A writer’s guide to making money on the STEEM blockchain – for beginners

cryptobloglover (25)in #steemit • 4 years ago

Hi crypto lovers,
Welcome to steemit blockchain platform. Today I am going to show you a writer's easy and more money-making strategy on steemit blockchain platform.

Due to popular demand, this blog post – slightly updated and expanded – is now available in book form! You can find it on Amazon in Kindle, paperback, and Audible formats. In fact, you can get the Audible version for free if you’re a new customer.

In today’s media climate of collecting and selling eyeballs with “rage porn” and fake news, there aren’t a lot of ways to make a living doing thoughtful writing. Books are the most honest exchange of money-for-words there could be, but in the months or years between releasing my books, I personally have found myself waiting for a payday. Then, I discovered STEEM, the cryptocurrency that powers the Reddit-like social network, Steemit.

I joined Steemit about a year ago, and it has turned into a decent revenue stream in my business as a writer and podcaster. In 2017, I earned a modest $2,000 on Steemit. But, things are picking up. Last week, I cashed in more than $1,000.

I also cashed in nearly $1,000 two weeks ago. So I’ve already come close to surpassing my 2017 STEEM earnings. My account is currently “worth” almost $12,000. (I’ll explain in a bit why these aren’t earnings yet.)

Steemit estimated account value

Where does this money come from, and how can you get started making money for your writing on Steemit? I hope to show you the basics in this post.

Before I get started keep the following in mind:

I’m going to simplify things as much as possible to help you understand the minimum you need to know to start earning money on Steemit. If you’re like me, you’ll learn more by actually doing. There are lots of complexities built into STEEM to mimic the economic mechanics of the “real world.” Just as LeBron James doesn’t need to have a PhD in physics to play basketball – you don’t need to understand every last bit of how STEEM works to start earning money for writing on Steemit. If you want to get a deep understanding of how STEEM works, this is not the post for you. Start by reading the STEEM white paper.

I’ll probably mess something up from a technical standpoint. Sometimes this will be intentional and okay because it will help beginners understand better.

Remember, this post is a beginner’s guide to making money for writing on Steemit. Other times I may just plain be wrong (I’m not a trained software engineer, and I don’t keep up with every aspect of STEEM). I’m open to corrections in the comments.

It’s possible to invest in the STEEM cryptocurrency. It’s also possible to invest your time writing on Steemit. You could lose all this money and all this time. This is not investment advice. Read this information, do your own research, and decide for yourself how to invest your money and time.

If you join Steemit, follow me, and upvote my work, I will earn more STEEM. I tell you this to point out that it’s a potential source of bias. You also might decide that you’re grateful for this beginner’s guide to Steemit, and you want me to earn more STEEM. It’s up to you.

Where does the money you earn on Steemit come from?
The question I usually get asked first when talking about STEEM is “where does the money come from?” The short answer is that STEEM is a cryptocurrency, like Bitcoin, that investors trade on the open market, and which you can track the value of through charts.

When I joined Steemit, the price of STEEM was about 14 cents. Recently, it has jumped as high as over $7. With many cryptocurrencies climbing lately, you can imagine how valuable STEEM could become.

Where does this money come from, and how can you get started making money for your writing on Steemit? I hope to show you the basics in this post.

Before I get started keep the following in mind:

