The following post is sponsored by online printing & design company MOO. For more information about our Sponsored Content policy, click here.
The New Year has barely kicked off and even with multiple predictions of ‘what 2014 will be all about’, the truth of those statements will only reveal itself a couple of months from now. Some habits die hard, and even with all the great tech we have today and the potential we have to interact with each other, we don’t embrace them all at once. I still travel on standard monopoly trains, I still buy my groceries at the store, and I still pay with my bank-issued credit card.
Granted that all of those things will change sooner or later, but some things we don’t want changed that soon. Take business cards : we could all be bumping our phones with each other to exchange contacts yet we don’t do it, and we don’t want to because there is something distinctively human in exchanging a business card – it’s both a fluid interaction and a discovery moment. It’s one of the few pieces of a paper-based era that managed to survive in the digital world.
It’s amazing how a small piece of paper can be all so revealing about yourself. Of course, we all have online digital projections of our persona and the digital world can deliver such a rich experience. But then, we enter the world of hyper complexity and information overflow to the point that we are not even reading the full story behind the person anymore. Paradoxically, the tiny pieces of paper that we deliver as business cards can be crafted to such perfection that they bear a much more powerful message about ourselves. There is the general first impression of the card, the weigh and thickness of the paper, the texture when you pass it through your fingers, the lettering, the colouring, the softness of the edges, and the written message timbered on the paper and slightly altering its thickness.
I’ve been using MOO’s MiniCards as a way to make it more fun to exchange information. It’s not the wheel reinvented, just a card half the size, and yet everyone breaks a smile when they see them because they are utterly an invitation to connect on the personal level, to pass a comment on how “fun” the MiniCards are or how “cute” that specific design looks. Having the chance to use MOO’s Printfinity, you can print a unique image on every card in the pack, having many designs is a good invitation to let them pick their favourite and break the ice. They’ll fit in a stack of standard-sized business cards, which is good too. A card that matches your personality can do more for remembering your face than a thousand Twitter followers.
Rethinking our communication and simplifying where we can is a good exercise we should do every now and then. Getting rid of old stuff in our apartment, emptying a bookshelf, or carrying on less stuff in our daily backpack. Small things we do, which put us in connection with what truly matters, remind us of what we are here for and how much we appreciate an honest human interaction. It strikes me how powerful that moment is, when you first hand your business card to someone : they’re looking to know you better so why not give them something to remember you from?
The MOO MiniCards can be a great way to present yourself, or if you want to be more creative, you can use them as branding tags for your business, small ‘save the date’ reminders or as a thank you note to your contacts. In fact, they now make them in the Luxe format, so you can mark the moment on a premium medium which makes your message much more powerful. As a heads up to our readers: MOO is now giving 25% discount on all of its printed products, so you can take the chance to refill your business card stock, and who knows, maybe reinvent yourself again and stand out from the crowd.
This post is pponsored by online printing & design company MOO. For more information about Sponsored Content, email us at [email protected]
