Why aren't more authors upvoting comments on their post?

in #steem7 years ago

A question that I've always had in the back of my mind is why most authors are not rewarding their audience..and I still don't have the answer.

So you mak ask why am I not upvoting my comments? Because I am not interested in growing a following here, I'm just an investor but for Vloggers,bloggers,etc..rewarding your followers should be a no brainer.

Let me explain why upvoting your comments can help you grow and creates a positive snowball effect

First by upvoting comments you chose which comments gets on top. ( Most readers only read the first few comments) so if the comments on top are troll or spam then those users have effectively reduced the quality of your post. On the other hand if the top comments are valuable your post will be more valuable.

Then there is the obvious benefit which is to attract more users to your post. If you regularly rewards good comments on your post people will see it and will want to participate more and interact with it.

Many users will determine the value of a post by the discussion it brings, this is a very valid metric that I often look at. If a post has a lot of quality discussion attached to it but a low payout then its most likely undervalued, unless its very controversial.

By upvoting people who upvote you you are giving more power to yourself. this is a lot more effective than self voting but its a long term benefit. When you self vote there is and only will be one person upvoting your post and that's you, by going around upvoting many people you are creating a circle around you of people that will upvote you and the voting power of this circle is constantly growing and by upvoting people in this circle you increase the snowball effect.

Also one of the key things to increase your following is to answer comments on your thread, at least those that you liked and upvoted otherwise it shows that you only care about payout and don't give a f* about your audience.

Another obvious benefit of upvoting comments is the visibility that your username will get, if you upvote a post your name will most likely not even be listed unless you have a lot of SP, by upvoting comments you can give your username a lot more visibility. For example on dlive.io by tipping a very small amount of reward to a very popular streamyou can get your username seen by many people, this is much more effective than spamming people's wallet.

If I was a minnow and wanted to grow quick here, I wouldn't waste my time posting long quality original material, i would wait to have a large following before putting a lot of time into my writting . I would however invest a lot of my time to interact with other users's comment and I would also buy myself a little steem power to upvote comments.

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Wow the best post i have read for the day, you nailed it @snowflake

If I was a minnow and wanted to grow quick here, I wouldn't waste my time posting long quality original material, i would wait to have a large following before putting a lot of time into my writting . I would however invest a lot of my time to interact with other users's comment and I would also buy myself a little steem power to upvote comments.

Thanks for that advice to minnows like me

You make a great point about waiting to post long quality material. Cute inspiring pictures can do just as well at the beginning. I need to take your advice and get a better following and also upvote the comments on my post as well.

Did you actually just lead out by saying you don't upvote comments, but other people should?

That's if you want to become popular and grow your audience on steem, not something I'm personnally aiming for.

Fair enough. So you're aiming to be unpopular with a small audience?

The answer to your question is at the very beginning of the post.

So you mak ask why am I not upvoting my comments? Because I am not interested in growing a following here, I'm just an investor but for Vloggers,bloggers,etc..rewarding your followers should be a no brainer.

There is more to Steemit than just posting articles, I found out the hard way that commenting and upvoting it goes a long way in building relationships. Putting this out there ensures those coming along would find it easier. Stay blessed.

I totally agree. I also usually reward my audience by Upvoting their comments on my post, if they are genuine and honest (so no upvotes for generic "nice post" or "please follow me" comments)

I ask this very often. I do it consistently as people who take the time to read, comment and engage should be encouraged to do so and deserve some reward for their effort. Of course, I don't upvote every post.

There is so much value and so much community development possible under the post yet many ignore it.

Also one of the key things to increase your following is to answer comments on your thread, at least those that you liked and upvoted otherwise it shows that you only care about payout and don't give a f* about your audience.

I can't comment on every post but I am quite disappointed in large, highly rewarded accounts who put so little effort into the audience who supports them.

BTW, I just wrote an article mentioning you (not directly) and was wondering what you were up to and thought I would drop by. Nice to see this kind of post here.

I can't comment on every post but I am quite disappointed in large, highly rewarded accounts who put so little effort into the audience who supports them.

It is going to backfire big time. This is not youtube, as you know the game theory here is completely different !

Indeed, but let's be honest, how many people here really, 'have game'?

Many seem to think that auto- and whale-votes will always come their way no matter what they post. They are going to find themselves in the cold if a few slight changes take place unless they have bought-in/powered up enough stake. I see many who have not working on assumptions that the current situation is the final situation.

I question how many of them can adapt well to changes in the system. They do see themselves as intelligent though... so I guess we will see the results of the test. I predict when push comes to shove, many will debase for reward and leave their ethics on the shelves and the self-proclaimed ancaps will look for regulation to protect their investments.

It is going to be great fun!

Something I love about this platform are all the chances to observe and play in a whole range of sandpits.

Many seem to think that auto- and whale-votes will always come their way no matter what they post.

Steem userbase is still tiny and most people have never heard of it , when the masses come rushing in there will be a shortage of Steem power, the price will increase a lot, many whales will sell and people that were on auto whale vote ignoring their audience will cry . That's the most likely scenario imo.

There will be a lot more popular authors making reward exponentially harder to get. I can't wait to have some of my favorite authors to join Steem.

"If I was a minnow and wanted to grow quick here, I wouldn't waste my time posting long quality original material, i would wait to have a large following before putting a lot of time into my writting . I would however invest a lot of my time to interact with other users's comment and I would also buy myself a little steem power to upvote comments."

True. Although at times 20something votes from minnow friends may not even earn me up to one Sbd on my posts, but I still appreciate their support. Although, having steemeans with higher steem power upvote my usually long, original posts would be extremely encouraging. Guess I need to focus on making more comments now.🤷

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.

Great!. Thanks a lot for the advice. Would get to work now(crazy commenting)☺️.

It's a good reminder to do this. Most of the time i'm just so happy someone has commented on my pics that I forget to give them a bump. I'm a minnow - but I've had pretty good luck with my content. I find it interesting that the advice is always to not spend time on that....why do you think just to comment. Wouldn't it be better to do both?

I think it's important to not focus too much on the money aspect and look at it more like passive income especially when you are a minnow.
When you take a lot of time to write a blog post you are expecting a return, that's not a good place to be if you have almost no followers .

I don't even really focus on the money part....if i get something great. if not, try again. Kinda like insta - i spent a long time building a following. Hopefully I can do the same here. Most of my followers so far have come from interactions in the comments. :)

As a minnow of Steem I often feel like the lack of comment interaction comes from greed. People don't want to waste influence unless they think it'll make them more money or increase their following. The best way to get a good following here is to invest a good chunk of cash and using bots to comment/find/upvote/resteem (which is pretty much half the damn posts).

People don't want to waste influence unless they think it'll make them more money or increase their following

You are right, people focus on short term gain and fail to see the long term benefit of giving more power to others.

I always upvote decent comments on my blog posts. I mean I don't have anything to lose from doing it and still have enough power to curate other content.

It's also just rewarding people for the effort they put into reading your post and commenting.

I'm new user, and like your opinion of waiting to have a larger following before posting original, long contents.

This is what we minnows face: you take your time and write an original content but you don't get rewarded for it. Our blogs are littered with good contents without rewards. This is sad. Some have resorted to commenting but the big authors may not reward us either. This is the lot of most of us.

If authors were to upvote comments on their post their follower count would grow a lot faster, why most authors are not doing it is a mystery to me. As an authors there is no better way to use your voting power than reward those who gives you attention.

That is the obvious truth.