It will never be easy to make money writing if you aren’t a good writer. Writing on Steemit will not get you rich quick. I have been working on writing and building my platform for fourteen years now, and I have been writing on Steemit for a year. Maybe you’re more talented than me, or can learn a way to do it faster, but I caution you that if you aren’t willing to put in the work, you will be wasting what time you do put in.
The main criticism I hear about STEEM is that it’s f*cking confusing. This is correct, but it doesn’t mean it won’t work. Just watch the video of Good Morning America hosts trying to understand the Internet, and you’ll see that it’s possible for large groups of humans to learn to use and sometimes understand complex things. These are still the early days of this technology. It will get more user-friendly, and people will learn.
I’m going to simplify things as much as possible to help you understand the minimum you need to know to start earning money on Steemit. If you’re like me, you’ll learn more by actually doing. There are lots of complexities built into STEEM to mimic the economic mechanics of the “real world.” Just as LeBron James doesn’t need to have a PhD in physics to play basketball – you don’t need to understand every last bit of how STEEM works to start earning money for writing on Steemit. If you want to get a deep understanding of how STEEM works, this is not the post for you. Start by reading the STEEM white paper.
I’ll probably mess something up from a technical standpoint. Sometimes this will be intentional and okay because it will help beginners understand better. Remember, this post is a beginner’s guide to making money for writing on Steemit. Other times I may just plain be wrong (I’m not a trained software engineer, and I don’t keep up with every aspect of STEEM). I’m open to corrections in the comments.
It’s possible to invest in the STEEM cryptocurrency. It’s also possible to invest your time writing on Steemit. You could lose all this money and all this time. This is not investment advice. Read this information, do your own research, and decide for yourself how to invest your money and time.
If you join Steemit, follow me, and upvote my work, I will earn more STEEM. I tell you this to point out that it’s a potential source of bias. You also might decide that you’re grateful for this beginner’s guide to Steemit, and you want me to earn more STEEM. It’s up to you.
Where does the money you earn on Steemit come from?
The question I usually get asked first when talking about STEEM is “where does the money come from?” The short answer is that STEEM is a cryptocurrency, like Bitcoin, that investors trade on the open market, and which you can track the value of through charts. When I joined Steemit, the price of STEEM was about 14 cents. Recently, it has jumped as high as over $7. With many cryptocurrencies climbing lately, you can imagine how valuable STEEM could become.steem price chart

The long answer to where the money comes from is that STEEM is a cryptocurrency built on blockchain technology. Steemit is a social network built upon that blockchain. The STEEM blockchain is a database that holds all of the posts, comments, upvotes, and transactions of STEEM. Part of what gives STEEM value is people trading it on the open market. But, as you’ll see, STEEM has inherent value within the Steemit social network. Let me explain those pieces in more detail.

STEEM IS A DECENTRALIZED BLOCKCHAIN (HERE’S WHAT THAT MEANS)
The STEEM blockchain does not live on a server like, say, Facebook’s database. That would be what you’ve probably heard referred to as a “centralized” model. Facebook owns and controls the database, and could delete it all tomorrow if they felt like it.

Instead, computers around the world have copies of the STEEM database and compare it to each other to make sure it’s up-to-date. This is what you’ve probably heard referred to as a “decentralized” model. No one entity controls the information.

Because of this, this database cannot be censored, which some people believe to be a big problem on networks such as Twitter or Facebook. Anyone can develop software for the STEEM blockchain, which is why a site such as Busy.org is an exact copy of what you’ll see on Steemit. (I’ll be referring to STEEM as the cryptocurrency and Steemit as the network for this post.)

STEEMIT, LIKE ALL SOCIAL NETWORKS, IS BUILT BY THE COMMUNITY
Social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, and Steemit are collective projects, like big gardens. Tweets are tweeted and retweeted; Facebook Groups are built, posts are liked, and communities mature; and Steemit articles are shared, upvoted, and commented upon. These networks get more valuable as more people use them, just as a huge garden will bear more food as people plant seeds, water plants, and pull weeds.

Who owns these collective projects? In the case of Twitter and Facebook, they are owned by shareholders. If Steemit is a community garden, Twitter and Facebook are sharecropping plots. Users of Twitter or Facebook are “compensated” for their contribution to the projects solely through their enjoyment of the platform, or whatever they can do to squeeze money out of the eyeballs they capture on the platform. Because of these incentives, Twitter and Facebook need to find a way to fund the development and upkeep of these platforms. That is primarily done by selling advertising.

