Too many make a big deal about getting a large number of followers. I find of the 4300 that I have, very few are regular reader/commenting on my content. I imagine the vast percentage of them are not even on STEEM anymore.

I played the following game at one point and my feed was a mess. It was too much when I was following over 1000 people. I now keep it at 400 which is manageable but could use even more culling.
For most people though you will have to settle with community and discussion and not 5 super whales upvoting your every shitty comment and blog post. There are so many things against you. Blog about wrong stuff - no one is gonna risk upvoting you - at least not whales that are friends with other whales who might be politically correct etc. Blog too much and they will remove you from auto upvote. Blog to little and the same happens and so on and so forth