It's normal to experience zero or close to zero payouts when you're super new on Steemit. All of us have been there but we keep trying to work our way up for more consistent payouts. Pretty sure we're all here because we heard we could earn Steem, and some of us actually use Steem for our day to day expenses.
When you first arrived you probably saw the trending page conveniently left there and you're like "holy shit" but after getting $0.09 for your first payout, you feel like giving up. Or maybe you've gotten a huge $100 upvote on your introduction post by @blocktrades but less than $1 per post thereafter. That's totally normal here.
Source: Giphy
Your payout (unless you're a whale) depends on the people around you. Their Steem Power directly influences your payout if they vote on your content. That is also why people tend to cling around whales so often. That doesn't mean you should neglect anyone who's not a whale. Good networking is vital to success on a DPOS platform.
Here are some ways to not get a zero payout.
1. Make more friends
As mentioned earlier, you should make more friends on this platform. Don't just stick to your community. Branch out and network with people from other continent as well. Even if they are minnows or at most dolphins, it doesn't matter. If they love your content, they'll still give you an upvote and it can be worth a lot in big volumes. I've been lucky enough to be getting automatic votes from some of my friends.
Many of those on the list are automatic votes (i'm guessing they use SteemAuto for it). Thanks so much for the autovoting (or manual)! This means i don't end up with zero for every post for now.
Some of the people you meet may be minnows now, but who knows what will happen in the future? Case in point: @anomadsoul. He recently got a delegation from @blocktrades which made him a whale (albeit not permanently) but what i'm saying is that your minnow friend may become a whale the next day. LOL.
I'm counting on @zord189 to be a whale some day and provide some love to his loyal subjects. Just look at him addressing his loyal subjects!
Payouts aside, you may actually make a lot of real-life friends that you can count on! That's the community aspect of Steemit that is awesome, apart from the rewards.
You can make friends by:
- Commenting on posts by other users
- Start chatting on Steemit.chat
- Find groups on Discord and communicate with others
- Post quality content that facilitates healthy discussions
2. Join initiatives
There are many initiatives on Steemit that will actually help you on this platform. For e.g. i joined @ocd in June or July thanks to @acidyo and have made many new Steemit friends since. It has definitely helped me a lot (not just the people i nominated).
After @ocd I joined @sndbox and i've had consistent support from them since December! The direct support will probably end in May, but it's still a long-term support and i've had the chance to power up quite a bit. The added steem power has definitely increased my voting "weight" or "payout" and it will benefit many users on this platform, not just myself. The support from Sndbox has helped me to give more prizes on the Daily Food Photography.
On a side note, i gotta thank @fulltimegeek as well for the 6k SP delegation which has allowed me to bestow much bigger votes than I used to.
The point is you should join some initiatives or communities. It benefits both you and others.
3. We all want the Ds and Z and E
Source: Giphy
With all the recent delegations from @misterdelegation to @dlive, @dsound, @dtube, @dmania, @zappl and @esteem, there are plenty of ways to make more Steem other than blog.
@dlive - Basically a decentralized live streaming platform for gaming and any sort of streaming you want to do. Even adult rated stuff are on it.
@dtube - A decentralized version of YouTube by @heimindanger
@dsound - A decentralized version of SoundCloud by @prc
@zappl - A micro-blogging platform just like Twitter
@eSteem - mobile version of Steemit by @good-karma
@dmania - A 9GAG competitor by @zombee that allows you to post memes and earn.
Most of these platforms do take a certain percentage of your payout as beneficiary rewards so do take note. It's also a hit and miss. Some users may be luckier to have constant support from some of the platforms, but that doesn't mean you won't get "hit" by a vote. Just keep trying to create original stuff and you may be lucky enough to get voted upon.
This means you don't actually have to blog on the Steem blockchain to earn. You can do videos, music, streaming or other ways that suit your method of creating content.
4. Voting bots?
Source: Giphy
This has always been a controversial topic. Should you use a voting bot to boost your post?
I would think that if it's awesome high quality original content, then you can use them to gain more visibility (before a certain number of days). But i guess i can't comment on them since i use them to boost my @dmania posts..hehehe..
