Business Card Mistakes

Here are some common business card mistakes

Printing them yourself.
It's not much cheaper and it looks like you did it at home, no matter what kind of printer you use. All it is, is faster.

Not carrying them with you.
Pocket, coat, briefcase or purse, you should have a number of fresh, clean cards ready to distribute. And you should be able to get your hands on one quickly and easily.

Searching all over for them.
You should be able to "whip one out" without digging out your wallet and thumbing through pics of the kids, or plunging to the bottom of your purse past the hair spray. "Let's see, I've got one here somewhere, no, that's a card I got yesterday, no, that's my kid's picture, here it is, no, that's not it either.." You should be able to quick draw your card faster than an old west gunslinger.

Saving a buck with the magic marker.
Blotting out a changed phone number, address or email and hand writing in, or worse, cutting up computer labels with the new information is bush league. Yet, every day, some hapless wannabe loses a sale by acting like Donald Duck's Uncle.

Handing them out recklessly.
The exchange (business relations are TWO-way) of cards comes after some degree of conversation. Beware the boob walking about the room handing out his card like Santa's gifts at the lodge meeting.

No system for retrieval.
Once you get 'em back to the office, you must have a system to find and use the information when you need it. Customers and prospects should go into your computer without delay. The others require some thought. Develop a system to store them so you can find them again. (hint: think categories!) What about that one from the guy with one blue eye and one brown?

Whats your thought on letter heads, we've wasted a lot of money on having these printed and rarely use them in the quantities ordered.

For our next lot 2500, we thought of having a printed slip with all our details on and stapling this to an sheet of A4, which is the actual letter / invoice, we are sending out. Over here [UK] they call these slips - compliment slips, the intention is to save money on letterhead printing. UK printers are 1/2 the price of their USA counterparts.

If you have a logo you could use that for the letterhead, and print all contact information after the signature, just like in an email message,

Quote:

Originally Posted by Incidentally

For our next lot 2500, we thought of having a printed slip with all our details on and stapling this to an sheet of A4, which is the actual letter / invoice, we are sending out.

Would it be feasible to print all your details on the backside of the invoice?

Most invoices do not fill the page, there is always enough room for business card information AND a mini sales pitch for something else.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Incidentally

Whats your thought on letter heads, we've wasted a lot of money on having these printed and rarely use them in the quantities ordered.

For our next lot 2500, we thought of having a printed slip with all our details on and stapling this to an sheet of A4, which is the actual letter / invoice, we are sending out. Over here [UK] they call these slips - compliment slips, the intention is to save money on letterhead printing. UK printers are 1/2 the price of their USA counterparts.

I've found that while we don't use letterhead often, it is imperative to have it on hand. Perhaps because we deal in business-to-business, it conveys a degree of professionalism, the same way that a professionally printed business card does so much better than a print-at-home or mail-order company business card does.

With that said, we have small 3x5 inch notepads that we give out to prospects and customers. They are extremely inexpensive. However, we ALSO use these ourselves individually as compliment slips (though in the states, some people call them "buck slips" if we want to jot a note to a customer or prospect along with any printed material.

Still, we always have letterhead on-hand for the times we need to produce a proposal, or convey some other important information in a formal, professional manner.

I think a good idea is to have the back of your business card a dark color, possibly with your logo on it. This will stop people from writing other phone numbers on there which is something which many people do when they need to write down a number and can't find a piece of scrap paper.

Thats an impressive list of tips. How often we forget these basics. Business card exchange is still an important way to get genuine business leads.

	#1
BIG Mike	Business Card Mistakes Here are some common business card mistakes Printing them yourself. It's not much cheaper and it looks like you did it at home, no matter what kind of printer you use. All it is, is faster. Not carrying them with you. Pocket, coat, briefcase or purse, you should have a number of fresh, clean cards ready to distribute. And you should be able to get your hands on one quickly and easily. Searching all over for them. You should be able to "whip one out" without digging out your wallet and thumbing through pics of the kids, or plunging to the bottom of your purse past the hair spray. "Let's see, I've got one here somewhere, no, that's a card I got yesterday, no, that's my kid's picture, here it is, no, that's not it either.." You should be able to quick draw your card faster than an old west gunslinger. Saving a buck with the magic marker. Blotting out a changed phone number, address or email and hand writing in, or worse, cutting up computer labels with the new information is bush league. Yet, every day, some hapless wannabe loses a sale by acting like Donald Duck's Uncle. Handing them out recklessly. The exchange (business relations are TWO-way) of cards comes after some degree of conversation. Beware the boob walking about the room handing out his card like Santa's gifts at the lodge meeting. No system for retrieval. Once you get 'em back to the office, you must have a system to find and use the information when you need it. Customers and prospects should go into your computer without delay. The others require some thought. Develop a system to store them so you can find them again. (hint: think categories!) What about that one from the guy with one blue eye and one brown?

	#2
Incidentally	Whats your thought on letter heads, we've wasted a lot of money on having these printed and rarely use them in the quantities ordered. For our next lot 2500, we thought of having a printed slip with all our details on and stapling this to an sheet of A4, which is the actual letter / invoice, we are sending out. Over here [UK] they call these slips - compliment slips, the intention is to save money on letterhead printing. UK printers are 1/2 the price of their USA counterparts.

	#7
jimberan	I think a good idea is to have the back of your business card a dark color, possibly with your logo on it. This will stop people from writing other phone numbers on there which is something which many people do when they need to write down a number and can't find a piece of scrap paper.

	#8
alexhar	Thats an impressive list of tips. How often we forget these basics. Business card exchange is still an important way to get genuine business leads.

Business Card Mistakes

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