Marketing Genius: The CD business card.

Marketing Genius: The CD business card. What is a CD Business card? CD business card replication is a relatively new concept. CD Business Cards are business card shaped CD-ROM's that can play in any standard computer CD drive. Usually jam packed full of multimedia information about your business...anything from a full interactive web site to a catalog to a power point presentation with music, video, whatever you can imagine. These cd business cards give you the power to illustrate much more than a standard printed business card can. With cd business cards, you can include any audio, video (digital or VHS), PowerPoint presentations, brochures, sales literature and catalogs. You can even have "hot links" to your website and unlimited e-mail addresses to multiple departments, such as sales, customer service, technical support, etc. Your entire product catalog can be put on a CD for a fraction of the cost of standard printed paper catalogs. They actually come in many shapes and sizes, including an "hockey rink" shape with rounded corners, a credit card size and shape, a 3" round mini, and custom shaped cds (imagine a cd die cut to your logo's shape). The real advantage to cd business cards is that besides being a cool marketing product in itself, they are small sized, and are easily stored in a wallet or shirt pocket, just like a standard printed business card. Technology is now available to print on the disc in many ways. The standard is silk screening. But you can also upgrade to offset printing or digital printing at quality up to 600 dpi. In addition, Using a unique new all-digital imaging process to print labels for any format of optical disc media, variable data can be printed on each individual disc, making serialization and personalization possible, regardless of the number produced. Serialization can be used to control who can access data, along with accountability for how it is stored. This trackability helps prevent problems of piracy, theft, loss of production, and loss of sales, by making positive authenticity and ownership easy to establish. Personalization can be used to provide consumers with individualized promotional items and even serve as mailing labels. Photos of agents and/or products provide big impact as business cards, invitations, catalogs and other marketing materials, even on a small marketing budget. Some potential uses for cd business cards... For a salesman/executive... Photos of your products or services can be printed in full color on the CD business card with full contact information. Within the content of the card, full catalogs can be included with product information and links to your website. On each CD label, individual client's name and information can be printed, making each card uniquely personalized. For real estate company... Houses can be shown in multimedia virtual tours. Individual representative's data can be printed on the face of the cd, specifically addressed to the prospect. For an insurance company... Client's individual name and policy data can be printed on the CD label. Complete policy, actuarial information, and FAQs can be included or a full marketing presentation in multimedia can make an immediate impact. For an automobile company... Each dealership's customer database can be leveraged by simply sending a CD business card to each customer with the latest leasing /product information. Each CD label can be individually personalized and printed with each customer's information, salesman's name and contact info, and type of vehicle that interests the customer. For a fortune 500 company... Reports, whether quarterly or annual can be issued to each stockholder on CD with individual name and number of shares printed on the CD face. Prospect uses could be distributed with current performance information printed on each CD label. CD Business cards seem to be the hottest marketing item in the business sector these days, and its popularity is growing. They are only limited by your imagination. -Michael Nova