If you are reading this, someone told you about Steemit already and you have told, or are about to tell, all your friends about it. The last thing you want to look like is the naive dude or dudette pushing a pyramid scheme or some super micro-niche crypto anarchist platform that requires a masters in computer science just to use.
I've told countless people about Steem and Steemit and so this post is to share my pitch. Pretty common sense stuff to be honest, so if you are an advanced level 40 Paladin when it comes to crypto stuff, scroll down to the last section entitled Dealing with the 3 cryptocurrencies issue, if you are new to this type of thing you should find the entire post very helpful.
First things first... First impression. Before you go and open your mouth or post about Steemit on social media, think about what you are about to say. Will it sound like a scam? A ponzi? Tin foil hat-ish post? Dick pill email-ish? Use empathy and put yourself in the reader's shoes. The reader does not have the info you have, he hasn't watched the YouTube clips you have or listened to the soundcloud interviews you've listened to, nor has he read any of the posts you've read. The following few sentences you are about to say/type are it. 100% of the info they have in the Steemit folder of their brains will be those few sentences... sooo.....
Otherwise you know what happens?
That's right. Your face and eyes melt off. Ok so maybe I mixed up Indiana Jones movie deaths (ah, here's the one!) and maybe you won't die a horrible-yet-super-cool-looking-supernatural death at all. But you know what will happen? You will lose credibility, damage your reputation and we all lose a convert. So get yo WOLOLO on son!
Start with the effects of Steem(it) before going into the inner workings of it. You will peak their interest when you tell them they can make real money from posting, commenting and upvoting. Many won't really believe you but you'll have 100% of their attention now. That's when you backup your statement with the how it works part.
If you explain how it works without them asking, you will be like a door to door salesman trying to spit out vacuum cleaner stats when no-one asked you to, a hard sell...
You can always go back once the person is interested and wants to know how it all works. At that point you can say something like "Ok I said X to simplify it for you, but actually it's like this and like that".
I start off telling them Steemit is a blogging platform like Reddit where you can make money from posting, commenting and upvoting. Note that I don't say "you pay with upvotes" since they will think upvoting is costing them money.
I immediately tell them "It's free and easy to sign up, just pick a username and password and boom. You can start earning cash for something you already do on facebook, twitter, etc."
The more upvotes you receive, the more money you make.
The sooner you upvote future popular content, the more curation rewards you get.
If your comments get upvotes, you will get paid too.
If I'm not face to face and I the conversation is taking place through written form, I have been recycling a South Park joke by telling them it's super easy just:
By then I have 100% attention and they ask how it works. "Where does the money come from?" or "Is it real money?" Here is where I uber simplify the workings for them.
"You know how every ten minutes Bitcoin pays out new bitcoins to miners? Well the blockchain doesn't know who to send that money to, so it just sends it to the computer that solved a math equation. STEEM does the same thing but instead of sending it to a computer that solved an equation, it sends it to someone that has votes behind his post. So if there's 10 bucks to be rewarded and your post about your trip to Thailand got half the votes, you get 5$! The other 5$ is split between the other people that wrote stuff. So instead of needing technical expertise and some mining hardware, you just need a keyboard, a brain and two hands and you'll get the block reward if other humans like your content!"
Everyone that has heard of Bitcoin, understands this part. If they know a lot about it I just tell them the Proof-of-Work is done by their brains and hands instead of their ASIC.
"Steem is like a company without a CEO, a marketing team or an accountant department, it's just code. That company is made of shares, like all public companies. It has a budget to pay their writers and curators. But having no humans running "the company", it doesn't know which writers to pay. So it relies on the votes each article/comment gets. By the way, when you sign up, Steemit gives you 7$ worth of those shares. So as a shareholder, you get to decide where the budget is allocated each time you click upvote!"
I have had a lot of success with these simplified analogies! Now there's just one last thing to deal with. And here is where I think this post can be most valuable.
I put it this way: "No, there's only one cryptocurrency on this blockchain. It's called STEEM. You can have it in your checking account or in your savings account. The checking account should only have STEEM in there if you are sending it to someone or selling it off since it can lose value in there. The savings account is called Steem Power and that's what give your upvotes power. The savings account retains it's value. If you want to withdraw, you can, and it will give you 1% per week. So it takes 2 years to get all your STEEM out of your savings account. The final thing you need to know is what Steem Dollars are. It's just a Dollar's worth of STEEM no matter what the price of STEEM is trading at. So if you have 50 SD in your wallet, that's the blockchain owing you 50 bucks worth of STEEM anytime you want it. If STEEM is worth 2$ then you'll get 25 STEEM when your turn in your 50 Steem Dollars. If STEEM's value is 10$ a few months from now, you'll receive 5 STEEM when you redeem your 50 Steem Dollars. It's just a way to protect you from price fluctuation. You made 50$ on your post, you get to keep 50$ it won't suddenly be worth 37$ on day because of market price fluctuation!"
So that's how I've been explaining it. There's just ONE thing: STEEM. You can have it in a checking account a savings account, or as a blockchain IOU $ amount worth of STEEM.
If they understand Convertible Notes / Convertible Debt then that makes it all that much easier, of course!
I hope this helps you guys and gals. So far I've had some pretty good success with this method.
What about you guys? What's your pitch like? Any feedback to help me improve mine will be greatly appreciated.
