My Week on SteemFollower - the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
As a fresh account on Steemit and a certifiable minnow, it's difficult to get attention. Even producing quality, original content on a consistent basis, building an audience takes time and diligence. There's no getting around that - hard work is the lifeblood of a successful venture, after all.
But it's only human to look for a slight advantage over the competition, and to that end, I came across SteemFollower. SteemFollower isn't a bot - it's effectively a trading platform that connects you with posts to upvote and accounts to follow, and in turn, promises that your account will receive the same amount of follows and upvotes as you've given.
Definitely a novel concept! If you wanna give it a shot, check it out here: https://steemfollower.com/?r=3673
That being said, SteemFollower has pros as well as cons, and I feel that new users should be aware of all aspects of the platform as opposed to viewing it through rose-colored glasses. Let's get started!
The Pros
- SteemFollower definitely gets you more follows and upvotes than you would organically. This is indisputable. If you vote on the platform, you will be upvoted in kind. If you follow, you'll be followed back. Plain and simple. Here is a shot of my feed before and after joining SteemFollower - below the red line is before, above is after:
- By extension, you're also earning more for your posts. More upvotes, more eyeballs, more chance that a high-value account will be upvoting your content. As you can see, my pre-SteemFollower posts earned either nothing or mere pennies. Afterwards, 10 to 20 cents was far more common, with one post even earning over $5!
The Cons
- SteemFollowers seem even less likely to actually read your content than those on Steemit proper. For example, my latest post has well over 50 upvotes, but just over 10 views! If you care less about Steem rewards and more about building a genuine readership, SteemFollower may present issues. Evidence of this:
- The followers you receive on SteemFollowers aren't necessarily of the highest quality. Because people are incentivized to follow accounts, many do so simply to receive a follow-back. Furthermore, many of the accounts I've been followed by on SteemFollower are blatant copypasta accounts, accounts producing very poor content, or accounts that are clearly not interested in my content. That's not to say this is true of everyone on SteemFollower! I have followed and been followed by many users who share mutual interests that I probably wouldn't have found otherwise.
- Using SteemFollower is also quite tedious - it's also very easy to go overboard with voting and tank your voting power, and thus, curation rewards over time, so be sure to show some restraint and upvote only exceptional content!
While my first week on SteemFollower has been a mixed bag, I do think the service provides a lot of value, especially to new accounts like myself. Is it frustrating to see a post receive so many upvotes, yet no one has actually read it? Certainly! But I've also made plenty of great contacts on the platform from people who are genuinely interested in my content and who produce great articles themselves. I'm going to continue using SteemFollower for the foreseeable future and will continue to give updates on how it goes.
Again, if you're interested in trying SteemFollower out, give it a shot here: https://steemfollower.com/?r=3673
And as always, remember to upvote, resteem, and follow if you like this content and check us out at CryptoHero.info for our latest podcasts and articles! Until next time ;)
I use to wonder why a persob would have so many upvotes and less amount of views. Now I know. I just started using steemfollower and I hope it gives results. I do like meeting and chatting with people and I hope the service does not curve that. Actually on discord it allows me to chat with other members so that can be avoided.
Thanks for your info! I just started on steemfollower and your post is very helpful. As for people upvoting and not reading, I get the same thing all the time, votes but very few actual views so this is no longer a big deal for me. I have almost 900 followers and average upvotes 7 to 9 and the occasional resteem. So giving this a try before I start promoting my referral link. Resteemed your post so others can evaluate the pros and cons for themselves.
I'm glad you found value in the post, @thethreehugs! I suppose Steemit is just like any other blog - where the "bounce rate" is quite high but a handful of people stick around to read the content.
Thanks for the resteem, you've got a new follower :P Congratulations on your success on Steemit, 900 followers is quite the achievement!
Thanks my friend. It getting to know people like yourself is what gives me joy and a sense of accomplishment. I would rather have quality and caring anyday over quantities. And followers, no I'd rather have leaders i can learn from that show their presence and connect on a personal level than a million follows. We are the power behind the steem!! The crypto is just a thank you because you gave my life value. And sources way of sending you the resources you need to to step fully into your chosen path. Steemit is an open portal for all to awaken to their true authentic self. It also teaches us what we can tolerate or cannot tolerate, it holds us accountable and it encourages us to expand our gifts and talents and gives an audience to be acknowledged and to share our growth and progress, vent our daily frustrations without judgement or bias yet being able to call out the injustices. It forces us to go within and seek what is in our hearts. It connects us to the whole without the constant interference of government, secret societies and the ones who think they are in power. And the very ones who seek to hold us down, some have already joined..they too will awaken and learn and release. It is like The field of Dreams, build it and they will come!! Put be a button on here where I can use my USA debit card to buy steem and that will be all the crpto I will ever need. Heck use to spend $500 a month at casinos in the mainland. Won some, lose some. My concern is doing my part to reverse all the wrongs done to the human race and the bastardization of our planet. If I can bring a little beauty, laughter, tears, compassion, love and even anger and disgust to someones lonely confused scared life, then that is my reward. Everyone is here for their own reasons and the ones that stay are getting their needs met. Its tough in the beginning but then they realize, they cannot do this alone and reach out for help. Find out what their true needs are and then you help fill those needs the best you can. If you can't help, someone will come along with just the encouragement or challenge they need. That is the diversity of this community. We learn to give and we learn to receive and we learn not to judge..simply offer our perspective and let the receiver decide if it is worthy to them.
