Essentials To STEEM (The Guide You Need To Kickstart Your Journey)

[zord189]

This Guide will help you

Over my 2 years + on this wonderful blockchain, I have found that there aren't many tutorials on Steem and how to get started as a content creator here. A lot of these tutorials will be from my experiences and also the things I've learned the 'hard-way' on Steem. Nonetheless, I'm happy to share them with you all and hopefully, you will take back something useful from this post and turn into a beautiful butterfly.

Smart people learn from their own mistakes, Smarter people learn from other's mistakes and not do it

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1. Understanding Steem The Best You Can

Everytime someone new comes to me asking for guidance and help, the first thing I would ask them is, 'Have you read the FAQs'? When I first got into Steem, I had no one to guide me and no community was known to me yet. I believe some of you reading this are in the same shoes.

OMG! He understands me!

Yes I really do, because what I did next is what you are going to do. Did you know there is a pretty solid FAQ to get you started? Though I don't expect everyone to understand Steem and its websites in a day, it'll definitely come in handy whenever you are wondering 'Where does my Steem tokens come from?'.

FAQ HERE!!!

Read through the FAQ and try your very best to understand the basic terms and lingos used on Steem. If you have further questions, my following steps will guide you on how u can cry for help.

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2. Be Part of a Community

Steem is a people-centric platform, same like any other social media platform. You need to engage with people, create friendships and even start something of your own. But you can't do all this, without a community behind you. You may think that you just come on to Steem to blog and earn some side income, you don't want to socialize. Yes u can do that, but I'm talking to those who want to take Steem to the next level. Cause truth be told, no one will see your posts whereas in a community, there will be members supporting you and giving you advice and tips on how to improve.

You can start with one community first, where you actually engage with the members inside and build priceless connections/friendships. Here are some of the communities I am in.

Team Malaysia

A Malaysian community of Steemians.

Only for Steemians who lives in Malaysia. #teammalaysia

Subscribe to this community here : https://steempeak.com/c/hive-127719/created

PowerHouseCreatives

Do you consider yourself a quality content creator? If you do, this is the community that will help you learn & grow. With support from all members, you can take your blogging to the next level.

Subscribe to this community here : https://steempeak.com/c/hive-114105/created

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These are just a few communities that I joined. IF you have a country's community like #teammalaysia. I strongly advise you to join it. What better support than your homeland buddies.

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3. Drafting a Post/Find your Niche

Many times, a lot of new Steemians come onto Steem with the wish of just posting whatever and whenever they like, without proper focus, goal or strategy. Mostly by the lines of 'I will post things about life or things that just come to me'. You can definitely do that because there are no rules about what you should or should not post. My advice here is this, if you want to get somewhere on Steem, you

Need to find a Niche

Work on your Strengths and not on what you're bad(weaknesses) at and 'want to improve'. You can work on your weaknesses when you're further down the road. Right now, it's all about building a strong foundational presence.

There are still a lot of niches to be covered on Steem, now that's your homework to find out. For a headstart, we need more dancing videos or talent videos. You get the drift.

When I first started Steem-ing, I thought that I could do photography and animation. After looking at the niche market of photography, there is no way I'm going to be the one that's prominent in this field. Hence I switched to animation which was what I'm good at. The downside about animation niche is that it takes a lot of time to create an animation, could take days to weeks to months. It is not so efficient on Steem having only 1 post per month. After a few trial and errors, I found out that the people of Steem needed someone who was able to design good banners, GIFs and videos for their profiles and initiatives. And Thus, I found my niche.

Some of the profile banners/signatures I've designed for amazing Steemians

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No. 4 Dos and Donts

Do to be awesome

• Reply comments on your post ASAP.
• Engage with other authors in their articles
• Give quality comments
• Upvote Steemians who comment on your post. Be generous for good comments.
• Give more than you take in support.
• For your post to be of quality, make sure they have no less than 3 photos & 700 words.

Don't be less awesome

• Hold your upvotes thinking they're worth a thousand USD. Be generous
• Beg other people to upvote/follow/resteem your posts.
• Bad & short commenting.
• Ask people to look at your post.
• No single image posting without any words.

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No. 5 Basic layout and title

Keep your post consistent in its layout and title. For example, if you are doing a post on cooking. You may use titles like Food for thought, Kitchen-works, Foodie etc. This would allow your readers to quickly identify the post's niche.

Also, if you're planning to do a series of a certain topic, you may use title like this.

