Yesterday I published an article titled, Conor McGregor: The Greatest Show on Earth. I was very happy with it, but after 16 hours spent floundering on Steemit with under $1 in Steem rewards, I realized part of the problem: it's a terrible title for Steemit. Now, I obviously can't rule out the possibility that it's simply not a good article, whether specifically for Steemit or just period. But I'm pretty sure the new title, "How to Become a Champion: Conor McGregor," is more appropriate to the medium. Steemit is a new platform and people seem attracted to the hope and aspirational nature of it.
Steemit feels like an opportunity to redefine ourselves, improve ourselves, and improve the world. For that reason "How to" articles seem to do better, especially when they are related specifically to Steemit. I played with the idea of naming the article, "How to Become a Champion Steemit Creator," but I felt that this was a tad disingenuous. I do believe that studying high performers in any field always provides incredible value, including to people looking to create better content that gets better traction. However that parallel isn't necessarily obvious enough in that specific article and I do not want to risk leaving the reader feeling as if they have been mislead.
That being said, I still think the new title could do well, but I can't help feeling that as an older post it is now at a disadvantage. The odds of it being seen are lower and there's nothing I can do about that.
That's why I wish there were some way to spend Steem or Steem Power to goose the article and attempt to regain some traction. I don't see any reason why this should not be possible.
It's not "unfair" for me to spend the Steem I have earned creating valuable content (content that did earn a lot of Steem) to attempt to get some of my lesser known stuff in front of more eyes. If I'm wrong and the content isn't valuable, then the only person I'm hurting is myself. To take this specific example, I would gladly spend $10 worth of Steem to test out my new title. If the current revenue from the article ($1.68) is a strong indicator of the article's "real" value, then I'd likely lose over $8 from the transaction. Which is fine by me. I should be penalized for attempting to boost bad content. But at the same time, I should be rewarded for creating good content, even if I make the mistake of giving it a bad title or (as another example) publishing before it is quite "ready."
I believe the importance of this cannot be overstated. High quality content is the key to Steemit. People may be drawn to the idea of getting paid to participate in a social network, but if the content isn't any good no one will feel the need to visit the site. But let's be honest. Right now the best content creators are not on Steemit and they won't be until it is a more attractive option than their current platforms. Where Steemit can differentiate itself (and to a certain extent already does) is in its ability to enable you to modify your content and continue to make money off of it.
I will often post an article before it is "perfect" just to get it out there to see how it is received. If it gets immediate attention, that usually tells me that at least the title is good, so I'll go back into the body of the post and refine it some more. I'll correct any spelling and grammatical errors I might have missed, organize it a bit better, remove any redundant text or elaborate on any points that might have been insufficiently fleshed out. That way the post actually gets better the more people read it, creating a virtuous feedback loop.
Giving users the ability to enhance this effect by boosting their posts with Steem could be a unique value proposition for content creators that Steemit could offer over the competition. By enabling Steemians to A-B test and refine our content we would be better able to compete with the "professionals" using other, more mature, platforms.
as far as I remember @ned said in an interview that this is planned
Cool, thanks
I understand your point and agree that you shouldnt be penalized for writing good content with a bad title. On the other hand, it does put brand new users at a large disadvantage over more established ones, as they clearly wont have the STEEM to spend on boosting lowly rated posts. I wonder if there might be a compromise?
Fair point. Though I would counter by saying that new users being disadvantaged is equal to old users being advantaged. It seems obvious to me that old users should have an advantage. The advantage should be fair, but I don't think most people (for example) would take kindly to a campaign to "remove advantage from early adopters." A big part of the whole reason we are using this platform now as opposed to later is because we believe that doing so will provide us with an advantage.
I would add to @andrarchy's comment that a new user does have the ability to buy STEEM through BTC and can then use that to boost their posts. So while they would likely not have any STEEM from posts, they still would have the ability to purchase it with outside funds and boost posts that way. This would also have the effect of bringing outside investment into Steemit.
A new user who is unfamiliar with Steemit [but very familiar with Facebook boosting posts] asked if there was any plans to bring this to Steemit — the ability to spend money to get more reach.
I suppose you could have a 'boostit' account which you top up with a lot of Steem, making your vote count for more, and then use that boostit account to vote for the post you want to boost? Would that work at all?
Hmm, good thinking
Great article. I actually found you because I was searching on Youtube for Steem. Your Tesla video brought me here. I see nothing wrong with allowing people to use Steem to pump up old articles. It is just another use case for the currency and a cool functionality for the site. This article reminds me of a question of mine that still has not been answered for me properly (I keep getting different answers). CURRENTLY can old posts (over a day old) still earn Steem Dollars? Thanks and here is my latest: https://steemit.com/steemit/@bitcoinmeister/video-from-january-where-i-recommend-that-twitter-incorporate-a-cryptocurrency-system-into-their-platform-and-where-i-describe
This is a great idea!
I definitely ask myself this same question. I think there should be a downvote feature as well as upvote.