5. Write quality content
Source: Giphy
I think this is one of the most common advice on this platform. Write quality content and you may be discovered by curation guilds (@ocd / @curie / etc.) or even by some whales / dolphins.
But do note that this platform is based on proof of stake, and not proof of effort, which is the reason why a meme can earn more than a 5-hour written post. That's the harsh truth. You don't always get rewarded for your effort, but you should get rewarded in the long run. Hopefully.
6. [Bonus] Buy a shitload of Steem Power
7. [Obvious tip] Check if you've declined your payout, because if you did...
In a nutshell
If you're hardworking enough to network, make friends and try out different platforms, you shouldn't be getting zero or close to zero payouts. Don't just post and leave it there. Make more friends or acquaintances! It takes time as well.
I appreciate all upvotes, resteems and follows.
Support the OCD initiative!
Join the Daily Food Photography Challenge!
Great tips. This how I got started, earning cents per post. To all the newbies, be patient and learn and earn as you post.
To be honest, your first gif distracted me so much while I'm reading! I totally can feel it man!
I do agree with you on making new friends here and there and grow together especially with #teammalaysia. But sometimes getting an upvote from curation trail is important too as some carry whale or the whole trails are dolphin which in return give me good paid and hence it gives me the motivation to keep going.
For point 4, it considered as hit or miss too right? For example, I bought a upvote from @smartsteem and his upvote worth 2.2 - 2.5x of what I invest. I will hit when that period SBD/USD is uptrend and I will miss when that period SBD/USD is downtrend, right?
Point 5 like you said everyone will tell write quality & original content and sometimes just lack of exposure and get fewer upvotes.
Point 6 will be valid if you started to earn more and more unless buy SP using real $$.
Thank you for the detailed guide @howtostartablog! :)
Now, is time to make more friends!
haha i guess that gif resonates with a lot of people here.
I'm glad #teammalaysia has a curation trail now. Those days there were only less than 10 of us and we had to make lots of friends from everywhere to get to where we are now. Luckily we've some help now and with the recent delegations to the different 3rd party apps, it should be easier to earn SBD and SP.
Yeah bidbots can give negative returns, depending on how many people bid and the fluctuation of the price of Steem. The payouts reflect the market price 3 days ago. So today the price went down a lot, i'll be getting much lesser than what i paid for the bots nearing payout..
Thanks for the lengthy comment. Keep networking bro :)
Yea, hard work pay off in long run. Thanks again bro! :)
This is an excellent read. I am a fellow qurite and I am new. So lot of these tips are useful to me. One of the things I am struggling with is the lease to get steempower delegation. I bid for purchase steempower multiple times on minnowbooster, but I never get a lease. I tried higher than the default numbers, still no deal. I see all over the place, people with fairly modest to fairly high leased steempower (I have learned to check the + sign, and check their upvote worth on steemnow), I just can't figure out how they get it. Any input on this is highly appreciated.
Thanks@howtostartablog, for all the tips and challenges faced by newbies. I do noticed that the people that are getting huge votes have many followers. Whether they are robots or not, i really don't know. I am still trying to understand what's Resteemed? I was told it will be regard as Spamming if you resteemed. Also by resteeming others post, you are not writing and posting. Can you comment and advice on this??
Thanks
@jackpot
You haven't done resteems yet? It's basically re-tweeting something but you can't undo it. It's only spamming if you do it too often. Once in awhile is okay.
Good advice. I am steadily building my community of followers, and am not so concerned about the payouts. Comments mean more to me at present. It provides an opportunity to interact and get to know the people interested in your posts, and you find a lot of interesting stuff they have posted also. As you probably have similar interests, I find I follow many back.
It's great that you see it that way. Most people leave after failing to achieve certain payouts..
Haha. I never had much money, so always valued the people around me more than the dollars I had. A nice payout would be great, but it is not why I am here.
This post has received gratitude of 9.00 % from @appreciator thanks to: @howtostartablog.
Wahhhh so many things to learn and digest. I do notice dlive and dmania are rewarding but didn't know there are others. I usually spend quite some time writing a post per day. Looks like gotta learn to be smarter on this platform. Thanks for this write-up for noobs like me to learn from. It's funny and yet educating :) I wanna resteem it to slowly digest, boleh tak?
