you should join a group like curie or powerhousecreatives . They tend to support one another but to be honest I don't know the full ins and outs of how they operate. I would start with PHC as they seem to be a very active group on Discord. You do use discord right? That's a big part of the process.
You are not doing anything wrong, it just takes a while to build an audience especially since our user numbers have diminished quite a lot in the past year or so.
Thanks a lot for the suggestions. I don't use Discord but I will see what I can do. I am looking into both curie and powerhousecreatives as we speak. I just wished everyone would start using FOSS privacy focused services like Matrix/Riot instead of Discord, which is nefarious for its predatory privacy policy.
it took me a bit to get into Discord, because i feel the same way as you do about privacy and what not... but it is the standard and for me at least it took a little getting used to. The people in PHC are really active and they do look out for one another. It is also a great way to not get lost in the god-awful "new" section on Steemit.