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There is alot of spam here too, so hard to find anything good to read.
Too true, @tmxpro. Steemit is a promising platform but is definitely still in beta form. I really wish there were more options to customize what one sees in their feed, it'd go a long way in dealing with spam.
Yeah you learned how to be a dick and spam your referral link so little fish can catch it.
That's not exactlly the way to get ahead here on steemit my dear fellow steemian.
Be true.
If you're really interested in making free publicity to SF just link them to the actual link without your referral.
If you do post it, be a pal and specify so that people can know you get a percentage from every vote.
It's pretty obvious to anyone with two brain cells to rub together that those are referral links, m8. I found SteemFollower through an affiliate link myself and gladly signed up using it. I'm happy to give 5% to the person who referenced me to the service - that's a value-add. This article was an attempt at bringing to light an interesting service while maintaining an objective viewpoint - you disagree with the tactic of affiliate links, fine. But there's no need to be such a douche about it.
It's not as though this is a glowing review of SteemFollower, after all.
Y'know, I was a geopolitical blogger and a purist for the past few years. I refused to put advertisements of any kind on my website, insisting that the content was free and anyone who found value in it should donate instead. I watched as my work became somewhat popular, being resyndicated by some bigger alternative media outlets who were making money shoving ads into my content selling survival seeds, freeze-dried food and discount precious metals. But the message was more important than the money to me, so I kept on with my original "anti-business" model.
In fact, my work became so widely reblogged that Cheetah and other "anti-piracy" bots would routinely flag my posts well after confirming that my blog was indeed my own work. To add insult to injury, all of my content is licensed under Creative Commons and is free to anyone to republish, so long as they don't profit from it commercially and credit me properly. So much for being a "good Steemian."
I still feel that way about inherently ideological content - that the message is corrupted in a sense by financial incentive - and have kept my deep political blog free of such things specifically for that reason. But I also understand that linking people to valuable products and services, ones that I have used personally, not just random horse shit to make a dime, is one of the few ethical ways to monetize content in the 21st Century.
Hell, look at the blog and podcast component to this Steemit account - CryptoHero.info. Those articles have a few odd affiliate links to hardware wallets and bitcoin-based services throughout, but I take great care to remove them before posting them to Steemit specifically BECAUSE I don't want unnecessary affiliate garbage everywhere. The only reason SteemFollower was linked is because it's a Steem-specific service and totally relevant to the post.
So while I somewhat appreciate your passive-aggressive sage wisdom and will take it to heart, this ain't my first time at the rodeo, cowboy.
This post was almost more interesting than the article. With reference to steemfollower, I am doing the same trials and coming to the same conclusions as yours. I don't know if I really want to keep posting honestly, it's time consuming with little to no result, despite the search for quality.
I was thinking about involving my friends, but none of them is really taken from this platform due to the effort and dedication you need to give.. Anyway, I'm following and keeping an eye on your good work!
Haha, well I'm glad someone finds value in my peeved rants! >__<
Steemit is a tough egg to crack, honestly. I love the concept of blockchain-based social media, I love that your work is the product and not corporate ads, but you're totally right: It's hard to gain any traction, especially when taking the time to produce quality, original content.
The highest-value accounts I follow are ones that already had a large following pre-Steemit, like @corbettreport and @dollarvigilante. Then you come across accounts that are raking in the dough doing nothing more than reposting YouTube videos because Cheetah isn't smart enough to recognize that as "duplicate content."
For the time being, I'm treating Steemit as pretty much a blockchain-hardened backup of my blog(s) moreso than an avenue for earning.
Thanks for the follow, @f3nix, and I am likewise following you! I see you resteemed a post about MinnowBooster - have you used the service yet? I'm considering giving it a shot.
I agree with the way you're dealing with steemit..it's good especially for someone that already has some content to publish. It can enhance the communication channels, leverage them. Minnowbooster seems interesting, with the delegated Steem Power (SP) leasing..i think i should try to send 1 steem and make an experiment. Another one i'm trying to apply for is qrator.
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