I've written a number of guides that have gone into a lot of detail, linked to many resources, and attempted to cover all of the bases. I will continue to do work on those types of materials, and work to improve on the ones that I've already made. Here I'd like to cover some more general ideas that can lead people to have fulfiling experiences as bloggers on Steem.
When I got started on Steem, I was reading the book
How to Win Friends, and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.
I'm going to have to credit this book with a lot of my success here, and I hope to blog about it in more detail in the future. The part that stands out the most to me, and seems the most influential in my growth on this platform is summed up in this quote.
"You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”
I'm definitely not perfect in putting this to practice. However, to the extent that I have suceeded on Steem, I'll guess that 80% of that sucess came from my attempt to follow that advice. Additionally, that ideal is the cornerstone of every bit of advice I'm about to give.
First
If you are brand new, you'll want to make sure to read the Steemit Welcome Page. It contains a simple "Quick Start" guide, as well as "Helpful Posts from Steemit Users". This is an extremely helpful resource, and gives you the basics to get started on Steem. When you want to dig deeper, you'll have to check out the FAQ. If you want to dig really deep, you should head for Steem Whitepaper. Personally, I didn't read the whitepaper in it's entirety until I had been active on Steem for quite some time. In the meantime the Steem Blue Paper is a much easier read and gives you an overview of the Steem Ecosystem.
I spent 3 days, reading all the guides, and trying to figure as much about this place out as I could before writing my introduction post. Not saying that you have to, but there's so much to learn here, and it was mostly new to me, so I think that helped. I think the Welcome Page is the most valuable resource for learning enough to get started participating on Steem. There's plenty of time to learn all of the technical details, later.
Comments
The #1 activity you can participate in to grow your account and begin to gain traction on this platform is by leaving thoughtful comments on the blogs you read. To make this even more effective, it would help to seek out blogs that are on similar subjects as yours, this can attract those writers to come check out your blog.
The more active you are in comments, the more people are going to become familiar with your account name, and the more likely they are to check out your blog, and vote on it.
Linked above is a detailed post in response to all of the "not so great" comments we receive on steem. As well as some examples of great comments. I'll recommend you to check it out.
To put it simply here. When you comment on a post, you must respond to what the post is actually about. "Nice Post" is not a good comment. "Great article, please follow me." is not a good comment.
If we use the above idea "be interested to be interesting" you could ask questions about what was in the post. You could ask for, or offer further resources, and appreciation. If it's a work of art, you could comment on a particular feature of the art that you appreciate. You can choose some aspect of the blog, and reference it, and add further commentary. The idea is to relate to something that was in the blog, not to beg for votes or followers.
Not only are your comments on other peoples blogs more likely to be noticed than your earliest blog posts, they're more likely to get votes! That's right, as a new member of Steem, commenting a lot is the quickest way for you to grow your account, and begin getting votes.
@spiritualmax is one of the fastest growing users I know. He tries to comment 30 times a day.
Chat
The best way to make new friends, and build relationships on steem is through chat. It's hard to make a lot of progress in developing a friendship through comments. For that, chat helps a lot!
There is steemit.chat and then there are the multitude of Discord Chat Servers. The largest of these is the Minnow Support Project. That's a great place to go when you're new, to learn some of the social order behind steem, make some friends, and figure out which direction to go.
There are many more chat servers listed in that link.
You'll also want to know some etiquette for how to get along with others in chat.
Don't randomly message people you don't know. Instead spend some time in chat rooms getting to know people and try to follow along with the conversation a bit. You can ask for help understanding things, but don't just jump and ask people to look at your post. You can ask your friends to look at a post and give you suggestions, but you have to make friends first. A better way, that goes back to "be interested to be interesting", is to ask them what their steemit name is and go start looking at their blog! They're likely to want to check yours out, in return. During chat with people you don't know, it's good to be curious about them, and find out what they are doing on steem, and why they are here.
Blogging
We all have our favorite subjects that we'd like to blog about. One thing that can be difficult on steem, is there isn't a niche here for every subject. If there are bloggers who are already blogging on your favorite subjects, dive in, and make sure to follow them and develop relationships with them in their comments section.
Something I've learned that can gain you some more attention on your blogs is by blogging about people and projects that are here on on the blockchain. There are so many amazing people here! I used to do "Steemian of the Week" posts, where I showed off what my favorite authors were doing, with links to my favorite blogs of theirs, and showing off some of the things that make them special.
If you're an artist, you could make art for your favorite steemians. Creating art that's free for others to use is another good way to make friends!
It also helps if you're willing to dig deep and create excellent content. It seems like most people don't want to spend the time it takes to do really detailed deep coverage, making the posts look super nice with great formating.
You need to consider, if you want to get paid for writing, then that should reflect in the quality of the work that you are doing. Same goes for art or any type of content you create. There is really no ceiling on how much you can earn from your blogs if you are willing to take the time to build relationships, and create quality content.
It's incredible that I wrote that when I was only 1 month old on steemit. Soon I'm going to give it an overhaul and write another in depth guide like it, but a lot better, since I'm plenty more experienced on Steem these days. However, the tips and suggestions in that article still wring true today.
The most important is Patience, and Perseverance.
After going over this a few times and trying to get it ready to publish when I wake up, I already have some other ideas for something else that I need to write. Of course this is going to take some time for me to get my idea together, and chat with some other folk for feedback on how I can make the best content for all of you. Until next time ....
"You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”
How-To Steem Resources
- Welcome Page
- Welcome to Steemit. A Simple Guide to getting Started on Steem
- Comments. The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
- How to Actually Succeed as a Steemit Blogger
- Steemit FAQ
- @timcliff - The Ultimate Guide of Tips for new Steem Users
- @thecryptofiend - The Complete Steemit Etiquette Guide
- @drakos - The Secrets to Success on Steemit