Engagement Is Key To Growth
Introduction
Back in 2017 when I created an account on Steem and became active on the platform, it felt like an easy choice to keep doing what I had been doing for 25 years on various Internet platforms prior to that. I first started using Usenet news and IRC in 1992. After that, I used to blog without giving a thought to monetizing my blogs. It was mainly about just talking about interesting stuff with friends I knew from the walking world and later from online.
I did all that happily for free. At no point did it cross my mind to be bitter let alone rage quit because I wasn't getting what I thought I should've. Even though most people on Hive are capable of monetizing their blogging and commenting to a degree, for many it does not seem worth the trouble of leaving their comfort zone on familiar platforms where there are people they already know.
After a critical mass is reached engagement will fuel itself
This is where engagement comes into the picture. I'm really happy to see how the Tribes are finally developing a stronger identity and are beginning to see their token appreciate in the wake of LEO. When Hive users are sorted into communities of like minded individuals engagement begins to have a pull on its own to keep people coming back. On Steem and later on Hive, engagement always seemed secondary or even forced as it was necessary to gamify it and for large stakeholders to go out of their way to reward for it.
It takes a critical mass for engagement to form a positive feedback loop. It is much more likely to happen in communities formed around shared interests. The best changes of it happening are on LeoFinance because the topics discussed are crypto and the economy in general. The push to improve the domain authority of leofinance.io is a critical part of it. The more likely our posts are to appear in Google search results, the more likely it is to pull in more people.
Flattening curation rewards good for engagement
The decision to flatten the curation curve was a really good decision because it makes making and curating great comments and thus engagement much more financially rewarding. I think the flat curve should be seriously considered for HIVE rewards as well.
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
Seemingly the problem is getting to that critical mass.
I think Voice.com gamifies things in a very interesting way. Possibly too much! So people are always just voting to get rewarded and not commenting as much there.
The value of social networks grows non-linearly relative to the size, which is why getting to the critical mass is a problem. As the Tribes are garnering attention, Hive users are being effectively sorted into communities for the first time. We'll see if it helps.
I have to admit that at first I was against communities because I thought if I'd post to one community or another my blog wouldn't have that exposure any longer, but on the other hand it's much more convenient and fun to just browse through some communities that you resonate with instead of doing that through tons of tags or by simply scrolling through a shitty page or the new posts page as I would do on the old Steem. I will say it again, and might not be too appreciated for that, but some people are too engaged and that is quite obvious. It is crystal clear that they're doing that to score rewards, engagement tokens, attract upvotes or promote their blogs. None the less engagement is essential for s successful social media platform. By the way... I saw you're already active on the internet in 1992... I was six back then 😀
I was a freshman at university back then.
Yeah, communities have really brought this place to another Leo. Just as I was giving up on HIVE, I came here to Leo and stayed ever since. The best thing is, just as you mentioned, - relatable topics that we can all talk about and share our experiences, and it creates engagement.
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
The LeoFinance team seems to be serious about onboarding crypto investors. LeoInfra is supposed to enable one to opt to get one's rewards in ETH and to log in using Metamask. They've also talked about relaunching wLEO but with considerable security upgrades.
Yeah, logging in with MetaMask could really bring a difference. Didn't know about rewards in ETH, sounds too good to be true! :) hehe
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
Too bad the ETH rewards would have to be bought with LEO from the market, which would put downward pressure on the price unless wLEO existed.
Yeah, communities have really brought this place to another Leo. Just as I was giving up on HIVE, I came here to Leo and stayed ever since. The best thing is, just as you mentioned, - relatable topics that we can all talk about and share our experiences, and it creates engagement.
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta