If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s nobody around to hear, does it make a sound?

There are 2 keys to becoming a successful blogger on Steemit.

Content
Followers

There is a good amount of information on creating interesting content already out there and I'll probably write a blog in the future about my strategies regarding content creation. But first, we need to build a following. Unless you are bringing an already built community of followers to Steemit from Youtube, Instagram or another social media platform, we need to grind it out to be successful. You could post the greatest, most interesting blog on Steemit but if nobody sees it, you can't be successful. This means we need to follow before we lead.

We have two options for growth. Option A is a proven model and the most suggested I have come across from others who have built big followings. Its starts small by being active in trending posts. Simply, post thoughtful comments where a large portion of the Steemit community is. If people think you have interesting and thoughtful opinions, find humor in the way you write or you can provide value they will typically follow you in hopes of seeing more of that. This will, however, be a slow build. It will start with 3 comments here, resteemed 5 times here, make $2 there. Option B is my strategy. We don't want to grow large numbers of minnow with little steem power. We want whales. Whales can make you hundreds, even thousands of SBD on a single post. They wield huge influence, not only with their steem power but also getting your content in front of their huge audience. Having a whale resteem one of your blogs could open you to an audience 8-10X larger than your own.

To accomplish option B, first I needed to find who the whales were. Simply enough, Steemwhales.com provides a list of who the whales are. Now comes the grinding. I went through the top 1000 whales and followed each that had been active within the last year. Out of the nearly 700 who I followed, 50 followed back. That may not seem like a lot but I'd wager my 50 whale followers provide more value than 200, 350 or 500 minnows.