Business Cards that Make a Professional Impression

© by Rena Klingenberg; all rights reserved

Your jewelry business cards can be an excellent marketing tool. Make them interesting, high quality, and memorable, always have them available, and be sure they accompany every sale.

Here are some tips for making the most of your cards:

My most important recommendation about your business cards is to include at least one photo of your jewelry on them!

Otherwise the customer will come across your card a month or a year later when cleaning out their wallet / purse / desk, and say, “What kind of jewelry did this person make? Oh well, I don’t remember, so I’ll just toss out their card.” I know I do that with other people’s cards, if I don’t remember exactly what their products look like or why I have their card!

But a good photo of your jewelry right there on your card makes them remember not only what kind of jewelry you make, but also how much they like your jewelry! Jewelry is such a visual thing, that business cards without a photo of your work are really not a very effective marketing piece. Their job in your jewelry packaging is to be a mini-billboard for your business.

So make business cards with a photo of your jewelry on them an important part of your jewelry packaging! People will remember exactly why they have your card.

See Tips for Photographing Jewelry for help with getting good, clear, professional looking photos of your jewelry.

For the highest quality and best value, I recommend designing your own cards and having them professionally printed by an online business card printing service. You can easily upload your text and art files into their business card design screen and place your order. These printing services have become very competitive, and often have special sales, so you can really get a great deal on very high quality cards this way!

I designed my own business cards around a scan of one of my pendants. I edited the scan to make the photo look like a painting, and uploaded the photo to the online business card printing site. Then I just added my text around the photo and ordered the cards. It was easy, inexpensive, and totally custom!

Readers have asked me to add a picture of my business card to this article, so here it is:

Front:

Back:

For a good deal on high quality jewelry business cards, I recommend iPrint or VistaPrint. Depending on what you order, you can get a good supply full-color business cards for a lower price than your local printer. Both iPrint and VistaPrint have a simple upload interface for you to enter your own photo and text, and they have free shipping in the U.S.

The main advantage of having your cards professionally printed is that their high quality will speak volumes about the caliber of your jewelry business - for probably less money per card than printing them at home on your inkjet printer. The paper quality will be heavy and sturdy, and the print quality will be top-notch—your ink won’t smudge like ink-jet print does!

But if your cards aren’t professionally printed, be sure to use the heaviest cardstock that will go through your printer or copy machine. Most of the perforated business card stationary designed for making your own cards is too flimsy to give an impression of quality, and the perforated edges don’t look very elegant. Limp, floppy cards with raggedy edges and fuzzy inkjet print affect people’s impression of your business - and are probably a false economy.

I found that home-printed perforated cards actually cost me 4 cents more per card than having my cards professionally printed in multiple colors on heavy, glossy cardstock and shipped to me!

However, the main advantage of printing your own cards at home is that you can change the text and design as often as you want without any extra cost. But if you’re printing your cards at home intending to save money on printing, you should compare the difference between the per-card cost of your perforated business card stationary plus inkjet ink / laser toner, and the per-card cost of professionally printed cards from an online service.

The important elements for your business cards to include are:

• Your business name

• Your name

• Phone number

• Website URL

• Your e-mail address

• A short (10 words or less) catchy slogan or statement about your jewelry

• Address only if you have a P.O. box (for security reasons, it’s wise not to give out the physical location where your jewelry is kept!)

• Enticing photo of your jewelry.

Be sure to lay out all this information in a neat, easily accessible design that fits the character of your jewelry business. If the amount of information you want to include makes your business cards cluttered and overcrowded, consider printing some of the information on the back of the cards. Most professional printers will print on the reverse side for only a penny or two more.

Let the photo of your jewelry command the card’s layout and design, and fit your contact information artistically around it.

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Read more about Packaging Jewelry.

Good luck to you in your creation of beautiful, professional business cards! :o)

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