The trick is to:
- Vote early enough before the bigger votes come in.
- Not so early to the point you burn most of your rewards.
The optimal time is at the 5-minute mark. However, many people would forgo some of the curation by voting earlier in hopes that the boost from bigger votes would offset the burned portion.
You'll find many people shotgun their votes to maximize curation.
The problem with this approach is that there is no curation to speak of. It's people blindly voting on posts that tend to have sustantial votes.
Another problem is curation initiatives with large HP are reluctant to vote on posts that already have a few dollars on them.
In terms of percentage return, it's easier to have a higher APR when you have less HP. The more HP you have, the harder it is to keep those percentage points up.
You may try voting for yourself instead, but that may have undesirable consequences when done in excess.