I seem to be in a particularly disagreeing mood this afternoon, which makes this the perfect time to share a post that I wrote a few days ago (but didn't publish yet). Here goes.
We see these kind of posts and comments, begging for followers, pop up all around us lately and I don't think it is a positive thing.
It is an understandable thing though. People who just joined Steemit want to earn and they want to earn big. They will think more followers is key in this. While this is partially true, there is more nuance to this.
The follower for follower method
You have gathered a big amount of followers from all over Steemit. You've begged people to follow you through comments and direct messaging. You've joined every 'Followers train' you could find. Even after gathering 400+ followers, your posts earn under $1 almost every time. This is because, although you have many followers, they aren't particularly interested in the topics you write about. These followers have applied the same tactics as you. In that way, they have gathered a huge amount of followers aswell and in doing so, they are now also following a lot of other people. Your posts get lost in their Home feed, because there are simply too many for them to keep up with and the quality they see there isn't the best, so why should they even check it anymore? They don't upvote your content.
The hard worker and consistent good quality method
You write many posts about the topics that interest you. You enjoy writing these posts and you enjoy the discussions they spark. You don't get new followers very quickly, but the followers you gain are interested in your posts. They follow you for how you write and what you write about. Whenever they see you appear in their feed, they click your post, read your article, comment and upvote your content. You might have started out with less than $1 payout on your first articles, even though they were good quality. However, you see the payout prices rising slowly, but consistently. Your followers grow and the comments on your posts increase. You have loyal followers and are building meaningful relationships.
The nuance in the quantity vs quality in followers is not clear to everyone yet and I think it should be made clearer. I ignore most of the comments that say "I followed you, pls follow back", but I feel I could be doing more. I honestly don't have the energy or patience to reply to each and every one of them though, so when I noticed another one of these 'Follower train' posts, I decided to comment there instead.
"I think this is a bit of short-term thinking. How much are these followers worth if they don't like the topics you write about? They won't comment, they won't upvote. And on the other side, you now follow many people who write about a lot of subjects that you might not care about at all. So now your Home feed is filled with articles you don't find interesting. The people you follow for their content get lost inside this feed, so you risk missing interesting articles and they don't get the upvotes you think they deserve."
I gave my comment a 1% upvote, which is mostly enough to reach the top in these kind of posts. I'm thinking I should try to reply to more of these of posts, because in that way, I will reach more people and I will find the target audience I'm trying to reach.
What do you think? How do you handle those kind of comments?
Closing notes
Why I felt this was the perfect time to share this post? Here are a few reasons why:
Not to mention the private messages I get on Steemit.chat. And guess what! Just today I received a private message on Discord aswell. It's expanding...
Thanks for stopping by! If you've enjoy this article, try my other sites:
| Photo shop | Foodblog | Photo gallery | Twitter |
Don't forget to Upvote, Resteem and Follow!
My own image used as a header for my blog posts.
Yes yes yes, i was just thinking about this today, prompted me to ask a question in regards to unfollowing. The trend of newbies following a ton of folks to gain a huge following but when as you point out, instances after the "follow me then ill follow you" happens im sure its overwhelming to try and engage with all those youve asked to follow back.
I came across a new account where the person was following 14000+ folks... i was like how in the heck you gonna engage with even a quarter of those folks. Idk.🤔
What i do know though is Slow and steady always works in the long run. SteemIt is a new and exciting platform with great rewards and everybody trying to figure out how to benefit.
Great points you made.
Thank you for your great comment! Yeah, that sounds like this person was just trying to rebuild the New feed on his Home feed! That does not let you get to know anyone, because you'll be missing everything from everyone!
Hi @playfulfoodie
Post engagement is what all Steemians want, but some fail to realise that for people to engage with your you, they must be interested in what you are talking about.
I don't really blame people who take part in follow for follow, they don't know anything about blogging or building an audience, if some were told that they would own a blog they would probably laugh at the person who told it to them.
But @ned came and changed everything and very soon almost everyone on earth would own a blog.
This is one of the reasons i started my #blockchain-blogger series two weeks ago and since then i have seen a 50%+ growth in my follower base, and i am very sure all those people have a keen interest in what i am blogging about.