I think @ned's idea is to grow 3rd party apps to be more popular than Steemit. Maybe you should try other platforms to see if you get lucky haha. Sure, i always appreciate resteems!
Thanks for sharing. Still learning a lot as I'm only about 9 days in :)
Ah welcome! There are plenty of articles on understanding the platform better.
Its very detailed and descriptive.... I have been doing the opposite of what you've said but now i have learnt new things....
I want to join a steemit chat. How do i go about it? Thanks.
Hey just go to steemit.chat and sign up there. There are plenty of people on that platform.
Thanks alot
After i read your blog, hope i wont get zero payout anymore for my posts, haha! Struggling is real for newbies like me 😂 i followed also some steemians you mentioned. Thanks for another tip you shared. Upvoted!
Hahaha can't promise you that XD
When I just started to read this post, I see that it was a perfect guide and I bookmarked it to read it carefully later as I do not have much time right now, but just after that I keep reading all and here I am writing this comment. That is really a useful guide and yes I will read it again tonight :)
It is good that we have more third party platform emerging, not many of us good in writing. Hopefully, I can do my own wrestling channel and earn enough money to go Wrestlemania 2020....haha
LOL good luck with that haha
And try entering some contest too like your daily food contest. I remember few of mine was chosen when I started, thank you for that!
Ah glad you won a few times in the beginning. It's getting tougher these days..
Yah lor, haven't been chosen for months already... hahaha
I really enjoyed reading this. It's apparent that you understand the key ingredients. I just saw someone with 14k in followers, and 20 posts, and he was averaging 10 cents a post. He was also following about the same 14k. It's not rocket science. Engaging is key. I believe I've personally accomplished a hell of a feat in 60 days, but I also do this full time, and if I'm not here, I run a unofficial steemit server. Nothing will be handed to you on steemit. You get in what you put out.
That's probably because he just follows every single person (f4f nonsense). Good luck on doing it full time. I'm almost full-time here as well.
Thank you for the kind words. I fell right into that f4f bs when I first came to Steemit. What I'm learning now, is that it's much easier to add a bunch of junk to your feed, than it is to sift through it all, and keep the gems. Take care. You are definitely one of the gems 😉
Good luck @howtostartblog i find an amazing post i learn couple of things which i really do not know before..
thank you for the tips, ive been a steemit user since December and im still learning all the tricks ^^
My first payout was $0.09 but I feel it is amazing and did an instant 300% giveaway. Steemit is a long term investment and required to put in effort to in order to be success.
Oh wow, good luck on your journey
Will do. Thanks!
Thanks for the article @howtostartablog! Really encouraging for the new members, as I am as well! Thanks for your time and effort you put writing this down:)
Thanks for dropping by :)
nice article, I have a question, does boosting your posts gets back your investment ?
Can be more or less. Most of these bots are bidbots, meaning it depends on how much people bid in the 2.4 hour time frame. So it may be a loss if someone comes up with a huge bid in the same time frame you transferred the SBD. Maybe you can try with a small amount and see your returns.
Just minus the 25% curation, divided by 2, see if the SBD and SP covers the cost. Furthermore, if you're using it on a dsound/dmania/dtube/esteem post, they will take a percent as beneficiary as well. So, rugi further..
That original content gif is hillarious 😂
Hahah IKR. The one who created is a genius
Wow. Guess I should bookmark this page. A couple of things I haven't really tried.
Thanks for sharing @howtostartablog
Been here for almost 2 months now and able to provide good contents but still on the process of establishing my presence. I am interested with the @ocd and @sndbox stuff, hope to be in that circle
helpful..blogging from busy and esteem as well as mspsteem has gained me sure upvotes but of course quality blogs are needed for this platform...thanks for sharing these tips.
Thanks for this informative blog @howtostartblog, it can help us on how to improve and gain many friends on this platform thanks also for the contest like daily food photography. I started checking and resteeming your account to learn more about joining steemit thank you for the encouragement ang guidance.
thanks for sharing :) still new and learning
A good read for tips and it's encouraging too. I'm glad I continued here on Steemit after not being active for weeks or few months last year. I haven't been to the Steemit chat and groups but I found, I can consider a handful of becoming my Steemit friends. 🙂 I haven't used voting bots but tempted to try at times, maybe when I make a long, high quality content I will. Aside from the small earnings, I am having fun posting on Steepshot and enjoying photos and travel posts here on Steemit. 😄
Haha the most important thing is to have fun here :)
Bruhhhh.... why man??? why??? Hahaha.
