Posted by Linda_H/FL on 5/26/09 9:45pm
Msg #290014

Advertising...

Does anyone advertise on Facebook? If so, how has it worked for you?

Reply by Claudine Osborne on 5/26/09 9:53pm
Msg #290016

Linda, Great question. I have been wondering the same thing!! Can't wait to hear the replies.

Reply by Charles_Ca on 5/26/09 10:12pm
Msg #290018

Re: Advertising...I've been pondering this for years...

To me the problem with Facebook and many of the other social networking sites is how to advertise to the demographics you are looking for. i have several friends who advertise successfully on Facebook, MySpace and others. I also have friends who try to work them but don't seem to get much traction. Most of my friends who do well on Facebook are all musicians, you can look up the likes of Lief Sorbye (leader, of the Celtic band Tempest), Mark Ungar (Plays in the Band Avalong rising) and Cat Taylor Overstreet (a fantastic violinist who plays with several Celtic bands and is Music director for a couple of Rennaissance Pleasure Faires). They all use the Social networking sites to whip up their fan base. The problem I see with these sites is that you ahve to have your targeted audience listed as friends on your sites sos that you can broadcast to them and i don't see how as notaries (or for that matter in the businesses I am involved) how one gets the target audience to get on board. I can't see title company people jumping on your MySpace to check out what a notary is doing. The problem is even worse than that, I wonder how many notaries can specifically name the decision maker that would use them, I know I usually don't know who the true buyer of the notaries service really is.

Let me digress for a moment and give you a true life example of me totally muffing who the buyer is. I have a friend who is in the heavy equipment industry. He is a user of construction bonding and I sell construction performance bonds as well as other things he might be interested in. This guy is a high prssure go getter and I am friends with him. We were tallking about a new contract he has coming up and I thought it was an excellent opportunity to pitch a performance bond he needed. We chatted about the specifics, he was interested, I gave him a bond application and several days later found out it was his wife who handled the finances and bought the insurance. I totally blew the sale because I didn't specifically nail down who the decision maker was. Sometimes it's difficult to make that determination.

Reply by Linda_H/FL on 5/26/09 10:20pm
Msg #290021

Thanks Charles....I asked because of their offer of

advertising on the site..

The problem *I* personally see with it is the separation of personal and professional ... anyone looking at my profile on facebook is going to see a picture of a siberian husky (2 as a matter of fact) and a picture of one of my grandsons .... unless you can have two listings, that's not exactly a professional face being put forth. (Can you tell I'm new to Facebook??..<G>...wondering, too, about the "crank call" factor that may come into play with that type of advertising...

Reply by Charles_Ca on 5/27/09 11:30am
Msg #290070

Re: Thanks Charles....I asked because of their offer of

thaqt is another excellent point. I know that my Facebook page quickly disintegrated into a fre-for-all. I have my friends, my daughter, my daughter's friends and relatives and some of them present a less than professional image. I believe that people own what they say but to many in business this would be a deal killer for me. Some of the comments are either not a reflection of my personality nor the philosophies I subscribe to but the overall picture is not a pretty one .

Reply by BrendaTx on 5/27/09 11:15am
Msg #290068

Re: Advertising...I've been pondering this for years...

*The problem is even worse than that, I wonder how many notaries can specifically name the decision maker that would use them, I know I usually don't know who the true buyer of the notaries service really is. *

Charles, you are so correct.

Target marketing is a missing piece with many.

Reply by Michelle/AL on 5/26/09 11:04pm
Msg #290030

Don't laugh, Linda.

I have a personal facebook page. About 3 weeks ago I created a page for my notary business. I had big plans about how I could use it to advertise. Well, I can't locate it. No joke. Can't pull it up. I emailed the facebook admin team and they told me to check the FAQ's and if the answer to my problem wasn't there I was out of luck. I'm not joking. I've been to busy to pursue it any further. The problem I think is that I was trying to use one log in code/ID for both the personal and business profiles. I have not purchased any ads space on facebook.

Reply by Linda_H/FL on 5/26/09 11:15pm
Msg #290031

Re: Don't laugh, Linda....Michelle

I wouldn't laugh at you for something like that - that sounds EXACTLY like something that would happen to me...

Reply by notaryinmo on 5/27/09 3:31am
Msg #290042

Re: Don't laugh, Linda....Michelle

I'm trying to get a website built so that I can advertise on ActiveRain. Not sure if this is a national advertising venue though. Thought I'd throw my .02 in

Reply by Charles_Ca on 5/27/09 11:33am
Msg #290072

FWIW I find Active Rain to be a waste of time...

everyone is so desperate to advertise that you have no interaction only people advertising to people stuff that they neither want or care about. It should be renamed Active Noise!

Reply by PAW on 5/27/09 7:25am
Msg #290049

Facebook? What's that?

That's a question I'm often asked when notarizing clients in my area. (Average age in this county is 57!) Most of my general notary clients are seniors, don't have computers and have no idea what Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and the likes are, except what they see on the news.

So, I don't advertise there. I do advertise on many sites such as ActiveRain, MerchantCircle, CraigsList, YellowBook.com, CitySearch, legal and real estate directories, etc.

Reply by jba/fl on 5/27/09 7:56am
Msg #290051

New coffee table book of faces... n/m

Reply by Yowheelz on 5/27/09 8:08am
Msg #290053

I use Craigslist but it has never brought me signings even

though that is the primary emphasis in my ad. It has brought some simple notary work but in MD were we can only charge $2.00 it is more a nuisance than anything. They usually want a bill of sale notarized at 9 PM on Sunday night.

The only benefit I have derrived is policing other notaries. One advertised her fee at $5.00 and I sent her a reminder that she can't do that. She emailed back that she had moved here from another state and didn't know MD had a different fee. Really read her handbook didn't she! I also sometimes remind new listings that advertise mortgages thrown in with bill of sales, POA's etc that if they don't already have a TPL they will need to get one to do mortgages. Just trying to keep the playing field level.

On the other hand it is free and I can keep it local to the areas I cover. Who knows, someday it may get me in with a good TC.

Reply by Jess/CT on 5/27/09 9:01am
Msg #290058

Re: I use Craigslist & Linkedin

I'm fairly new to mortgage signings, but I get work from craigslist and linkedin.com.

The only problem is that I have people that want me to travel out of state, which is illegal, so I try to direct them to listings in their area.

Reply by Marian_in_CA on 5/27/09 12:46pm
Msg #290081

I hate Facebook!

Okay, there... I said it. I hate it! I have a personal page that I signed up for at the goading of friends and my younger sisters... but I can't stand it.

Now, Twitter is different. I love Twitter. But, I can't STAND the people on Twitter who use it to market themselves every 5 minutes. Yuck. I use it to try to help others, and for random personal quips.

I saw a video the other day from a guy who is an Internet marketer and I really like his perspective on things. As a rule, I kind of don't like internet marketers... they all seem so, I dunno... I can't place it. But this guy explained it really well:

Reply by MW/VA on 5/27/09 3:58pm
Msg #290106

Re: I hate Facebook!

Good post, Marian. He presents an interesting perspective.

Reply by BarbaraL_CA on 5/28/09 4:09pm
Msg #290219

I have a facebook account for "me", and I also have a facebook account for my notary business. I'm not wild about the business result because you have to keep up with your contacts and list them as friends and then "network" thru your facebook page. I love facebook for the "me" and my friends aspect.

I use linkedin.com as a business network and it is working great! It's amazing how many contacts you have access to (or have access to you) just thru business contacts. I suggest you use linkedin.com for business networking.