Posted by David on 11/8/04 10:38pm
Msg #11033

Best Directory to List In

What do you guys feel is the best NOTARY Directory to be listed on?

Reply by Glena/NV on 11/8/04 11:03pm
Msg #11034

123 Notary First, Notary Rotary second

I love these sites.

Reply by BrendaTX on 11/8/04 11:57pm
Msg #11038

More than you probably want to know, but...

Here's my assessment:

NotaryRotary.com has the user friendly marketing features for me in that the company list has working links, fax numbers and emails, so I'd say it's got perks not found in other directories that I am aware of. I get good results from being listed here which equal those of the others, pretty much.

I get a few calls from 123notary.com, and very recently, I have received calls as a result of my listing on gomobilenotary.com. Also, I picked up a couple of good clients the last three months from NNA.

I have also received the benefit of good clients from being a member of the SigningRegistry.com. The SR has a very good marketing list and other perks that I feel I benefit from.

For work other than loan signings (i.e., affidavit work) I have received legal support related assignments from www.1legalstop.com.

If you want to see what directories are the best recognized by the search engines for those searching directly from Google or another search engine, do a little experimenting. It could be that your potential clients are searching directly from the web. Even if you don't have a website, the directories' efforts to index their sites and to be returned in the search engine's first couple of pages of results is of importance to me.

Try a search on your county, state and city + notary (and/or signing agent). It's critical at budget time to see if a directory is getting hits from search engines IMHO.

www.50statenotary.com is floating up to the top quite a bit these days when I input those terms for my own location. Victoria Ring has obviously been working on promoting her site and making it a viable place to be listed.

Reply by Ted_MI on 11/9/04 9:40am
Msg #11047

Re: More than you probably want to know, but...

Hi Brenda,

Thanks for a very informative and comprehensive overview! One question - you indicated that one should do a certain type of search to see if a directory is getting hits from search engines. I am not totally sure how one knows if a directory is getting hits from search engines. Is it merely an inference that can be drawn from a directory's placement (like close to the top or on the first page)? TIA. By the way, no I really don't think it was more than one woluld want to know.

Reply by BrendaTX on 11/10/04 1:41pm
Msg #11120

Re: More than you probably want to know, but...

Hey Ted. Cox-internet.com in this area was out yesterday (24 HOURS!!!!!) and I am just now seeing this.

You stated:
"I am not totally sure how one knows if a directory is getting hits from search engines. Is it merely an inference that can be drawn from a directory's placement (like close to the top or on the first page)?

And "TIA."

You are very welcome!

I search the search engines for what I believe clients might put in the search engine to find me.

For instance: "brazos texas notary" or "notary signing agent Texas Bryan." When a directory comes up that you are listed in it's nearly as good as having your website rise to the first page if you are in Texas. Not sure about the saturation in MI but wherever you put your $$$, I would think you would definitely prefer a site that gets favorable results from the search engine to increase your visibility when a search is done.

If you can pull a 50 mile radius zip code list from NotaryRotary.com with your Ever-Popular and delightfully sublime Premier Membership benefits (See library tab) - here is a little hint on having a website work for you more -- Put a list of zip codes you will serve on a few pages in your site.

If you need to put them at the bottom way low to make them invisible, that's ok.
Do a search on ("a zip code served" + "notary") - i.e., "77850 notary" --on yahoo.com. I will be up at the top, or near there. Google.com is likewise.

I am not a web designer by any stretch of the imagination...actually I am quite bad, if you know much about it. But I like pranking with it.

(Just ask my oldest son who is a good web designer...He'll tell you I am pretty bad.) However, I get decent results just by doing the things that I have tried--even as funky as the code gets because I use FrontPage. It's got a lot of "clutter" in the html. But, I kind of get a kick out of trolling the search engines to see if my experiments with this kind of thing work. It only took me around four years to grasp concepts that work...I am a little slow on the uptake at times.

Reply by Darlene Olson on 11/9/04 8:32am
Msg #11042

My advice is to be listed on as many sites as you can. As to which is the best site to advertise on I would have to say right now I receive more calls from Notary Rotary and the premier membership is not very expensive. I am also listed on gomobilenotary and 123notary but I would not advise you to spend alot of money on 123notary as they have glitches in their software system. For example, if a company looks up the zipcode 86301, 86303 or 86305, I will not be found because of the glitches and I live right next to that city(Prescott) so I am losing a lot of business. I paid $199.00 for the year and companies can't find me using their site!

Also you want to get listed on any and all free websites that you can and you may want to think of exchangning web links with other sites if you have a website yourself.

Reply by Lawrence Goodwin on 11/9/04 11:59am
Msg #11054

You can also Google for FREE NOTARY LISTINGS and FREE BUSINESS LISTINGS. theres tons of them.

Reply by BrendaTX on 11/10/04 1:50pm
Msg #11122

Thanks for those tips Lawrence. I have never done that! Too busy with the forest to look at the trees.

Also, Darlene is very on target - exchanging links is a great way to get noticed by the search engines. I just read both of these after posting to Ted's post. Darlene, if you want to exchange a link with me, let me know. This is a repeat of my earlier recommendation about that but:

I will exchange links folks! Send 'em. All of us with websites could create a page to help one another that way - competitors don't have to advertise each other, but nationwide is not going to encroach on the business. In fact, pages with good links often get remembered and bookmarked.