Design Effective Business Cards
with
Debbie Anderson
A great business card can be flashy, fun, and memorable, but also needs to balance in professional and informative. See how to design your own business card so that it incorporates the most important elements that leave a lasting impression.
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Transcript: Design Effective Business Cards
Hi! I'm Debbie Anderson for About.com. Designing the most effective business card is by far one of the greatest challenges when promoting yourself because you are literally creating an ad campaign for your products or services. So today, I am going to cover a few tips on how to design the most effective business cards for self-promotion.Now, every business card design needs to have at least five key characteristics.
Design a Professional Business Card
The first, you should ask yourself, is the card design appropriately entertaining for your target market or clientele and does it represent the caliber of products or services your business provides to clients or customers? Although there are many wonderful online services and do-it-yourself business card design computer programs out there to help you create your business card design, when designing an effective business card, this issue can be addressed by the choice of colors and fonts used when designing the card.Choose an Engaging Business Card
Second, is the message of your business card both visually and textually “engaging” for the viewer reading the card? Use the layout of your business card design to visually draw people in to wanting to read your card. When designing the layout of the card, manipulate both the text and the visual imagery until you get a look that you feel really grabs and draws-in somebody.Make a Memorable Business Card
Third, is the message of your business card Memorable? Making a business card memorable can include doing anything from placing your picture on the card to using a great tagline on the card for your products or services.Get the Right Info in on the Card
Fourth, is the business card adequately informative or does it provide too much information or not enough information? When designing the layout of your card, make sure that the information placed on the card is designed so that your prospective client or customer can quickly and easily find the information they need or want to know when viewing your business card without having to look too long to find that information.Create a Persuasive Business Card
Fifth, and most important – Is your business card persuasive? Does it make people feel like saying, Hey! I should call this person? Persuasion for the card reader to take action can be created by doing something as simple as using the right tagline or even advocating your best credentials next to your name, such as Award Winner.Although these five principles are often overlooked during the business card design creation process, there is also a reason for why most business cards generally wind up being thrown in the recipients old shoebox.
So, in an effort to keep your business card out of that old shoebox, consider these five tips on how to design an effective business card. After all, your business card is your ad campaign!
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