One of the things I love most about Steemit is the community and the genuine support that you are offered from those around you, it truly is quite phenomenal - but on the flip side of that coin… I am honestly just SO sick of “upvote” and “follow me” pests and bullies.

KEEPING IT REAL ON STEEMIT!

Let me say this loud and clear - I am NOT going to upvote rubbish! Nor am I going to follow a rubbish feed just because A) you followed me or B) you told me to… really? Are we in kindergarten?

I am always more than willing to head over to a suggested post and take a look at it. If I like it, THEN I will upvote it and if your feed captures me, THEN I will follow you – and I would expect nothing different in return to me.

The “upvote for upvote” or “follow for follow” systems hold ABSOLUTELY no sustainability! All you are doing is building a feed for yourself that has a bunch of random people in it that you have no genuine interest in… and the same goes for the followers you build around yourself… most of them probably don’t even know what you blog about or even visit your feed after they have gotten your “follow”.

I will also say that 99% of the people that are pushing this kind of system are the ones that are posting rubbish anyway, so in your “receiving” of their upvote, you are inadvertently promoting rubbish by way of your return upvote.

If you want people to follow you or you want more upvotes, then publish something decent for heaven’s sake. Begging people to follow you is about as effective as a child whining for a toy in a supermarket. If you want it, then EARN it!

We are all adults here! (Well we are supposed to be)

A little while ago, on my independent blog site, I began sharing my posts on some of the Facebook blogging groups. Well, WOW is all about I can say! What a bunch of bullies! They are so ridiculously insistent on the fact that you WILL like and comment on EVERY SINGLE PERSON’S link. When I refused to do this, because I said I would only do it for the ones that I actually liked, I got kicked off most of the groups.

No skin off my nose, I started my own group and made it ABUNDANTLY clear on the pinned post that people were welcome to start a like for like thread on the page but were NOT allowed to FORCE people to do anything in return… they would be allowed to be selective as to who’s content they liked and/or commented on. I also allowed people to post their content directly onto the wall – which is also not permitted on most of these blogging groups.

The feedback from the general public of bloggers was absolutely phenomenal!!! The “thank you’s” continue to this day. The other group admins however took a major dislike towards me and my group because I was cheeky enough to promote it on their walls before they kicked me off.... boohoo for them!

Needless to say the group has been enormously successful because people are afforded the freedom to share their content directly on the group wall instead of it getting lost in a “one million comment thread” and they are NOT obligated to like every single persons post - they can interact GENUINELY with the ones they ACTUALLY like!

People DO NOT LIKE TO BE BULLIED INTO "false" SITUATIONS! It is as simple as that! – There is a lot to be said for the freedom of choice and authentic engagement.

Apart from that, for myself personally, I don’t want a whole lot of upvotes that were given for the sake of me offering one in return… I want to know that the upvotes and comments I receive are there because I earned them by sharing quality content that the reader honestly enjoyed.

I want GENUINE interaction – GENUINE followers – GENUINE growth!

Isn't that what this is supposed to be all about? Building a REAL network... one which motivates you, inspires you and supports you... GENUINELY!

Now, this is just my opinion – you don’t have to agree with me – I am merely sharing my perspective on the matter.

PS. For those of you that DO make use of other social media platforms to promote your QUALITY Steemit blog posts - you are welcome to tag me (@jaynielea) on fb/twitter/instagram/etc.) and if your post SPEAKS to me, I will GLADLY share it for you!

You are also welcome to join my recently launched Steemit FB group and share your QUALITY posts "follow for follow" FREE!!!!!: https://www.facebook.com/groups/465820317130772/

Until next time...

Much love from Cape Town, South Africa xxx