I'm not sure newer users should worry too much about curation. Rewards from that are likely to be cents a week even with 500 SP. Better to give your vote to content you want to support anyway. I think some of the big earners do even better as minnows think they will gain something by voting for them. Support fellow minnows and make good comments where you can. A good comment can make a good amount. Of course bad comments can get you flagged.
I think the main thing is to make Steemit fun for yourself. Follow people who share your interests and then there's always something you might like in your feed. I rarely even look at the trending page.
Just my humble opinion
Great advice! Thanks for your contribution
“I think the main thing is to make Steemit fun for yourself.” -steevc 2018
Steemit is entirely what you make of it. This will be so much easier when official community tools emerge, but it can certainly be put into practice already.
I didn't make much in the early days. If it hadn't been fun I would have given up
I agree. Make it fun. Steemit has serious long-form fiction writers, crypto investors, musicians, jokesters, poets...all sorts of different people producing all types of different content.
I replied to @damp with a link to my contest, but there are soooo many with so many different themes that you can probably find something that fits your tastes.