybe just 5 people view it, lol... But most excitingly, i love the moments of interaction in the comment section of people's posts or mine.
Well, my epic was when i had my post resteemed and subsequently referenced by you @humanearl, i felt like i had just been launched into a whole new level, and i was!
It's hard not to expect some financial rewards. It's not a bad thing though. We just have to remember that the people we reach are more important. But I know you always are thinking of those who read your posts. I think you are doing a great job and like I said before you are a great writer.
Oh, what can i say? Thank you everyday @humanearl
I’m no longer a newbie but definitely not a minnow either well according to someone’s post you have to have a ton of SP to be a minnow.
So it’s more like we are all little fish. The most frustrating thing about steemit is writing a good post and not getting a single upvote. Also, people, who follow then unfollow you it can be irritating why follow me if you were just going unfollow?
The most rewarding thing? I don’t think I ’ve experienced that yet. I would think it’s having a large following. So I wouldn’t post my best content, videos, on steemit until I have a ton of followers. I would just post really good content, not outstanding content. I hope that makes sense
Hehehe you are still a plankton. To be a minnow I think you have to have about 500sp or 1000sp. It will suprise you to know that @surpassinggoogle isn't even a whale yetbas many might think but a dolphin. Steemit is just funny ...lolzz
Now is the best time to get better and keep experimenting. I've tried to take this approach as well. Then once people find you, you will have really great stuff then because of so much practice. Plus it builds diligence.
Your definitely right I think the YouTuber Roberto Blake talks about this as well
Thank you so much for this encouraging words @humanearl....
I had always felt bad about being a minnow like I have nothing to offer.
Even my up votes are worth nothing yet...
But thanks for this encouragement... I know that with time, I'll get to that peak I want to...
Even a great comment or supporting a great project helps. You are valued.
Thank you very much sire....
The most frustrating part for me here in steemit is that I never get many votes. I don't know what is wrong with my posts. But somehow I realized I'm still new in here. I need to have enough patience to make my reputations go bigger. I needvto work harder and harder. Make some blogs that will help other steemians to uplift they're selves. I admit that my very first reason that came up on my mind when I heard about steemit is to earn some money. As days goes by the votes on my every post has only have 1 vote -3 votes I was then frustrated. I was like having some negative thoughts not to continue steemit. And then the other day I just realized that I must not think about the votes, I should keep on posting. I should enjoy what I'm doing. Because if that's the case I know that each and everyone of us will not get frustrated even though they'll get little votes. That's what I'm doing right now.
Besides the interesting part here in steemit is that I can share all my works, my story, and my life. Steemit is my way to express and share my ideas.
Thank you @humanearl for this very very encouraging article for all the steemians, especially fot the newbies like me!
May God bless you more!
Keep inspiring others! 😊😇
I understand 100% and I know it is highly difficult. If you really love sharing your heart with people keep doing that.
Thank you @humanearl 😇