I am probably the wrong person to ask about this, the common practice is to spam memos and beg everyone for votes, something I do not take part in nor do I appreciate.
I started a witness the first month I became active on Steem and it took me a while to even break top 100, then even longer for top 50. I think one of the advantages I had was I am a technical person, and personally that's something that is a critical factor in who I vote for personally.
There is a lot less competition now since the split, we have a lot fewer active witnesses and freedom no longer votes witnesses which was a significant factor in who got top 20 and even top 30.
The best advice I can give you is to put yourself out there, a lot of witnesses you only know are a witness because they are on the list, you never see them, they don't post, and they may not even be around outside of making sure their witness is printing Hive.
I appreciate the feedback, and it’s basically my plan going forward, I am also a tech, sysadmin is my day job.
I’ll add some technical details with my next witness update post.