What info do you put on a business card?!

taagstore.com

Hey

This may seem like a ridiculous question but I wanted to find out what information new businesses put on their cards. Here is my problem:

Business Logo
Name
Title
Business Name
Business Tag Line
Website
Mobile Number
Office Number
Email
LinkedIn (Personal and Company)
Facebook (Personal and Company)
Twitter

It looks like a bit of overkill at the moment. What would you drop?

jetsonx

drop LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

Include your:

Location
AND
your Services Or Products List


State which segment of the market you intend catering to.
E.g. if you are a plumber - people will want to know whether you specialise in commercial or residential or both?

then list your service. Specificity Sells.
e.g.
Pipework
Heating Systems
Taps and Fittings
Shower Units

blah blah...

taagstore.com

Cheers jetsonx

Thanks for the feedback. I don't want to have people directed to the location. I only sell through phone and email mostly up to this point. Sending most people through the website in the coming weeks. Was not thinking of having the location on there.

My company name is Trophies Awards and Gifts Store. It's like a keyword dream. TAAGStore for short.

jetsonx

Whether you sell via your website or phone. Your location is one of the
first things people will check before they place their order. People want the peace of mind an address offers. People get suspicious if there is no address.

Ask your local County Entreprise board...(they get paid enough) if they know of any addresses you could use. Use you're grannies address if you have to. Just put an address in there.

Acoshla

Just put a general address area, for example if you were in Cork just put either Cork City, or Bishopstown, Co. Cork, etc, the nearest general address to you will be fine, as mentioned people like to see an address for peace of mind. My location is on my cards but so are my email, website and to Find Me on Facebook, so my location isn't too big a deal as most people go to the Facebook page. Hardly anyone ever buys from me at home (everything is normally delivered to them) so the address doesn't matter but they'll still ask where I am.

Your company name, main contact details (phone, email, website), location and brief explanation of what you do would be the most important things.

Make your website prominant.....then people only have to remember that to get all the info they need on you.

taagstore.com

Cheers for all the feedback guys. It is a balance of reassuring information, important information and overload!

Kendlebell Naas

Hi,

I don't know what business you are in or whether your are in the B2C or B2B environment, however, I have a general rule of thumb. I do not do business with anyone who does not have a full address and land line number on their business card. I am not really interested in their linked in face book etc details , I just want to know that they are an established business not someone using a mobile phone only who could disappear in the morning.

Thats a great rule of thumb, mobile numbers alone would turn me off too.

Same kind of thing as going onto a website with No Prices.

No I won't fill up your form, send it and await your reply....I will just navigate to the other 20 websites in your field that have their prices up for all to see.

Some people just don't get the internet....rant over. lol

taagstore.com

Thanks Kendlebell and Hotspur

So much for the internet not being a bricks and mortar type of business! I don't generally have people on site and ironically I don't particularly have the most glamourous of professions and so I wanted to prevent people from arriving on site. I will consider the address being included for definite.

I sell to both B2B and B2C and work with a lot of schools and sports groups. The company is Trophies Awards and Gifts Store and can be found at www.trophiesawardsandgifts.com. The site we have in place is pretty innovative and the company is hoping that everything up front will pay off, especially based on the experiences that people have on similar sites.

I would benefit from your feedback if you would check out the site. I respect honesty and constructive criticism. I intend to launch more products in the coming days.

I think functionalitywise the website covers most of what you need it to.
IT makes use of a lot of Web 2.0 features and design too.

What I would say to you is what I say to a lot of people though is if you are going to design a website for Broadband uses then go the whole hog.

The photos of your products are condensed for a Dial Up Connection.
Photos are half of what your website is about after all because thats the only idea we have of your products...so I would ramp up the quality.

The name though is a bit long winded but tags.com is taken but taags.ie isn't.

Put a Download of your Brochure on the website.

Have some video shot of your awards being presented to real people and edit them together and put up on the website.
Lets say Cavan/Dublin/Offaly Minors win a trophy etc.
If your trophies are presented to the teams and someone does a video, have them send you a link to youtube or send you photos for your facebook page and that gives people a reason to visit your facebook/website and view your trophies.

Following along on that theme I would have a monthly award given to the video of the most creative awards ceremony (using your awards naturally).

Hope it helps.....you have some very nice stuff!

Pope John 11

taagstore.com wrote: »

I would benefit from your feedback if you would check out the site. I respect honesty and constructive criticism. I intend to launch more products in the coming days.

Your facebook icon does not work, for me anyway

conversion of prices from £ to €, oops you have it!

maxer68

taagstore.com wrote: »

Thanks Kendlebell and Hotspur

So much for the internet not being a bricks and mortar type of business! I don't generally have people on site and ironically I don't particularly have the most glamourous of professions and so I wanted to prevent people from arriving on site. I will consider the address being included for definite.

I sell to both B2B and B2C and work with a lot of schools and sports groups. The company is Trophies Awards and Gifts Store and can be found at www.trophiesawardsandgifts.com. The site we have in place is pretty innovative and the company is hoping that everything up front will pay off, especially based on the experiences that people have on similar sites.

I would benefit from your feedback if you would check out the site. I respect honesty and constructive criticism. I intend to launch more products in the coming days.

