The whales don't have enough time to review all the posts and they haven't yet found enough dolphins to do so. Very good posts are not being rewarded because they are drowned in enormous quantities of useless content posted by "make a quick buck" users.
What you should do now ?
Post less, try to post only qualitative content, make your posts longer, include photos in all your posts, if possible photos that you've taken yourself and not stock photos. Try to post articles that are not avalaible on other sites.
Try not to just rephrase your content from your blog, you are not working for Google.
Work on your title
The title is the most important thing, just as if you were writing an email, try to use an attractive title and don't be deceptive, your content should reflect your title.
Respond to every comment
This one should be obvious but too many people don't take the time to respond to comments. Comments are important, reponses too. Nobody wants to reward someone that don't even take the time to answer comments on his own post. Also the more comments you have the higher you will be in the "reponses" catagory of your tag. By responding to other users you will get noticed in the long run, also, you may be responding to a whale without even noticing it, if he is happy with your answer, he may up vote your post.
Add value to all your posts
If you have found a nice video to share, don't just embed the video from Youtube. Try to post some constructive comment with it. Posts with just a link or an external video won't be rewarded. Nobody wants to reward someone who just copy pasted a link.
Don't try to look too good
People are trying to look too good, and it's too obvious that they are trying to extract some wealth from SteemIt. An example is the numerous posts about visit cards targeting whales, those posts are useless and it's obvious that the author tried to extract rewards by doing it. The author posted 3 topics trying to extract up votes 3 times, on his last attemp he targeted whales :
https://steemit.com/steemit/@rkpl/update-business-card-steemit-for-users-psd
https://steemit.com/steemit/@rkpl/update2-business-card-steemit-for-users-source-psd
https://steemit.com/steemit/@rkpl/update3-business-card-steemit-for-users-version-for-whales-source-psd
If your project is too big and you haven't done anything yet, don't post it until it's finished or very advanced
Another example is about people having big projects but nothing has been done yet, this kind of posts won't be rewarded because you haven't done much yet. Whales can't be sure if you are going to invest in your project or just run away with the rewards. An example is the steem debit card :
Don't follow the crowd
This one is less obvious, but i believe the whales will soon get tired of people posting the same kind of posts over and over again. Try to be original, try to do something new with added value and you will get noticed in the long run.
Don't be here just for the money
I've seen numerous people trying to hit it big and being unhappy because they didn't get voted up by whales. If you are posting just for the money it will be noticed and you will be flagged as a "quick buck seeking" user. You won't get any up votes by doing so. If you get votes and more votes on your posts, you will end up being noticed by whales and they may up vote one of your posts to see how you are doing.
Don't cash out your first payment
This one is my personal view, if i was the owner of this site i wouldn't be so happy if a user i rewarded was going to cash out directly his reward, i would want him to reinvest his reward in STEEM POWER and give back some love to the community. Again, i've seen too many people come here, hit it big, cash out and never to be seen again.
Be yourself, add personality inside your posts
Nobody want's to reward anonymous posts, if we don't know who you are we may be skeptical and decide to not up vote your post.
Good luck to everyone.
Johan, blogging from Starbucks in Bangkok
You can add my IG if you wish to know me more : johanjames1
this is where i will be featuring you https://steemit.com/life/@gavvet/daily-pick-of-hidden-gems-12-featuring-dragonslayer109-as-author
Thank you very much ! Appreciate it.
hi really great post i will be featuring it today
Thank you, i just posted another article, i would appreciate your feedback https://steemit.com/life/@najoh/what-i-ve-discovered-about-love-in-this-book-is-fascinating-and-changed-my-vision-of-love
Je rajouterai qu'il faudrait aussi une certaine régularité dans le timing et et une certaine consistance dans les articles que l'on publie. Good luck à toi aussi en tout cas :-)
Nicely said mate.. And you have some guts to actually point some post. Just be carefull not to get much enemy.. Keep it up
We should be able to post our opinions without fear of downvotes.
