Business Cards 101: The Purpose along with Tips & Tricks to Create One

Some students may overlook the importance of a business card, not realizing how much they can benefit one’s professional endeavors. Business cards serve you in many ways, by allowing you the perfect way to deliver information in a professional yet personalized setting that leaves a lasting impact.

Business cards allow extreme ease in giving away professional contact information. The contact information on your card should be, your name, your title or intended title, phone number, professional email, and possibly your personal website (depending on your field). Not only do they allow potential employers to have quick and easy access to your contact information, but they allow them to get a taste of your personality.

The design of your card allows the potential employer to see a lot about your person. A card with a well thought out design, inviting colors, and appropriate information is more likely to stand out in the pile of business cards that have boring designs, dull colors and not enough contact information. Wondering how to make a business card that turns heads? Follow these 5 steps to learn how to make the business card of your dreams!

• Depending on your desired career field, there will be limits on how creative to get with your card before it looks unprofessional. Find out what other professionals are doing before you decide to use every color of the rainbow on your business card.
• This also applies to the information you put on your card. If you have a more creative career path intended, you might want to include a link to your digital portfolio as well as the handle of a professional social media account.
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2) Experiment, experiment, experiment!

• Play around with different layouts of the text on your card. Ask yourself questions such as, “what is the most important piece of information on my card?” and “does this represent me as a professional?”. 

Something to Consider: When playing with the color options, consider using similar colors throughout your job search material such as resumes, cover letters, and LinkedIn headers. Having consistency shows excellence in your personal brand that employers will love.

• The creation of your business card can be intimidating. But with the help of many websites such as, com, Moo.com, and Uprinting.com, the business card creation will be rather easy. These websites come with customizable templates that give you the ability to change colors, typefaces, and patterns to match the personal brand you are trying to establish. They also allow you to upload a premade design that can be made on an outside source such as Adobe Illustrator.

Something to consider: remember that you are designing for print rather for the web. Make sure that your contact information is big enough to see (6pt font should be the minimum) and that all your copy is a good enough distance away from the edge of the card to guarantee that the information is not cut off.

4) The many kinds of finishes

• The finish that you decide to place on your card is a huge factor to the success of your card. By taking the extra time to decide on the proper finish, it could be the deciding factor on who the future employer calls when looking through his stack of business cards. Here are the two main finishes and what they are good for:
  • • • •       Glossy Finishes: glossy printed cards are great for business cards that have images on them. They add       shine to your card and protect them from bends and water (up to a certain extent).
  •       Matte Finishes: matte finishes on cards give a sleek look and also provide a great area for the employer   to take notes on your card. Matte finishes are easy to write on as opposed to glossy.

• Creating a business card is one of the few steps about the job process that allows you to be creative and show a bit of your personality, so take that to your full advantage! This should not be something you create just to create, employers want to see enthusiasm and excitement, so make sure to show that through your card. Professionals will see that you put time, thought and consideration into your personal business card, which will represent you as an outstanding worker.

With these tips in mind, you should be on the right track to creating your very own business card! Use resources like Pinterest to keep you inspired as well as seeing what your peers are creating.  

Creating a business card is one of the first steps to getting you to your dream job, so congrats on getting started!

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