I make my living selling high placed listings and upgrades. Yet I talk people out of it half the time. But, why? People who do well with high placed listings have complete looking listings.

Being high on the list raises the quantity of people who see your listing

Having a quality listing raises the batting average of how many people who see your listing actually call you.

If your listing is high quality and on the bottom, you get work, but not much. But, if you raise that high quality listing up the list, it will get more work.

A low quality listing with no notes, or stripped down notes, no reviews, no 123notary certification, and not much else will not do well high or low. This is why I discourage people brand new from upgrading.

Yes, join 123notary. Get a regular or preferential listing to start with. But, then work on your notes section. Put lots of useful information, not fluff. Get reviews, and pass our test. If you mention you are certified or approved by other agencies that helps too. If you have all of the bells and whistles on your listing, then your upgrade will be cost effective. That way I make my money for something that benefits you. I don’t want to take more than $120 of your money unless I am sure that what you are buying is right for you.

I call it — reverse sales. Untalking someone into a sale or talking them out of a sale. But, if you are right for the spot, then I will put that expensive top spot on the list of options that I recommend. This is how I do it.

As I go through the other directories looking for Notaries to add, I notice a correlation between the quality of your photo and the quality of how you do in real life on my site. I cross-reference data on my site to photos on Snapdocs for example. Here is what I noticed.

1. A good photo shows your face clearly. Some mediocre photos show a person far from the camera, and perhaps with other people.

2. A good photo has a good background. If you show a photo of you in your messy house, or in a neighborhood with lots of trees, cars, and buildings, it is disorienting to the person looking at the photo. If you show the wall of an attractive building behind you, or one where the background doesn’t distract from the main point of the photo (you), then that is a good point. Those with professional photos often have a solid color background behind them. Additionally, if you are wearing a dark shirt or have a dark skin tone and have a dark background, you blend into the background. If you wear dark, have a light background. If you wear a white shirt, perhaps a darker background.

3. Some people come across as very beautiful or sexy. That might be nice for a dating app. Remember, you are on Notary apps, and your clients probably don’t want to date you, and probably don’t want to date them — although you never know. After a few drinks the game changes completely. Try to look professional.

4. Try to look like someone who works in a bank or office who handles paperwork. Some of the people on SnapDocs look like lowlifes, or like people who work at the corner store. People who are serious about hiring a Notary want someone who looks like a professional clerical type. You don’t have to look that smart, but you do have to look responsible and conservative. So, if you drink a lot, or do drugs, or are tired, don’t have your photo taken until you can appear sober, alert, well dressed, and presentable.

SUMMARY
Most of the Notaries on Snapdocs and NotaryCafe look like people I wouldn’t hire even if it were to save my own life. Many people look like they have attitude problems, or look unprofessional, or worse. People who don’t eat properly or who take drugs or too much alcohol develop an air of haziness and have a faded appearance. You can spot these types very easily. They look like people who are mentally slow, and who will not get things done correctly or on time — and above all, will not care. If you want to get hired — don’t look like that.

I can sense a lot by tuning into people, and their photos. Some women look like they have anger problems. Others look depressed, terrified, or something else. When you are handling half million dollar loans, you need to look like a methodical clerical type who is pleasant, but not too emotional. Try to fit the part so to speak when you are having your photo taken and in real life.

People with good photos have a one in three chance of being acceptable to 123notary after we are done talking to them and quizzing them. Those with no photo or a mediocre photo are in my experience not worth adding as they are more like a less than 10% chance of worth keeping.

SUGGESTIONS
If you want to do well as a Notary, most sites have the option to post a photo. 123notary does not do this as we focus on information and not a fashion show. However, a photo reveals a lot about your soul and who you are, or at least who you are pretending to be.

1. Investing $100 or more on a professional photo shoot makes sense. Being well rested, wearing professional attire and having someone top notch take 50 photos of you in different poses and backgrounds makes sense. You choose the best ones and work with those. I did this for dating apps and got tons of responses from my top notch photos. The photo worked miracles, although I didn’t meet anyone compatible. But, married life is like a prison I hear, so I am happy that I have my freedom. But, as a Notary, you want clients, not freedom, so get a photo taken by a pro.

2. Spend time having photos taken of you with different professional looking outfits and backgrounds and then compare them. You will do much better with photos if you can pick the best one out of several dozen or several hundred. The average guy just takes some sub-par photo and upload it and then wonder why nobody calls them. Don’t be that guy.

3. Spend some time looking at photos of people who do look like professional clerical types and try to see how they portray themselves. I find that they are not too happy, not sad, not too fashionable, but neatly kept. They dress like they work at an office, but not too fancy usually. They keep their hair neat. Most of all, they look like they get work done in a timely manner.

4. SigningAgent.com has a much higher rate of professional looking people. Whether they are good Notaries or not remains to be seen, but most of the photos look like people I would not have an issue with at a minimum.

