Nowadays, an increasing number of NFC card-based digital business cards are available on online marketplaces. There are cheaper ones and significantly more expensive ones, yet it is almost impossible to compare them based on the listed parameters.
Here are some important points that a reliable digital business card should have:
Our company’s business card is like the appearance of our employees. It plays a significant role in the external perception of our company. Therefore, it is essential that it also embodies our company’s image. Request that it features our company logo, or if possible, customize the entire design of the card to match our brand’s appearance.
If a digital business card provider doesn't offer this option, it is likely a mass-produced product, which is not the best choice if we want to stand out in the business world rather than blend further into the average.
A digital business card is typically not given to our partner permanently. They only see it when it is tapped to their phone. After that, our business card profile will appear on their smartphone. Don't overlook the significance of this, as our partner will draw conclusions about us and the company we represent based on this profile.
Most companies that produce digital business cards don't emphasize this aspect; their product presentations don't often include illustrative images regarding this. Probably because it’s not their focus.
Every digital business card is backed by software responsible for the digital profile. A good digital business card should ensure that the online profile appearing here can also be customized to the company’s image. For example, unique background color, custom button colors, renamable content, freely adjustable digital elements.
We generally use a digital business card to transfer our contact information (name, phone number, email address) to our partner’s smartphone. Some cards indeed only offer this functionality. However, a “SMART CARD” can do much more. We can display numerous features under the contact download button that can greatly aid our company’s marketing and sales activities. For example, on our salesperson’s card, we can present our product range, current offers as downloadable PDFs, or display our services on the customer service profile, or even integrate our company’s loan calculator for insurance agents to be available at the press of a button. Additionally, useful features might include subscribing to our newsletter or placing "Review us" buttons for Google Review, Tripadvisor, or even our internal system. These are all digital functions that reduce paper usage and provide much more direct communication with our partners.
Basically, there are two types of digital business card providers.
There are those who develop their own custom digital business card servicing software and integrate it into their NFC cards. In this case, the company can continuously improve their products and meet unique customer needs.
Naturally, this is the more time-consuming and costly version, but due to the proprietary data management, it is much safer for customers.
In some cases, digital business card distributors don't engage in software development; they focus solely on distribution. They do this by purchasing ready-made software, typically operated by Indian, Chinese, or Vietnamese software development companies. These products are mass-produced on the market, sold with different logos by different companies, but essentially, the same product lies behind them. Here, the distributing company often doesn't handle customer data personally and doesn't have full control over system access. In some cases, this is a much more favorable solution, as it doesn't require as much money, time, and expertise to produce the finished product. However, it may leave some security questions.
As we learned, a smart business card requires servicing software to function. Someone needs to operate it continuously in the background. In some cases, we may need to turn to the operator with technical questions. Therefore, it is important to choose a partner company that is active in the field beyond sales. Indications of this could be continuous social media presence, quick customer communication, regular professional articles (blog section), etc.
The larger a company, the more important it is to represent unity in both online and offline appearances. In an advanced digital business card management software, we can manage all user data in one place. We probably don't want to fill out each user's data individually if the company-related data, company name, address, website, company logo, etc., are always the same. In such cases, it can save us a lot of administrative time if the online editing interface allows us to create templates, customizable profile templates in advance, and activate them per card. Thus, only the differing data need to be modified, such as the name or phone number.
Fundamentally, a digital business card is not an expensive thing when considering its wear-out value. For simplicity, let’s calculate an average price of $48. The amount only needs to be paid once, and from then on, it can be used for years, unlike paper business cards. Calculated over 4 years, this means an annual cost of $12 or $1 per month.
Therefore, in the long run, price will not be the most important comparison factor. The features listed above will play a much more significant role.
