That's a good point. You have to look at it long term though, those 20 votes will be worth a lot more as your minnow friends's wallets grow and price of steem increases.

Visibility is directly correlated to upvotes, the more views the more upvotes. As a minnow with a small following your posts won't get seen by many and so its a waste of time to post quality stuff, you are better off posting the same content in a comment somewhere more visible ( needs to be on topic though or could be considered spammy)
My advice is to post where you will get the more eye balls which is not on your blog if you have a small audience.