My Own Statistics and What I Would like to See Happen on Associated Content

I have been on Associated Content since 2005. Since that time I have published over 900 articles on the site in different categories and was even one of the top 1,000 producers in 2009, and I even have 31 fans. That was a very good year for me but I do not expect to be in the top 1,000 this year, and I will tell you why. For one I have found it difficult to put out the type of content that generates a lot of page views. Last year there were some huge stories that broke in the news and this year while the news is still interesting I have not been compelled to cover every little thing that happens, or even some of the big stories like the oil spill. I really have to feel a topic, and a lot of what has interested me, has only been of interest to a select, niche, audience and a small group of people, though I have been passionate and did okay considering how small the audience is.

As usual I have been addressing an audience that is not on Associated Content, which is okay. I do what I can to pull that audience in through my Twitter profile in hopes that some of the audience that I have on that network will sign up with Associated Content and write articles on the site. Getting people to sign up here is difficult. It doesn't pay a lot, the topics that Associated Content suggests, though they will bring in a lot of page views, are not necessarily what people want to write about and while this is clearly the largest writing platform out there next to having your own blog people that do not know about this site do not realize that. You own the content that you write on Associated Content and are free to publish it anywhere else unless you specifically give AC the exclusive right to publish it here only, which I only do when the assignment topics come from AC. I do not feel right about taking an idea they came up with pimping it out on other sites anyway.

It would be nice to get to clout ten, and I will in time but I am not sure that it is going to happen this year. I have spent an entire year at clout nine and will probably go into 2011 at clout nine unless something major happens. It took a lot just to get to nine from eight and I stumbled upon some great ideas that gave me the traffic that I need. My most successful article of all time might get 40 views one day while my Justin Bieber article received 545 in one day. Do you realize how hard it is to talk about Justin Bieber though; it was worth it, even though that next day that article received one hit but it isn't an article I could write every single day.

The way I see it, on a good day I can get 800 views and a bad day I might only get 200 views. I would love to get 1,200 views for a change. My total content viewed for a single day is weird too, I can easily get 100 of my articles viewed in any day but may never get 200 it seems. It would also be nice to have at least 10 page views per article. If anyone else looks at their stats I would like to know what they're getting if their numbers are considerably higher than mine. It would also be interesting to hear from people with a lower clout index than mine that are getting better numbers as that would tell us that you're on the way to the top and could get to clout ten quickly. I already know of a few writers on this site I used to converse with that have gotten to ten that came in after me, and I know what they've done but I would to see if I can do that my own way.

Is there only one way to get to clout 10 and reach the goals I would like to reach on Associated Content? Do the articles have to be written one way and does one have to promote their content in the same manner? It seems as if I did better when I read everyone else's articles and gave feedback, so perhaps I should not write as much? I tried writing shorter articles and that did not last for long, there are so many things to consider and the numbers game on this site fascinates me but one does not want to obsess on numbers to the point where they will get depressed and they stop writing. That is what happened to me over at Helium; I wrote, but I could slowly see where my article would be the highest ranked I would go from 1 out of 1, to 1 out of 30, to 3 out of 100, to 53 out of 400, it was very depressing. The more people that chimed in, the lower my personal rank would go. It was as if you were better off seeing what everyone else did, studying it, and then coming through at the last minute with the best article ever. I sure am glad that Associated Content is not like that; or perhaps it is and I do not realize it ...