Even though I spend time on Steemit virtually every day, as often as not I end wondering something along the lines of "I wonder whatever happened to ____?" and then I go off in search of the person in question.

Blossoms
Flowering salmonberry

In spite of being a pretty active poster and commenter, truth is that I can't keep up with most of the people I allegedly "follow."

As I write these words, there are 516 people on my "following list." Each and every one was "hand placed" there because of something they said and contributed to the community that I felt was worthy.

Of course — just to add a little perspective — 516 is nothing, compared to the 3,855 followers I currently have. Alas, I must confess that I don't know most of you.

Either way, I feel a little ashamed that I am not keeping up with you all... but I just can't. And I wanted to talk a little bit about that, today.

Large Numbers Aren't "All That"

One of the things I never succumbed to when I first started here was this idea that I needed to "follow a large number of people." I also never harbored any delusions that just because I'd follow someone, they should follow me back.

Close-up of hyacinth

That's not how ~~social media~~ sustainable social media works. It has always been a slow build. Some people want to take me to task for that, pointing to the fact that I have a Facebook page with 17,400+ "likes." My response to which is "I started that in 2010..."

The thing about Social Media, and maintaining and building a social content blog, is that it is basically an exercise in "relationship marketing."

In our own way, we are "in relationship" with our followers here on Steemit. And that's what we want to to. We want people to care, to the point that they keep wanting to come back not just to check out our content, but because there is actually a level of caring and familiarity there.

And that's not something you're going to get, simply by going out and arbitrarily following several thousand people.

The REALITY of Following

The sad truth is that — as active as I may be in the community — in any given two week period, it's unlikely that I see the posts of more than about 300 of the 500+ people I follow. And I am a fairly active manual reader and curator.

cherry
Cherry blossoms

The reason I point this out is that I see relative newcomers to our community, and after just two weeks, they are already following over 2,000 people! And I think to myself "What are you DOING?"

Of course, what they are "doing," is following a pattern that was already established in the early days of MySpace, 14-15 years ago: A race to see "how many friends" you could add... with no regard whatsoever for whether any of those people cared about you, once you'd clicked the "friends" box.

In short, it was more of an "ego contest" than anything to do with effective social marketing.

Where Do Your Upvotes COME From?

For the purpose of examining this point, I'm going to ignore anyone who "buys" upvotes via bots. As far as that is concerned that's basically ADVERTISING, and it has no statistical relevance here.

Narcissus in bloom

The vast majority of upvotes that will come to this post will be from people I have built relationships with. Regardless of whether this post earns $3.00 or makes it to the "Trending" page, it will do so primarily because of votes from some of the approximately (just a "guesstimate") 250-ish people I interact with on a regular basis. The post's success or failure will have almost nothing to do with the approximately 3,500 other people who claim to "follow" me, yet probably have not voted on a piece of my content since the day they decided to press the "follow" button.

Whereas the "big numbers" look tempting, truth is that we make it or break it on the interest of our "core" followers.

When we are still new, we might fairly quickly "get to know" 8-10 people with whom we share mutual comments and votes. In time, we expand our core.

Even the biggest Whales — who have been active here since mid-2016 — don't have "cores" of much above maybe 500 people. If you actually analyzed their very rich posts, you'd discover that 90% of their rewards come from the same 80-100 followers. And even though they might have 700 upvotes on any given post, 650 of those are worth little more than a couple of cents each, and come from hopeful newcomers "hoping" their name will be seen.

So What's a Wee Minnow to DO?

If you're sincerely interested in "building a presence" and being part of Steemit in the long run, shoot for quality, and BUILD RELATIONSHIPS!

Grape
Grape hyacinths

Choose posts that sincerely appeal to you, upvote them and add substantial sincere comments. Saying something meaningful and sincere on 10 posts is worth FAR more than spamming "nice post" to 200 random posts you didn't even read.

I know you've probably heard that ten times already, but probably not from someone who has been here a long time, but is NOT a Whale and is NOT an overambitious newcomer who doesn't quite know the ropes yet.

I don't use upvote bots, and I don't belong to any "upvote guilds." My only serious affiliation is @steemitbloggers, and we're not an upvote club, but a content club. And much in the spirit of what I have shared here, membership is closed and capped because we know that "too large" simply doesn't WORK, when it comes to building a social content following.

Now, you might say "You just don't remember what it's LIKE!"

No, actually I do.

You see, I also serve as admin of a "younger" Steemit account for my wife and my art gallery, @reddragonfly, and an even younger Steemit account for my wife's non-profit organization @whitelightxpress.

So I'm pretty intimately familiar with all stages of minnowhood.

Realistic Expectations

Before I wrap this up, I will bring up something I have repeatedly talked about here — and will continue to talk about for as long as there is a Steemit: You have to have PATIENCE and REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS!

Frankly, I don't give a flying flip what you may have read somewhere, or seen in someone's promotional YouTube clip... It doesn't apply to you.

Orange
Some orange spring flower I don't know the name of...

No, really, it doesn't.

What you think you know is only the truth the same way a car dealer advertising a new car for $9,000 is truthful: There is only ONE car at that price, and it has already sold. All the other cars are $20,000+.

What that means in Steemit language is that there is only one person (in the video) making $300 a post, and that person has been doing social media for 20 years and has half a million followers. That's not YOU. Just like opening a YouTube account doesn't make you Pewdiepie.

So get REAL. Get your head back in the game in a realistic fashion.

Even if you work hard, it will take you at least 60-90 days to become anyone at all. And that means creating quality original posts every day, and commenting intelligently on quality content every day.

There are quite a few people on Steemit who have gone from "nowhere" to "quite successful" in six months or so. But if you think you'll be quitting your day job and "doing this full time" anytime soon, you need a reality check. UNLESS, of course, you ARE Pewdiepie (or Jenna Marbles — let's not be sexist), and bringing over 60 million subscribers. If that's the case, feel free to ignore everything I just wrote!

But seriously?

DON'T take it all so seriously! Remember to chill a bit and just enjoy the ride-- stop worrying so damn much about the rewards and just get to know some of the cool people here!

This is SOCIAL media, remember...

How about YOU? What — if any — were your expectations when you started on Steemit? WHEN did you join here? How have things gone for you, compared to what you expected or hoped? Do you think a lot of Streemit newcomers have unrealistic expectations? Is Steemit generally more work than people think it will be? Are the people who are out there "making big promises" about the community actually HURTING the community? Or is any newcomer a good newcomer? Leave a comment-- share your experiences-- be part of the conversation!

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Created at 180406 01:28 PDT