5 Tips to Create Your Own Business Card
A business card is an important part of your personal brand. It’s an essential piece of collateral in the networking world. You want to put your best foot forward and present your potential connections with a memorable business card that they can use to contact you later. It can be easy to get overwhelmed with design templates and inspiration from all over the internet. Luckily for you, I’ve put together 5 tips to design a stunning personal business card.
1. Keep it simple!
You don’t want to clutter your business card with irrelevant information. Keep the card simple including your name, phone number, email address and relevant social media usernames. It’s popular for professionals to include their job title (e.g. copywriter, graphic designer, photographer, etc.) but if you are still in college or a recent grad you don’t want to limit your opportunities and potential connections by strictly labeling yourself.
*PROTIP: Try making your username the same across all social media channels. That way you only need to have one listed on your business card, keeping your card clutter free, and allowing your potential connections to easily find you across all networks.
2. Make it legible
It can be tempting to shrink the size of the text on your card in order to fit more information. Text tends to look more legible on screen. As an unwritten rule, keep your font size larger than 8pt. Likewise, choose a font that is easy on the eyes. Stray away from decorative fonts and stick to simple serif and san serif fonts.
3. Be mindful of the “safe area”
In the printing process, the safe area is usually 1/8th from the finished edge of your document. You want to keep all important information, like your name, phone number and email address, within this safe area to prevent it from being chopped off in the printing process.
*PROTIP: Avoiding using a border around the edge of your business card. When the card is cut during the printing process, you’re likely to have some uneven edges.
4. Use color wisely
This goes back to keeping it simple. You don’t want to overwhelm the recipient of your business card with crazy colors. Choose one accent color that represents your personal brand for design elements and print the rest of your information in a neutral color like black or dark grey.
5. Get them professionally printed
Sure, you could print your business cards at home on cardstock, but professional printers tend to offer more high-end paper and have better printing capabilities. You don’t have to break the bank either! Vistaprint starts at $9.99 for 500 cards.
*PROTIP: Before you send your final design off to the printer, triple-check for typos. There’s nothing worse than receiving your cards only to find a typo in your phone number or email address.
Follow these tips and you’re sure to have stunning business cards to hand out to your new connections!
