Business Cards Get Flashy For The Future

Effective networking relies on being able to pass on enough information to a potential client so a sale of a product or service can be made. Traditionally, business cards have been the way to get the attention of a potential client, and flashy graphic design has been the key to make an impact. However, in this fast paced technological environment, is the business card still the right medium for keeping ahead of the competition, or are there other ways to get your message across to the customer?

The traditional business card is an unassuming yet highly effective marketing tool. Anyone who is serious about their skills in either their own company or working for someone else will never leave the house without a fully loaded business card holder. The platform is simple, a well designed logo with eye catching colours, fonts or a combination of both convey the attitude of the company or individual. Business cards are used when networking at trade shows, in meetings or even spontaneously when chatting to people socially.

The level of information available from business cards is however finite. Name, business address, email address, phone numbers and job title are about as far as it can go with a business card. Additional information needs to be supplied through the power of patter, with the handy little card acting as a reminder for a point of contact. For a greater level of information inclusion, some people are looking toward a high tech version, but where might this technology lead us?

At present, mobile phones have an in-built device to read a business card and store the information on the sim as part of a business directory. This information can be added to with notes about the company or person, and it avoids the inconvenience of having a stack of cards to sift through whilst looking for a company or service. Unfortunately the drawback with this system is that the very essence of good business card design is lost. Unless it is a company or service a person uses regularly, it is possible that information will be lost in a list along with competitors as visual clues from card design are not transferred to the database.

One way around this is for phone manufacturers to come up with a similar system that allows the entire card to be assimilated into the phones directory, that way the visual trigger can be utilised to maximum effect. Alternatively, turning to electronic business cards may be the answer. We are already overwhelmed with the number of information technologies available to us, from hand held computers to phones that double up as personal computers. There is also a huge array of data storage mediums from sim cards to memory cards and flash drives that can be carried around, not to mention more conventional storage devices as disks.

An electronic business card has the capability of storing a huge amount of information about a service; all the usual contact details are combined with portfolios, examples of past work, testimonials and even clever marketing inclusions such as videos. The flash drive has the potential to be the ultimate business card due to the advances in USB storage technology. The price of flash drives has dropped considerably over the last few years, and the amount of information that can be stored has grown exponentially. Thanks to the relatively low cost and mass production, it is possible for even small companies to use a flash drive as a business card.

Manufacturers are now offering a service where a logo and contact details can be added to the case of the drive and all the other information is on the drive itself. This is a desirable product because it can be used by the potential client for their own needs, and therefore they are more likely to pick it up. Whether or not this will take over the success of the traditional business card remains to be seen. At the end of the day, a small card is much easier to pick up a pop in the wallet than a novelty flash drive on a key ring.