#01 Photography
#02 Photography
#03 Photography

Having a footer is great too, it doesn't have to end with an image footer. But I would recommend your footer to have images/banners so it looks good.

Things you can include in your post footer

1. Links to your previous posts.
2. Your vision/purpose/how/why you join Steem.
3. A shoutout to another Steemian.
4. A community logo/banner that you're involved in.

Note that the footer can be consistent in every post you write

The Important Post Tags

When you've finished your post, you may be clueless on what tags to use. Well, fear no more! Your first tag is usually the most important tag. The other 4 tags even though they can be edited, it is still important that you use the right ones. Do take note that different frontends like www.steempeak.com allow up to 10 tags.

Also, if you are in a community, you can write a new post in your specific community.

Use Good Tags

Do not use tags that you create yourself, cause no one would look at it.

Example of bad tags :
#lifeishardsoieatcupnoodles
#yolobolo
#ilovemycatsomuch


Example of good tags :
#food
#steem
#writing
#community

Note that there are some specific tags like #teammalaysia that is ONLY available for members of #teammalaysia. Upon abusing the tag, #teammalaysia will flag/downvote you.

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I hope that you've found something useful here that might help you in your Steem Journey. There are plenty of other guides out there and there are many more things that I can explain to you but here are the few basics you should grasp.

GIFs taken from www.giphy.com

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Thank You

If you like what I do, check out my other posts on my artworks, photography & animations.

I'm also open for

Personalized Steemit Profile Banner,logos & GIFs

DM me on discord : zord189#7776

Credits to @pinstory & @coloringiship for this lovely photo of me.

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_{Animated Banner Created By @zord189}

Comments

[gingbabida]

Wow! I have learned so much! Thank you my friend! I will try to make a quality post with 3 photos and 700+ words. I seldom do that. But I'll keep this in mind!

Thank you for these tips. I'm so glad I found a beautiful community in PHC, and found you there too! 😊

One of these days I'll chat you for a banner too! 😉 Thank you.

[zord189]

Ur welcome! I'm glad that you can be part of the PHC family. We always love having like minded people together. :)

[gingbabida]

Thank you. 😊😊

[brittandjosie]

GOODMORNING MALYSIA, HOLLAND HERE,
Indeed a great post for the people lost in the world of steem, in the last couple of weeks so much happpened that also we as longer members lost the roadmap i think. The best way in deed is walk through these tips you gave and make a list and keep that as a roadmap besides your blogging device and start to blog. That way all the blogs will be the same lay out, thats a great thing to have mastered.

And if that wasn’t enough you can always come to discord steemterminal with all the questions that are left.

And if all did work out order that zord signature, as a reward for all your hard work.

Thanks this is very usefull, gonna put it in Steemterminal discord under blogs to read
Have a great weekend ( inside ~)

[zord189]

Thank you for everything you're doing with @thekittygirl to get new Steemians comfortable on Steem.

[thekittygirl]

🤗

[papilloncharity]

Wish I had this when I started here instead of feeling around almost 3 years ago my friend. A great post for the beginners.
Blessings!

[zord189]

Thank you @papilloncharity. I'm glad that you're doing well on Steem. I wrote a few survival guides to Steem 2 years back because there weren't any really good ones around.

[papilloncharity]

My pleasure @zord and I don't know for how much longer we will be on steemit with all of the things that are going on.
We certainly pray that we can continue as I have worked hard and everything that I do here belongs to the Papillon charity, but what must be must be.
Blessings to you and take care with this new virus around!

[fionasfavourites]

Great advice here Zord. Communities are so important. After all, it's how I met you in this big Steemy puddle. 😀

[zord189]

That's true! We wouldn't all be here today if it weren't for the communities

[fionasfavourites]

Agreed. However, I'm not convinced about how they've evolved. Just as I'm not convinced about tribes and SMTs. Happy Sunday.

[mballesteros]

These are wonderful tips, I'll take some of them into account, I'm very lazy when it comes to making a footer. Thank you for those jewels you share with us. 👌

[zord189]

you're welcome, I hope you got to learn something from this post :)

[bossku]

Thank you for your support. Here's a !shop as token of appreciation.

[teamcn-shop]

Hi~ zord189!
@bossku has gifted you 1 SHOP!

Currently you have： 23 SHOP

^{View or Exchange SHOP Please go to steem-engine.com.}

Are you bored? Play Rock,Paper,Scissors game with me!

[nickyhavey]

Good advice here Captain Zord!

