Behold My Masterpiece
Sometimes I spend hours or even days thinking about a certain subject matter to post about. Then I set about putting my thoughts down on paper and edit it maybe once or twice. After that I might add some apt photographs (usually my own personal photos) or I might add a video if I am referring to a specific football match for example. Between one thing and another, the whole endeavor will be around a half a day.
Now I enjoy writing the posts, but the hope is always to either create discussion and commentary in the comments section below your post or to attract the attention of a whale or a curation group. Unfortunately, there are times when neither find their way to your post and for the most part if they are not there within 12 to 24 hours, they simply aren't coming and your five hours of thinking, planning, writing and editing makes you $2 to $4.
Now I appreciate that there are users who make $0.01 to $0.05 for some excellent posts, as they are all but invisible in those early days on Hive. However, for more established users, like myself who have 1376 followers, posts every day and is very active in various communities, getting low engagement in the comments and a small smattering of upvotes from your reliable auto-upvoters, it can be quite discouraging.
Thank goodness for the auto-upvoters that I am lucky enough to have supporting me though, as without them, I am really unsure whether I would still be here. The community is fantastic here and I love getting to know people from all walks of life from every corner of the globe, but in all honesty, we all signed up here on Hive to make some Crypto currency, so if that bit doesn't work, it can be quite demoralising, especially when you put time and effort into your posts.
So, my question to you guys is what was your best post to get the least engagement and/or reward. Was there one in particular where you thought, wow, that was a masterpiece, I have poured my soul into this one for it to just blow past like tumbleweed. How did you feel after it and how did you pick yourself up, dust yourself down and keep on trucking?
Remembering the little guys
I try to remember as often as I can what it was like starting off here on Hive with the best will in the world, but hidden behind an invisibility shield. It takes months of engagement and effort to build up that initial following and then things start to get that little bit easier.
So, in that regard, I try to find time every month to go on a little minnow search across Hive. I find them at #Beersaturday, #ThreeTuneTuesday, #SportTalkSocial and at many other little nooks and crannies around the Hive Eco system. My vote may not be worth all that much (HP is just over 4,300) but every little helps especially for those starting off here. It does not bother me if the post is a day old or 6 days old, I will sprinkle around some upvote magic and hopefully contribute to making someone's day and I always try to drop a comment to welcome them, encourage them or congratulate them. Again, I remember how nice it was in those early days to get any engagement or upvote, so I now try to reciprocate that sense of decency and kindness.
The minnows are definitely the lifeblood and just like any business or sports team, bringing in new blood every year is essential to keep things fresh and interesting. This place would get very boring very quickly if it was the same people posting again and again and again, so I always love to see new people joining us every day and for me it is vital to make them feel welcome and valued.
Thanks a million for reading as always.
Peace out
Personally, I am like you, I love engagement. It can be intellectual, philosophical, heart-to-heart - a learning experience or simply a moment shared. So for me, that is what brightens my day most, seeing people engaging on my posts and responding to my comments on theirs. I remember what it was like to be brand new on Hive (just 11 months ago) and to feel so lost and flailing in the water... and then how nice it felt when people started reading what I was writing, commenting on my posts, and reciprocating in the effort to build relationships. So I try to help people too in the little ways that I can as a way to pay it forward too. The #heyhaveyamet tag is another great place to find new writers on Hive. And it really is great seeing new writers joining the platform all the time! Of course, it is nice to get the upvotes too, but we can't rely on whales or curation groups favouring our posts... so it is simply nice to be appreciated when we do get them. I also put many hours into my posts, especially my short stories, from conception to research, to writing, and editing. If I only did it for the financial capital, I most certainly would not still be doing it lol. But I love writing and the social capital is worth it❣️ I have connected with a few beautiful souls on this platform over the year that I have been here, and I feel truly blessed in that regard. There have been posts, especially in the early days, that earned almost nothing, that I wish I could repost now so that I could share them with more people... (wouldn't it be nice if Hive allowed posts say more than a year old to be reshared? - maybe one per month per account?) Actually, I do share some of them through Dreemport, which helps to get more eyes on my content and opens them up for engagement again. And I share new posts there too. Ask me about it if you're interested... would love to see you sharing your writing there regularly too 🤗 (@blackdaisyft shares there regularly too 😊) !ALIVE !PIZZA
Upvoted on behalf of the VYB Curation Project
Hey there, thanks for such an insightful and time consuming response. I agree actually, the more I think about it, the engagement and feedback in the comments is what I really look forward to, as even though some of the posts make a few dollars and sometimes more, that does not make much of a difference to my overall financial day-to-day, sure it is nice to have it there compounding away, but ultimately it is the friendships and interactions that keep bringing me back day after day.
