Business card design efforts tend to focus on the decorative elements. What color paper should you use? Which border should you select? However, there are a number of business card essentials that should take precedence. Here are the things you must take into account when you design a business card.
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Your Contact Information
Not every business card needs both your name and your business name. However, you must include the information they need to contact you. For example, if you’re one of several people working in a firm, make it as easy as possible to reach you, since you’re the one that met them. This may mean putting your extension after the business phone number, or it requires putting your job title after your name. Nearly every business card has the name of the business or organization. If you don’t have a formal business, at least put a description of your line of work after your name so they remember what you do.
If your business has a brick and mortar location, your business name should be followed by your physical address. If you sell primarily online or visit clients’ homes, then you can leave this off. In this case, put your business phone number, email and web domain on the card. A phone number gives your firm more legitimacy than just an email and web domain. A formal email address that shares your business website’s domain gives it more gravitas than a personal email address. Don’t assume that a social media profile is sufficient. That can even be detrimental, since people may take points off for promoting social media profiles but not having a website of your own. Or you lose them when they visit your social media profile before being distracted by all the other content online.
Communicating Your Purpose
If your business card header shows your name followed by your job title, they don’t wonder what you do for a living. You can still build on this with a logo that represents your business or pictures that tie into your line of work. It doesn’t have to be fancy. In fact, a complicated logo or multiple photos crammed onto a business card can get in the way of promoting your contact information. Go for a simple logo or image. A yard service could have a stylized representation of garden tools and a thriving garden. A beauty consultant could have a logo representing long lashes or luscious lips. A photographer doesn’t have to have five sample images on the back of their business card. A logo hinting at wedding photos or family portraits is sufficient. It is also hard for the printer to mess up.
A tag line associated with your business is helpful but not essential. A call to action often works better. Whether it is “call us to kill your pests” or “book your next event with us” depends on you. However, a tagline that already does this should be included on your business card, especially if it is already part of your advertising.
A List of Products or Services
A long list of products or services will count as clutter on a business card. A few short bullets can work well, especially if it isn’t easily encapsulated in a single graphic. For example, your bakery business card could use a picture of a cupcake, while the bulleted list says you make cakes cupcakes and artisanal bread.