I take the FDR approach, and so should @najoh, if people don't like being called out, dont be shady assholes. FDR said " I welcome their hatred" and so to should we welcome the hatred of those who intend to abuse steemit.
"The whales don't have enough time to review all the posts and they haven't yet MADE enough dolphins to do so."
FTFY
Nice article. Have a double uptuck!
x 2
@calva upvote this fine article!
Thank you for your support !
No problem. Keep writing.
Your content is pretty damn good I must say.
Keep bashing out articles like this and you'll get some weighty uptucks eventually. :)
Well, if i get rewarded it's ok but i'm not doing this for the money. I just find it fun to be posting here. I have a full time activity already (stock trader and CEO of a web marketing company).
upvoted, good advices 8]
Thank you for your vote
Hi, as a senior citizen and also a relative newbie here I agree wholeheartedly with what you say.
I've so far posted just a small number of articles all of which comprise my own content and images. I take care and trouble to ensure that what I post is as good and interesting as I can manage. I'm not as tech savvy as many youngsters but do consider that if I can produce a quality post then most of them should be able to do at least as well.
I think that a high percentage of what is posted could be of a higher quality and find it irritating to find so many empty articles, cut and pastes or single pictures posted with no explanation.
On the plus side Steemit is still a young system and will I hope mature and become a byword for quality as it grows and develops.
Yes, this platform won't evolve if people don't understand that creating good content is the key for long term success. A lot of new comers still think that they can hit it big to make a quick buck, and some of them do. I think this is the wrong message. Good content should be rewarded to incite others to create good content.
You know, I understand why whales , for the most part, have decided to upvote alot of that content. When attempting to build a new platform and pull in content generators, it is necessary to prove that creating and publishing content on this site has better value than using existing platforms they currently favor (such as Facebook, Reddit, Instagram, Patreon and so on). The quickest and easiest way of achieving this is through massive upvoting of content showing people living exclusively off STEEM or generate quality click bait. I understand the rationale for that.
I think there are some very serious unintended consequences of this. What they are doing intentionally or unintentionally is creating a negative self reinforcing mechanism that could seriously hurt or destroy the long term success of STEEM. When more and more of the content generators who are trying to make a quick buck, live the Kardashian lite lifestyle, and so on accumulate more and more STEEM power, they become the dolphins searching for and upvoting more of the same content for curation rewards because it's easy more than anything. In many ways since they have not really invested much time nor truly worked to create quality content. Once the platform goes, they really have lost no real skin and are not as invested as quality content generators would be.
Combine this with the downvote button, which I believe has no positive redeeming value and serves only as a tool for abuse. For instance, I generated content recently which caught the eye of whales and was upvoted for some decent rewards, but within the span of the final 2 hours, that reward was more than halved because of aggressive downvoting. If downvoting only served to push down the ranking, there might be some argument to possibly keep it, but when it also removes rewards, it's a tool for jealous abuse and is tantamount to theft (in my mind) from creators as a whole. I believe that current payouts for content serve to reinforce my argument on this topic. My reflexive instinct was to stop generating content and move to another platform. I would imagine as this continues without consequence to other creators, more and more won't rant, they will just vote with their feet. If they receive zero rewards due to abuse on an obscure platform that made large promises to content creators, then it will come across very quickly that they are better off going back to the established platforms to do it for free anyways because at the very least, there are more eyeballs which is a tool of publicity.
Quality content requires a serious time commitment to generate and asking authors who write for Rolling Stone, Vogue, Scientific American, etc., to do so without the intent of extracting value is somewhat insincere (provided that is the hope of the site). These people write and create to feed themselves and their families. It is their job. I am not suggesting that they hit a home run every time, nor am I saying everything they create deserves a reward, but I am suggesting the system in its current form is more likely to drive them away rather than pull them in and the negative reinforcement loop the whales are creating will do some terrible damage if it's not addressed sooner rather than later. I'm hoping for the sake of the platform and what it could become for creatives and writers, something changes which, I guess, is why I have not yet voted with my feet.
