In the era of digital, where promoting a business and networking has taken a new dimension with social media platforms and virtual meetups coming into the picture, it is only fair to assume that the dependency on a paper business card would be quite low. However, the statistics prove otherwise.
Based on a survey conducted by Statistic Brain Research Institute, 57% of the people still feel that having a business card is essential, 39% of the people would choose not to do business with someone if they had a “cheap-looking” business card, and 72% of the people judge a company or person based on the quality of their business card. So much for the saying – “Don’t judge the book by its cover”!
While business cards are still essential, the idea of carrying a bunch of cards in a physical wallet seems very old-fashioned. Additionally, with the pandemic bringing in new social distancing norms, exchanging a physical business card not only sounds outdated but also risky.
The ‘new normal’ has forced us to go contactless, even sanitizing our groceries & dairy before we consume them. Even the circulation of printed newspapers has slumped drastically with the pandemic-induced hesitation to touch things that might have been in someone else’s contact. The pandemic has accelerated the adoption of technology in all businesses and has transformed the very way we interact and collaborate with people.
India has seen quite a digital revolution itself over the last decade. Businesses that shifted towards technology before the pandemic outbreak did not face large repercussions when lockdowns and social distancing norms were put into place. Technology helped them carry on with their work and operations seamlessly, even when their employees were working from home for most of the pandemic. This digital revolution has not been limited to large businesses and MNCs. In fact, we can see a digital boom even when it comes to small & micro-businesses. Take your nearest grocery shop or local business for instance, which now accepts most digital payment methods.
Virtual business cards have a number of advantages over physical ones, some of which are listed below:
- They can be created instantly using available templates and customizations to suit your needs. There is no need to hire a professional to design and wait for them to be printed.
- They can easily be stored on your phone or device and shared within seconds, anytime, anywhere! and shared any number of times without having to worry about running low on stock or reordering for cards.
- In case of updates in the business card, the changes can be performed, and the e-Card can be updated without having to redesign & reorder a fresh set of cards.
- Besides being affordable, virtual business cards are also eco-friendly. Research shows that 7.2 million trees are cut every year to print business cards, 90% of the business cards shared with people are thrown away within a week. The probability of people retaining your contact information and following up when they have a requirement is much higher with Virtual cards.
- Digital cards can be shared in multiple ways, including custom URLs as well as QR codes. With virtual events and online meetings being a significant part of the new normal, they come very handy to share via email or social media.
The business card software market was valued at over US$ 1000 million in 2019 and is projected to cross US$ 3,065. 8 million by 2027; it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 14.7% from 2020 to 2027. In a world that is increasingly turning digital, CardByte is a home-grown contactless business card-based contact management and networking platform that allows users to network seamlessly and leverage their business cards better.
It would be an understatement to say that the world has changed with the pandemic. In times when people prefer E-meetings over face-to-face interactions and hesitate to shake hands without having to sanitize or wear gloves, every option to go contactless seems like a smart choice to make. The virtual world seems to be the safest after all!
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