First, Why I'm Doing This...
In the last week, I've been helping a few Steemit users who were new and/or frustrated with feeling unsuccessful on this site. The help ranged from critiques on content, formatting tips, marketing or networking suggestions, to just being connected to somebody they could talk or ask general questions. I'm sure we can all remember what it's like to be brand new to Steemit or having frustrations over our quality content seemingly go unnoticed.
It's important for users to have realistic expectations on here with external marketing tending to focus on the posts earning thousands of dollars. While this may happen (even though unlikely) for users, in my opinion the slower, more organic growth of both a following and payouts is way more reasonable. I want new and existing Steemit users to feel like they are a part of our community and stay with us, searching for that ideal win/win scenario. An example of one of those I've been excited to help and see achieve increasing success is @ziogio.
Steemprentice Mentoring Initiative
With this in mind, I'm excited to launch the Steemprentice program, a group initiative including myself and other seasoned Steemit users such as @reneenouveau (and I hope to bring in others) who donate time to mentor Steemit users who wants help in an area.
Do NOT view this as a get rich quick scenario! Reaching goals takes work and effort by the individual. We are here to 'teach others HOW to fish,' not just 'GIVE out fish.'
Mentors have limited time just like everybody else, so we are looking for mentee's that have a passion for what they do and are already working hard. Remember that mentors are doing this for free, don't spam them and please respect the time they are donating.
If you see posts by minnows stating their frustrations, please send a link of the post to @sykochica in a DM on steem.chat. I want to be able to have a mentor be able to reach out to them and potentially offer some help.
[Edit: I've made the #steemprentice channel in steemit.chat open to the public, so just join up. If there are problems I may change this in the future]
Those seeking help can fill out this short Mentee Form which I will keep up with as best as possible, but I promise a response within 48 hours maximum. You can leave a response here or DM @sykochica in steemit.chat, but I do ask all people wanting mentoring to fill the form out. (It has less than 10 questions)
We are also looking for other veteran Steemit users who would like to help with group mentoring and/or some one-on-one when necessary or wanted. Those interested in being a mentor can fill out this short Mentor Form or just send a DM in steemit.chat to @sykochica. Personally I tend to create content that are non-fiction pieces, so I have my limits of critiquing things like poetry or art. I expect there to be a need to various mentors with a wide variety of specialties to best help potential mentees.
There is a private #steemprentice channel in steemit.chat with a growing collecting various guides, putting together an expanding FAQ, and any other sort of helpful reference materials. New Steemprentice members will have to be manually added in. [EDIT: just join the channel now, it's been made public] This channel will be the hub for the mentoring initiative so everyone involved can learn together. As needed, one-on-one sessions can be setup.
Keep Smiling and Steem On!
Image Sources:
Mentoring for Success
Mentor Word Collage
[Edit: Now that there are multiple active mentors, my next steemprentice post will include updates on what we've been able to achieve (probably avg payout and/ or retention numbers) as well as how followup post payouts can be distributed to active mentors]
Thank you for donating you time to making steemit a viable user friendly platform. I am brand spanking new to this and I am pretty confused but I figure if i spend a little time on here each day it will get easier.
Absolutely!
While the steemit.chat group isn't as active as it once was, feel free to ask me (directly) any questions that come to mind if you don't get responses in there. I can be reached through a comment (like you did here,) a private message on steemit.chat (my name is also @sykochica in there,) or on discord (also named sykochica.)
While you don't have to understand a whole lot to get started, it does take a while to figure all the various intricacies out.
Great idea !!!!
Thank you!
Feel free to join if you are looking to give or receive help. Or both :)
thank you for your help to new users.. I do need your guidance and advice to grow and progress to better posts each day..
Absolutely! :)
I'm falling asleep soon but you'll be top of the list tomorrow to look at your blog, make suggestions. If you want, you can join our channel #steemprentice in steem.chat.
Keep Smiling and steem on!