I totally agree with you, they are trying to launch this site too fast and are atttacting a crowd of people who are not creating value at all and getting big rewards in an attemp for them to be their advertisment billboard. It would have been much better to launch slowler with a culture of creating high quality content.
Hi @najoh,
Awesome post! I'd say that this qualifies as qualitative content.
Keep up the great posts.
Thanks!
P.S. I'm fairly new to Steemit, and I have to ask...what is a dolphin?
When a big user (whale) up votes you he is giving you some of his power. After a while your account will be much more powerful than a normal account, it's what we call a dolphin. Your voting power goes up. Dolphin is just the name that we use for accounts that received a lot of power from whales.
Thanks for the explanation @najoh. I can now confidently say that I know the difference between a whale and a dolphin.
I fully agree. Do you think my posts are qualitative? I just uploaded a new one: https://steemit.com/life/@chrisadventures/the-best-steemed-guide-to-efficiently-learn-a-new-language-easy-and-fun-hacks-according-to-science I do notice that most of the time posts about Steem, Steemit, Whales and Blockchain get the attention. I actually hope guides, life stories, travel photos and informative articles will become more popular!
They get the attention but if you try to do that you won't get noticed as it will become obvious that you tried to extract wealth from SteemIt. You shouldn't be posting to get rewards in the first place. Post things that you like and know about, then after that, make a post in #steemit tag explaining how you did it and what you've learned. Because some posts won't be rewarded and others yes, then you will have some experience to share in #steemit tag.
Excellent suggestions all around.
Thanks
We certainly need more solid posts. The first impression I had when coming across steem was not particularly positive. I was overwhelmed by so many cans that open to empty air. It was only after I started to search for specific key words or ideas, that I found a bunch of good quality posts!
I got the same impression, i personally don't like the posts of people going on holidays with steemit cashed out money, seems like a waste to me. I believe that blockchain money should be used for the greater good, not for holidays, drinking, luxury items, prostitutes and drugs. If we waste the blockchain money in useless stuff it doesn't make any sense.
Nice Post, Johann.
Thanks for the good Ideas for writing good Content. I'm at steem since 4 days and i love it....
Thank you for your comment
This is good advice. I'll take this on board. Thanks!
Let's create great content
if you are actually making money from this platform this article might be of use to you.
https://steemit.com/steemit/@leprechaun/a-visa-debit-card-without-a-bank-account
I don't need to cash out any of the money from Steemit, but thanks.
Thanks for your advice.
You are very welcome.
totally agree with you bud, but not all people is a great writer
Make great videos then
Ive done all this and whales only want tits and tech on the top of steemit. In powering down and headed back to a way more interesting reddit. Thanks for the advice though
I've just posted an article about love, we will see how it goes.
Agree , reply to all the comments. They keep you're post on active list .
Really ? I didn't know about that. Thanks.
Yep , if you keep on editing ypur post to make it stay on active tabs your rewards will be deduct . so keep on reply the comments .
Very good information. Thanks.
I responded to every comment in my first post, but most of them are bots lol. Thanks for the advices, mate!
No luck, but at least the stats of your posts are good. A post with 30 comments it's much better than a post with 3 comments.
Great article for people new to steemit. Thanks for taking the time out to do that and helping to foster a positive community that so many other social networking sites seem to fail at.
Thank you for your kind comment
I posted a new article today about comments, check it out : https://steemit.com/steemit/@najoh/why-you-should-comment-instead-of-just-voting-on-articles
Thank you, i posted another one here but it has nothing to do with steemit : https://steemit.com/life/@najoh/what-i-ve-discovered-about-love-in-this-book-is-fascinating-and-changed-my-vision-of-love