How to Survive the Clout Drought

I was thrilled when I recently discovered Associated Content. Finally, I thought, a viable medium for me to strengthen my craft within a supportive community of people who love the same thing that I do: to write. I made plans to write frequently and to familiarize myself more each day with how AC works.

I couldn't wait to complete my Content Producer profile and share the good news with my loved ones that I was on the way to being published. However, once my profile had been completed and I had a chance to view it, a couple of things stood out that I had not anticipated. The most obvious was the message beside my photo that stated: "My clout level: 1 of 10." Whoa, I thought, that's not exactly an ego booster. However, I was tickled by that cute little purple dot beside my name - until I understood what it symbolized.

Upon doing a little research on this site, I learned that my clout level was based on my number of page views, so I took this as a challenge - a motivator of sorts to write as often as possible and learn different strategies for increasing my number of page views. I found some great advice for promoting my work and was appreciative to all of the CP's who took the time to write helpful tips for those of us who are desperately seeking them.

What I wasn't fully prepared for was my psychological reaction to having a clout level of "1". Suddenly, I found myself in the midst of a clout drought. I would liken the feeling to being a high school freshman. You know - the excitement of being around the cool older kids but the knowledge that for now, you are just not going to be one of them.

Some people believe advice should only be given by those individuals who've been there and done that - the folks who have "arrived" in life, or reached that coveted stage of self-actualization that others are still climbing toward. However, I'm going to take a stab at giving advice while I'm still an AC rookie. This is good stuff, or at least is seems to make sense to me.