Business cards are usually used to display personal and/or company information as well as contact details; contact details such as telephone number, fax number and e-mail address etc. However, as businesses are evolving, the ways in which to communicate to potential employers, customers and friends/acquaintances is changing as well. One way in which it has changed is the formation of social media business cards.
Social media business cards display the person’s telephone number, fax number and email address as standard, however social business cards also include the twitter username, LinkedIn details, Facebook name, blog address and QR codes etc. of the card distributor. It maximises the space with social media links and increases the ways in which one can be contacted. In order to fully maximise the potential of using a social media business cards is to follow these simple steps as suggested by Eric Swallow from Mashable Business.
1. Keep It Simple
2. Display Plenty of Options
3. Publicise
4. Present Both Personal and Private Information
5. Use QR codes
6. Promote Events and Codes
7. Emulate a Social Site Design
The two businesses that I have found to specialise in this are www.zazzle.com/social+businesscards and https://about.me/ . The following examples above can be created on Zazzle.
The growing importance of social media channels has already and will continue to pour into the business world, with businesses continually realising the importance that social media has in business. Thus, potentially fax and telephone number could be replaced with our Facebook and/or Twitter name, or LinkedIn details, which could be the norm in the future, where becoming more social will consume us further.
Would this interest you? Would you ever utilise a social business card and do you think this could be a future fixture?
References:
http://mashable.com/2010/07/12/social-media-business-cards/
http://www.slideshare.net/socialgears/social-business-cards-by-follrcom
I would only agree on this if the social media business cards are used only for business purposes but then again displaying your face as a picture wouldnt be the best way forward. This is not a very professional look but then this is my view.
ReplyDeleteNavsk, I respect your point that displaying your face may not seem very professional, but I feel now in our society where almost everything we do now has a social aspect, it would make sense to attach a face to the name. In addition, if one was to receive business cards from a multitude of people, in order to make it stand out and memorable at the same time, which is the intended aim of a business card, a profile picture I feel would capture the recipient’s attention. As well as it providing a sense of identity and familiarity, which I feel is important in today’s business climate.
ReplyDeleteI agree with both your points in that I wouldn’t mind using a social media business card, providing that it is only used for business purposes. and I also think that it’s always a good thing to be able to put a face to a name, which is where I believe that having a photo attached to the card, wouldn’t be such a bad idea, due to the sense of familiarity it would provide.
ReplyDeleteThe only problem I can see is that biasness might creep in terms or how good or bad a person looks, similar to the modelling industry.