This would not be so i did follower begging.
Thanks @playfulfoodie for this post, i was considering making a post on follower begging, i will drop my next #blockchain-blogger post instead.
Resteemed
@ogochukwu
Ooh that sounds like a great initiative!
You're right, having an engaging audience is a goal we all aim for. I love to read comments from my frequent visitors, because I know they care about my blogs.
I also understand that not everyone knows how it all works. It is part of the reason why I posted this. They will not learn if no one tells them otherwise. I think our Steemit community as a whole is nice enough to educate people, so I hope they will all learn better ways of building a following in the future. That way, everyone can connect with like-minded people :-)
Thank you very much for your comment and the resteem!
This.
Thank you for saying this. I can publicly declare that I involved myself in the You Follow Me I Follow You train and it was part of fun, really.
The numbers don't count to me.
I see everyone as a human. Each one typing away, reading, and glancing through words. So it's a fun way to connect. But it quickly gets boring.
Because, like you said, that's the reason for the $1 post (for those who care). Personally, for me it is how well they react to my content is what matters.
Otherwise I have no problems with folks asking me to follow them. I do it all the time. It doesn't benefit them much, obviously. And, like me, they will learn with time.
Or through posts like this... they get to see beyond the train tactics. :)
Thank you for your great comment! We all have to figure out what works for us and what doesn't. I just hope some of these posts help others in their journey :-)
Definitely with you here! This is a nice community we have here. <3
The Follower count doesn't make you earn any more money, it just makes you look really dumb when your post gets 2 upvotes but you have around 1000 followers. Followers hat don't upvote are worse then no followers at all.
Exactly my point, thank you! :-)
This post received a 8% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @steemchiller! For more information, click here!
If my followers would vote(nah doesn't matter.)
I think the followers who follow you for your posts are still more likely to vote than the other kind of followers.
Speaking for myself though, I'm already following too many people, so I don't notice every good post my favorite authors share :-(
We are still only in Beta ofcourse, but that's one of the problems i have to go through all the material and love to see new stuff from new people.
i wonder, i wonder!
Yes exactly! I think we really need more filtering options, before we should even want to go viral.
I agree. It is tough to find things sometimes. I feel like there is a lot I am missing, but I'm just getting started so that may be just me.
I think it's very confusing for new people to see some ordinary posts earn alot of money and get tons of upvotes. There are also alot of schemes to add followers, buy upvotes, and get noticed by these "whales" that have much weight.
For new joiners to the community it seems like you have to work at getting noticed so I don't know if it's not too judgemental to question their methods of trying to be successful, those methods may evolve over time.
Also, some of us write on a variety of topics so would naturally gain a variety of followers. I'll follow you because I like food and I enjoy analysis of how the steem community operates.
Thank you very much for your comment. I agree with you that it might be very confusing. When I first joined, Steemit was quite confusing for me aswell. All I did was post, upvote and comment and ignore most 'About Steemit' posts, because there was so much to learn. The extra knowledge of the inner workings of Steemit comes with time and I hope this is the same for all of our new members aswell. Atleast those patient enough to stick it out.
I did not write this post to make newcomers feel bad, I wrote it to make a point and to hopefully educate new members. The copy/paste comments in which people beg for followers (without even reading the article) are not only annoying to many people, they are also harmful for the people writing them. There is not only a risk of getting ignored, but people can also flag (downvote) them, which harms their reputation.
I sometimes reply to a private message to explain this to them, but in all honestly, I don't feel like doing that a lot. This post is easier for me, because it can be read by everyone.
I'm learning a lot from just reading the comments. Thank you!
You are right.
It does not matter the number of followers you have, what matters is the rich content of your posts.
Exactly! I know it takes a long time to build up a meaningful following and it can get frustrating sometimes, but it'll pay off in the long run and you'll enjoy the platform loads more that way :-)
Yh.
Upvoted!
Thank you :-)
Excellent post! There is no quick success :))
Exactly! Thank you very much :-)
Well said.
I'll follow you if you follow me (just kidding 8-).
Oh my gosh! Let me click that follow button right now!
Oh wait... Unfollow? That wasn't supposed to happen...
