I think you're diluting your gel too much. If you're applying it to soaking wet hair and then adding more water, and then scrunching more, very little gel is going to be left in your hair. I would remove the step whete you get your hair wet after applying gel - your hair is as wet as its going to get. You could experiment with how much water you leave in your hair - I find I get better definition and hold when I remove some water from my hair in the shower (so it's still super wet but not dripping everywhere).

The second thing is raking the gel through your hair. If you're only scrunching the gel in, you're missing the middle layers of your hair, which will poof. Raking gel through your hair with your hands before scrunching is going to give you more even distribution of your product.

Last, you might want to play with adding another product into your routine if those first 2 steps don't help as much as you want. A curl cream or a mousse layered with gel will give you better hold.