It's great to see such minnow supporting projects being created. The more the better :-)
I totally agree! We have to reach out and help a lot of minnows if we want them to stay here.
Everyone has something to contribute to the community! :D
Yeah. Steemit is full of potential but it needs us to be fully utilized for minnows too :)
I agree :-)
thanks for sharing this material, I like what you posted. Thank you so much
Thank you automated reply bot! :D
I had been thinking about this for awhile and you briefly mentioned it in chat. This is awesome! :)
Thank you! Regardless of payouts to me, I really hope it's useful to others.
I know many people have been helping and mentoring, but I think it's useful for something to advertise the help out there. It seems a lot of frustrated users didn't know assistance was available or how to get it.
I just applied for being a mentor. I think this is an amazing initiative to help connect users that need help with users that have knowledge! This is what REAL social networking is!
That's awesome! Lemme get right on the form and invite for you! (I had to step away to finally eat something for the day, lol)
I love helping people. I know I'm not always the best posting comments on here or there to stand with activists protesting a great cause. I tend to connect with people offline, in the moment, genuinely trying to fulfill somebody's direct need.
I have to assume that there is development in the works to connect queued up mentors with mentees, but with user satisfaction and retention being more important than ever, I wanted to at least try to start an intermediate solution.
It can get frustrating, glad to see there is help for anyone who wants it. I just keep telling myself "patience is a virtue" its worked so far.
There is no understating the important of patience. Without it we are stuck in the impossible lottery situation of:
No one truly expects this with the lottery, but so many seem to on here.
Patience and Perseverance are sustainable. Luck is not.
Would you like to join @timbot606? See if we can help you out?
I would love to! Just worried about my work scedule, I work long hours, usually 10-11 hours a day, maybe more, so I don't have a lot of time, but depending on how its setup I may be able to show up to some of them.
It's a good mantra.
I saw your profile and I think you have a lot to tell. Why don't you join us in the steemit.chat? It could be great :)
I went in chat one day on my laptop, sadly it doesn't work so well with my tablet, but I will certainly drop in my next day off. Work ruins all the fun.
Don't stress :)
Just go to this post and you'll see our suggestions
:)
No worries! We added you to the channel and are trying to think of things that might help your posts a bit more exposure. :)
Plenty of ways outside of chat to communicate. We'll get some ideas to ya one way or another. :)
Yea, I am getting updates sent to my e-mail, chat is spinning ATM, it may load.
Once again a great initiative!!
Thank you!
Would you like to join in?
In reality were all mentors and mentees at the same time anyway :P
Sure. Knowledge exchange is what makes Steemit alot of fun.
what's your name in steem.chat?
Love this idea! runs to get help; tripping over some letters on the way; well I hope they were just letters, lol Looking for part on the help side and part on the to help side. Also had an idea where / how to offer this service in a different way that I will mention in the future. And also to / with renee.
Thank you!! I hope those were just letters too!! Rofl :P
I honestly figured most people would be in the same boat, both looking for and providing help. Definitely no issue there. :)
I'm all for ideas to make this better and/or supplement it. It's something that needs to be done and is beneficial to everybody in the long run.
I just wanna see @reneeneaveau interview a whale again! That's forever burned in my brain! lol
Yes, she needs to interview another whale!, haha
This is awesome and much needed in my opinion. Several people have given up on Steemit because they didn't get rich. Well, they fail to see the importance of building a community of like-minded people.
I honestly wish I could help as a mentor but I was just accepted as a Municipal Liaison for NaNoWriMo and it will be hard enough to volunteer there, and keep up with my own growing tribe here.
I hope you have a great response.
Maybe you might consider something like an "Adopt a Newbie" where you match a new member to a seasoned one. Just an idea :)
Oh...and I found you through steemwhales. with a name like sykochica, I had to follow you! LOL
Thank you!
