It’s hard to believe that it was 100 days ago when, in mid March, I signed up to steemit. My parents, my family and my brother and his family have pooled together to invest in cryptocurrency and that was how we eventually found it.

Seeing Red and Green candles in my sleep

Our little crypto investment group is run by me and my father. The other family members, I’m convinced, are just humouring us. My dad introduced me to Bitcoin and that was enough for me to go off and research and understand the basics. We started off with some Bitcoin back in November 2017 and I can remember watching the price action and being totally addicted to it. It was pretty exciting watching it climb all the way to 20k. I was singing its praises and telling anyone that would listen the merits of Bitcoin and crypto in general. In the meantime we increased our investment little by little. We now hold Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, Omisego and Steem.

A steemy transaction

After one of the transactions that we made, probably on Cardano, we had a little left over and we had a discussion on what we should do with it. It was again my dad that had heard of a cryptocurrency that was linked to social media and had big potential for growth. This, of course, was Steem. I did my due diligence and quickly decided that I liked it and to go for it. We used Bittrex for the exchange from ETH to STEEM and voila! Lovely Steem sat there looking all steemy!!

What! No wallet!

Right! We need a wallet. *Google search Steem wallet! That's weird no results. It’s only then that I looked up Steemit and realised that I needed an account to hold the Steem. I signed up and waited for the verification process. I never intended to start blogging and writing posts, it's not something that I have ever done before. I’ve used social media like Facebook and Twitter and have been using it for years. I am also interested in tech and gadgetry so I have stayed in touch with advancements over the years.

Just do it

Could I start Blogging and increasing our crypto investment? Maybe I could. Since my wife, daughter and I have left the UK and travelled around the world I have learned to do things that I would not have dreamed of a decade ago and that has given me the confidence to have a go at it. In the time that it took for the verification I decided that I would go for it.

What does this button do?

I signed in with my new key and had a look around. I was terrified to touch anything. For example clicking a button that would shut down your account. It would be like driving a car and accidentally hitting a button called ‘dismantle’ while your moving at 100 miles per hour!

Lovely steemians

The first thing that I wanted to do was move our Steem into the steemit wallet. It looked a slightly different process from some of the other cryptos that we had moved around so I looked up the procedure on how to do it. One of the first things you realise about steemit is that there is always a queue of steemians ready to help or give advice which is amazing and extremely encouraging. I eventually felt confident enough to give it a go and clicked on send. Those moments when you are transferring crypto as a newbie are excruciating. You convince yourself that it’s gone forever and that some fat, rich guy is sat there running his fingers through all of your coins. Then it eventually arrives and your heart rate can drop from the 160 its been hovering around at.

I didn't even know I needed therapy! 😁

Now to make my first post. All the advice that I had picked up had suggested that an Introduce Yourself post was the way to start and so I got straight to it. I immediately found the process of writing about my memories, thoughts and feelings to be a therapeutic, interesting and enjoyable experience which I honestly wasn’t expecting. It also helps that my first post had a lot of attention and a lot of people wishing me well or congratulating me on a great first post. It was also exciting to see the upvotes coming in and my steem investment increasing. Every day is a school day on steemit and I love the place. It's a positive environment and place to meet like minded people but also meet new people with a different outlook to me and learn something new.

A brief who am I

My name is Gaz. I am a teacher of English as a second language and I am also a football (soccer) coach. 9 years ago myself and my family decided to leave our home in Bristol, England and see the world. We have lived and worked in Bahrain, Thailand and Romania but have been lucky enough to have visited a lot of other beautiful places before or during our journey. My original introduction post can be found here and more details of our journey can be found here. We have a wonderful daughter that is 15 years old who is excited to be traveling and seeing the world with us. My interests are in travel, crypto and sport but with me, nothing is off the table! I am absolutely loving the steemit experience and love to talk to anybody that wants to talk back.

For the stato's

At 100 days (increase since 50 days)
Reputation - 49.1 (5.4)
Followers - 487 (199)
Posts - 55 (28)
Comments - 841 (411)
Following - 235 (28)
SP - 355.90 and 41 earned on steemit. (220)(21)
Steem - 7.353
SBD - 4.117
Intro post stats - $7.68, 29 upvotes, 17 new people commented
Curie upvoted post - $32.57, 523 Upvotes
Highest earning post - $14.02 (not including the curie or intro posts)
Most Upvotes - 134
Most comments - 42
Longest time spent on a post – 9 hours
Shortest time spent on a post – 30 minutes

Steemit Bloggers

One of the big changes that I have had in my steemit world is the Steemit Bloggers group. I created a post a while back on the Pineal Gland which, funny enough, happens to be my 9 hour post. I had what for me was a good response and a lot of comments which I've always enjoyed and appreciated. Then someone called @jaynie visited my post left some lovely comments and promoted my post on the steemit bloggers minnow initiative. This clearly attracted some good people to my post who all added value in some shape or form.

I applied to join and I was accepted into the family. It is the first place I check on steemit now and certainly has increased my connections to some great steemians who are pretty diverse in their knowledge and skill set but overall just a nice bunch of people. @jaynie is the founder of @steemitbloggers and is a very good leader and an extremely hard worker. My overall steemit experience is better for the Steemit Bloggers.