Nothing bad happened! I assure you! No @ocrdu's were harmed in the making of this comment.
Phew.
Usually I just reply a thank you and leave it at that hahaha! Unless their blog is something I'm genuinely interesting in of course :)
I am of the nasty kind of people who does the complete opposite of what people ask, if they ask me something I don't agree with or find inappropriate. So this behaviour towards me assures them I will not check out their profile (except maybe to check out how good their copy/paste skills are).
Glad it is not me only - i wrote about this over a week ago, the typical spam influx when people hop on a new platform where rewards / money is mentioned to them. I personally also sometimes ask them similar to you - if they reply and you see thy got the message and improve behaviour all fine but most won't - I never used the down vote button yet - i certainly will soon if it goes worse. The other option - MUTE these guys but in the sense of ur community it is better to down vote them after an educational try.
Yeah, there's really not a perfect fix, besides trying to educate people. I don't like to downvote, because Steemit is being looked at as if it's just a social media and in that regard, I can understand people expected upvotes for sharing a simple cat picture or a video. They might just not know better.
Muting is an option, but that doesn't help the community as a whole. Commenting on every post like that would be a day job though, so let's just hope these articles we write sometimes will help a bit.
Yeah exactly my words - some are just so ridiculous copy and paste a comment under 100s of posts
I think I would just flag such comments. If just enough people would flag those things, would that not make it a little better?
After all it's nothing more than spam no? And spam must be flagged!!
Peace out Sister and new Followee (yes everybody is a brother or sister to me)
I definitely understand the appeal, but with many people saying 'Why post on Facebook if you can earn money by doing the same thing on Steemit', people will see this as its equal, meaning a simple social media site where they can post cat memes for 'likes'.
I think we should try to educate first, tell them it doesn't really work like that here. If after that, they continue doing so, there's always flagging as a plan B :-)
Great post! Please follow back! I'm just kidding... ^^ I've never added one of these young blood sucking vampires. I love your articles, they always contain so true and honest thoughts. Have a nice weekend with many positive inspirations ;)
Thank you! No, I haven't either, but I do feel that some of them really just don't know better yet (doesn't go for everyone I'm sure).
I'm so happy to hear you like my articles! I hope you have a great weekend :D
puedo republicarlo en español? esta muy interesante
Can I republish it in Spanish? It is very interesting
Sure, not a problem! I would ask you to mention it came from me in your post though, but I'm sure I didn't have to say that :-)
Thank you, it's more than clear that the mensionare: D
I agree with you.
At first I also thought I would need many followers. But then I saw that most of the posts did not interest me. And the interesting contributions go under.
And so I started to unfollow some people.
I think many new members want to build something quickly. But they do not know what that will be.
I am happier with a few, who like my contributions, than 1000 followers, which my contributions do not look at.
Sorry for bad english ^^
Thank you so much for sharing your experience! That is exactly why I wrote this post, because I think it might help people understand that it might not be the best thing to have a huge following in that way.
Your English is fine!
I hope you are right!
But I think most people don´t want to understand.
They are blind and deaf.
Blinded by the money. And deaf for true words.
But i hope you are right and i am wrong!
Wish you a nice day! :)
The beauty of it is, the people who don't want to understand (or don't care) probably won't make it very far here :-)
I agree, but we will see. Maybe the take over .. Haha... i just kidding :D
I cannot agree more with you @playfulfoodie!
I joined Steemit very recently but I have also had that feeling...
Thank you. It always makes me glad to see new members who are above the begging for followers thing!
Im really glad you commented on my intro as I was not sure how to go about building my profile, I certainly didn't want to get stuck in the I'll follow you if etc... seems a lot like network marketing stacking to me. SO I will write about stuff I love, be creative and whatever happens, happens.
Aww thank you for this, I'm glad my article was useful for you. Yes, there is a lot of networking involved here. The best advice I can give you is treat your posts like you're on a blogging platform (more substance than a Facebook post) and treat your social activities like you're on social media (lots of networking).