In the case of Steemit, the collective project is owned in part by the users. You may already know that the Bitcoin cryptocurrency is mined by huge computers burning lots of electricity to solve complex equations. STEEM is instead mined by actions taken within the social network. When a post is published, upvoted, or commented upon, STEEM is created and distributed amongst contributors.

You can earn STEEM for writing a post, or commenting on a post. You can also earn STEEM simply for upvoting a post: The earlier you upvote a post that later gains a lot of upvotes, the more you earn as a “curator.” When you see an estimated dollar amount on a Steemit post, that is the amount of STEEM (in USD) that will be distributed to the author and curators. Developers can also earn STEEM when people use their applications.

When you earn STEEM, it’s not necessarily immediately spendable. In fact, there are different types of what I will refer to as “STEEM” from here on. Don’t stress if you don’t understand this explanation the first, the second, or the tenth time around, because this is where it gets more complicated.

STEEM POWER HELPS YOU EARN MORE STEEM
The first thing you can earn is STEEM Power, which increases your influence within Steemit. If you have a lot of STEEM Power, you earn more STEEM (in all forms) for your posts and upvotes. When you upvote a post, it also causes the author of that post – and everyone who upvoted it before you – to earn more money than otherwise, because an influential user (you) have upvoted the post.

As you can see, STEEM Power is important, and…powerful. The catch is that you can’t immediately spend STEEM Power. You have to do what’s called a “power down.” Your STEEM Power is converted into spendable STEEM Tokens. At the time of this writing, when you power down, you receive one-thirteenth of your STEEM Tokens every week for thirteen weeks (it used to take two years).

This is why you saw me cash in about $1,000 worth of STEEM Tokens. I had just received a distribution from a power down. This is also why my total “account value” is not yet earnings. All of my account value is locked up in STEEM Power.

Notice that you can’t spend STEEM Power, but STEEM Power is important to your influence within Steemit. This will be relevant in a bit as you understand where the money comes from.

STEEM TOKENS ARE IMMEDIATELY SPENDABLE
The second thing you can earn is STEEM Tokens (which are generally referred to as simply “STEEM,” but remember, I’m currently using that term as a catch-all for all forms of STEEM). You can immediately spend STEEM Tokens. There aren’t many things I know of that you can buy directly with STEEM Tokens, but you can exchange them for other cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin (which you can then convert to U.S. Dollars or other currencies, which I’ll explain later).

You can also do a “power up” to convert your STEEM Tokens into STEEM Power. Doing this of course increases your network influence, but it also makes your STEEM unspendable until you do a “power down.”

STEEM DOLLARS (SBD) CAN BE SPENT TO PROMOTE POSTS
The third thing you can earn is STEEM Dollars, or SBD. Like STEEM Tokens, you can convert SBD to other cryptocurrencies (then to U.S. Dollars). You can also spend SBD to “promote” posts on Steemit, which gets them more exposure, in turn earning more STEEM. You can also hold SBD in savings – sometimes with interest – on your Steemit account.

Originally, STEEM Dollars were meant to be a stable currency, always worth $1 USD. Lately it has spiked as high as $13, and at the time of this writing it’s around $8. Apparently it’s due to it being listed on the Korean UpBit exchange.

STEEM HAS VALUE BECAUSE IT’S USEFUL IN THE STEEMIT NETWORK
So, where does the money come from? STEEM Tokens and SBD are both traded on the open market. STEEM Tokens and SBD also have inherent value within the Steemit network. STEEM Tokens can be converted into STEEM Power for more network influence, and SBD can be spent to promote posts within the network. Both of these actions help people make more STEEM (in all forms).

STEEM represents the value of the collective project that is Steemit. STEEM has inherent value within the Steemit network. This all works together in a virtuous cycle to help STEEM maintain value.

In the garden that is networks like Facebook or Twitter, users have to live off of the crops grown – what’s leftover after Facebook and Twitter take their cut, anyway. Those gardening in the community garden that is Steemit share the food, and can also sell some of it at the Sunday-morning Farmer’s Market.

