Hello Steemians!
Forgive me if it took too long to complete this post. It should have been uploaded days ago, but there are circumstances that are beyond my control. I have been asked countless times already on how did I achieved that 4 @curie upvotes in the span of 6 weeks. I have to be honest and frank here so please bear with me. Also, please bear with me if this post will be much longer than my normal post, as I will try to expound everything to the best of my abilities.
Before the main course of this post, I would like to mention a few disclaimers:
- After reading this post, I will not guarantee that your next post will be upvoted by @curie.
- Data and photos in this post all belong to the rightful owner. I don't have the intention to plagiarize. All credits belong to where they are due. My purpose is to simply help those who wanted to be the best in their craft.
- The claims presented here are my opinions that are based on my current understanding about how @curie functions. I don't claim that they are the absolute facts as they might be subject to my own bias or my understanding is really wrong in the first place.
- I am not the absolute authority when it comes to which post deserves a @curie upvote or not. I am not part of the @curie community either. The authority after all, belongs to the reviewers of the @curie community who I believe are competent individuals in their own chosen field.
- I don't know if I'm allowed to use #curie as my main tag, but I'll use it for easy recall and recognition.
I would like to thank the @curie community for recognizing my posts and of course, my efforts in creating those posts. It really helps me in affirming myself that I am good at something; not the best, but at least I have something that could prove my worth.
What Is Curie?
I have been mentioning @curie a lot of times already, but for those of you who don't know what @curie is all about, @curie is a curating community here on steemit. Once @curie upvotes a post, the minimum reward of that post would be about $100. Curie is also a community witness; last time I checked, it's No. 18 witness here on steemit. Yesterday, @curie released its White Paper which gives detailed explanation of how @curie functions as a community. If you're interested to get a @curie upvote, I suggest that you read the White Paper and understand every single word it contains.
If you go to @curie's blog page, it's "biography" is: Discovering exceptional content. From that phrase alone, you will have an overview of everything about @curie. That's what drives @curie forward, specifically an exceptional content that goes unnoticed.
To be noticed, upvoted, and curated by a whale is one thing, but to be upvoted by @curie is another. This is a little bit exaggerated, but for me, @curie is the Nobel Prize of steemit. That's how I look up @curie when I was still starting to do this blogger thing 4 months ago. To be honest, I said to myself that if I can just have 1 @curie upvote, I'm satisfied with whatever this is I'm doing.
Curie remains to be apolitical and unbiased in its decisions. For the sake of transparency, it publishes a weekly update that detailed the activity of the community for the week. Since the day I've known about @curie, I have been following its weekly updates and reading its announcements. I have been monitoring it for 3 months and I realized that @curie is not just passively curating. It's actually very dynamic and evolving at a faster rate than any other curating community. There are changes in the community that are the results of its continuing movement towards excellence. They have the most rigorous selection of contents that out of thousands of postings per week, only a few hundred posts are curated. And if I mean a few, it's actually less than 200.
Preparations Before Creating that "Curie-Worthy" Post
Now that I have introduced what @curie is all about, let's move on to the preparations before you create your "curie-worthy" post. I have been in steemit since September, 2017 and I got my first @curie upvote on the first week of December. In short, I prepared for my "curie-worthy" upvote for almost 3 months. From now on, take note of the sentences that are quoted for it will help you with your journey.
One (1) @curie upvote might be an accident, but to be consistently upvoted is out of strategic planning.
Let's be honest here, to be upvoted once can be disputed. There are tons of circumstances surrounding that 1 upvoted post that could explain why it was upvoted by @curie. But if you have been upvoted twice or more, it means you have passed the consistency test of @curie. That's why this post took too long, even if many people are asking me how I did it. I waited for my 4th @curie upvote to convince myself that I now have the right to write about this topic.
Follow @curie and study everything about the community.
If you haven't heard about @curie until now, you should follow @curie and study everything about that community. In that 3 months, I just observed how @curie functions. Once the weekly publication is released, which is every Sunday, I looked at everyone who has been upvoted and studied what made their post exceptional. I never upvoted then because my vote had no value. I just read every post and I was amazed by the plethora of "curie-worthy" topics, but there are topics that @curie mostly preferred.
You're all lucky because @curie released its White Paper 2 days ago and the data presented show that @curie upvoted more on art. Two of my posts that were curated belong in art category. For me, this is more than just statistics. Together with @legendarryll, we inferred that @curie really loved art. It mirrors the outlook of @curie when it comes to exceptional content. What separates art from rubbish is the amount discipline that the artist puts into his work. I would say that @curie in itself is an art and a discipline. Choosing and curating those exceptional contents is like looking for the needle in the haystack and that requires discipline.
