FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions
How do I put my best foot forward with a business card? Contributed by Deb Ling
No matter what medium you are advertising in, these rules apply. Sometimes all the potential customers sees, is your ad, business card, sign, etc, rather than your work, therefore it must represent you to the utmost. If you are at a festival with other face painters, and you all do comparable work, the consumer will only have the business card to go by 6 months later. You want yours to stand out, but with taste.
1) White Space...
White Space is essential. When designing a business card, (or any advertising medium), find the most important fact you are promoting, and surround it with white space. If you have a graphic included, the white space can be outside the graphic, if it is a part of the main topic you are promoting. Don’t go overboard with graphics, use them to point to a main topic, or to give the card some pizzazz, but NOT just to fill space.
EXAMPLE:
2) Lists...
IF you have a lot of info you want to share, you can run a list to save space, i.e.:
birthdays * school events * festivals * corporate * special events
* picnics The list can run across the entire card in two or three lines, if that is how
much you offer, or you run a vertical list down one side, or both sides. But use bullets,
(i.e.: diamond) rather than commas. Graphic Design does not necessarily follow what you
learned in school. Bullets catch the eye more than commas.
EXAMPLE:
Gary used a good means of listing his clients, that others could call for a reference. On
the back of his folded “Party Faces Inc.” card, he did use commas, however he
used different colors, to break the monotony of the list. This usage of multi colors
works in this situation, but this is the exception to the rule.
EXAMPLE:
3) The Type...
Use one or two fonts, maximum for your regular copy. Change the type by stretching,
italics, bold, different colors. You can get use a third font in a heading, such as
“About Faces” used in the card above. When proofing the layout, before printing,
make sure that there are no typos, that there is spacing between words, that the card is
‘pleasing to the eye’ and easy to read. Having everything, centered, with equal
amount of space between each line with nothing popping off the page, is called “shot
gunning”, and makes for a bad layout. Below I have made up a card showing you what it
looks like.
EXAMPLE :
4) Color...
Again, less is more. If you have a colored card, the print must be in a good contrast
color. One that is EASY to read. You do not want to have a lot of colors for the
type, either. Use one or two colors max for the type. One color for the main body of type,
and one color for the main event -so to speak - of your card information. If you want to
use more colors, then separate the colors out by segments of type i.e.: headline in red,
phone # in blue, list in green.. Color also is used to draw the eye... Red is a color that
draws the eye more than green Using Sweet Tomato the clown’s card as an
example, there is a red outer border, with an inner blue border, and her name is in red,
the border draws the eye down from the top, to where her name is written. This is a clean
layout, and she used the back of the card to place all her info on.
EXAMPLE:
5) Information on Card...
On a One Sided Card, only place on the card what is pertinent... If your address is not
important, then omit it. Web sites, email addresses, fax numbers are good, but the main
thing after your name should be your phone number for focus. (That does not mean that is
the order it must go in...). But have your name or company name as the main item, then
secondary should be your phone number... unless you think there is something more
important than that. The phone number should be second in size also. Larger than the copy,
smaller than your name. So you could have 3 sizes of your font. Berry-Merry used two
lines on the front of her card. Her name is first then her phone #. And if you look you
will see they are repeated on her costume, everything else was placed on the back of the
card, therefore her focus is her name and then the phone number.
EXAMPLE:
Below is my card showing the three focus areas, 1) my name, 2) phone number, and 3) copy
EXAMPLE:
Now if you absolutely must place everything you do on your card so as to spark ideas in
your potential customers mind, consider having a folded card, or a two sided card. It
would cost more, but be worth it to have a memorable card with a clean layout. In that
respect, Gary’s card is an excellent example. He has a two sided card, that has all
the info he needs to convey to the customer, as well as facts about face painting. The
facts about face painting, give the customer another reason to hold on to his card. He has
offset the photos. As you look at the card, first you see the photos, then
company name, then
the body copy. This is a great layout, in that it forces your eye to see what you want it
to see, in the order of importance. 1) The photos that show what his product can look
like. 2) The Company Name. 3) His name. 4) His phone number. 5) The pertinent body copy.
EXAMPLE:
His “Party Faces Inc.” card also used the same type format, causing your eye to
travel. But on this card the focus is different. He wants people to read the inside, so
the “Look Inside” is the third focus after the pictures and company name.
EXAMPLE:
6) And finally...
If you have a web site, place the address on the card. People are more computer
oriented than ever. If they have called you for a date and are waiting for you to call
them back, your voice mail can direct them to check out your web site for more information
while they wait for you to call back. It is another tool of this day and age. For any
questions or feedback, please email me at IAMsKlown@aol.com
Deb Ling
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