How can we submit proposals to add value to the Steem blockchain, receive funding for our projects promoting Steem, get more upvotes on our posts, and earn 50% as an investor delegating Steem? Will we discover the answer by reading this post because below are solutions to some of our most challenging questions on Steem such as how do we fund innovation quickly, what works to earn more money on our posts, and how do those of us holding Steem power convert it into Steem without powering down?

To stay updated with changes, review budget proposals, view funded projects, and see investor payout reports, will we please visit https://steemit.com/trending/budget because #budget is the primary tag for our collaboration?

Steem Budget Proposal Format?

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1. Design a project intended to add value to the Steem blockchain such as hosting a meetup, building an app, advertising Steem online, scheduling a meeting to pitch Smart Media Tokens, marketing Steem to an existing audience, etc. For example, I will be submitting proposals for ads for Steem on Google and Facebook along with hiring a developer for SteemJ to start. Review my previous proposals at https://airtable.com/shrXuoYTnODWA0QG1.
2. Write about this project in a budget proposal post beginning with the tag budget as the first tag because this will help us to find all the budget proposals in one place at https://steemit.com/trending/budget.
3. In the title, tell us the value we are getting out of the project if it has not started yet or provide an update about an existing project if posting an update about a previous budget proposal. We prefer funding projects that already have been started and need funding to continue.
4. Include clearly in the proposal the amount of STEEM requested to pay the proposal along with a USD equivalent in case the price changes suddenly.
5. Explain clearly in the body of the budget proposal how the money is used to help us understand what we are paying for. For example, in building an app how much are the developers being paid? How much is hosting? For ads, how much is the CPM? Where are the ads targeted? Are Facebook and Google receiving 100% of the payment or is part reserved for production?
6. Provide links to any proposals submitted previously to help us track progress and review our work together. An Airtable spreadsheet like https://airtable.com/shrXuoYTnODWA0QG1 works nicely for this.

Example Proposal!

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Our first budget proposal submitted by me is at https://steemit.com/budget/@jerrybanfield/50-million-ads-for-steem-on-facebook-google-and-youtube and presents one way to request funding succesfully.

TITLE
Steem Video Ad #10 on Facebook and YouTube

TEXT (Abbreviated)
1,000 STEEM to pay the advertising costs on Facebook and Google AdWords to promote Steem's new budget proposal systems for $10 a day for 2 months to those interested in cryptocurrencies. Thank you for funding $10,000 so far on these previous campaigns (list of links). More details explained in the post including screenshots, etc.

TAGS
budget, steem,steemit,advertising,busy

First Funded Proposal

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View the first proposal to receive funding at https://steemit.com/budget/@steempunknet/steempunk-net-mmorpg-on-the-steem-blockchain-already-in-open-beta-testing-attracting-players-from-outside-steem.

We funded this proposal to begin because we liked seeing the months of service in creating the first MMORPG on the Steem blockchain alongside an active website and community prior to requesting funding.

Proposal Funding Active!

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We naturally can fund budget proposals at https://steemit.com/trending/budget with an upvote or our own Steem/SBD. We hope that posting all under the budgets tag will help organize what we have already been doing so far on many different tags to make it easier to upvote projects intended to improve Steem. How will we collaborate to provide greater funding than what we already have available through upvotes and direct contributions?

We are primarily funding these proposals today with the new @jerrybanfield voting bot as explained at https://steemit.com/budget/@jerrybanfield/promote-steem-posts-and-fund-budget-proposals-with-our-voting-bot.

Transferring 0.1+ SBD to @jerrybanfield with the link to a post on steemit.com now results in an automatic upvote based on the existing bids with half of the amount sent going to fund budget proposals to grow Steem from https://steemit.com/trending/budget while the other half is returned to investors delegating Steem power to @jerrybanfield!

All bids sent to @jerrybanfield will give 50% into the @budgets account and 50% into the delegator account @jerrybanfieldroi. Technically the percentages from everything sent will be 47.5% to @budgets, 47.5% to @jerrybanfieldroi, and 5% split between @aggroed and @yabapmatt for managing the bot as explained here. For simplicity, we will just mention the 50/50 split and consider the 5% a necessary fee charged before rewards are calculated.