I'll tag this blog in future Bluffer's Guides if you're cool with that seeing as we're both on the same page with helping new folks start out 😁

[zord189]

Thanks! Yea I see you doing some good guides out there too.

[wwwiebe]

These are some absolutely terrific hints and tips. This is something that probably aught to be resteemed, shared, and made a little more public.

Speaking of resteeming, I absolutely loved this:

(Don't) Beg other people to upvote/follow/resteem your posts.

That's my biggest personal pet peeve on the platform, by far.

Great post!

!tip

[zord189]

Thank you for the generous tip! Yes, I remember last time when steem had more spammers, most of them were like 'upvote and follow me plz' or 'follow me, I follow you back'.

[tipu]

🎁 Hi @zord189! You have received 0.1 STEEM tip from @wwwiebe!

@wwwiebe wrote lately about: Happy (Almost) Half-Birthday To My Daughter Feel free to follow @wwwiebe if you like it :)

Sending tips with @tipU - how to guide.

[wesphilbin]

Like @brittandjosie said, awesome post that's full of positive energy! If it weren't for @steemusa and of course the @steemterminal (shameless plug) I'd not be where I am today. You continuously provide wonderful examples of engagement and positive content...

... and your animations/signatures are also SWEET!! Thank you for sharing this with us my friend !tip

[zord189]

I agree! The ladies have done a tremendous job for onboarding new steemians. @thekittygirl and @brittandjosie. These are the heroes who should be made known to everyone on this blockchain for their contribution.

[tipu]

🎁 Hi @zord189! You have received 0.1 STEEM tip from @wesphilbin!

Check out @wesphilbin blog here and follow if you like the content :)

Sending tips with @tipU - how to guide.

[wesphilbin]

!trdo

[trendotoken]

Congratulations @wesphilbin, you successfuly trended the post shared by @zord189!
@zord189 will receive 5.00853375 TRDO & @wesphilbin will get 3.33902250 TRDO curation in 3 Days from Post Created Date!

"Call TRDO, Your Comment Worth Something!"

^{To view or trade TRDO go to steem-engine.com
Join TRDO Discord Channel or Join TRDO Web Site}

[wesphilbin]

@tipu curate

[wesphilbin]

@alliedforces curate2

[alliedforces]

You got some love from a member of @thealliance family!
Keep up the great work and join us in The Castle sometime!
^{The #spreadlovenotwar curation campaign is under the guidance of witnesses @enginewitty and @untersatz.Current VP: 89%}

[wesphilbin]

!giphy awesome

[giphy]

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giphy is supported by witness untersatz!

[helpiecake]

Hello!

This post has been manually curated, resteemed
and gifted with some virtually delicious cake
from the @helpiecake curation team!

Much love to you from all of us at @helpie!
Keep up the great work!

Manually curated by @wesphilbin.

_{@helpie is a Community Witness.}

[innerblocks]

Thanks for sharing your experience with us!

You have been curated by @wesphilbin on behalf of Inner Blocks: a community encouraging first hand content, with each individual living their best life, and being responsible for their own well being. #innerblocks Check it out at @innerblocks for the latest information and community updates, or to show your support via delegation.

[wesphilbin]

@untersatz curate

[untersatz]

This post has been upvoted by witness @untersatz. You've done a great job!
^{The @untersatz witness and manual curation is under the guidance of @contrabourdon and @organduo.Current VP: 90.98%}

[c-squared]

This post was shared in the Curation Collective Discord community for curators, and upvoted and resteemed by the @c-squared community account.
If you are a community leader and/or contest organizer, please join the Discord and let us know you if you would like to promote the posting of your community or contest.
@c-squared runs a community witness. Please consider using one of your witness votes on us here

[joanstewart]

Great words of advice, following your reasoning, members should find a good fit for them with so many topics and communities available.

[arcange]

Congratulations @zord189!
Your post was mentioned in the Steem Hit Parade in the following category:

• Upvotes - Ranked 2 with 1294 upvotes

[jayna]

Awesome tips, @zord189. It's so easy to get lost in the many possibilities for what to do here, and how to do it. And it's also easy to look around for examples of how to do things and then end up emulating people who are doing activities in the "don't be less awesome" category!

[trendotoken]

Congratulations @zord189, your post successfully recieved 5.00853375 TRDO from below listed TRENDO callers:

^{@wesphilbin earned : 3.3390225 TRDO curation}

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^{To view or trade TRDO go to steem-engine.com
Join TRDO Discord Channel or Join TRDO Web Site}