King Pin Business Cards

Free business card designs can be a quick and easy way to get up and running as quickly and as cheaply as possible when starting a business. It can however, be a false economy.

We all know starting a business can be an expensive undertaking, and a set of business cards probably don’t come very high in the extensive list of priorities. If it isn’t something that you consider immediately, keep it in the back of your mind for once things have calmed down a bit. Being able to present a good quality business card to a colleague or prospective client is a valuable business and marketing tool.

There are plenty of free business card designs on the internet if you aren’t the creative type, or have run out of operating capital until you get some work in. They are generally free to download and print yourself, or business card manufacturers and printers usually have some as examples for you to use. You can either print them yourself or online for a nominal fee.

It may be tempting to use a service like this when you first start out as they are very cost effective and don’t really take that much thinking about. However, be careful of the design you use as it could say more about your approach to business than you might think. Shopping on a budget is an art form, and one that has spawned an untold amount of TV programs. The trick is to be clever with your budget purchases and make sure they don’t look like they were cheap.

If you want to use a free design then I advise you to shop around. There are literally thousands of sites with free designs out there. I think I surfed most of them when I was looking for my own. It’s quite easy to burn a few hours checking through them all looking for something half decent. A few hours you could be earning the money to pay for a proper one! I ended up downloading a few free templates and not liking any of them. Even playing around with them in Illustrator or Paintshop Pro didn’t make them any prettier. In the end I spend about three days looking for a good design to use or modify for my needs. I then found a freelance site and got a designer to create one for me for $15! It is original, looks good, and is most of all memorable.

I believe it says the right things about me and my company. It is also of a standard far higher than any of the free designs I saw when trawling the internet.

If you can take other people’s ideas and adapt them for your own needs then a free business card design may work for you. If on the other hand, creativity isn’t what makes you famous then I would pay someone to do the work for you. The end result will be much better and you can concentrate on building you business instead of wasting time on the internet.

Business cards are an investment, but don’t really cost all that much to acquire. There are free business cards out there, either actual card designs or templates. Often they are used by a printer to add value to orders or increase browser interest by using the word ‘free’. Let’s be honest it’s a word we are all interested in!

The designs of free business cards are generally basic, but if you have or are familiar with programs like Adobe illustrator then it’s quite simple to make up a template or two for your card design. Most home computer printers can print onto card and many are configurable enough to allow you to print a whole sheet of cards at a time. While not technically free, as there is a cost in the cardboard, it is minimal. You just have to ensure that the card is thick enough for use in a card, and pliable enough to be able to be rolled by your printer.

The other way ‘free’ is used to market business cards in the ‘buy x amount of cards and get x free!’ offers. If you are purchasing a bulk set of cards, then the printer or stationer may offer to throw some in for free. This is popular at the moment with online printers. ‘Buy 100 and get 25 free’ is one I saw the other day while looking at new designs. A value oriented offer that adds to the overall value of your order rather than giving you the whole product free. This is ideal if you have a better design or are using one that simply isn’t available free. All of the offers I have seen so far though have been for standard cards. No soft corners, or plastic or metal finishes as they cost too much to produce to be able to give them away.

I have to confess though, although I love the no cost option of almost anything, I don’t feel them appropriate for business cards. Like a website, a card is a long term impression of your company. If you present a cheap mass produced card to someone at a lunch or a meeting you are hardly going to impress them. Even if they aren’t the type to be wowed by a funky clear plastic card or a sheet of foil with your name on it, you still need to present yourself and your company in the best light possible. What would the impression be if your business card was blatantly the cheapest you could find?

The brand and overall impression of a company is all important. It will live and die by it. People have to be able to relate to your brand and identity. They have to be able to trust it and be confident that it can produce quality. Trying to sell this kind of identity while using free business cards is not the way to inspire confidence in your future clients.

Take my advice and spend a little money on your business card. It doesn’t have to be a lot, but enough to give you something original and memorable.