@budgets will be used exclusively for sending payments to fund projects proposed in budget proposals. For accountability, @budgets will resteem every project that it funds and @jerrybanfield will publish investor reports showing which projects were funded for how much along with a report how much each delegator received out of the @jerrybanfieldroi. Both the @budgets and @jerrybanfieldroi accounts will resteem each of these reports.

With the current Steem dollar price and the existing voting power we have, we are starting with probably around $500 USD a day in funding split with $250 a day to those delegating and $250 a day to budget proposals. As delegations are made to @jerrybanfield we will soon have thousands of dollars a day in funding for budgets and returning to investors.

How Does The Voting Bot Operate?

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Sending @jerrybanfield at least 0.1 SBD with the link to a post will provide an automatic upvote within 3 hours based on the bids received. Read more at https://steemit.com/budget/@jerrybanfield/promote-steem-posts-and-fund-budget-proposals-with-our-voting-bot.

Track all upvoting bots including @jerrybanfield when live at https://s3.amazonaws.com/yabapmatt/bottracker/bottracker.html. What we will enjoy about using the @jerrybanfield account as a voting bot is knowing that the earnings are going to help fund projects that add value to Steem.

Earn 50% As An Investor!

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Delegating Steem power to @jerrybanfield starting today provides a simple way to earn passive income in both Steem and SBD! Make a delegation once and receive payouts indefinitely each week from @jerrybanfieldroi which will receive half of the available rewards from the voting bot while @budgets will receive the other half. View the first round of investor payouts at https://steemit.com/budget/@jerrybanfield/first-steem-budget-investor-payments which averaged out to about 62% APR!

The minimum delegation amount to receive a payout is 500 Steem Power which today is 1025530.6135 vests. Less than this will still contribute to the project but will not receive payouts from @jerrybanfieldroi because of the amount of time and energy necessary to send the payments on smaller amounts.

Easy Delegation Solution!

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Want to just click a link and delegate? Ask me for a link in the comments including the phrase "Would you please make me a delegation link" because then I can search directly for that in the comments? As soon as I see your request, I will make a link you can click directly to complete the delegation using the active key to sign in. To make sure I get it right, please include the amount of Steem Power to delegate or say "ALL" for a full delegation link.

Do It Now Delegation with Vessel!

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To make and manage delegations, I prefer using the Vessel wallet by @jesta as seen in the newest update at https://steemit.com/vessel/@jesta/vessel-0-2-0-interact-with-steem-securely-from-any-website because this makes it easier to send transactions without logging into steemit.com and also easy to withdraw delegations. Follow the three screenshots below for easy delegation and to undelegate easily as needed!

First, open the wallet, click on accounts, click on SP Delegation, and then click on + to add a new one next to the account desired.

Next, add jerrybanfield into the account field and choose the amount of Steem Power to delegate by typing the number in or using the slider at the bottom to select. Note that previously delegated Steem Power takes a week to return meaning when we remove a delegation to make room for this one, we have to wait a week to delegate. Click "Confirm Delegation" to proceed and enter the Vessel wallet password to finalize the transaction.

To confirm the delegation was successful, visit https://steemworld.org/@jerrybanfield and check delegations (in).

Delegations can also be confirmed at https://steemd.com/@jerrybanfield

Not using Vessel wallet or just want to delegate from here? The link structure below will do it directly when substituting our account name for ournamehere in the links below and the VESTS in with the amount we want to delegate. Here is an actual link example for @joeparys with a picture of what happens after using the link.

https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/delegateVestingShares?delegator=joeparys&delegatee=jerrybanfield&vesting_shares=5517354.700800%20VESTS

Customizable Links!

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Here are prefilled links by Steem Power that we can use just by replacing the ournamehere with our account name with our own account. Customize the delegated amount of Steem power using http://www.steemdollar.com/vests.php to convert to vests, copying that amount of vests into the vesting shares area, and making sure there are six decimal places after the period in VESTS which requires usually adding a couple zeros to the end after using the converter.

