We minnows are all on the boat ;) just write good content, even if you get 2 likes per post if the content is good they will surely upvote you and follow you, take time to read other posts and comment something funny or informative, don't spam, and sooner or later you will make it.
I will give you a example, @nathan290595 commented on my introduceyourself post, i could see that he actually took time to read the post, and didn't comment spam, so i followed him and every time he posts i come here, i read the post and try to comment something.
It might take a while but we minnows will soner or later digivolve into dolphins, we just got to give it time and hardwork, and on the way make some friends :)