Put yourself into your potential audience’s perspective, if you were to come by your own post, would you really be interested in consuming the content you put out? I think this is the part where most content creators, especially those starting out forget. They forget that they are also content consumers functioning on the same brain wave that decides what type of content would they be willing to use up their precious time.
So if you happen to publish content you aren’t even invested in, it’s going to show and the hints may not be apparent on the post itself but by how consistent you are at the subject. Now choosing to blog random topics doesn’t necessarily mean a lack of investment on those topics. It could simply mean you have other interests you are passionate about, like normal people actually do.
There’s an advantage on being consistent with your niche. When people see you post, they’d know what themes you’d be running and that sense of familiarity works when nurturing a relationship with your audience. It’s difficult to get that advantage by blogging about random topics spontaneously on Hive because followers usually follow you for the content they’d best known you for.
Here’s the interesting social dynamic when it comes to social rewards on Hive. There are several ways to approach the blogging to earn route and the consequences aren’t as punishing compared to doing the same thing on other platforms. You can focus on a niche community or blog about random stuff yet still have the same potential to earn substantial rewards for your time. The rules of the game are different here because Hive, while a social media platform, has other features on it that make it still profitable without being pressured to be a content creator.
Content that goes viral on Hive don’t necessarily mean the same content can get viral off the platform. It can happen but how often has that really happened?
Regardless of the pending payouts of the post, I consider any post with at least 10 views on it already a success. Getting some attention on your posts here consistently is an accomplishment. If you post the same stuff on Twitter or Facebook, you’ll get more views than what you get here on average. That’s just how much attention here becomes a precious resource.
I mean if you get at least some views on the counter, you’re doing something right in getting some clicks over your content in a platform where the average post barely reaches 2 digits of views. There was a time when the post reflected the view counter from the old blockchain. Imagine seeing more than 200 votes on a content with 7 views on it. That’s just how much trash can be tossed into the trending page back then.
Your post that went to hive trending isn't a big deal.
Right Content, Wrong Platform
You can make the best content about your niche but it still would go underappreciated given how limited the prospective audience you can get from Hive. Everybody here posting content is playing the hero role and competing for attention, nothing new there, this is the norm on any social media platform. The problem is setting yourself up to an expectation that content discovery here is as efficient as the content posted on centralized social media platforms.
Unless you posted content that is useful, controversial or interesting that people can get back for entertainment, most posts get buried after 2 days. That’s just how long people would mind the fresh post on their feed. Random AI recommendations on centralized social media are so efficient that it can lead one to gain more followers over content posted months ago as a suggested relevant content. We don’t really get that advantage here on Hive because content discovery requires manual browsing and banking on that prospective followers be interested in what’s old content.
Old Content Posted Still Matters
This is underrated especially for people more focused on those 7 day payouts and less about the long term life of their blogs. A lot of the time it’s curators screening for abuse that revisit old posts. But here’s something to think about if you ever want to get serious about improving your blogs first and prioritizing social rewards second, consistency matters to curators and prospective followers. If you ever want to expand your reach to other platforms, having your blogs here could help boost some confidence and give more prospective followers content to consume.
It’s not an unusual habit to search for more information about the content creator you like. If they happen to have other social media pages attached to their profiles, there’s a good chance that invested fans can explore those pages too. I don’t think I’m the only one who browses previous videos or art works of my favorite content creator even if those were posted years back.
This is how I gained random followers (not bots) on Instagram even when I’m not even posting on it for months. In reference to how efficient content discoverability can be under those AI suggestions, I find more artists with works to add to my sources of inspiration and these accounts post weeks to months apart.
For people that maximize their daily autovotes for social rewards, this wouldn’t be a problem if your endgame is just for the $. But for those that have goals like consistently putting out useful content for their target audience, it’s better to step back and compose the content to maintain consistency. Daily posting isn’t bad if you can maintain the level of consistency as a content creator people subscribed to you for.
At some point I've given up and just became a shitposter.
If you made it this far reading, thank you for your time.