Rewards are just not going to be related to effort as people will vote either based on whether they liked the post or if they like the person. So you need to be popular and/or have really good posts. The latter is still no guarantee if nobody sees your posts. It is not 'fair', but there is at least the potential for anyone to earn. There are curation project who seek out unrewarded content and they may do well as you can make more by voting on those rather than the stuff that will trend regardless.
It is a lot about who you know, so it does not do harm to build connections. As Hive grows (if it does) then the votes will be spread more widely. I'm doing what I can to help that happen.
Steem trending is all about buying votes these days. Seems you need to be Asian to get up there, but that may just be the audience who have decided to stick with it. I am practically out of Steem now.