Know-How Exchange : Advertising/PR

A great business card starts by understanding why people would contact you in the first place. Who specifically is likely to contact you? Why? When? How often? Why would they choose to hire YOUR services, instead of one of your competitors? Also a business card alone is unlikely to jumpstart your business. You'll likely need a website so people who might be interested in your offerings can learn a lot more about your business and why they should trust you to help them.

Your business card will be used when your target audience sees high value in keeping it and following up with you. To achieve that goal, you need to communicate the unique and compelling benefit the target audience can expect when they hire you.

First define your target audience as precisely as possible. Then understand what they need and value. Position yourself as the ideal solution to their biggest problem. Come up with a name and tagline for the business card, brochure and website that expresses your positioning in a compelling way for the target audience.

Agreed on the above - you need to define your audience. Then it might be helpful to collect brochures and business cards of competitors, as well as to review their websites. This can give you a good idea of how others are marketing themselves and what is important to that client group. It might also give you ideas of how to differentiate yourself. I'd recommend making your name meaningful and something that speaks to what you do. This will help people remember your name. In terms of actually designing a business card and brochure, I recommend hiring a good graphic designer with experience in this area. Good copy and design are important and work to help sell your business and service.

I completely agree with Laura, Jim, and Michael, so I won't repeat what they have already said. Instead, I'll add a couple of more suggestions to think about when choosing a business card.

1. Business Card Material: Avoid having glossy business cards. Some people like to write down information on the business card, and it's hard to write on a glossy material.

2. Business Card Designer: My favorite company I have found yet for business cards, postcards, stationary, brochures and flyers (just to name a few) is MOO (www.moo.com). They have hundreds of templates to use that are designed by their designers. You also get to customize the branding, logo, content, layout and more.

3. Business Card Thickness and Size: Most likely, your prospects you're giving your cards to are also getting a ton of cards from other people. It makes it hard for them to remember who's business card is who's. For example, at a conference, you come back with probably 50 business cards. But what I had experienced myself when I met MOO at a conference, and what I have been told by prospect's who took my card, was that my particular business card stood out from the rest.

The reason is that they have a thickness called, "Luxe." It's their thickness material, hard to miss and you can make it larger than the standard business card, without it being obnoxious. You can also change the shape of the card.

If you're starting out a new business, you need to make sure that the effort you put into optimizing your brand and answering the question, "why you" isn't wasted because your card was lost amongst the other 100 business cards.

First, do what Jim, Laura, and Michael recommended above. Second, choose the business card company that will represent the quality of your work, when you're not there to speak with them yourself.