What belongs on a business card
The card is not there to describe your business. It is there to be findable in a drawer in four months.
The short version
Name, trade, one phone number, one web address. Readable without glasses. Use the back for something the customer actually wants - a QR code to your reviews, or the date of their next appointment.
People keep saying business cards are dead, and then a plumber finishes a job, hands one over, and gets called eight months later about a different bathroom. Cards are not a marketing channel. They are a way of being findable later by someone who already met you.
Which means the job is narrow, and most cards fail it by trying to do more.
The front
- Your name and your business name. Both - the customer met a person and will remember a face before a company.
- What you do, if the business name does not say it.
- One phone number. The one you answer.
- Your web address, if you have one worth visiting.
That is the list. An email address if you genuinely take work by email; most local trades do not. And that is where it stops.
The single most common mistake is type size. A business card is often read by someone in their fifties, in poor light, without their glasses. If it is under about 8pt, it is decoration. Print one and hand it to somebody older than you before you order five hundred.
The back is the useful half
Most cards have a blank back, or the logo again, larger. Both are wasted. The back is where the card can stop being a contact detail and start doing a job.
- A QR code to your reviews. The card is already in their hand at the moment they are pleased with you - see how to ask for reviews.
- Space for the next appointment. A hairdresser, a dentist or a garage writing a date on the back turns the card into something the customer keeps on purpose.
- A short list of what you do, if your trade is broader than your name suggests.
- Your opening hours, for a shop.
Printing on both sides costs very little more than one. Leaving the back empty to save that is the false economy in this whole subject.
The physical thing
A card is one of the few pieces of your business a customer actually holds, and thin card feels exactly as cheap as it is. You do not need anything exotic - a heavier uncoated stock, matte rather than gloss, is noticeably better in the hand and costs a few pounds more across a full box.
Avoid a glossy finish if anyone will ever write on the back, which for appointment cards is the entire point. And keep anything important well away from the edges, because trimming moves by a millimetre or two and a phone number cropped in half is a box of waste.
Try this now
Before approving a proof, check the phone number by ringing it from the proof itself. Reading a number you already know is the easiest way in the world to not notice a transposed digit.
A few common questions.
How many business cards should I order?
Fewer than the price break tempts you into. A box of two hundred and fifty used over a year is better than a thousand that become wrong when your number, your website or your services change. The unit price on a large run is only a saving if you use them all.
Should I put my home address on it?
No, unless customers come to you. An area - the town you work in - answers the question people are actually asking, which is whether you cover them.
Single or double sided?
Double, almost always. The cost difference is small and the back is the most useful surface on the card - a QR code, an appointment space or your hours all earn more than a blank.
What size should it be?
Whatever is standard where you are, because that is what fits wallets, cardholders and the slots in other people's card boxes. A square or oversized card is memorable right up until it will not go in a wallet and is left on the counter.