I can't believe that you have only been here for 11 months, I thought you were around longer and well done on your impressive growth to date and all of those posts and comments. Thanks a million for telling me about that #heyhaveyamet tag too, as soon as I finish typing here, I am going to head over there for a look around.
That's a really good idea actually, as we all had some great content in those early days that either nobody or very few people read, so to reshare them once a month would be a great little feature in my opinion too.
Chat to you later, hope your evening is a great one.
Thanks @ablaze I truly enjoyed your post! 😊🙌 I wonder how one goes about making such suggestions !LOLZ
Just a thought, but I wonder if making a post collection could be an answer to bringing some of your older posts back into the limelight. I've never done one myself, but see them from time to time on other's pages.
There's the option in the menu on peakd to "Create a Collection of Posts", but I don't know if it exists on Hive.blog.
Oh that is an interesting idea! I will have to look into it, thank you. I thought it grouped posts forever under a new banner so to speak eg: for a serialised novelette... but worth checking @minismallholding 🙌❣️ !ALIVE !LUV !PIZZA
Hello @ablaze and @samsmith1971 😊 I consider myself still a newbie around here, but if I think in my beggining, mine was a rare ocurrence 😆... I made a good first impression at the time and even my following posts exceeded my expectation in the way they were received.
I actually met you both on my intro post 😍!
Although there's been almost 6 month since I joined, so far I have had 5 posts making less than 2,5$, 2 less than 1$... I admit one of them is my worst quality post so I think I didn't even deserved that much. But the others I still did put a good amount of effort. I understand how frustranting can be, however I have never had a long period like this so I don't know how that feels, although I can understand the disheartening.
About DreemPort it can really be a cool way to get more people to read and maybe upvote your or even newbies posts! You also get to curate other people's posts so it's a good way to making connections. As for my experience I can say I gained quite a few friends and regular upvoters for my content 😊 It's super easy and you can even gain DREEM tokens 😁
Lastly I agree with @samsmith1971, I really love engagement and just the fact to get some regular people to comment and connecting with me, even if my posts doesn't make a lot of rewards, is encouraging to me 🤗.
P.S: I only realized now the community you posted ahahaha Rant and complaning seems like an easy thing to do 😂😂😂 And very relieving, so get it all out @ablaze! We are here for you 🤗
Ah you've gotta to love Hive, my rant post has given me exactly what I was looking for in some super engagement from a bunch of legends. We should definitely organise some European get together at some stage where a bunch of us meet up and drink too much and sing songs or the like, @meesterboom said he can house around 38 of us if we go to Glasgow or there's @blanchy's 17 seater couch below in Tipperary...
Your intro post was one of the best I've seen @blackdaisyft and then you had the presence of mind to just interact with people for the following week or so and didn't rush into post 2 like most of us did, well me anyway. In doing so you built up meaningful relationships and got to know people across communities and I would say you are well known now, which is great for someone relatively new to the platform.
I must check out dreemport - what is it in a nutshell?
Awesome! I'm glad 😁 I hope that gave you motivation for you to keep going 😊
Is it possible that maybe because you have so many things going on offline that you're been feeling like it's just too much effort for the activity and engagement you've been having?
