I'm the perfect example of this. I've been here for 5 years now although I've only really been active for the last 2+. Up until this last December, I've almost been exclusively about commenting and voting. I would write the occasional post of my own, but far and away my most "profitable" avenue on Hive was through curation. I've always been about making 10 meaningful comments a day and then making sure my voting power never hits 100%. I decided to get more active on posting over the last couple months with the goal of getting the "Monthly Author" badge. While my posts do get me a decent return, I'm still getting almost as much through my curation.
Like I said, I spent most of the last two years just engaging rather than writing and it has helped build me to where I am now. I've earned about 3 times as much through curation as through writing articles, and it's a lot easier.
If you want to get noticed, spend the time adding to the conversation on other peoples' posts. As you so rightly point out, you can write the best article in the world, but if nobody reads it or even knows it exists, what good is it?
Get on Threads and start engaging and get your name out there. The followers will come when people start seeing you're committed.
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