Edited liao
HAHHAHAHAHAH
Haha u duwan i remove lo..
I saw his face! Conspiracy!
iu?
Unforgettable moment... Love the pose!!!
txt damage +9999...
Lol j/k. Good advice, especially the part about Proof of Stake that many forget. The only way to earn is by increasing your stake either with your own wallet or through your network's.
Edit: Bidbot ROI seems to be negative on most votes now so it's a bit of a gamble.
Yea should go back to memes..
Good tips! I'm focusing on making friends and making quality content.
Thank you for this @howtostartablog <3
Thank you @howtostartablog, will definitely put this advice into practice :)
I'm still waiting that one day I could earn high payout that make me sick that I have to decline the payout sometimes...still waiting.
Great advice - thanks, still learning lots!
I think the great thing about this platform is that it is still "small" enough to find real engagement - it is genuinely like a community as you see the same "faces" around and people really want to help one another.
Built on the common understanding that, if the platform is to succeed, we all need to succeed.
Yeah the people are generally friendly here and the community spirit is still here. Hope to see the platform succeeds.
I don't doubt @zord189 will be a whale someday. Thanks for sharing this tips.
Well yeah sometimes it becomes hard to go on in here but we should not give up ,everyone's time comes .So will ours ;)
Yeah good luck man
Great post.
I think it's just the Dmania upvotes that are the wild card here. Making everyone else question their 50cent post while others get a whopping 70USD for a 5 minute meme! Haha!
Yeah the voting percentage is very high. Maybe give more votes and reduce the vp would be ideal. Kinda disappointed with dlive as well. I can stream 5 times and maybe get a vote once ($20 - 40), but their own mods can stream 3 times a day and get 70+ each...
Oh yeah? I think I saw @danielwong get upvoted maybe 2-3 times in a row by dlive but not so many after that. It feels really random. dsound so far has been super consistent with my posts for which I am super grateful for.
Yeah man it was a crazy week of CNY surprises I got from dlive. But 3 days in a row nothing from the team. Haha. So yeah maybe random. The goal... become a mod. Lol 😂
Maybe you're on their autovote since the vote comes pretty quick.
Yeah he did get a few in between streams.
Agree with this one! Btw.. thank you for the tips and words of encouragement.
Thanks for the info. It is really helpful for a newbies like me. I hope you can share more info like this in your future post. Thank you again.
Certainly alot to dig in. one thing i find it challenging is making more. and more friends here. Been wanting to engage even more but too occupied at home. But will try. Sometimes tried halfway then woke up with handphone on hands. lol. tertidur dah. failed attempt.
Great tips and totally agree with the points stated. But what really caught my eye and got me LOL was the pix of Lord @zord189 addressing his subjects #TotallyEpic!
Hahaha had to put a steemball on his head since it's gonna be here forever!
Gosh! Thanks for the tips! I shall definitely start looking all the links up! keep up the great work dude!
Thank you so much for the tips. I'm a newbie and would love to learn more.
Gonna boost this up with bots
worth boosting🤗
Probably lost at least 20 sbd after it dropped so much :(
Didnt realise it had dropped so much until now.
You got a 8.13% upvote from @postpromoter courtesy of @howtostartablog!
Want to promote your posts too? Check out the Steem Bot Tracker website for more info. If you would like to support the development of @postpromoter and the bot tracker please vote for @yabapmatt for witness!
how do join sndbox and ocd..please?
Thanks so much! I didn’t even know about half of the alternative platforms you mentioned! How does one become part of ocd or curie? Love Lali xx
This is very informative! I have been trying to comment and read as much as I can over the last month. I have used my small earnings on some bots (at a loss pretty much lol) but I am still not sold on using them (I feel bad). I had someone upvote me quite a bit yesterday, I almost had a heart attack! It was such a nice surprise! I definitely think I need to get involved with some communities on here, but I am pretty shy so that's going to be tough! I am just trying my best for right now. I look forward to your future content!