That's a pretty cool idea!! I'm sure someday we can make it happen! At a tuesday preferably, and we would do a presencial #TTT 😁🍻🍻🍻 I would love to visit Scotland eventually 😍
I'm so grateful 🙏! #TTT was the first weekly contest I joined after my intro post which brough me great meaninful friendship like yours 😁 Thank you so much for your kind words 😊
So in a nutshell, it's a platform where you can submit your posts once a day, from Monday to Friday. It can be older posts as well. The main focus is good written content, so only posting pictures without words won't pass the screning. In order for you to submit your post, first you have to curate and rank 5 random posts. We are encouraged to upvote and make a meaningful comment.
Here you have a 6 minute post that explain everything. For you to start will only take 10 minutes, it's super easy 😊
Did I summarized it right @samsmith1971 😆?
You're right actually, now that you mention it, spinning lots of plates and trying to keep everyone happy does eventually catch up with you.
To be honest I'm usually one to rant and complain much, so the fact that I did must mean I'm running on a near empty tank. The good news is we have a family holiday coming up in June when I'll be able to recharge my batteries.
Dreemport sounds amazing and thanks a million to you and @samsmith1971 for taking the time to explain it so thoroughly. I think I'll have a blast of it and see how I get on one of these days.
You're preaching to the choir sir 😆
If it would be ok for you not to post everyday, maybe it would be preferable to slow down a bit here on Hive (but not #ttt plese, keep going!!) rather than building up frustration and overwhelming yourself 😊 As you say to me, no pressure 😁
I would say it's easier said than done... But I just wanted to leave here this reflection for you to know that option is available if you choose to do so and depending on your Hive/crypto goals.
Anytime! Reach out to us if you have any trouble or questions 😊 I look forward to see your content there! 🤗
!PIZZA !ALIVE thank you for helping out with the Dreemport explanations x
!PIZZA !ALIVE and you are very welcome. Please do come and visit... I think you may decide to stick around 😉 It complements Hive really well. One thing though, if you share #TTT posts, don't share full lyrics 😉... of the songs shared... a small excerpt is fine as is the youtube performance.
Yes I will for sure, in fact I've just registered, just waiting for the verification email to come through now 😀
Yes, you did @blackdaisyft 😊
@ablaze Dreemport is an off-chain website (although it has an on-chain presence in @dreemport and @dreemsteem ) that brings together bloggers from multiple platforms to share their posts on a daily basis, Monday to Friday. It enables authors to get more eyes on their content, increases engagement and builds community. Sign-up is quick and easy. Each day that you choose to use the site, you are assigned 5 random posts that were submitted by writers the previous day, and you read them and rank them. You reject any spam or anything not meeting Dreemport guidelines eg: excessive violence, sexual content, etc that may have slipped by the Dreemport screeners. Once you have read your '5', you can submit your own post, to be curated by the public the next day. You share your posts URL in Dreemport so that people read your content on your own preferred blogging platform. You also earn Dreem tokens for curating your 5.
Dreemport also runs monthly 3-week challenges in collaboration with targeted communities on Hive to shine a light on those communities, bringing more people and engagement to those communities and simultaneously sharing the Dreemport community with them.
There is also a discord. Details in the post that Margarida shared.
You can also read this review written of Dreemport by a Dreemport newbie recently Building a better name with Dreemport
Take a read and if you have any further questions, I am more than happy to answer them 🤗
I am sure that @dreemsteem would be happy to respond to you too if you have any questions for her as the community leader.
Thank you! 😁 You gave all the details so clearly 👏👏👏
I have to check that newbie's post 🤓🤓🤓
!LOLZ well there is that little business of the big DV that might follow you around if you repost haha. It's all good, I am patient. I just think it would be nice for it to be a generally acceptable practice to allow reposting of content from say the first 3 months that someone was on the platform when their content was likely largely ignored, but it would probably be too challenging to administer to ensure that the platform didn't just get swamped with repeat posts. Just thinking out loud !LOLZ
There is definitely a greater balance to be had :-)
ROTFLLLLLL so funny😂 !LOLZ !ALIVE
That's why it's always important to remember "was it worth my time?" and act accordingly.
