I think it is good at first to follow the crowd and find a niche here. Also I respect the people who are community oriented a lot. I used to do it a bit more, but got overwhelmed.

Personally, I try my best to produce platform independent content and keep the Hive community stuff to a minimum or at least add unrelated photos.

I disagree that outside views are useless for the author. I take the longterm approach, and find people (read curators) recognize and look for this type of content.

Usually I share my posts on Twitter (except niche Hive or controversial stuff). You never know who will notice.