The first thing you need to change is the speed of your swing - I'm sure you are swinnging way too fast if you covered Alabama in 5 days
Slow down - a fast pace makes you miss most deep targets - on relic sites the deep hits are usualy much older than the surface - the surface is covered with junk, which hides the good stuff underneet.
if you have regular and good sites, then remove some of the junk - or get a smaller coil for your detector. A small coil is excellent for thrashy sites as it can allow you to find good targets next to junk.
if you are only interested in coins, then get one of each type, put it in the ground listen to what your detector tells you - most coins has a solid sound, which is easy to seperate from a pull tab.
Take a few days to learn your detector by digging in sand - it allows for fast recovery pay attention to the tones, and see if you remember them.
Search the net, and read about how successfull/experienced MD'ers do - you can eventualy join a local MD club, to get to know somebody who can guide you in the right detection.
remember - research is everything - the best/oldest sites are producing the best finds.
I recall when I started with this hobby last winter, that I were pretty shure that mother earth were mad of dirt, sand, rocks, cigarette paper and pulltabs.
I did actually get 1 coin the first day I were out, but it took me a few days to find a nice spot with more finds. - when I located that spot, I searched it a bit, and then I started to search nearby promissing spots - the reason for that was that I wanted to see something coming out of the earth every time I went out, and that way I could search unproductive sites, and return to the sites I knew were producing when I had confirmed that there were no loot on the new spots. - Today that one spot has turned into a lot of nice and productive sites, and more places are added on a regular basis.
Here's an easy tip to help you verify if a new site is proming - sweep the place, and dig the solid signals - leave the ones which does not sound familar. This will allow you to see if a spot is worth a further investigation. Coins are like dogs, and they like to be with other coins! Make a note of the spot, and see if you can guess what that place were used for earlier in time - you will find that some places are better than others, but there will be a system.
Have fun