Now this is a post I can get behind. Only follow people who post things you like, and never beg for followers. The most that will get you usually is a once in a while up-vote or so from them. Your post spreads a much needed message to people. Not only does it make you seem desperate, but most of the time it will turn users away from your content in disapproval. Thank you sharing this much needed message. I am fairly new here, but the amount of times i see this happening is ridiculous.
Thank you very much, I'm glad you agree with me. Yes, it has been happening a lot lately, due to the big amount of new members. I think it'll be harmful for the platform's image if this keeps on going. Many serious bloggers might be put off by the idea of a platform filled with beggars.
Yeah, well what can you do? Ultimately those people just see this as a way to make a quick dollar. They don't seem to understand that only by putting time and passion into this and talking about things you truly love will give you any success.
Yeah, I guess we'll have to live with this, especially if we hope to go viral one day, it'll be pretty unavoidable. I think we would need some extra filtering options to sift through the garbage and find the gems :-)
Honestly, I see a big future for steem so I have to agree there. This is going to be a playground I'll enjoy working on for quite some time.
Hi @playfulfoodie, your comment on @acidyo's blog caught my attention and here I am. Well I am that quintessential newbie here who is yet to post an introduction and your description fits well. This blog changed my perspective totally about the follow me - I follow you deal here in steemit. Thanks to you I am steering clear of it even before I post my first blog ever here. I am a story teller, a mariner, a biker, a bookworm and a philosopher with a weird sense of humor. I see that your field of interest are food, photography and games towards which my interests are a bit mild. I won't ask you to follow me (you know the reason now) but do check out my blog and leave back your thoughts. Trust me, it matters to get feedback from an experienced blogger like you. Btw I have never blogged in my life and here I am to try it out and make some money, honestly :). Ciao.
Hi there @topdog! Welcome to Steemit! Thank you for your comment, I'm glad you found my post useful. Before Steemit, I had just started with my own food/gaming blog on Wordpress, but that's about all the experience I had with blogging. I now spend most of my time on Steemit, because I really like the community here and I didn't limit myself to just two topics. Sure, I have three major interest areas, but I allow myself to stray from those. It really helps me to become a better writer.
I am going to follow you, because I enjoy actual conversations and I liked your comment. I'm also curious about your weird sense of humor and story telling, so I want to check out some of your future blogs :-)
Thanks @playfulfoodie, I am delighted to have your back., I cook a bit. I live with my dad and my mom is no more. So I am the chef at home. Will introduce some south Indian delicacies to you sometime. I always watch this TV program Man Vs Child in fyi TV and the little adorable chef estie (she started competitive cooking at the age of 7 and is considered as a prodigy) is my favorite chef. I am that angel's fan and my bucket list is to eat at her restaurant in the United states, some day. She acknowledged me on her FB page and I was on cloud 9. Check out chef estie kung on YouTube :)
Oh my gosh, she look adorable! I can't check Youtube right now, but I'll definitely check it out later!
Being a newbie myself, i'm glad you were one of the first i followed! I'm the type of blogger that writes what comes up in my mind but i won't ever be asking for followers! I'm always learning though! Usefull post!
Thank you very much! I think you're a great addition to our little Steemit family! I really enjoy your posts and you take the time to talk aswell :D
Thanks @playfulfoodie! I know my posts aren't always that meaningful but i enjoy the random writing and freedom this platform gives you! I always enjoy your posts!
Yep, Discord is going to get all jammed up soon, too, with the kinds of comments that swarmed over steemit.chat. It's better to have supporter than followers -- people that will visit regularlly, comment and upvote. We may grow more slowly, but it's more real. I pretty much ignore any follow-for-follow posts I get.
Definitely, I'm actually kind of worried about the Discord thing. It's not the place I want to receive this spam, because I actually use it for other purposes besides Steemit. We'll see how that works out...
Time will tell, for sure.
This is a really helpful blog for me just starting out. It gave me a lot to think about moving forward. I really appreciate it.
Ooh, thank you for telling me this! I'm so glad to hear you found it useful :-)
I totally agree with you here. You must build up a following slowly with like minded people, there are no shortcuts to success. I continue to post low value posts but am proud of them so keep posting. I love more than anything to communicate with others through their posts and have made some interesting friends I feel. That is the bonus of Steemit, one day I hope, I will get some recognition for my posts, but I will feel that I have earned it. Great thought provoking post. X
Aww, that as an awesome way of looking at it and I sure hope more people will feel like that. It's how you will manage to outlive all the money seekers here!
