Good to see another Brit on Hive. Just don't use up all your good shots too soon as you can only earn from them for a week. Better to build up more of an audience. There may be contests and communities that can get you more exposure. Plenty of photographers here. Have fun with it.
Thank you for your comments @steevc, and there is a group of us from lincolnshire who have all joined up in the past couple of weeks. Currently enjoying the little time I have spent on here so far, it is a refreshing breath of fresh air compared to Facebook and Instagram...
I'm trying to spread the images out as much as I can although in my experience (albeit very limited at 3 weeks) posts with with 1 picture don't do as well as posts with 3 or 4 pictures. I am spreading out what images I do have and keeping my posts varied and relatively interesting. I have also been looking at, and participating in, various contests and communities... although trying to search for new communities seems awkward on here
Feel free to mention your friends in a post. I know @pennsif was keeping a list of active UK users, so he may need to update it. There have been various meet-ups in the past, but it's obviously not a great time to be doing that.
I agree longer posts can do better. Some people are against single images with little text, but it really depends on what people will vote on.