5. How you present yourself in general really matters. Having a clear photo where you can see your face easily when it is a thumbnail photo, and with a clear background is key. Most Notaries do not give much relevant information in their notes section. Having reviews from clients about your service is also critical and very few new additions to our site have even one review. Lastly, being certified by 123notary, Notary2Pro and LSS really helps a lot. If you have all the bells and whistles, your phone will probably ring.

But, if you have a bad photo, just remember this:
A mediocre photo is worth 1000 words — misspelled words.

Notaries hire us to advertise them and promote them by virtue of listing them. But, many notaries do counterproductive things with their advertising. Let’s take a closer look.

YOUR BUSINESS NAME
1. Have a generic sounding business name like “Nationwide Notary Service” , “Statewide Signing Service”, or “Illinois Notary Service.” You will get confused with a lot of others and not stand out. Or just don’t have a business name at all.

REVIEWS
2. Don’t ask for reviews — ever… And make sure your work isn’t that great, which will alleviate the risk of getting a positive review. Or you could try to get negative reviews.

PHONE ETIQUETTE
3. Never answer your phone, and if you do, make sure to have screaming kids in the background, try to sound muffled, don’t speak into the phone, and don’t be polite. Never announce who you are when you answer your phone — make them guess.

4. Give roundabout answers to questions via phone and insert lots of unasked for information which you think makes you look knowledgeable, but to them makes you look like an annoying novice who won’t stop talking.

YOUR NOTES SECTION
5. Use baseless cliche adjectives to describe yourself like “responsible” and “reliable”

6. Leave your notes section blank on your 123notary listing profile.

7. Ramble on and on in your notes section without letting people know your credentials or what you know how to do.

YOUR PROFILE
8. Don’t fill in your # of loans signed on your profile. Let people guess and when they ask, say, “lots” rather than giving them actual tangible information such as an actual number.

9. Only work two days a week, and only three hours on each day.

10. Only serve your home county and refuse to go anywhere else for any price.

KNOWLEDGE & CERTIFICATIONS

11. Don’t get any. Or at a minimum, don’t get certified by any agency with tough testing standards. Why bother?

12. Make sure you don’t know your notary knowledge at all. That way you can ensure that you will make Notary mistakes, get in lots of trouble and lose clients.

SUMMARY
If you follow all of my tips, I guarantee that you will do really poorly in your business unless you have a very loyal following already. On the other hand, do the opposite, and you might do well. In addition to these tips, if you send back packages late, or in incomplete form, and speak in a rude way to clients, that will enhance your ability to fail in business. Once again, do the opposite and you might succeed.

I wrote this article in jest, but the reality is that most Notaries are not doing everything, or even half of everything they need to do to succeed. Making it as a mobile notary is not a matter of luck. There is a checklist of things you need to do: Notes, Reviews, Certifications, Notes, Business Name, Phone Etiquette, Notary Skills, etc.

The good news is that we have many articles and even free courses on our blog for ALL of these points. And you can become an expert with n

Are you a mobile notary? If you are reading this, the answer is most likely yes. Most people want more business, but can’t figure out how to get it. I have written many articles on this topic. But, let’s look at it from a new point of view.

COUNTIES
Most Notaries advertise in a handful of counties. From time to time we get someone who only does their home county, and might begrudgingly go to a close neighboring county, but only if you pay enough. This is not the attitude of growth and success. Then there are those who go everywhere.

Number crunching has proven to me that those who have lots of counties get far more clicks. If you have one county, you might get half a click per day. But, each extra county you have your clicks go up by (.1) or more clicks per day. If you have twenty counties, you will get a lot of clicks.

You might be thinking that you will have to drive too far and it is not worth it. But, by driving far, you get new clients, more work, and more experience under your belt (assuming you wear a belt, some wear suspenders.)

If you agree to go farther, you need to charge more. But, if you are new, you can work for cheap in order to widen your net. I got many new clients by going where others refused to go. Or if Star Trek wrote this — those Notaries went where no Notary had gone before…

ASK FOR MORE REVIEWS
If you ask everyone who likes your work for a review, you get more reviews. Normally you have to ask ten people for a review, and email each of them a link, and then get an average of one review. By widening the net of who you ask, you can get more reviews. It is a similar concept as my strategy about counties.

WIDEN YOUR NOTES
Most Notaries don’t write enough in their notes. Those who do write don’t always strike a chord with what they write. Writing fluffy content that doesn’t grab your attention, or using baseless adjectives about how great you are will alienate readers. Cold hard facts organized well with a warm fuzzy description about what you are like is my winning philosophy. But, the attitude of writing more notes and then having me review it (free as a courtesy of course) you are widening your net. This costs nothing, but few really put in the effort. It’s a lot easier than driving three more hours per day.

BE ON MORE DIRECTORIES
More directories = more calls. Some are worth paying, most are not. But, if you never try them you will never know. We recommend particular directories. Read our other blogs in the advertising section and find out.