Thank you so much, I'm glad you like the post :-)
Thank you. I firmly believe this. Your post was exactly how I feel. You are a 'star'! X
Aww thank you so much, that's so sweet :-)
You have made me think about followers. Now instead of just blindly following after they have followed me, I now check out their work. One chap, a very 'newbie' posted for followers to stick together and build up a quick following that way. I linked the reply to your post and am not following yet! Another has not even posted yet, just a few comments.....come on, do some work for your followers. X
Exactly! I don't automatically follow people who follow me, because I don't think it does justice to the people I do follow. I follow those I find interesting, either because of their posts, or the conversations I have with them. I hope my followers had the same reasons for following me :-)
Well I certainly have. I did not know you existed until I found your resteemed post. So glad I did. X
This post is really very funny.
Double standards here.
Your post also "begs attention"
When your write
"Don't forget to Upvote, Resteem and Follow! "
At the end of your post.
Congrats ! This proves you have no right to lecture others on this topic.
Circus going on here.
Very observant. I write that on my own post, which people have clicked, because they were interested in its contents. That comment will only be read by people who actually made it all the way to the end of my post.
I also post a link to my posts in several chat channels that have the sole purpose of promoting your content.
I do not, however, go around linking my post in private chats to random people or beg for followers on random people's posts.
Do you understand there's a difference there?
Its the same behavior of *seeking attention.
Your style to seek attention is different from the newbies.
That is all.
Okay, so you're saying that seeking attention in its own is bad? That can be your opinion and that is okay, but I do not state that all attention seeking is bad perse.
We are all attention seeking when we share a new blog post here on Steemit. We are all attention seeking when we write a comment.
I agree with the above no doubt :)
I was only talking of double standards to begin with.
I understand. I just feel that there's a big difference between asking for something in your own blog post, compared to spamming a copy/paste message on 100+ articles without reading it, or linking your article uninvited in private messages.
Thats spam for sure.. I agree.
My point is that dont offend the newbies..they will make mistakes and learn on their own over time.
Steemit is barely 180k users right now.
These kind of articles could still be OK at 1 Million users and with a softer tone.. and probably should go in the "Steemit Help" section under the subheading "Do's and Don'ts"
Well I think there is a difference... On one hand you got the comments, just begging for followers with no addition to the discussion/question/whateveritis... But if you first write something, putting some of your time in it, I don't think it is wrong ending the post with a polite question to upvote or follow...
But that is my 2 cents
Simply writing follow is still ok.
Follow, upvote and resteem is royal begging.
Money makes people do weird things.
I imagine Steemit as a multi-pocket community with like minded people coalescing around topics they have a genuine passion. For those only interested in gaining followers they'll find a long list that fall into suite, "misplaced ambition to has a destination which may not be desired or expected".
To tag a phrase from my post: https://steemit.com/life/@anthony160/intrigued
@playfulfoodie, I really enjoyed your thoughtful well written post.
Thank you so much :-)
Yes .... but ... I've made a post this afternoon about the state of photography on this site. What I've observed is that the most earning, most voted, top posts in photography in many instances are some truly sh*tty pictures. So the whole follower thing is actually promoted very much here. Makes me sad :(
see my post: https://steemit.com/steemit/@divyne/first-rant-photography-on-steemit-photos-are-meant-to-be-looked-at
You are completely right about this. The most popular (or rich) people on this site have a huge following and they gain a massive amount of upvotes, no matter what quality (or lack thereof) they post. The only way you're going to consistently earn well here is to build yourself up a massive following aswell and that isn't easy. I do still stand behind my idea that 'follower for follower' does not help in this regard.
Example:
I could do the 'follow for follow' thing with many sports writers, but I don't care about sports at all, so though they now have me as a follower, I will not upvote any of their sports posts, because I don't care about them.
Trending and Hot can be very depressing pages to look at. I'm not sure what we can really do about it, other than stay true to ourselves and upvote content we really like.
The next update (Hardfork 19) might help a bit though, to even out rewards. We'll see how that works out in the coming month.