If you are interested in@steemitbloggers the click the link for more details.
steemitbloggers

Discord and Gina-Bot
I knew nothing about Discord until a nice steemian called @paradise-found invited me to a group called grateful vibes and I downloaded the software and joined. Discord is software that allows you to, among lots of other things, chat off-steemit to other steemians within different groups like @steemitbloggers. It really opens up so many opportunities to grow and meet new people that I consider it an essential part of the steemit experience. Link

On top of this there is Gina Bot. She is like a steemit secretary that will notify you in real time of any interactions that you have. For instance upvotes, comments and follows. You can tailor the notifications exactly how you’d prefer to make the experience work for you. Again, another essential piece of software in the quest to be efficient and organised. Here is a link to find out more. GinaBot

Dust Sweeper

@dustsweeper is a clever little system to make sure that you don’t lose out on the tiny increments of Steem that you sometimes receive in the comments. For those of you who are unaware single upvotes less than the value of 0.2 (roughly) do not pay out and go back to the pool of Steem. I was initially using my own upvote on these small amounts so that they would not be wasted which was not ideal for someone who doesn’t like to self vote. I was then recommended dustsweeper by a friend and once you sign up you just sit back and let it do the work. Totally recommended.

For more info on @dustsweeper click here

So many tools to help you.

I have only scratched the surface but there are a huge amount of developers out there creating clever tools and other bits of software to make our steemit lives that much easier. Three worth mentioning are:

Steemd.com
Add your user name to the URL and you instantly get a load of information on your account. I mainly use it for voting weight, voting power, reputation and age but there is so much more. Link here

Steemworld.org
Is a very nicely put together website that will give you info on many things. It’s user interface is good and easy to understand and use. You will get curation and author reward tracking, interactions and comments and an accurate list of all of your account vitals. Link here

Steem.makerwannabe.com
A cracking little page that tells you who has followed you or who you have followed and any posts of yours that have been resteemed. Link here

Who to follow?

If your looking for inspiration then I can recommend a few good steemians with great blogs that will interact with you.

@workin2005
If you are interested in the price analysis of Bitcoin, Ethereum, Steem etc then workin is your steemian. Link here

@rentmoney
Great advice for newbies and beyond on formatting posts and general hints and tips. Taught me all that I know. Link here

@thevillan
Great fitness blog but also the Epic Music series is well worth looking out for. Runs a brilliant minnow support competition. Link here

@twowheeledmonkey
A really good cycling blog and decent photography. Is starting a cycle blogging group which should be very cool. Link here

@steemitbloggers
So many talented and diverse people in this group that get regularly promoted. If you’re looking for interesting posts to read then look no further and don’t forget that if you are a keen blogger then you can apply and join in the fun. Check out the feed - @steemitbloggers

Newbie hints and tips.

My 50 day post included this section so I thought I would add it again to see if the advice has changed.

Be active as much as you can.

Posting your own good content is crucial but do not neglect commenting on others work. In my opinion commenting is 50% of the steemit process. Use the filters to not only check your own feed but go to the new content filter and meet some new people.

Add quality.

Again whether posting your original content or commenting on others work. Make the effort to read others work and add a comment that is relevant and adds to the post. They will appreciate it and you will probably gain followers this way. In my experience as a newbie it was also a great way of getting upvotes at the beginning when my own posts were struggling to be viewed or upvoted.

Use the tools at your disposal.

I have been through a few of the brilliant options out there but that was just a drop in the ocean. There are so many ways to give yourself an advantage. Don’t do what I did when I started and buried my head in the sand when someone mentioned a tool that I didn’t quite understand. Find them and use them. You’ll be pleased that you did.

Buy some Steem and power up

Why not? That’s why we are here to a certain extent. Buying Steem and powering up shows others that you are serious about this platform, gives your blog a little more credibility and helps you to grow faster. Everyone has a brief glance at your account especially if you are new. If you are just sat there with the 15 Steem that you are loaned at the start it doesn’t look good.. I know a few hard working steemians who have never added there own but have earned all of the Steem on site. This is admirable and takes a huge amount of work. If you are a newb I would definitely recommend adding your own. Another negative is having fifty thousand accounts you follow when you are followed by 100.

My biggest rule: Reply to everyone

There is nothing worse than writing a great comment on someone's post and not receiving any response at all. Likewise not replying to someone commenting on your work is sacrilege Make the effort to interact with people especially when they have gone out of there way to comment or upvote your work and you will gain a following and feel good about what you are doing.

So 100 days completed

I am happy with what I have achieved and the progress that I have made. I think I have honestly learned a hell of a lot from some really knowledgeable people out there and for that I am thankful. I am still enjoying the steemit experience and still have that addiction. I feel its a cross between social media, a role playing game and a hot or not rating site and a casino. Last thing at night and first thing in the morning I check my latest interactions with anticipation. I wonder what the next 100 days hold?

Thanks for reading and please feel free to comment and have a chat.

Cheers, Gaz

@steemitbloggers