Look for common characteristics among those being curied.
What I mean when I say "Look for common characteristics among those being curied" is to click those accounts and study their contents. This is not an exaggeration because I really clicked those accounts curated and examine their contents. I really spend time in deciphering the thoughts of the curators and the reviewers as why they thought a particular content deserves a @curie upvote. I cannot give a general formula or an all-around solution, but I can say that you should study the pattern every week.
Determine which of the categories your niche belongs.
I assumed that by now, you should have known your niche already. If not, I suggest you join @thegaillery's the Confidence Project. Everything about the project is in her blog. In that way, you should be able to determine which categories you're good at.
Together with @legendarryll and @thegaillery, we studied how to be upvoted and curated by @curie. We look at which category could we possibly be good at. We already knew @legendarryll would be in travel and photography category. He could also touch the art category. In @thegaillery's case, she's confident in writing and research. I'm a jack-of-all-trades, so I had a problem in choosing which category to focus on. I'm confident in telling my experience so I chose travel and art. By now, you should have realized which category to focus on. Before you continue on reading, review again and give a careful assessment of yourself.
Familiarize all the @curie guidelines.
Last December, @curie released the expanded guidelines that would be used to govern the selection process. For me, this is the very heart beat of @curie activity. Every curator in the community knows about the guidelines for they will use it as the basis in choosing a post that they want to submit. Before you go any further, I suggest you click that link and read the guidelines. After reading, try to memorize those guidelines and allocate one portion of your brain for storage of those information. I will not expound them here because that would take me forever to discuss one by one. Just leave a comment below if you have questions in one or more particular guidelines. I'll try to answer them based on my current understanding of the guidelines.
Before the expanded guidelines, @geekgirl (one of the community representatives of @curie), would post a call for an application for @curie curator. A post like this, would contain the necessary information on how to become a @curie curator. This is a vital source of information, not only to those who wanted to become a curator, but also to those who aspire to be curied. Why? It's because you can have the idea which post is likely to be upvoted or not, based on the opinion of a seasoned reviewer. If you wish to visit that post, pay a careful attention to the comments. There, you will get the idea of how rigorous the selection process is. I thought one post submitted was exceptional, but @geekgirl's response was OK-ish but not exceptional.
Pay attention to the curators and their curator score.
You might ask, "Why would I pay attention to the curators and their curator score?". As I've said, you should understand everything on how @curie functions. All posts in steemit have gone through the eyes of @curie curators. I don't know how they did it, but it's really true. These curators are maintaining their curator score. So, not only that they would be picky in their choices, but also, they would really prepare an arsenal of arguments before they submit your post. This goes back to the guidelines. If you want your post to be submitted by a curator, all conditions should be met. Unless your post is the exceptional of all exceptionals, then you might bend some of the rules. But if your post is just an average exceptional like mine, you better play safe and make sure you met all the conditions to be considered.
You see now why the selection process is too rigorous? It's because of the curator score that your post should overcome the first barrier; your post should convince one curator to submit it. Whether it should be accepted or rejected, is up to the reviewer, which is another layer of resistance. According to the White Paper, even one reviewer would ask a second opinion, or a voting process would be conducted. Can you imagine the deliberation process? I think that one flaw in the post would cause it to be rejected.
Look out for those featured or resteemed by @curie.
It's my next goal to be featured or resteemed by @curie. I think it's the ultimate achievement possible here on steemit. To be featured or esteemed means that your post possesses the quality of more than exceptional. It means that you go an extra mile from being exceptional, or you go higher than expected. Only a few have been resteemed by @curie. Watch out for the feature post every Monday, an initiative by @carlgnash.
Creating that "Curie-Worthy" Post
Let's say that you have completed all the necessary preparations that I mentioned, let's move on to writing the post. Here are some points to consider:
You can't afford to be lazy on steemit.
When @honeyletsgo asked me how I did it, I told her that I do this and that. She answered that she's lazy when it comes to formatting or proofreading. I frankly told her that many people would say that steemit is an easy-money scheme, but it's not. Every post takes time and effort. What more if you're trying to make an exceptional one. You really can't afford to be lazy especially if you're wanting that @curie upvote.
Sell your post or convince a curator to submit your post.
When I write a "curie-worthy" post, I always showcase what's different in my post. In this era, you don't have the most novel idea. If you can think that idea, then someone must have thought that before you. If you want to do a travel post, someone must have gone to the place before you and already told the story. If you highlight what's different in your post, then it must be what makes it exceptional. It always pay to make a research first before you dig into writing.
