When you look at your business card, what do you see? Do you see your name and contact information, or do you see your brand? If your business cards don’t reflect your business’s overall branding, you’re missing out on the chance to make a good first impression that strengthens your brand and drives conversions.
Business cards are often the first impression a potential client or customer has of a company and its brand, so it’s important that those cards be consistent with the branding you use online and in other business properties. You might even think of your business card as a single (and somewhat smaller) page of your company’s website. The style, color scheme, fonts and logos should be identical, as well as the marketing message you want to communicate.
There’s a lot of information you could put on your business card, but it’s only a small card, so you should limit how much you put on it. Certainly, some information is universally expected, like your name, your title, the company name and logo and your e-mail address. To decide what other information to add, consider the purpose of your business card. Think of it as the first step in the conversion process, and include the information that will point the card’s receiver toward that conversion.
Here are some elements to consider putting on your business cards:
Your Physical Address
- Include it if people need to come to your place of business for a conversion to occur.
- Leave it off if you do most of your business online or if you come to the customer instead of them coming to you; just put the city and state name instead.
Your Direct Work Number
- Include it if part of your job is speaking directly with clients and customers.
- Leave it off if you work out of the public eye and rarely use the phone at work; put a customer service number or general business number instead.
Your Cellphone Number
- Include it if it’s your work cellphone or if you really want people to call you outside of work.
- Leave it off if it’s your personal phone; if you need to give someone your cellphone number, you can pen it in at the bottom of the card before you hand it to them.
Your Fax Number
- Include it if you actually have a fax machine for business purposes.
- Leave it off if you work in the twenty-first century.
Your Home Page URL
- Include it if your website is mostly supplemental to the work you do offline.
- Leave it off if you do most of your business through your website; instead, include a URL deeper in the site, closer to your conversion goal.
Your Business-related Social Media Profiles
If you’re all over the social sphere, don’t put every single profile on your business cards. Consider what your company does and who its customers are and add the social media sites where you can get the greatest traction with clients.
- Include it if you want to build your brand through social media and have an active social media presence.
- Leave it off if you don’t have a social presence or your social interactions are few and far between.
Your Personal Social Media Profiles
- Include it if you’re interested in personal networking or personal branding, if your personality is part of what sells your brand or if most of your business cards go to people who are in no way related to your business.
- Leave it off if you don’t have a strong social media presence or if your company insists that your business cards be all-business.
Because business cards are traditional, most people only think of them in traditional terms. But your business cards can help reinforce your brand and connect your offline marketing message with your online marketing message. You just have to give it a little thought first.