1,000 Steem Power

https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/delegateVestingShares?delegator=ournamehere&delegatee=jerrybanfield&vesting_shares=2051061.227000%20VESTS

10,000 Steem Power

https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/delegateVestingShares?delegator=ournamehere&delegatee=jerrybanfield&vesting_shares=20510612.270500%20VESTS

100,000 Steem Power
https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/delegateVestingShares?delegator=ournamehere&delegatee=jerrybanfield&vesting_shares=205106122.704600%20VESTS

After creating our link, we need to sign in with our account name and ACTIVE private key to confirm the transaction which is found in our permissions tab under wallet like this https://steemit.com/@jerrybanfield/permissions except substitute your username for mine.

Bonus for Delegators!

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All of @jerrybanfield's nearly 100,000 Steem Power does not count towards the total meaning the 50% is divided up among just those delegating! This means delegating immediately will provide the highest return as those delegating early will essentially get a huge bonus from my upvote!

When 100,000 Steem power is delegated in total, those delegating will effectively be receiving about 100% of the delegated voting power in return because of my voting power not counting to the total. When 1 million Steem power is delegated, everyone will effectively still be receiving a ~10% boost from my Steem power.

Review existing delegations anytime at https://steemworld.org/@jerrybanfield under delegations (in).

Curation and Witness Rewards?

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All of the curation and witness rewards @jerrybanfield earns from now on will simply increase the power of the voting bot which will give @budgets and those delegating a larger potential for rewards. For those of us that delegate and have not voted jerrybanfield as a witness yet, will we please visit https://steemit.com/~witnesses and place our vote because this will help us maximize our return on investment and the available budget? Higher witness ranking equals more Steem power earned which equals larger voting power which means more Steem and SBD received for votes which means more earnings for @budgets and @jerrybanfieldroi.

Limitations

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Starting yesterday I paused my @steemvoter and will no longer make any votes on Steem because doing so would use the voting power delegated and reduce rewards for everyone. After reviewing my voting history with hundreds of people on autovote, upvoting thousands of reader comments on my posts, upvoting my own comments 100% for "visibility" on trending posts, voting mostly for those voting me back, and randomly voting on posts sent to me in private messages, I believe this new system will be a huge improvement for most of us. Those previously receiving the votes for free, including me, will collectively be losing about $100 a day in upvotes. These losses can be replaced by placing bids through the @jerrybanfield voting bot. Additionally, all existing delegations I had yesterday were withdrawn to support fully funding this project which will increase the voting power by 7,000 Steem power within a week or so.

After reading all this, we might wonder how I am going to earn anything now given that I am not taking a percentage of the rewards anywhere and not planning to power down indefinitely? My liquid author rewards will be my only earnings going forward. To keep these separate, the rewards will be immediately redeemed and transferred to my wife @laurabanfield and sold from there. Laura is also the first one to delegate to the project meaning that until more delegations arrive, she will receive all of the investor rewards. We probably will see 100,000+ Steem power in delegations within the first week or two which will then reduce Laura's percentage to around 10% of the investor rewards perhaps even for the very first payout next week.

Finally, this system is not coded into Steem and relies on our collaboration. It would be ideal for us to be able to have this done completely through the Steem blockchain but it also would require a lot of energy from the development team which would be best spent now making sure we get Smart Media Tokens launched and improved consistently. Perhaps one day we can get a built in budget proposal system in which case I would stop running my system. Given the feedback on the budget proposals whitepaper I wrote, we are unlikely to see a budget proposal system coded into Steem within a year if ever which is why we see this system here today which is immediately available for us to use!

Questions?

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For questions, will we please collaborate below in the comments because there we can provide clarity for anything uncertain and improve this project to help us add the most value to our Steem blockchain? I will attempt to answer as many questions as I can and focus my reading on Steem in the budget proposals going forward.

The main question I can think of is "Why not use a separate account like the rest of the voting bots?" Branding. Trust. Using my account to vote and separate accounts for payouts is ideal in the big picture.

Thank You for Reading!

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I appreciate this chance to be of service on Steem together and hope our time in this post together was useful!

Love,
Jerry Banfield