10) Up Voting and Replying to Spam Comments

We all see and get them, those comments "nice!" or "good job!" or worse outright scams or solicitations for their services! These kinds of replies offer no value and in many ways take value! As a new user you are excited to finally get a comment on your post, but do not be fooled into up voting these bots. Go out and up vote REAL content instead and develop a real following!

9) Constantly Powering Down Your Earnings

If you don't increase your Steem Power (SP) you are not adding any value to the community! The reason steem works is because more people "vest" or Power Up their Steem than sell it. The entire system is designed so that we increase our influence overtime by investing or Powering Up each week. That is why at least 50% of your earnings come in the form of Steem Power. If you are constantly Powering Down this new Steem Power, you are creating liquid Steem, which can be bought/sold/transfered. This can be good for an economy to exist, HOWEVER, if you are constantly Powering Down to cash out to other coins you are simply pushing the value of Steem down.

8) Not engaging your followers

If your followers reply to your post and you never respond to them they will stop bothering. Steem is a social platform, you must realize that your followers want to engage with you if they took the time to make a reply! On the flip, be sure to reply and engage in others' posts that you enjoy so they have a chance to do the same for you! Steem is a mutual system, work hard, work together, earn more!

7) Asking for votes, resteems and follows

Probably the most annoying and biggest no no, asking people to up vote you, resteem you etc. We know where the like button and re-steem button is thank you! We are not 2 years old! If you tell me to do something I am less likely to do it especially if it directly benefits you! Let me decide if your content is worth the vote and/or re-steem! Telling me is just insulting. Exception: Asking for witness votes is very fair since most people would not know otherwise you are a witness. I am not currently a witness (disclosure).

6) Too many replies (comments) not enough posts

You do not create content but engage very often with others. This isn't always a bad thing, especially if you add value. But, it does show your lack of ability to generate a conversation. Creating a post is in a a lot of ways creating a conversation. You set the tone, the setting etc. By not posting often enough you are not really creating the following you should. Even if you create the best comments around all day, you still need a post for your followers to read that tells them what you are up to, what you are thinking, etc. If you have not been creating posts but leaving a lot of replies, consider throwing in a few posts here and there. Watch how quickly it builds your following and future earnings!

5) Up voting and replying to old content

After 7 days (actually 6.5) a post is "expired" and no longer can earn through up votes. If you up vote a post that is over 7 days old it will cost you Voting Power and earn you and the author nothing, in effect a complete waste! Replying to old content is okay if you understand it is expired. My preferred method however is to create a new post and tag the author, quote their expired post, and then reply with a link to my new content. This gives the author a chance to converse with you and others on a new post, gives exposure and credit to their original post, and lets you have a potential to earn more for the thoughts you put into your reply!

4) Depleting your Voting Power

I see this far to often, letting your Voting Power go below 80%! Remember you get about 20% back per day (trickled in each block)! If you consume more than 20% of your Voting Power each day you will not get back to 100% before another round of voting! Your Voting Power is your life blood here, the higher it is, the more your vote matters! You want to keep this ideally over 90% and never below 80% at all times! If you are below 80% wait until you hit at least 90% to begin voting again!

3) Not consistent with content and frequency

Talking about random things and not sticking on topic is great if you just want this to be a basic social media platform and not worry about the earnings (which is not a bad idea). But if you really want to focus on earning more, you need to stay lightning focused. People do not want to read your posts or follow you if you constantly switch topics and have no theme. If you notice my theme is investing, cryptocurrency and technology. I very rarely make posts outside that. Again, I am not saying NEVER make an off topic post, in fact your followers will love that if you have been good, it makes you "real". If I NEVER talked about something like how my experience at the movies was I would probably look like a robot or just be boring. A nice healthy balance is what you should look for!

2) Under utilizing past/expired posts

As you see in #3 I linked to a past post. Sure I can't earn more on it, but remember search engines index it, and others read it which in turn lead to them liking your content more and following you. Do not forget how much time you put into creating a post only to have it never read again! You do earn from past posts, especially if you reference them! You earn indirectly! More followers and more up votes and more re-steems on your new content is what results from sharing your past expired content! Never overlook this!

1) NOT Viewing Steem like you do [Insert Facebook, Twitter, etc]

And the final point! If you think Steem is just a blog, you missed the point! We are a social revolution! We are what Facebook was to the internet of blogs! Although we are just starting and fairly new, Steem is set to become the biggest social platform on the planet! I would begin looking at Steem as the new social platform instead of just a blog site as many still do!

Thanks for reading my post, I hope it helps everyone! Let me know below which one you think is the most important!