In early days, weeks, months it is good to join (discord) communities though. They are often the key to find your earliest followers. How else will one get noticed.
No matter how long you plan to be here and how long you think the marathon is, networking is of utmost importance. There is no magic search service like Google which will eventually absorb the quality content and drive traffic in exchange. This is mostly the feed life.
But seeing you are active on Steemhunt... keep at it and after a while your level will increase and some rewards will be generated via it. Steemhunt is also a marathon, especially for new members. It takes a while to achieve those first levels.
thanks for the advise. I am frankly not against discord groups- I am actually a member in some of them- aside from those who have upvote for upvote or requires me to pay up to be promoted.