I'll take my 4 posts as examples:
In Existence of Art Even in Mundane Places, I packaged it that after reading, you can claim, "Who would have thought that a dull and boring sponge would harbor such beauty when magnified?".
In Kim's Quest #2: Olango Island, Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu, I went against the normal claim of bloggers who have gone to the island once; that Olango has not much to offer. Since I went to the island five times, I claimed that every barangay has something to offer and is waiting to be discovered and explored. That's what makes it unique.
In Cebu's Street Art and Where to Find Them, I claimed that blogs are limited to one street only and are obsolete, so mine is a compilation of major streets where you can find street arts in Cebu. Another thing, I claimed that street art pushes the boundary of art to another level. And the dynamics of street art alone makes my post unique and exceptional.
In Kim's Quest #2: Kandungaw Peak, Dalaguete, Cebu, I claimed that ours was a unique experience because we got there very early in the morning. Other blogs have their photos taken at high noon.
Photos do matter and equally important as the write up.
No matter how good your writing is, but your photos are blurry or taken from your backyard, your post will surely be ignored. Choose your thumbnail carefully since it will be the first to appear in you post. Old photos are also shunned. It should also first to appear in steemit. Recycled photos from your other blogs might not attract @curie, but would attract @cheetah.
Always engage and bring value to your readers.
Your post should add value to your readers in a form of information. Information that could be thought-provoking, view or perception altering, or simply mindset guiding. If that post does not impart value, people would ignore it.
Pay attention to style and formatting.
Style and formatting of your post would take more than half of the time it takes for you to complete your post. I usually spent 2/3 to 3/4 of my time beautifying my post. It's because style and formatting alone is both an art and a discipline. It's even included in the guidelines. If your post is properly laid out, you are enticing your reader to anticipate more and continue reading your post.
Proofread your post and read it again as if you're the curator.
I usually read my post 4-5 times before posting and 4-5 times after posting. This is to correct grammatical errors and eliminate off-sounding sentences. It will also give you an idea if it will be submitted or not. What will the curator think if he reads your post? Even at my level of proofreading, there are still grammatical issues in my writing. It's much better if you let someone proofread your work for you.
Note: Some of these tips could only be applied to general blog of any category except open mic, videos, or codes, but the general exceptional content should be applied to all categories.
After Posting that "Curie-Worthy" Post
Let's say you have done all the requisites to meet the @curie guidelines, here are the few things to do:
Set your expectations low and the quality of your posts high.
This will spare you from unnecessary emotional drama. I usually sleep after posting to keep me from checking and expecting if I got the upvote. I usually give it a 24-hour allowance, as stated in the guidelines.
Focus on the intrinsic reward and not on the extrinsic one.
Yes, it's true that once @curie upvotes your post, the monetary reward will go flying. But what if your post was rejected? Will you end up frustrated and will succumbed to self pity? Focus on the brighter side. Your post might be rejected because it did not qualify to one of the guidelines or the reviewers find it OK-ish, but not exceptional enough.
Once You Get Your First Curie Upvote
Well, congratulations on your biggest reward yet! If your aim is just to have one, you can stop here. But if you wish to be consistent, here are a few reminders:
Engage the comments in your post.
Once @curie upvotes your post, it will immediately catapult that post to trending posts of the same category. It will have more exposure so tons of comments are to be expected. As much as possible, reply to all of them. Replies must also be engaging and add value to the whole post. Generic thank you replies should be avoided if possible.
Think of your next post. It should have the same level of quality as the previous one or better.
Consistency is another factor to consider when you have been a candidate for a second @curie. Once they see that your post have been shitty in the past week or you have gone radio silence, most likely that your next post will be rejected even if it is exceptional.
Timing is a crucial factor.
One of the guidelines is that you should not have a pending payout in a single post that is $25 or above. If you want a post to be curied, don't post it if you still have a pending payout for a single post that is greater than $25. But if you want consistency, don't mind the payout. You can post anytime.
Show that you are evolving or striving for excellence.
If you are a specialist, your post should be better than the last. If you're a multipotentialite, show that you can excel in varied areas of interest while constantly elevating your post to the next level.
I guess that's everything I have. I have special case studies in mind, but I think it should be in a separate post. Depending on the outcome of this post, I'll probably post a @curie case study in the coming days.
Annyeong!
Kim, @ybanezkim26
Update: This post has been edited twice and proofread 4 times. If there are still grammatical issues, please don't hesitate to point them all out.