Business Card Essentials – Seven Power Business Card Etiquette Tips For Greater Networking Success
Do your business cards really work for you? And are you using them effectively? Most business people wouldn’t dream of leaving home without them, and that is a good thing, since business cards are an essential tool for connecting with others — and making that connection stick.
But you have to use them correctly, or they will not serve you as well as they could. Read on for a quick review of seven power business card etiquette essentials:
1) Your business card represents you
Before you hand out your card (and preferably before you have them printed up), check the following:
– Does your card match your introduction or audio logo? — Is it immediately clear from looking at the card what services or products you provide? — Is it branded to reflect what you do and your marketing position? — Is it clean, crisp and of good quality without dog ears or scuffs? — Does it look professional? — Is the information on it correct and up-to-date? Avoid handwritten corrections.
2) Do you have enough of them?
If the answers to the above questions are positive, make sure you have enough cards so you’ll always have them available when you have an opportunity to pass them out. Find places to keep an extra stash – toss a box of cards in your truck or glove box of your car, and keep extras tucked away in your purse or briefcase so you won’t run out.
3) What if you do run out of cards anyway?
Make sure to get one from anyone you meet AND then email a quick note with your contact information or a V card within 24 hours.
4) How do you exchange cards correctly?
You should first establish rapport with a person in a conversation before exchanging cards. If you aren’t asked for yours, ask for theirs first. Most people will respond in kind. If not, simply ask, “May I offer you my card?”
5) Look at the cards you receive When you receive a card, borrow from the Japanese tradition. Honor it by looking at it and at the person, and then make a comment about it. This focus will help you remember both the card and the person.
6) Take notes
Be sure to jot down quick notes on the back of the business cards you get while networking. These notes can make the difference between a follow-up happening or not. There’s nothing worse than getting back to the office with twenty business cards and you can’t remember who all these people were.
What if you don’t have a pen handy? Just fold over a corner of the card for people with whom you definitely want to connect further.
7) Don’t Get Your Cards Mixed Up
Make sure to keep your own cards separate from the ones you get from other people. Keeping them in separate pockets or sections in your purse or briefcase, for example, will help you avoid the embarrassment of handing out a card that isn’t yours.
What is the Best Business Card Scanner? See This Answer
It is a common question across various professional fields that need to store data from printed receipts and cards – what is the best business card scanner? The answer is actually a simple one – the best is one that is capable of producing very high quality scanned images and is also equipped with a good OCR software.
The best scanners in the market have a high dpi (some have even 600 dpi) and they will reproduce a very sharp scanned image of the business card or any other document. As for what is the best card scanner supposed to be like, it is either going to be portable (for laptop warriors) or they are going to be bigger desktop scanners with special features to scan varying sizes of cards, receipts and documents.
When you are in the market for a good business card scanner, the ideal thing to do is to go to online stores and compare the models according to your own needs. Instead of just pondering on what is the best business card scanner, go into the details of the packages and offers. See what suits you best according to size, portability, quality and of course budget.
Some of these scanners are large multipurpose machines; others come in ridiculously small sizes for portability. Business card scanners come in packages with software so they start archiving your data out of the box. The accuracy of these systems usually depends on the software you are using them with and most have their own software and work seamlessly with it.
Business Plans – How To Anticipate What The Banks Want
If you’re looking for information on business plans, then the chances are you have spoken to a bank or financial institute about a business idea and they have asked you to go away and write a business plan for them. I’m also sure they will have given you no advice as to what key facts they will be looking for in your plan. For most people writing a business plan will be a daunting task. Unfortunately, this can, and does, put many people off starting up their own business and commits them to a life of working for someone else. I intend to show you why you shouldn’t be running away from writing your own business plan and even better, how to get around writing one at all.
Like most things in life, experience is key to success. I can’t over emphasise how important it is to get your business plan right first time, as banks are not impressed by return visits with second attempts. Although I said you shouldn’t run away from the plan, I didn’t actually say it has to be all your own work. Some banks will give you packs which set out a basic business plan for you and all you do is fill in the blanks. This can work for a lot of people, as their business plan may be quite simple and low risk for the banks. If you want to be more certain of gaining the funding you require to start your business, then you will need a business plan that goes into greater detail.
Writing your own business plan from scratch can be hard work, so you need to go about this in the correct manner. Do not try to write the plan from first page to last page, as many areas are likely to change over the weeks leaving some of your early information outdated before it’s complete.
Start by writing down exactly what the business is about, what you are trying to achieve and over what time period. What your business is going to be about is completely down to you, but it will be advantage if it’s in an industry or service that you personally have experience within. You can always pay for that experience, but this always puts great pressure on your finances from day one.
Next you need to look at the basic finances of the business to get a rough idea of whether it can be profitable. This information is made up of 5 main areas:
Start-up cost for the business (manufacturing equipment, computer equipment etc) Annual indirect costs (rent, rates, electricity, wages etc) Individual survival budget (your personal income needed to live) Annual direct costs (cost of sales) Income (from sales)
If you have an accurate plan which includes all of the 5 point above, then you will be able to find out how profitable the business plan really is. This will also give you an idea of how much (if at all) you will need to borrow from the bank to realise your new business. Research is imperative to a successful plan, otherwise your business will have unforeseen problems once you start trading. Remember that putting false data into a business plan might fool an unsuspecting bank manager, but the outcome is likely to backfire on you in the future.
Once you have your basic finances and structure in place, you need to set about writing the plan in a format which any finance company will find easy to understand. The layout of the plan can be as important as the contents. It’s no good having well researched and detailed information, if the investors or bank managers are unable to understand what you have written. Make sure you have a clear contents page and that all your referrals to appendixes are correctly labelled and are relevant.
Finally, present your new business plan in a professional folder or wallet and make several copies for the different financial institutes you’re going to see. Make sure you know your plan well and can go to a particular page quickly should you be asked a question about an area of the business.