Early tricks are follow a lot of people (that you like their content, esp with higher reputation scores), upvote their articles and comment on them. Many will follow you back just to give you a chance to see if they like your content. And others who come after you and see your comment might follow you also. No followers = no upvotes = no payout.
Be sure to use all five tags that you're allowed to get maximum exposure. Your posts are only seen by people looking int hose categories (and not for very long usually). I've been inactive for many months and just now poking around again. I'll follow you awhile.
-g-
PS - pretty faces in profiles tend to get more followers, so you nailed that trick already!