How do you earn STEEM?
Don’t be frustrated if you still don’t understand what I’ve explained so far in this beginner’s guide. The best way to learn is to simply join and try using Steemit. Now that I’ve provided a beginner’s background on STEEM and Steemit, I’ll explain how you can earn STEEM for your writing, and convert it into the currency of your choice.

As described earlier, you earn STEEM each time you:

Post content, such an article (75% of a post’s earnings go to the author).
Comment on a post.
Earn upvotes for a post or comment.
Upvote a post or comment (25% of earnings are shared amongst “curators” who upvote).
Upon joining, you’ll be “delegated” a bit of STEEM Power to get you started (This means you can’t power down that STEEM Power, but it will help you earn more STEEM). To join, you’ll have to verify your email address and a phone number that can receive SMS messages. Accounts are still approved manually, so it may take a few days for your account to get approved. So, it’s best to join as soon as possible.

I can’t stress enough that this is not a path to quick riches. It is, however, a way for writers to earn money for the value they create within a community, rather than having to attract eyeballs for the sake of eyeballs. There are always going to be barriers to making it as a writer, and not all of those can be knocked down by new economic models such as Steemit. If you want to make money writing on Steemit, it will be hard work.

A NOTE ABOUT NSFW
Steemit is a community where just about anything goes. By default NSFW posts will be hidden, and you can view them by clicking. I personally prefer to not see these posts in my timeline at all – I’m working after all. You can disable NSFW content under Settings > Private Post Display Settings, and set the drop-down to “Always hide.”

POST ARTICLES ACCORDING TO TAGS
Content on Steemit is organized by tags. Since the main timeline is crowded with a variety of topics, many users will look for content on a particular tag, similar to how Reddit users hang out in a particular subreddit.

You can see a listing of exactly how many posts have been issued to the top tags, and exactly how much STEEM has been earned on said tags over here.

You’ll also see the most popular tags on the left-hand side of the Steemit home page. At the time of this writing, the most popular tags are life, photography, and steemit. Naturally, this model causes a bias toward STEEM and other cryptocurrency-related content, but there is plenty of STEEM being earned in other topics.

The tags you choose for your posts will greatly affect their exposure. When you’re starting out, you want to choose tags that actually have some volume, but aren’t so popular that it’s impossible for your work to get noticed.

Just because you don’t see a tag listed on the tags page, doesn’t mean it’s not worth writing on that topic. Just type in steemit.com/trending/[tag name] for whatever topic you might want to write about. Chances are you’ll see some level of activity. A couple of my favorite topics to write for – entrepreneurship and productivity – don’t show up on the tags page, but still have plenty of activity. I’ve even had a reader tell me he discovered my work on the entrepreneurship tag.

#WRITE AN INTRODUCEYOURSELF POST

Soon after joining Steemit, you should write an introduce yourself post on the introduceyourself tag. If you do this well, this will be the easiest STEEM you make early on.

I would advise taking a picture of yourself with something that says “hello Steemit,” and has the date on it. If you’re notable (or really, really good-looking), you should also share the link to your introduceyourself post on your social media accounts such as Twitter or Facebook, so people can verify it’s really you. Here’s my introduceyourself post, and the current most popular introduceyourself posts.

STEEM REWARDS COME IN AFTER SEVEN DAYS
At the bottom of your posts, you’ll see a dollar amount. That is the amount of STEEM, in USD, that your post has earned.steem rewards for a postEarly on, this will be a very small amount. You can see that some posts make hundreds or thousands of dollars. 75% of this will go to the post author (you), and 25% of it will go to people who upvote it.

After seven days, you’ll earn your rewards for your post.

#cryptocurrencymarket #steemcrypto #trendingonsteemit #earnmoney #write

4 years ago in #steemit by cryptobloglover (25)

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