I just wish there was an easy way to find the good photographers and not the popular ones :) But hey I'm new I'll figure it out.
Yeah, I haven't found a great way for it yet, besides checking out the New feed (filter on Photography on the right by the way). You could also follow the people hosting photo contests, like @jamtaylor. You could check out his selection of winners to find a few good photographers.
All senior members of Steemit are making posts after post criticizing the posting styles or usage behavior of new steemians.
You are destroying the Steemit Community.
Offended new users, will leave Steemit and never return.
Also this kind of pin pointing never happens on other Social Media platforms.
I've never seen Steemit as simply a social media platform. I feel it is a combination with a blogging platform, because the contents being shared and written are of a higher standard and also, generally, a lot longer than a swift social media post.
How have I offended new users by writing this post? I am talking about what I see happening and I am telling people what, in my opinion, is a better way of having a more dedicated following.
Please tell me, what did I write to offend you, because that was not my intention.
"I am talking about what I see happening and I am telling people what, in my opinion, is a better way of having a more dedicated following."
Why have you asssumed your way of increasing following and upvotes is better than that of the newbies?
Based on your Reputation and Steem Power?
And what makes you think a critiqe post of yours is a good blog post in the first place and what newbies or other senior members will like and agree with.
What offends me is the attitude of senior members. They are all trying to regulate newbies behavior.
Steemit is decentralized and uncensored. Senior members are acting the opposite.
A senior member like you should post something worthwhile and positive.
I am mainly talking about this, because of my experiences here so far. Because of what I've seen. If you disagree with me, please tell me why you think their ways are better. What have you seen that differes from what I've seen?
Where did I state that I think this is a good post? I post whatever the heck I want to write about on my blog. The people reading it (or ignoring it) can make up their own minds on whether or not this is a good post. And because I have never pretended to be someone I'm not, at the very least my own followers will generally know what to expect from me when clicking this post.
I'm sorry, but I do not owe you some kind of self-censorship, because my opinion might not be shared by every single person on the platform.
I posted this, because I feel that it might help explain to some new members why they haven't gotten a lot of meaningful engagement on their blog posts. Because I know not everyone is equally experienced in blogging and building up a following.
I do feel this post is worthwhile and I completely respect you disagreeing with me, but I write about what's on my mind, and this was it. If you do not like the way my mind works, I will completely understand if you do not read my future posts.
Thats a good response :)
Well... you of course have the right to write whatever you want. I just want to say that you might think these posts will help newbies. I'd say these kind of posts will back-fire.
There is actually no need to make a post about it.. tell this to a newbie when "He asks for Help"
Unwanted help and advice is practically of no use.
*just my opinion (It matters and does not matter, both at the same time)
Thank you. I have to agree with you that posts like these could backfire, but I think it really depends on the writing style. Did you think my post was too agressive towards new members? I was going for educational/informative and admittedly, also a bit of an opinion piece. I always let my opinions shine through a bit in my articles.
Anyway, I think not all newbies are aware of doing anything 'wrong' and with 'wrong', I mean potentially harmful for their own reputation. People do talk about flagging these kind of 'spam' comments, which is quite harmful to new accounts.
Reading advice from older members might help them re-think their strategy.
I do want to hear people's opinion, otherwise I wouldn't post my articles.
Besides, I suck at discussions, so you're helping me learn here ;-)
Lol... Even I had no idea I could engage in a long discussion like this.
steemit is becoming even more popular, the word is out "you can make money on steemit by just posting things" . i see some post and they are just outright ridiculous.
The quality of posts greatly vary and the payouts aren't always based on quality, but also on popularity. I think "you can make money on steemit by just posting things" is not a great message to send into the word about Steemit, because it gives people certain expectations. And although there is a lot of 'Social Media'-ish about the platform, naming it that draws lower standards to the posts being shared I think. If that makes sense at all.
And many people who begging for followers by this way, they don't even read.
Exactly, while most people would very much like meaningful engagement on their posts.
You Made a lot of sense
Thank you very much, I'm happy to hear that :-)
Quality of followers over quantity every single time.
Agreed! Thanks for your comment :-)