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Many people overlook the value of having a professional business card that accurately reflects your brand image, yet this small piece of paper can be an important part of your collateral package. It’s often the first item prospects receive from you, so it’s your first opportunity to make a strong, positive impression on them.
The preponderance of do-it-yourself online business-card printing companies is an interesting and somewhat troubling phenomenon. With limited exceptions, it’s fairly easy to spot an inexpensively produced card. When you choose to “go cheap” on your business cards, what message does that send to those with whom you wish to do business? Are you really doing yourself any favors by missing out on the opportunity to start building a positive brand image right from the start?
Cheaper isn’t always better when it comes to first impressions. Give clients a great first impression with these tips and tactics:
Design Tips
Tip #1: Enlist the help of a professional designer unless you have the requisite skills to design your business card yourself.
Ideally, this person’s also tasked with designing your other collateral (letterhead, brochures, website, etc.), so it’ll be intuitive to carry your brand image through from those pieces to your card.
Tip #2: Keep it simple.
Business cards are typically just 3.5″ x 2″ (except when they’re not–see below), so you don’t have too much space with which to work. Don’t make your logo too large, don’t make the type too small to be comfortably read, and don’t be afraid to use white space.
Tip #3: Keep to the standard business card size–unless you’re the adventurous type.
There are things you can do to a 3.5″ x 2″ card to differentiate yourself (e.g., rounded corners), but going with an unusual shape can be tricky. A round card, for instance, is quite memorable, but it certainly won’t fit in standard business-card holder devices. You must be willing to trade convenience for memorability if you choose an unconventional shape or size.
Content Tips
Tip #4: Be deliberate in choosing the information to appear on your card.
What’s most important? Your name certainly needs to be there, along with the name of your company (via your logo), your phone number and your e-mail address. Space permitting, you can add your physical address, fax number, cell-phone number and company website address, if desired. Don’t clutter things up too much–as with the design, simpler and cleaner is always better.
Tip #5: Keep the back blank, or use it for non-critical information.
How often will people see the back of your business card? Traditional card storage modes assume that side is blank. If you do wish to put copy on it, be sure the information is of a supplemental nature: e.g., your company’s mission or tagline. While business cards should promote your brand identity, they shouldn’t be confused with advertising.
The Bottom Line
Think about how you use other people’s business cards when you make decisions regarding your own. Do you get frustrated when you can’t quickly find the information you need? Or the type is too small to read? Or printed in a font that’s hard to decipher? Do cheaply produced cards make you think less of the person or company represented? Does it take you a while to realize whose card it is, or what company that person works for?
Don’t make those same mistakes when designing your business card. Make sure it’s a positive reflection of both you and your company, and it mirrors your well-defined brand identity.
Think of these tips while writing your marketing flyer and you should be set up for success. Remember the final product should be a harmonious combination of good content and striking design, creating a clear, concise and effective flyer to boost your business.
- Article source: http://www.printaholic.com/15-tips-for-writing-effective-flyers/
So you’ve launched your business, your business cards are printed and your products are on the shelves, but customers aren’t coming through the door or visiting your website.
There could be hundreds of reason why this could happening, but one of the first questions to ask yourself is whether your customers can actually find and interact with you. Obvious question, right? But certainly worth investigating.
Think about it, if your target customer can’t find or contact you easily, you can bet they’re contacting your competitors. To make sure you this doesn’t happen to you, here are 4 ways you could be making it hard for your target audience to interact with you:
The usual suspect, the difficult-to-find-contact information. This could be a simple of case of not having your website or telephone address displayed prominently on a poster or leaflet. Obvious I know, but you’ll be amazed how many businesses make the classic mistake of not putting their contact information on the obvious pages.
Quick tip : Look at your marketing material -offline and online – is your address, email, phone number – even Twitter or Facebook accounts if you have them – clearly visible on every piece?
If you haven’t got the space to put all your details on your printed marketing material, make sure your company name and a contact detail are visible. You could even add a QR code with a clear call-to-action explaining that all other contact details can be found through scanning your QR code. In fact, create a mobile business card! You can use this both as a business card, and on any marketing collateral as described above.
No matter what product or service you offer, whoever is going to place the order is a person. Your contact form needs to show your customer that when they deal with you, they’re dealing with “real people”. It’s as simple as putting a live link to your email account in front of your target audience or having visible business contact details of someone who will help them if there’s a problem. If you’re a “one man band”, you could use your name. Just make sure people know who to contact and how.
Quick tip :Include a photo so that your customers can see what you look like/who you are. And don’t forget to promote your social media accounts if you have these.
We’re in an age where consumers expect every business to have an online and recently a social presence. The hard truth is, some of your target customers are unlikely to believe you exist if you don’t have a social media footprint. Social media shouldn’tbe taken lightly, so before you dive in, you need to determine where your target customers interact on social media and take it from there.
Quick tip: Make sure that you claim your personal name and business name on all major social media accounts – LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, Google+. Even if you’re not quite ready to do anything on these networks just yet – at least claim your names before someone else does, and before this “someone else” grows on the back of your business.
A quick way to get started is to research what your competitors are doing on social media. If you like what you see, print it out or make a screenshot and remember to make a note of what you think works well/ what you would like to do as well. Add this to your Marketing Inspiration file.If you already have a public profile, make sure you have included on this a link to your website along with a business contact phone number.
Never underestimate your personal brand. You could be an expert in your field or simply a person who loves sharing your passion via Youtube videos, blog posts or Flickr photos. You should ensure that anyone that comes across your content is exposed to your brand in some way. You don’t have to obvious or brash either. It could be as simple as embeding a link to your website and Twitter page in the author bio at the end of the post.
Quick tip: If you have, or if you are developing video content, make sure you post it on Youtube as well. Make sure that your Youtube channel is branded correctly and that it will appeal to the target audience you have identified. And while you’re branding everything, don’t forget the little things like putting your logo inside your QR code on your business cards!
If you ingrain a mindset of ensuring every touch point you have with potential customers is branded, your customers won’t be able to help themselves but to click on your link, make that call or buy that product! The last thing you want is to put up unnecessary roadblocks in front of customers that actually want to do business with you.
- Article Source: http://www.pitneybowes.co.uk/pbse/blog/Why-Your-Target-Audience-Cant-Interact-With-You.shtml#sthash.qGfh3X74.dpuf