I definitely love the adopt a newbie idea, I expect to see it happening in some form as people come in. I've tried to do that myself with a couple of people so far and it's very gratifying (and exhausting sometimes, in a good way.)
A big part of this, especially here at the beginning is outreach. Since we can't expect the new people or frustrated users to find this post or chat channel some focus is searching the chat rooms for 'frustrated' posts or going through the intro posts or something to find brand new people to at least let them know this is available for them.
I'm on steemwhales! Woots! I'm so tiny on here, idk how you found me on there! Lol
But thank you! That's been my gamer tag for a long time. :D
I found this post from the chatroom, so I'm going to head back over there now that I have a deeper understanding of the initiative, but I want to say its a great idea, and to thank everyone volunteering their time. Its funny, because I made a post earlier about the frustrations this initiative aims to resolve, so it couldn't have come at a more perfect time.
I'm so happy you joined us!
I couldn't agree more, something like this was needed. There are users that have been mentoring, but anyone only has so much time to give. Hopefully this collaborative mentoring approach is able to reach a lot of those needing a little assistance.
Keep Smilin and Steem On! :D
Thanks so much, I'm really excited to be a part of the initiative!
Well, while I am a little bit disheartened by my situation in regards to posting, It just made me concentrate on other things, namely translation efforts, that is helping the non-english community (Russian one, since that is the one I am a part of) to be able to have coherent posts. I also charge a little for my service, but more important is that 'translated by @xanoxt' thing, that is a part of the deal that I have them agree on.
I've noticed the upswing in followers, after the posts with that bit in the end, while not actually writing much myself.
Since Russians have a lot of people that don't speak or read English, I also joined the efforts of @rusteemitblog, that translates posts of @ned, @dantheman, and @infovore, for the Russian audience, with their blessing of course. The best thing is that they use the SBD proceeds of the posts to power up the translators, so our efforts have a return.
I feel that I had to share this, because it is also a good strategy, for adding value to Steemit indirectly, and it seems to be working. :-)
That's a fantastic idea @xanoxt! There is an absolute need for services like that! If we run across someone needing some russian translation help mind if we refer them your way? Many of us are not of use in that area. :)
More generally, I love how you were able to 'think outside the box' a bit to find a much needed niche! Have you posted your service on steemswap.com?
Nope, but I will now. Thanks for the encouragement. A bit of it I did after chatting with you. I decided against going via featured author way for now, which could have probably bring me some money, but is a bit too much effort for the previous posts. I've started saving the drafts of my posts for the future though.
Update: most likely a wrong place for that kind of ad, but to encourage people to use it I'll put it there. It is advertised by word of mouth in the Russian community though. I'll probably write a post about it too.
I'm happy to help where i could! And that's always nice, having those drafts available for when you're in the mood. No stress, just enjoyment. :)
Yea, even if not there, putting it in a post is great! I love how you're approaching everything.
I think you are very generous to offer this service to others who are struggling. For me I have found patience is key, and remind myself that even if a post earned 5 cents, I never earned anything at any other site before, so I am happy here. Still learning and growing.
Thank you! There are already a handful of mentors that have joined up. This is got to be a group effort.
You've got a great mindset that will take you a long way!!
Would you like to join us? We're in the steem.chat channel #steemprentice if you'd like :)
Hey, this is great. Similar to what I've been doing on #dolphinschool posts. I find it gets a lot of comments, and gains me some followers, but doesn't make much money, but I figure if I can't give back, my success won't last long anyway!
I'd not run across the #dolphinschool, gonna check it out.
I hear yea, I've written some stuff for minnows that I don't expect to make money on, but really want to help. I decided to take a more proactive approach to not just hope they see or read my post..so this happened. With this we can actively seek out new users or posts showing signs of frustration or giving up and actively reach out to them. I wan't them to know the offer is there regardless of it they take it :)
Feel free to join in if you'd like! We've already got about a half a dozen mentors, and the hope is let people help when they feel like it, keeping burnout to a minimum. :)
I think I've got my hands full with the few I have! LOL I've been kicking around writing platforms for about a decade, so I figure most of them out pretty quick. It will be interesting to see what this place looks like in six months.
