I like this idea, however, first you have to teach the average Joe Steem users that they should care who their witnesses are. I think there are a lot of people on Steem who do not care one way or the other.

Maybe this current situation could be explained in a way that encourages people to set a proxy, but who do we encourage them to proxy to? Asking people to proxy needs to be accompanied with a list of potential proxies for people to consider. Asking people to proxy to yourself can easily be read as a power play.

So convince the people who don't vote for witnesses to vote, make it easy for them to proxy, and give them a list of potential proxies to choose from. I think then you might have a SLIGHT chance of making a small difference in the witness rankings.

But maybe I am too pessimistic.