We are all adults, with responsibilities, and spending half a day on something that will bring 2 usd, is (pardon my bluntness), a waste of time.
Also, there is nothing worse than working for days, even weeks on a post, you finally press "publish", and then...Nothing burger...That's the actual worse, especially when you see others putting the minimal amount of effort and getting a good pay.
Anyway, that recent crash, might be the great equalizer we needed, because now everyone is making 2 USD, even the big ones, and it just feels like justice hahahha.
Everyone is a minnow now!
It's beautiful that you take the time to engage with newer and underrepresented folks. I try to do that several times a week too. I know full well the sting of being new and writing a masterpiece only to get no upvotes at all. Evenwith a rep of 66, I still get those days when a poost falls flat.
What I have found is that posting in the right community helps a lot.
Posted using Proof of Brain
Thanks for the kind words. It's always important to remember where we came from. I grew my account up from 15HP delegation and I know how hard it is to grow in those early days.
It is hard indeed but that's where there are some excellent bots that target new accounts and upvote their work. If I see anyone under a rep of 30, I immediately upvote them my maximum (unless their stuff is obscene) and try to give them a tip or two as well. Advice from my 'Elders' here has really got things flowing and my friend @minismallholding has helped me enormously during this account reboot.
The current drop in Hive is also useful to new folks, this morning, I was swapping some HBD for Hive at a rate of almost 3:1. Even a newbie with a only couple of HBD to their credit from earnings can maximise their account now, ironically, as many other folks only interested in the investment aspect of things suffer greatly.
Thanks for a great comment. Very true about the HBD rate currently, it's actually a great chance for some organic growth for people. I have 500HBD coming out of savings this evening and Ill be converting to Hive. It will be back to parity before the end of the year I reckon
I'm sure that it will equalise eventually but for HBD to Hive conversion is the way to go!
!pizza
Yes I'm confident that it will happen before the end of 2022
I've reached the point now that most of my posts get a good amount of interactions, although the occasional one doesn't, even now, which is still a disappointing as it always was. Sometimes I wonder if it's because I've covered all my bases in the post and there is nothing left to add. 🤔 But sometimes it's purely timing and it gets missed on people's feeds.
I'm also in a position where I've gathered some good support, which I always remind myself shouldn't be taken for granted. Ironically the rewards are rarely the first thing I check for in the morning when I post, it's those lovely comments I look forward to. 😁
Rewards wise we've come a long way since the Steem days and a lot more newcomers are getting support much more than when I first started. There are many more large accounts with curators doing the rounds for them. However, I have to admit that when I'm short on time I'll get posts curated, but miss commenting. I feel a bit bad about that, especially when there are no comments on it and it's a good enough post to curate.
I notice some communities have more interaction than others. I think it is down to how much the mods and admin put into them. When they make it more worthwhile to comment, that increases the comments and interaction as a whole and people find their place there and are drawn to return.
Yes, that's the same for me too, the worst are posts I spend hours on which get zero or very limited comments. Engagement and interaction is what I love to see on my posts.
Yep. Another very good point, it certainly varies from community to community.
Thanks for an excellent and engaging comment 👍
Thankfully you've gotten a hell of a lot of comments man! That's awesome, sorry for not stopping by sooner. Too many damn things going on and it's hard to keep up posting and commenting lol first world problems :D
I hear you dude, it's a little annoying when I see posts with minimal effort getting wild rewards. That's the nature of things though, some of those people get on auto voters from people that used to be incredibly active on the platform and for one reason or another they are now largely inactive. I get a little annoyed but then remember that building a stake in good times and bad times is how things go. If we can manage to power through the difficult times, when the good times come around like they usually eventually do, we are able to churn out some serious content and rewards.
Think of what that 4.3k HP will be able to do when the price comes back up to 1.50 or 2$ per Hive. You'll be in a pretty good position! You'll also have probably a decent amount more HP at that point too, so it's certainly all timing.
