I spend about half my time creating content and the other half scrolling through content to find something that interests me and that I can contribute to. It's not much, but in the past two weeks my valuation here is at over $200 dollars, so I'd say it's been pretty decent.
A lot of people, including this choad here, seem to think that their content should be rewarded. Full stop. Your rewards are going to be largely due to posting the right stuff at the right time, like you said. I've been heavily involved in fiction writing, and while a couple of stories have hit sizable returns, most of them are at $10 or less. The last chapter I wrote for my scifi story wallowed at $.08. But I've been actively involved in the community and built relationships with just about every writer I can talk to, and it's been grand. I managed to win the 3rd place spot in the first #steemwriteoff competition they had.
Persistence and quality. Really, Steemit is just like every other endeavor. Keep pushing at it, and keep providing quality content.