Make a sign, put your thumb out, stay on the lawful side of the "pedestrians not allowed beyond this point" sign on the on-ramps, try to appear clean, do your best to actually be somewhat cleanish. Smelling bad would be more offensive than looking bad once you're in the car but looking bad will stifle your ride ops.
It's all just common sense stuff right? You don't want to be standing at an on-ramp in the middle of nowhere, you want to be at one where a lot of cars enter the highway. Ideally at a very popular gas/food/lodging exit. The ones that have truck stops are definitely poppin. It isn't the trucks that make those great, it's that a lot of people use those to fill up on gas/food/beverages etc while in route on a long distance trip.
Be smiling, not frowning. Don't wear shades. Smoking cigarettes tends to reduce your chances of someone pulling over to pick you up by some margin. You're more noticed when standing, sitting makes you a smaller target.. easier to not be seen. Try to avoid hitching in groups of 3 or more. A 3 person party means one person is sitting directly behind the driver in a standard 2 seats up front 3 in the back vehicle and that makes a lot of people feel unsafe.
I've personally found that pristine clean white cardboard with very well written bold black lettering stating where you're heading works tremendously better than a dingy brown piece of cardboard. If you're capable of keeping a piece of white cardboard pristine and perfect in appearance.. it might give the driver the notion you yourself are clean. This is just my opinion and I feel it's worked a lot better for me. It isn't hard finding white cardboard, it's usually where the brown stuff is.. just gotta look for it.
Also if you're wearing a visible fixed blade knife on your belt as I do(or any type of weapon that's noticeable really) try to wear it on your right side and slightly more towards your back than your side. If your waist were a clock and belt buckle sits at noon the knife sheath should lay at about 4 O'clock if that makes sense.
When you stand facing the cars coming at you, try to slightly have your hips twisted to the right so that the view of the knife is completely blocked by your body. As the car gets near you, you slowly turn to the right continually because sometimes they slow down after passing you and you need to be watching for that but also keeping your weapon blocked from view if they're looking in their mirror. Once they pull over, grab your bag and just carry it with your right arm and let it hang in front of your knife until you're in their vehicle.
The idea is to hide the knife entirely from the moment they first see you until you're in the car. This is also to have it in it's ideal place while you're riding in their car. They can't see it, they can't reach for it. It's in the best place it can be, usually dangling from your belt down the side of the passenger seat between the door and seat, easy access. Also, don't stab them.. just in case you thought that's where this was going. Most drivers prefer to go about their day unstabbed, it's just considerate. But you know.. if they try to harm you the rules change right? That's why you have it.
Try to appear jovial. I see hitchhikers sometimes that look like they're contemplating ending their life right then and there on the spot. I believe some people think this makes people feel bad for you and they're more likely to pull over to pick you up but that's a really bad method. It isn't going to yield even half the rides you'll get if you appear jovial.
Another tip that isn't so much common but rather one of my own theories/practices is
colors and the emotions they evoke in people. There's definitely something to this. It's the reason why McDonald's chose yellow and red and so many other megacorporations select the colors they do. I try to display blue to elicit calming and comfort and most importantly trust. I have a thin lightweight 3-panel unfolding sign that measures roughly 30" wide X 12" tall. I bring this with me along with a small stack of light blue paper and a couple new black markers and some double sided tape.
I write the name of the city or the direction I'm heading across the three blank light blue pieces of paper and tape them to the folding boards. It stands on it's own and I place it in front of my pack on the ground so I don't have to hold it. Blue for the psychological trust thing and light blue because the marker contrasts off it better than medium/dark shades of blue.
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I rock that and a big silly hand I draw onto a brown piece of cardboard as seen below, my nephew Cody and I heading south out of Redding Ca.
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The big silly hand is to draw more attention like a billboard would and it also makes a lot of people laugh for some reason. If you can make people laugh, they're a lot more likely to want you in their car. So use cardboard props, get creative. I've drawn little adorable puppies and stood them up like cardboard cutouts and put them near my pack. Everybody loves puppies, you'd be surprised at the things you can put on display that get people to pick you up.
I guess that's about all I have to add.. hopefully some of this helps. Good luck!