GET MORE CERTIFICATIONS
Why only get LSS or NNA certifications. Get more. If you advertise with 123notary, get ours too. If you want more knowledge, try the Notary2Pro certification — that is what we recommend the most although it is not that popular these days. More certifications = more 3rd party credibility from reliable sources. If you say how great you are you come across as cheesy, but if your reviews from title companies say you are great and you have four or five certifications, then nobody will argue whether you are great or not.

EXPAND YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Some people will only study if it is “assigned.” These are what I call sheeple or beta-people. They never think for themselves but only follow others. Knowledge is power. If you are rock solid on your notary knowledge and industry knowledge and practice communicating well without rambling or giving indirect answers, this is a marketing strategy. It is not widening your net per se, but strengthening your chance of turning a call into a job. People are impressed by solid knowledge, not snow jobs! So, keep getting knowledge. A little every day adds up, especially if you master what you know.

HIGHER PLACEMENT
Many people like higher placement on 123notary and it is a potent advertising strategy, but that is different from widening your net. That is more like deepening your net, or heightening it… or something.

SUMMARY
There are many ways to widen or expand your advertising net, and this strategy pays off big time. I used it myself and I became full-time as a mobile notary which most Notaries cannot do. There are other ways to expand your reach as well like social media and networking. I strongly suggest the widening strategy! It works!

Here are a few tips for the new folks to get more business.

1. Take jobs that others won’t.
Most Notaries are picky. They want the best jobs for the highest price from the nicest companies. If you are trying to develop a reputation and get signings under your belt, do the opposite! Take signings that are far away, pay little, involve a lot of fax backs, or sound difficult. You have to get your foot in the door.

2. Advertise on all the major portals and directories
Snapdocs, 123notary, Notary Rotary, Notary Cafe, and others

3. Advertise in more counties on 123notary
We don’t even charge for this. Once you are listed you can have up to 12 counties, and sometimes we can accommodate for more. If the database cannot accommodate them on one listing, we can create additional listings which generally is not free, but for an affordable cost if you want a larger net.

4. Call all signing companies in the nation that are doing a lot of business. Talk to all title companies within 90 minutes of you as well. If they need pick up and delivery, you might be their person.

5. Having mobile equipment helps
Mobile printing, scanning, faxing really helps. But, if your equipment is at home, make sure to have a dual tray printer, a reliable scanner, fax, and whatever else your clients say they need.

6. Network
Get listed with your local chamber of commerce, let local hospitals, Attorneys, nursing homes, airports, jails, bail bonds people and Real Estate brokers know you are in business. Often they have their own Notaries, but people get sick, quit, or won’t notarize due to conflict of interest.

7. 25K E&O Insurance
This is the minimum, but some people get up to a million to let people know they are serious. An absolute beginner should probably stick to 25 or 100K. But, you an upgrade if you start getting title work because the title companies want more.

8. Let everyone know you are a Notary
People often need a Notary and it is handy if one lives nearby who people know. Mention you are a Notary on your Facebook page, Twitter, at networking events, to your neighbors, the local stores, and anyone else you can think of.

9. One certification is good, but…
It is good to be “certified”, but having three or four certifications lets people know you are three or four times as serious as the others.

When I make welcome calls, the purpose is to get your information straight, answer any questions you have, and to acquaint myself with you. Most people don’t like to talk much, and have very little input to give me. But, there are always a few who are bright and bushy-tailed and have lots of insecurities and questions about the industry.

I try to help people decide how much E&O to get, and whom to get it from. What certification course(s) to take and why. I recommend ours as well as other agencies — they get free sales work from me (how nice of me.) How to contact companies, how to get reviews, and what to think about as a new signing agent. I help with all of these things.

It is hard as a new signing agent. It is hard to have confidence when you really don’t know which end is up or what your end of the bargain is. The fact is that you don’t need to know much about the documents, but you do need to know how to market yourself and handle situations.

Basically, whatever they teach in certification courses is the opposite of what you need to know — not that I am knocking traditional knowledge. You need to know where basic information is in the documents — where the rate, APR, prepayment penalty, 1st payment due, fees, closing costs, etc. you need to know why the rate is lower than the APR and how to date the Right to Rescind. You need to know how to be a good Notary — that is a little harder. But, the hard part is how to get used and handle difficult companies. We teach this if you read our marketing materials in our blog.

I hope I can help you with your confidence. The honest truth is that knowledge and a little experience go a long way. So read our tutorials on the blog and study from various sources and be solid in what you know. I feel confidence in others when they are solid. You can feel confidence in yourself when you are solid.

A Notary named Diane writes that after 19 days with a high placed new listing on 123notary she made back the cost of the listing! That is pretty quick especially for a brand new listing. Sometimes those listings take time to pick up speed and get noticed.

One other notary emailed me asking how he can know how much business he got from 123notary. I told him to keep a PHONE JOURNAL next to the phone. Write down the date, time, who was calling, and where they found him. It is a little like keeping a notary journal except without the fees, thumbprints or ID’s. But, that way you will have a record of where people found you and where to spend your advertising bucks next year!