Its about bloody time someone set up a decent trophy store online. I'm in a product area that people are always looking for trophies and will pass your details on as an when I get requests.

maxer68

btw - I can't find delivery charges anywhere. Plenty of spaces where you say freed elivery for orders over €200 but nowhere does it say how much for under €200.

IMO - It should be less than €5 and assume the extra cost yourself. High delivery charges put off a lot of customers, no details of delivery charges puts off most customers.

taagstore.com

EIREHotspur wrote: »

I think functionalitywise the website covers most of what you need it to.
IT makes use of a lot of Web 2.0 features and design too.

What I would say to you is what I say to a lot of people though is if you are going to design a website for Broadband uses then go the whole hog.

The photos of your products are condensed for a Dial Up Connection.
Photos are half of what your website is about after all because thats the only idea we have of your products...so I would ramp up the quality.

The name though is a bit long winded but tags.com is taken but taags.ie isn't.

Put a Download of your Brochure on the website.

Have some video shot of your awards being presented to real people and edit them together and put up on the website.
Lets say Cavan/Dublin/Offaly Minors win a trophy etc.
If your trophies are presented to the teams and someone does a video, have them send you a link to youtube or send you photos for your facebook page and that gives people a reason to visit your facebook/website and view your trophies.

Following along on that theme I would have a monthly award given to the video of the most creative awards ceremony (using your awards naturally).

Hope it helps.....you have some very nice stuff!

Hey Eirehotspur

Appreciate the feedback. Your thoughts are very much in line with what my plans are. We have an incredible plus in our favour. The recipients of my products are winners more often that not and have deserved their prizes! I have some stories written to be published. I haven't launched the Facebook page, hence it not appearing. I intend to launch all together.

I understand the long winded name but it is a keywords dream! It is pretty much what everyone is searching for. I have some redirects which count as hits

The YouTube integration is great and I have the intention of shooting some low quality ads for some fun in the coming weeks! I don't have a channel up for that just yet. I'll make a note to have it live.

I really appreciate the constructive feedback on the site. I'll do my best to get as much live as possible in the coming days. I still have to make more of the trophies active too.

Kindest regards EireHotspur

Chris
<removed>

taagstore.com

Pope John 11 wrote: »

Your facebook icon does not work, for me anyway

conversion of prices from £ to €, oops you have it!

Hey Pope

Thanks for the feedback and I apologise for the Facebook page. You are correct as I haven't launched it yet! Was hoping to make it live this week. You have a keen eye!

Chris
<spam removed>

taagstore.com

maxer68 wrote: »

Its about bloody time someone set up a decent trophy store online. I'm in a product area that people are always looking for trophies and will pass your details on as an when I get requests.

Hi Maxer68

I appreciate your input and contact. I think we are both united in wanting a webstore that doesn't link to a PDF catalogue solely, but can offer individual prices for the trophies.

Congrats on your own site which is clear and upfront.

I appreciate the feedback on the shipping costs. I hadn't realised that they weren't on. Such a simple oversight that means a lot.

If you have further feedback, please do not hesitate to contact me at any stage. Would be more than happy to partner up with organisations and businesses such as yourselves. I think we could all benefit

Kindest regards

Chris
<spam removed>

Kinetic^

1. Get someone professional to design your card, should cost you €40-50 at the very most. This is a representation of your business, cheap cards make you look cheap.

2. Do include postal address and landline. I don't deal with people who don't provide both. My address is on my card even though I work from home, my clients know and respect this. It's not like they're going to turn up at midnight looking for me.

3. Use both sides of the card. I've seen many cards who have a blank side to them. Imo, it's marketing real estate that you're not putting to work. It's not going to cost too much extra to get it done.

4. Get a proper domain, don't use @hotmail/gmail/yahoo as your email. It adds credibility.

5. An add on to the above, I see many people use their linkedin on their card but no website. Put your website there, if you have one. If you don't, it's 2011, why don't you have a website? I can find you on linkedin with your name.

6. Make sure the printer is using good quality paper/card. Get a sample book from them or an online printer. I think I got my sample pack from printcarrier.com, came within about a week. Flimsy cards are cheap looking/feeling.


I personally don't include social media links on my business card but they are on my invoices.

goz83

1. Logo and Business name
2. Category (plumbing/accounting etc)
3. Contact Numbers
4. Website Address
5. Email Address

Anymore is overkill, unless you need the business address, but everything can be seen on the website. Keep it simple. Avoid putting social networking logos on your card.

RATM

goz83 wrote: »

. Avoid putting social networking logos on your card.

Just curious as to why not?

OP by getting double sided cards you'll have a lot more space to work with.

goz83

It looks cheap and there is no benefit of putting twitter, or FB logos on your card if you have your own website. The only acception would be someone with no website, they could then use something like FB to promote products/services.

I also have a personal preference to using both sides of a card, but I only use the back for appointment scheduling, or putting your company logo on the card. I once got a card that had "don't throw away, you never know when you might need this". I thought it was very unusual, but guess what, I didn't throw it away. My boss at the time saw it a few weeks later in my folder and ripped it up. I should have punched him! The guy who gave me the card wanted to offer me a job I was not intereseted in at the time. He said, "it might be a month, a year or two, but you can call anytime."Sorry I went off on one there, but the point is, the back of a card can be useful. I wouldn't use it for extra contact info, unless your putting the website on it, which would look ok.