I know you got the good graces of Marky which was awesome and I think that has seriously helped you grow your account but what also makes it difficult is when things like that change, it gets discouraging lol I used to get some good votes from bigger accounts fairly regularly but then things happen and have fallen off a bit. It's good to have both situations occur, getting the good benefits as well as when those benefits go away for some reason. We can appreciate and work on growing what we can!
I think you're doing great man, I know I've seen way more comments on your posts than most people get and I think that's great. Eventually those turn into some good rewards, so let's keep on building together my friend!
Thanks for this quality feedback man.
Ya I hear you man, it can be hard sometimes to keep on top of everything. Just have to do our best and keep buiding as you say.
I'm delighted with all of the engagement it stirred up and after reading through all the comments, I'm seeing that I'm doing just fine. I think it stems from having those Marky upvotes for a while and then losing them that got to me a bit as well. I was thinking they were there to stay and was projecting my growth accordingly, but in hindsight I was lucky to have them as long as I did and it definitely helped me to grow.
I'm going to keep building and have 500HBD savings coming free tomorrow and plan to convert to Hive and keep 500 liquid and upgrade the rest to HP... When Hive and HBD hit parity again, I'll buy back the 500 HBD, that's my plan anyway!
This post just came in right on time. I have a lot of my posts that I spend sometimes days to put together. Hoping to get some really good reactions on them. But unfortunately, I don't get that. Sometimes I just deliberately go off hive because of the disappointments. Just like you pointed out correctly, we all came here for the crypto. And what happens when you don't even get any upvote, it is traumatizing for some. I like that you wrote this to encourage me to keep writing and always note that somehow, some people out there are watching.
Hey there friend, thanks for stopping by with your meaningful comment. I've just visited your blog and enjoyed what I read, so commented and upvoted.
Keep up the great work.
Thank you so much for your support my friend. I love your posts too. You have encouraged me to keep giving out quality contents and I certainly will always do. You just won a new follower too.
The feeling is mutual, you also just gained a new follower. I hope you had a great weekend there.
Thank you. Yea, my weekend was fantastic. And hope yours was great too?
Lots of painting!! 🎨🌞
Heh, yeah, I can always tell when my posts don't get past autovoters - they sit at the $5-$6 range.
I love getting comments and some engagement. I'm doing my best to browse through the communities I've subscribed to with the intention of finding new people as well. My biggest issue with beginning to engage, personally, is that I truly suck at small talk. It can be a challenge sometimes to find something to say!
Funnily enough I am the opposite and am king of the small talk, ha ha.
Ya it's always nice when people take the time to stop by and engage with your posts, so thanks a million for being the first to stop in here with your meaningful comment, I too am trying to find some time to find new users and often look at the comments below friends posts and click on the people I don't know and see what their most recent post or two is like.
I hear you buddy, what you are talking about happened to me too sometimes in my early years on the chain. It´s funny though because as probably most of us, I posted some of my very best material (like photos from my best travel adventures etc.) when I had just a fraction of the followers and support I have now :D :/ And yeah, some of those posts remained practically unnoticed... I don´t want to repost them though. It motivates me to collect new fresh material to post. Btw very kind of you that you support the little accounts. Whenever you find a real undervalued gem here on Hive, feel free to nominate it to my upvote giveaway that I host every Saturday, it will be my pleasure to support it ;)
@tipu curate
Hey man, thanks as always for the kind support, we just keep on going, isn't that it and as I say to be fair, the majority of my posts get to approx. $5 and some lucky ones can get to $20+ so I am also lucky as the vast majority of people outside of journalists are getting paid nothing on the web2.0 sites, so I will happily keep plugging away here and as @samsmith1971 rightly points out above, many of us come for the Crypto rewards, but stay for the friendships we make here.
I have two great contenders for your upvote giveaway, is it too late for this week or can I share now on your post?
Yeah, good points :) For posting stuff on Facebook, you get nothing but more and more annoying ads cluttering your feed. For posting stuff here on Hive, you always earn something. Yeah, it can be just a few bucks sometimes but that´s still better than nothing you get elsewhere, right? ;)
Sure, go ahead with those nominations, I will check it out...
