How to Create a great Business Card

Business cards might seem old-school, but they still have value! Here’s how to make them as memorable as you can.

Business cards. At their most basic they are rectangular-shaped cards which bear the business information about a company or individual. At their most elevated — they are a not-to-missed opportunity to convey an emotive feeling about a brand through a sensory physical product.

Image by Polleni branding agency

Business card design is the creation of graphics for these cards which help convey information about an individual and their brand as succinctly as possible. They are useful brand ambassadors, and are often shared during networking events or formal introductions as a convenience and a memory aid.

They might seem old-school — but they still have value! People still like something they can hold, and keep. It is your brand, manifested in something tangible, that a potential future client can actually take home with them.

Typically a business card will include someone’s name, the company they work for (including the company logo) as well as any other company information like street address, phone number, email, social media addresses and website.

But they are also an opportunity to show off! Think about ways of designing your card which also give a suggestion of what you do as a company. If your business is a patisserie — what about a die-cutting bite-marks into the side of your card, to show how tasty your products are and inject a bit of humour?

When we design business cards at Polleni we always bear some basic design principles in mind. Here are some tips on how best to go about designing a card of your own:

• Keep key copy to at least 5mm from the trim edge
• Work at 300dpi for best image reproduction
• Maintain a minimum size for typography to maintain legibility
• Design in CMYK unless you’re working exclusively with spot colours
• Get creative with the constraints of a card — typically 55cm x 85mm
• Get creative with finishes — think about spot varnish or foiling
• Think about how to add brand concept to the design of your card — what flourish can you add which makes a receiver smile and want to keep the card for a later date. Design for retention!
• Get creative with texture with processes like letterpress or die-cutting
• Get creative with low-cost ways of doing what you need. So what about screen-printing a sheet with an original design, cutting it up by hand and hand-writing your details? It takes time, but everyone you give it to would own a completely unique piece!
• Try different materials, shapes and sizes to make it stand out
• Always remember to double check artwork to avoid error

Find out more about our design agency.

Originally published at https://www.polleni.com/journal/how-to-create-a-great-business-card