No worries, I completely understand. :)
Yea, i can't wait to see where this goes!
@blakemiles84
I saw your form :)
Are you in steem.chat? I couldn't find your name in there to add ya to the group.
It's a very good initiative. Many new users come here with the expectation this was a "get rich quick" scheme - and it surely is for a few people, but not for the majority of users.
You'll have to invest lots of time and efforts, be networking a lot (which is so much fun, IMO), create unique content.
I'll join your channel, I'm definitely interested in seeing this initiative - and maybe I can also help a bit...
Cheers, Ines
Thank you @ines-f! :D
I was glad to see you in the channel last night and seeing you already helping out. Thank you so much for that! This is absolutely a team effort, I'd never keep up alone.
Well, that's what a community should be doing. Stand together. I remember my first visit to steemit.com and I was like "what the eff?". I've been helped a lot and found this sense of community awesome, so if I can help, I'd be glad to give something back. I also filled in the form for mentors, you have probably seen it already...
Cheers, Ines
I hear ya! It's somewhat daunting at first, I'd not have lasted with out the communities help.
Yep, saw the form, ty for that. It helps knowing people's skills to better match with needs of others. :)
I will get my application in by the end of tomorrow, though I don't know how much help I can provide. Still, I'll be happy to give what I can :)
No worries. They are mainly useful when trying to match a specific need with a mentor. Usually the questions are general...looking for feedback on content, formatting, marketing and/or networking :)
Hello @sykochica, I just stopped by to let you know that I included this post in my favourite reads on my Steemit Ramble today. I included a quote I took from you in the chat room during our chat. :) The post can be found here
That's awesome! TYVM!
I truly hope to help people with this one, any help getting the word out is very appreciated!
This sounds like a neat idea. Please have consistent standards about what amounts to "original content". Take a moment and read my blog regarding the double standard of text verses images.
Thank you! And I'll read up on your blog.
I agree on the importance of original content, whether text or images. I've actually seen some of the discussion on the image side of things recently in the abuse channel. As Steemit scales up using images with appropriate licencing and/or creating our own will only become more and more important. (Especially with the EU recently passing new copyright laws I read some about here.
With that said, right now the Steemprentice focus is more on things like specific wording (especially for non-native english speakers), appealing headlines and thumbnail photos, marketing their post (direct to certain channels), networking and building a following. While I can't argue the important of originality and correct usage, at this time I'm depending on other groups, such as steemcleaners, to monitor these types of problems. We can then work with that user to find and/or create more 'acceptable' things such as images.
So far I've not seen any issues on originality on the writing side, but I'll try to keep an eye on image usage and originality. :)
There is always something to learn.
I completely agree! I'm constantly picking up new things, it's the only way i can get better. :)
Would you like to join the steem.chat channel? Give and/or get some ideas? :)
my struggling is still on. i upvoted. i hope it is worth something
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hahahahaha，也ahyeahyeah
I made a recommendation to include integration with the SteemPrentice community as part of the 'official' welcome process for new users signing up. It is part of the latest Steemit Wish List! :)
I want in :) How do I get mentorship :)
Thank you for taking the time to help others. I have just started with Steemit and I find it incredibly overwhelming with all the new notions and info. I have joined the chat and will be following you .
Thank you for your time and effort to make steemit a user friendly platform and understandable by any new user.
Hola soy nuevo, y me gustaria obtener un poco de ayuda para hacer publicaciones
This is a great opportunity for those of us who are newbies
Hello, am very glad to have found you. My main frustration is navigation. I can find no step by step instructions.
Thanks for the article. So far I am not frustrated. Only started generating content recently. Seems to me the way to go is to constantly generate good content.
Of course a mentor would be fantastic!