That's it exactly, I became disillusioned with Facebook a long time ago, and Hive is one of the only places I go to online now, other than the likes of News, Weather, Crypto and Sports sites. I don't bother with any of the other social media, apart from Whatsapp for staying in touch with my friends.
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 0/45) Liquid rewards.
I had some proper corkers when I started and that was with me commenting and engaging like a mad funker. It can be a hard grind that is true. Eventually it pays off, I can almost guarantee it
Nice one Monsieur Boom, I'll keep on keeping on as they say, you must be pretty close to the magical 80 at this stage, that'll be some milestone!
I am still a while away from it. I see all these people overtaking and think I must up my game!!
Ah your game is tip top man, I always look forward to your posts - always good for a bunch of belly laughs! Your blog was steer of the year from brother @blanchy. We must get an auld session going some time in Glasgow or Ireland. Guinness, Haggis, Whiskey, Spuds and Deep fried mars bars..
Haha, I can imagine that would be a right good session!! I love everything in that list except deep fried Mars bars!!
I really appreciated your post. As a "minnow" myself (hell, who am I kidding, I'm chumm not even a minnow yet) it is refreshing to hear about people that have experienced similar things. I just found you, so I look forward to reading more of your stuff.
Posted using Proof of Brain
Thanks man, appreciate that. There is not doubt about it, it is tough at the start here, but with lots of really welcoming communities and cool people, just keep engaging, reading and commenting mindfully and you will grow just like the rest of us did.
Hello!
New users are the future, and I still consider myself a newbie. One of the things I found hard to assimilate when I started on Hive was the lack of engagement in those first posts. I came from writing on a platform where you might not get big votes from the rewards robot, but you never lacked comments, and that was encouraging. On Hive, it's not like that. And that was a big shock at the beginning. Here, we have to work hard to get some comments until we get some regular readers to engage with.
And engagement is at the core of any social platform. So the road is a bit bumpy sometimes, yes. But when you get the feedback you expect, Hive becomes a great place with multiple options. With the possibility of interacting with people from far away places, and with great initiatives like your #ttt. Cheers! :)
Hey there, what a great comment, you really get to the heart of the issue here and it is so true that hard work is required here at the start and I suppose it makes sense, as you start off with zero followers and nobody knows you are there, so 95% get no engagement on that first post and sometimes even the second, third, fourth posts. I think those who do best are those who mindfully engage with others across the communities leaving meaningful comments and get to know people that way.
I agree with this.
But the hard part for some newbies is to learn to be patient and not get frustrated dealing with resource credits when starting. Because is a paradox that engagement is indeed the key to success, but in Hive when you start the scarcity of RC doesn't allow you to comment much. However, in the end, it's all part of the learning process.
My posts that slag off Hive communities such as Splinterlands and Leo tend to get the best engagement as people can relate to it and the whales don't mind a little bit of grief........ well I hope not anyway. I remember I wrote a post on Steem called the accidental whale who became overlord of a crypto by mistake got curied and at the time that was a massive deal. It was like 50 quid. It really encouraged me to write more along the comedy side. Then with the success of Waterford Whispers here I started getting into the old satirical posts. TThey mean no harm but some day I will feel the wrath of a massive downvote I imagine so I'm squirreling as much away now in the event of this happening. 😀 P.s. I'd love a session.
Hey man, I always enjoy your posts, well those that I have gotten around to reading, always the Three Tune Tuesday ones and some others. It would be boring if everybody had the same opinions about everything, we are all big boys and girls and we don't need to see eye to eye with everyone about everything. Difference is a good thing, be it opinion, appearance or otherwise in my opinion. As humans though we seem to congregate into groups with common views, which can be echo chambers in the end. I always like to hear opinions that are different to my own, so that I can hear them and politely ignore them or use them to alter my own viewpoint.
As for Three Tune Tuesday, I have just posted my week 50 picks around an hour ago and went for a rapper from New York city called Action Bronson, I wonder have you heard of him? Check out his three tunes and let me know what you think when you get a minute. I'm looking forward to your picks this week as usual.