If you are new to Steemit, read this and learn from my mistake!

in #steemit7 years ago

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First of all, I am far from an expert at Steemit, as my 3 week anniversary is coming up this weekend. When I look back at all the things I've learned about and from Steemit, here's how I feel.

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However, when I look at how little of the surface I have even begun to scratch, and how much more there is to learn, suddenly my feeling changes.

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One of many of the mistakes I've made, and learned from, is in regards to voting power percentage, and hopefully by sharing my experience, I can prevent others from making the same mistake. When I started, I really didn't understand the whole voting "system". To me, the number beside my name influenced the power of my votes, how much money my vote contributed to the "pot", and how much money I received from the "pot". The "voting power percentage" was an unknown variable.

Of course I wanted to make as much money as possible, and there was so much great information out there that I wanted to reward, and I began giving my up votes away like a drunken sailor giving out beads at Mardi Gras on his first shore leave.

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Then, as I was reading through the FAQ's (maybe I should have started there, but there was so much to read, and I was excited to get started!) I realized that excessive up voting could decrease my voting power. A fellow Steemian posted an article that mentioned the website https://steemstats.com which shows your voting power percentage, along with several other great statistics. This site is instrumental in monitoring your voting power percentage. My percentage was down to 32%.

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But all was not lost. Over the next few days, I began to limit my up votes, and my percentage came back up. It is my understanding, and please correct me if I'm wrong, my more knowledgable Steemians, that you can use up to 40 up votes per day before it starts to affect your voting power percentage, and it replenishes 20% each day.

The lesson I learned is that my up votes should be regarded as having the importance somewhere between my virginity and the prize you used to get in a Cracker Jack box. Don't go wild up voting each and every thing you see and every comment that is made, but also, don't be stingy. Show your appreciation of good content, kind acts, and the thoughts and ideas of others.

Steem on my friends, Steem on.

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Wow 32%. Congratulations that is almost a record for a non bot voting. The lowest I ever saw was 31% by @mindhunter who was aiming for it.

Unless you've got a lot of Steem Power it won't really matter though as the slice of the pie is already tiny. Once you've got over a 1000SP you will start to see curation rewards worth monitoring the vote power of.

The next hardfork is going to turn the voting system on its head and we're all going to have to change our voting habits again.

Keep Steeming!!

Thanks for the additional info. Even if it didn't greatly affect my minnow sized rewards, I'm a perfectionist, and hate to be at 32% of anything! lol

Have you got the vote power yet?

Currently at 95.1%. I try to keep it between 90%- 100%.

Once you have enough SP you can control your voting weight with a level bar like this.

I always vote on posts with 100% power and my vote weight is often around 80% and last week it was down to 65%. haha crazy right. and I average about $2.60 a week in curation with about 2,400sp.

Oh and I just saw this article you might like.
https://steemit.com/steem/@oaldamster/hardfork-nineteen-will-be-coming-soon-to-a-blockchain-near-you

Gonna follow you. Nice to meet ya.

That is excellent info. I appreciate you taking the time to explain it to me. I can't imagine being at 2,400sp, but right now I am just having fun gleaning information, increasing my blogging skills (I've never blogged before in my life), and enjoying meeting new and interesting people. It's like a whole new world opened up before me.

No problem, feel free to ask me anything, just leave me a comment in any of my posts and I will see it.

Sounds like we had very similar beginnings. I had been writing a blog for a couple months before I discovered steemit. I was still quite new as well to writing but i always loved.

Here's a couple posts that should explain somethings for rookies.
https://steemit.com/welcome-aboard/@solarguy/how-much-does-a-steemit-author-make-per-month-some-interesting-thoughts-for-steemit-rookies

https://steemit.com/happy-trades/@solarguy/how-i-made-over-usd4000us-in-crypto-using-only-steem-and-sbd-my-trade-experiences

ya friend.... i have upvote and follow you...
please put interest on it and possibly follow back...
welcome to steemit

Thank you, friend. Let's journey together!

I'm new to steemit and didn't realise this. Thankyou

Glad I could help. I will be having another post in the next day or so listing some very helpful fellow Steemians, prior posts of great advice for us "newbies" and websites with valuable information to help on your Steemit journey.

I didn't know about this, thanks for the info!

Your experience you’ve described helps me better understand the voting system but I am not sure, completely. Thanks a lot for the wonderful article in an easy style to read)))

This is so helpful ---Resteemed

Thank you. If even one new Steemian learns from my mistakes, they are not mistakes, but teaching tools!

Great post and info that also opens up a door for many others to put in their experience, as is already seen by the great comments added. Thank you!

Good article, thanks. Upvoted.

I just learned a lot. Thank You!!! I agree there is a lot to read here. I'm new to this all as well. It's a bit overwhelming, but if you take bites at a time it's a little easier.

Welcome, and enjoy your journey! There are many very helpful and very experienced people here who are willing to help you every step of the way. It is very refreshing.