Thanks this confirms what I thought all along, that you need a lot of followers.
Either more followers means you get a lot of traffic from people's feeds or maybe it just means you've been around a while and have posted a lot and perhaps you get a lot of search engine traffic? I'm not sure but thanks for the analysis! I am also looking to examine the system and work out how to optimize my time here.
More followers definitely means more traffic. I could be wrong but I don't think the money being earned is from search engine traffic. From my understanding the money comes from upvotes and comments. The amount you receive is based on your Steem powerand the Steem Power of the person upvoting you.