There is no shortcut. No bot or upvote service will make you a better Steemian. Of course, you may become a bit more relevant by sending some SBD to one of those bots but that will simply not work for long.
Search engines and everything that's based on web content has come to the point where it mimics real-life: It has to be real to be popular. (But popular does not imply real, keep in mind)
By real, I mean that real people click on the content and actively share it with their peers because they want to. When you listen to music you love, you are more likely to share it. When you see an interesting story or something that made your day different, then you are more likely to tell others about it. While this process has many different layers, one of the key elements to achieve it is the use of narratives.
Narratives are everywhere. Journalism, scientific research, TV shows, jokes, memes, all of them require narratives of some sort to be successful. Without an introduction, a mid-section, and a conclusion, we lose interest in whatever we are seeing.
After the narrative is created, the audience comes next. The story has to resonate with them, make them think and feel. Your job is to excite people and to let them know that you can keep bringing them either tools, knowledge or entertainment.
I've been writing since I've got a memory. A month ago, I was struggling and a friend reached out to me and said: "Hey, I know you love to write. You should check out this page and see if you can make some money with it." She introduced me to Steemit. At first, my posts were kind of dull, but as I started to participate in contests and studying the website and the crypto world, I got hooked. I was fascinated by the community and how the purpose of the website was to promote good content. Now, I can't stop thinking about what I'm going to post the next day, or as some user put it:
"You mine Bitcoin with RAM, but you mine STEEM with your mind."
Now that's a short story. Did you feel engaged? Did you get to know me more than you did before reading up to this part? I really hope so! We humans love to hear stories, and telling stories or using narratives is vital for creating art, music, books, and even ad campaigns.
Please pay attention to this...
Submit a Story. The guys behind Steemit know this. Basically, everyone who is a creator knows this. A narrative is key.
How to employ narratives:
You are your primary source for inspiration. Think about it: How was your day? How did you feel during the day? Was it boring? Did you question your actions? How did your mood change as you went through your daily tasks?
After looking into yourself, you may then look into the environment. Think about your friends and family. Do their lives inspire you in some way? Do they make you angry or sad? Why so? Try to put those words into feelings and then write them out.
You may also find something others may enjoy, or perhaps you would just like to sing a song or write a poem. Maybe your inspiration is the price of Bitcoin and how Ethereum may pick up the pace at some point. Whatever it is, share it with us! Tell us your story in your own terms, allow us to see the world through your eyes. Perhaps we may actually learn something with a different point of view...!
Here, I highly recommend you read "Zen in the Art of Writing" by Ray Bradbury, the author of Fahrenheit 451. There, he discusses creativity and inspiration while writing. Truly worthwhile.
I know that if I read Stephen King I can expect suspense and horror. If I watch an M. Night Shyamalan film an unexpected plot twist is a sure bet. We are prone to find artists who do things we love, and that's why we stick with them. Whenever they put out a new album or film we criticize or praise them, depending on our expectations as an audience member.
Your audience has expectations. As a creator, you have artistic license, which is the almighty tool that allows you to throw a red paint bucket at a wall and call it "art." Some may loathe you for it, but then again, others may scream: "It's so sublime!"
After you find your creative niche, you choose whether to meet your audience's expectations or not. Most creators start by mastering their primary genre, to then move on and experiment after they've gathered a decent following or experience; they then gauge the reaction and decide what to do next based on their artistic needs.
The classic idea is that rock stars swim in seas of fans and one groupie is indistinguishable from the rest, we believe that this is ideal, to have so many fans that we do not know what to do with them. This is completely false.
A fan is a single person. That person has feelings and ideas. Each of your followers is a person just like you and me. It is flawed to think like social media teaches us, that businesses get reduced to 184,000 search results, acquaintances get reduced to 317 Facebook friends, and some people have 2 million followers on Twitter.
Yes, there is a business called social media marketing that seeks to increase web notoriety by the bulk. But when you are a creator, not a community manager, your interests are different, at least when you're just beginning.
Each fan matters. I cannot stress that enough. Engage with them, reply to their comments and talk to them as if they were your friends. Of course, if you eventually grow out to be a successful creator, you will not have so much time to engage with your fans. But you would have learned exactly why they chose to follow you and how to nurture your skills to spread your content to an even broader audience.
Learn from your followers, they are not simply "upvotes" waiting to be reaped. They are people like you and me.
For this step, I recommend you read "Tribes" by Seth Godin. He talks about how we may start forming our own tribes in any scenario we can conceive, and how now it is more doable than ever.
Image at the top's source. That's Ernest Hemingway
