Paper card or digital business card, and what each does best
An honest comparison of a printed card and a digital business card, where each one wins, and why most people end up carrying both.
Read it →A digital visiting card is a page at an address of your own that opens on any phone without an app. It carries your name, a WhatsApp button, a save-to-contacts button and a short form, and it is handed over as a printed code or a link in a chat.
Why WhatsApp changes the shape of the card
In India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and across the Gulf, business happens in WhatsApp. That single fact decides how a card here should be built.
Put the WhatsApp button first, set to open a chat rather than a dialler, and put your photograph above it so the chat starts with a face. On our cards, one big button sits above three smaller ones, and for most people in these markets the big one should open a chat. A pre filled first line helps: something short that says who is writing and why, so the other person is not staring at an empty box.
The number itself has to be in international form, with the country code, or the chat will not open on a phone abroad. The card checks the shape of what you type and says so plainly when a number cannot work.
The three trades it suits fastest
Property and broking. A face, a WhatsApp button, a gallery of listings, and a form. The whole job of the card is to be kept until the day somebody is ready, which is the one thing a paper card is poor at.
Trading and distribution. A catalogue section with products and prices, opening hours, a map, and a brochure button. A buyer who scans your code in a market can send you an order the same hour. With the store, an add-on to Pro, that catalogue can be a store on your card with a cart, and the buyer pays on your own payment page.
Clinics, salons and studios. A Book a time button, hours, directions, and a gallery. This is the card that turns a chance meeting into an appointment while the person is still standing in front of you. With bookings, an add-on to Pro, the card can take the booking itself: a Book a session button, your weekly hours shown in the visitor's own time zone, and a reminder email a day and an hour before. You can see this card set up for doctors and dentists and for salons and barbers, and the property version for estate agents.
What to print, and what to leave to the screen
The printed visiting card should carry the short version: name, company, one number, one email, and a code on the back. Everything else goes on the digital card, where changing it costs nothing.
That split solves the oldest problem with printed cards here, which is that a box of five hundred outlives your job title. Let the printed code open a tracked link, and a promotion or a new shop address becomes an edit instead of an order at the press.
The visiting card guide covers sizes and the printed half. India uses 90 by 54 mm, most of the Gulf 85 by 55 mm, and both are drawn with bleed and a safe area for you.
The address is the part people underestimate
Your card lives at yourname.visitingcards.store. Pick it carefully during sign up, because it cannot be changed from your own screens afterwards: every code, printed card and saved link would stop working.
Use your own name if the card is personal, and the company name if the card is the company's. Small letters, numbers and hyphens, and the box tells you at once whether it is taken.
What it collects for you
The Stay in touch form asks for a name and a phone number by default, and you can add email, company and a message. Those people arrive on your People screen, searchable, exportable, and yours.
For most people this matters more than the card itself. A printed card given away is a hope. A number in your list is a person you can follow up. The people and leads tab sets out what is kept, for how long, and how somebody asks to be removed.
Following up without typing every message
In markets that run on WhatsApp, the follow-up is where business is won, and it is the step people forget. The WhatsApp add-on sends it for you: a thank-you when someone saves your card, a follow-up a few days later, and a reminder before an appointment they booked. People who save your card to their phone can also get card notifications from you, which suits news such as a new stock arrival or festival hours. Pro is $0.99 a month. Make your free card first and add the rest when the list starts to grow.
Questions people ask
Is a digital visiting card the same as a digital business card?
Yes. The name follows the country: visiting card in South Asia and the Gulf, business card elsewhere. The page on digital visiting cards and the digital business cards page are the same product under the two names.
Can I have it in Hindi or Arabic?
The digital card is in English today. The usual arrangement is the printed card carrying the second language and the code carrying the digital one.
Do people in my industry actually scan codes?
More than they did, and the scan rate goes up sharply when you say what is behind the code. "Scan that and my number saves into your phone" works better than holding up a code in silence.
Does it work on an older phone?
It is a web page, so it opens in whatever browser is on the phone. The card is kept light on purpose, with compressed pictures and one small script, because a slow card on a cheap phone is a card nobody waits for.