How to Create Unique Business Cards For Viral Marketing

Unique business cards can be more than a way to spread your identity. If they contain useful or entertaining information, your unique business cards can become a collectors item - something viral that people want to keep and spread the word about.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Pick your topic and style.
   
   You really have two choices for a unique business card that people will want to keep and maybe even pass on to others. The first kind contains useful information. What common questions do your customers ask? Forget the sales pitch, and consider what they need to know. A tip, a trick, a factoid, a safety tip. They'll be impressed if this business card is useful to them even if they don't buy your product!
   
   The most unique business card, however, is one that will entertain. It works for beer ads, and it can work for you. A little story, a funny quote, a joke or a poem. A cartoon. If you are looking for a place to give your brand a personality, or display your style, this is a unique way to do it. Just as Taco Bell has funny sayings on their sauce packets, or Jones Soda puts interesting customer pictures on their bottles, your unique business cards can be a way to show that you are fun, or stylish, or anything you want.

2. Decide the size and type of your business card.
   
   There are many options out there. How much room will you need for the unique content of this business card? Will a double-sided card do? Or would a folded card be better?
   
   You can get up to 200 words in 9 point Times type on the inside of a folded 3.5 by 4 business card (if you have a border of one pica, or 12 points). You could have as many as 50 words on the cover as well. (Save the back for your logo and address.) But you will need room for a title, or image, or both on the cover. Something to get people's attention.
   
   You may want to write out what you want your unique business card to say first. Then figure out how much you can edit it, and how it will fit.

3. Create your design.
   
   If you don't know how to create a finished professional design, you may want to hire a designer. Many print shops have them on staff, or you could hire a freelancer locally. (And there are online sites where freelancers can bid on the job, too.) You want an attention-getting layout or art, readable text, and still have room for information about your company.
   
   When you have such limited space, small changes can make a big difference in design. Be flexible!

4. Distribute your unique business cards as if they were newsletters.
   
   Since they're designed to be interesting, useful and entertaining, use them more widely than ordinary business cards. You can leave them in waiting rooms, or on counters. Put them on flyer tables. Give people a chance to discover them.
   
   If your unique business cards are fun or interesting or useful enough, people will hold on to them, and pass them on to friends.

[jenroering]

on 10/7/2009 Great article, you got me thinking about how to better promote myself. Thanks for the quality information! 5*

[momose]

on 9/16/2009 This is a quite useful article, giving specifics and some great suggestions. Self promotion is often lost amid the "busy-ness" of getting the job done. Thanks, toogie2! *****