So continuing with the idea of this Post is that once you already know how to use the Bots, you start caring about not throwing all your money at the Bots. Doing this you only reward the Bots, which as stated by many are not forced to provide a profit on each round. On the contrary, on peak hours many Bots will do the opposite.

Steem, as you know, is complex, so do not think that when you see 25% sign, you are earning that. Until the very last second, before the Bot makes the actual vote, things can go from 30% to -50%, just takes that user who is greedy or maybe does not know, to put 10-50 SBD last second. Also, other whales just don't care if someone from India is putting all his hopes worth 3 SBD to earn more or promote his last post.

Money talks as in the rest of the world. That's why we need to spread awareness, one to learn how it works, and second to create a better and fairer environment for those who use the tool.

So after spending some SBDs over here I learnt quite a few things.

1. Do not bid high amounts if you do it consider the size of the Max. Profitable Bid

Let's look at a "small vote" Bot, @MercuryBot;

As you can see from the larger image version there are three snaps in time< 9 minutes, 5 minutes and then with only 30 seconds left. The min. bid is 0.10 SBD and looking at the detail everybody was bidding a small amount.

So the secret here is, look at the Max. Bid and divide it through the Max Suggested Bid, i.e., in our case if 30 seconds before the max. prof. bid was;

0.54 SBD / 0.10 SBD = ~ 5 bids

2. Time in your bid

So with only 30 seconds left, the chances are that five bids of 0.10 could go inside the pool of Bids. Steemrobottracker is fast but is not showing real-time data most of the time, only those that have the bottracker API. Installed could be "trusted" as reliable.

The moral is; calculate how many people are left to ruin the profitability of Bid round. And this takes us to my next point.

How profitable is a vote?

This is open for debate, some Steemers consider that the Bots are promoters, and not made to give profit back. In my view, we can discuss extensively on that, but my opinion is reduced to actual calculations.

STU Steem Tokens Unit

This is the $ sign you see at the bottom of all the posts and represents not USD, not SBD and not SP, but a representation of how the Rewards are distributed in the system.

I love to use this tool from Hive account@dragosroua, that guy deserves a medal honestly, where I can check how much time left I have for my next payout, and how many STU are left to be distributed to me. I do not usually use the USD equivalent since I invest and get STUs and not dollars. Calculating in USD is risky since the value fluctuates a lot recently.

Decoding STU to money

So if the $ sign represents STUs, how much do I get?. Well, generally by default, all posts give back a 50/50 return, 50% in Steem Power and the other 50% in Steem Dollars (SBD). The exception is if you choose to receive all the profits in SP.
But remember, this system encourages Curation Rewards which generally take a 25% of your STU.
So the best thing is to take your $ number and first take the 25% off.

To know the SBD value of your post we could make the following calculation; let's assume a post with STU 100.

SBD= (STU * .75) / 2 = x SBDs liquid to be paid out after 7 days
SBD=(100 * .75) / 2 = SBD 37.5

For SP there is a little trick; SP value is related on the USD value of Steem, so the higher the price of Steem is, the less you get in Steem Power since the dividend factor is higher.

SP = (STU * .75) / 2 = x / Steem USD Value (value divided by current Steem value)
SP=(100 * .75) / 2 = 37.5 / Steem USD value 5.035= SP 7.44

if the Steem value was USD 1 today, you get SP 37.5 in the example above*

Of course, the bot tracker is always calculating to USD, and it makes it even more complicated, so better look at the SBD value of your bid.
As an example let's use the next negative round;

As you can see in the extended version, this was a non-profitable bid, why? It states on the calculation of the app. that the result is -34% after calculating the 25% Curation Reward. The last happened because the Vote Value is USD 2.09 or 0.4 STU, and there was a total 0.45 SBD bid, so let's say one more than supposed to be the max. bid. 0.1 STU in that case was for the Curators, so put one too many and you are in red already.

So we can do another quick calculation before making a bid; no need to use a calculator, just round the numbers;

Should I bid? = if Total Bids > 75% of the Total Vote Value = NO

Assume a vote value of USD 4.000 (USD/5.35) SBD 747.5, If I were alone and made a bid of 1 SBD you would get it all. But let's assume other people are bidding, 2 minutes before, the total bid is of SBD 560.25, which represents already 3/4 of the total value, subtract the 25% of the curation, and you are already in the red = DO not bid.

The important points

I know this is quite a lot to digest, but if you have this guide next to you while bidding, I assure you that it will be much better. Perhaps you will notice that you need to let many rounds past, but those you do will be better.

1. Do not bid last minute high bids, chances are others will keep offering and you will make the whole round go red.

2. Having more SBD does not give you more rights, it should be a fair game for everybody, throwing 50 SBD even 2 hours before the Vote does not guarantee you someone else will not do the same.

3. Be aware that many bots are not showing current data, you could see a profitable round, i.e., 50 SBD vote value, and only 10 SBD in bids, but once you sent your offer, the tracker updates itself and there were 40 SBDs processed at the same time.

4. Do not abuse the system, upvote those posts that deserve a more significant payment. We all hate to see youtube pasted videos, memes, or low-quality posts raping the reward pool. It should be used to promote your channel.

5. We are a great growing community, and we are learning on the go, though there are no official guidelines, it would be nice if we start to see that we let others also take a little profit. Hence, try to measure your bid, as said before you could be throwing 10 SBD in the trash. Better to play with less, and then if you still lose is not much, plus you let the space for others to bid.

I hope you like my post and find it useful, if you do support me with your upvote, follow or reesteem. Not that much because of me but due to I see new users need a better guide on the bots.