OK, people. Listen up. Some people are absolutely killing it here, making $30.000 per post. However, the vast majority isn't making this amount of money. Many people are actually making pennies with their post which has lead to massive frustration around the network. If you are one of those people ... don't worry, because you are not alone. So you don't have to feel bad. There is nothing wrong with you or your articles. You are simply not providing the content the market is asking you for. You can make the best post in history of mankind, but if its content isn't satisfying the needs of the market, your post is literally worth nothing here.
How do I proceed if the market doesn't appreciate the content I provide ?
I firmly believe that if you are flexible and creative, you can find a way to make money. But in order to find a way, the first thing you need to do, is to learn the rules of the game you are playing. If you don't know the rules, you will just be running around like a chicken without a head not knowing where you are heading for. Therefore, the first thing anyone should do is TO READ THE WHITEPAPER !!!.
Now lets have a look at what the whitepaper says:
Voting input from community members is critical for Steem to accurately allocate payments
to contributors. Voting can therefore be viewed as a crucial contribution and worthy of
rewards on its own.
...
One of the primary goals of Steem’s reward system is to produce the best discussions on
the internet. Each and every year 10% of the market capitalization of Steem is distributed
to users submitting, voting on, and discussing content.
What this basically means is that you don't have to write a successful post in order to make money. Steemit is designed to reward anyone that does something valuable for the network. Posting is the most straightforward contribution and if you are very good in identifying what the market is asking for and make a nice post about it, then you will rock on Steemit. However, if you aren't blessed with this skill, it is still possible to make money by voting and replying in a meaningful way.
Shifting my focus on voting and replying ? ... You must be kidding !!!
No, I am not kidding. I am being very real here. You shouldn't feel ashamed to make voting and replying your main strategy on Steemit. Why ? Because Steemit was designed to also reward people that take time for voting and replying. Voting and replying are indispensable activities that contribute to the network. Steemit can't thrive without people that vote and reply. If you take the time to detect valuable posts to upvote, and if you take the time to make valuable replies that lead to interesting discussions, then the Steemit network will rightfully embrace your contribution and reward you for it.
But posting is financially more rewarding than voting and replying.
It is, but not for you. Because if you make pennies on your posts, voting and replying is financially more rewarding. Moreover, it will cost you much less effort. Sometimes you can spend hours making a post that you think is amazing, but in the end the Steemit network rewards you only with a few pennies. But a good reply can easily make you 10 times more with only a few seconds of effort. So when you look at it from this perspective, changing your strategy to upvoting and replying suddenly doesn't look so crazy afterall, does it ?
My advice for the subscribers that are having problems making money with their posts.
A lot of subscribers that aren't succesful in making valuable posts, usually feel frustrated. They want to get rid of this feeling of frustration by finally making that $10.000 post. But everytime they try, they fail in doing so. This keeps adding to their frustration until they reach a point where they suddenly keep bombarding the network with new posts that lead to absolutely nothing.
Therefore, I would advise those subscribers a different strategy. Don't let the emotion of frustration take the better of you. Keep it cool and calm. Just focus on upvoting and replying. Make sure that's the main part of your strategy. Does that mean you will never try to post anything again ? Of course not. But take some time before you make a new post. Rome wasn't build in 1 day, neither is a succesful post. As an example, have a look at one of todays top earning posts:
This is clearly not a post that was written in a few minutes. A lot of time and effort went into making this post. So maybe you need to do the same instead of bombarding the network with low quality posts. Focus on quality, not quantity. And don't feel rushed to make that amazing post you are waiting for. You don't need to make that $10.000 post today or this week. If you make it in 6 months, you still did a hell of a good job. In the meanwhile the Steemit community will be thankful that you stopped spamming the network :-).