Let us be honest for a second, Steemit is confusing, and Plankton - some call us Redfish - find it soul crushing when first starting out because you must learn all the techniques in order to stay engaged, or put all your free time and energy into it for a year in order to get the much lauded rewards and visibility.
What are the best techniques for newbies to use - please don't say create quality content because I have read plenty of great content from minnows that barely get 4¢ without deploying an army of bots. Should Steem be purchased and converted into Steem Power, or maybe Steem Bucks so that bots can be used? Any helpful hints from the users who have spent hundreds of hours reading, experimenting, joining dozens of Discord groups, or using every smarmy trick and bot in the book to make Steemit worthwhile time and money wise?