1.1 Background to the study Digital Business Cards are a tool to make networking more efficient. A digital business card is a necessary evolution of this essential part of business life. However, the mistake people make when they think about digital business card apps is that they assume that the aim is to entirely replace the traditional business card when in reality; a digital business card is simply a helpful counterpart. This mobile application intends to make sharing contact information easy and efficient.
It will ensure that contacts remain up to date and well organized. By creating an identity that can be stored onto the smartphone and when information related to that particular person changes, so does our database. This way there will always be updated information on your contact list. What makes business cards so attractive is their tangibility, and yet this is also their greatest weakness, as they are easily misplaced or destroyed (Cheung et al, 2014).
The system should make the cards easy to store and share as well as hard to lose without completely robbing them for their precious tangibility. The aim is to convert an already mobile technology from analogue to digital, and yet attempt to keep it tangible, while creating a digital platform where the user can store their received business cards as well as their own. 1.2 Problem Statement Business cards are a source of clutter and according to a survey approximately 88% of business cards get thrown away after one week, yet we stick with them because they work. They work because they don’t require the recipient to have any special software or hardware in order to exchange information (FullContact, 2014). But most of the current solutions are scanners and readers of business cards, and those that allow users to create business cards have no way of authenticating the validity of the person as an employee of that particular company.
Digital business cards will solve these problems by not only ensuring that the database has the most recent contact updates but will also ensure that someone searching for a particular employee or entrepreneur finds exactly who they are looking for in the shortest most convenient way possible. 1.3 Aim In reference to the problems stated in section 1.2, this mobile application intends to provide a database that would automatically update contact information for users on a database and keep it updated. It aims to help increase the legitimacy of a business and help improve its bottom line. 1.4 Objectives The objectives of the Digital Business Card Application are: i. To review the existing Digital Business Card Applications in use. ii. To analyze the requirements of the Digital Business Card Applications.
iii. To design and develop a mobile application for digital business cards. iv. To test the functionality of the developed system. 1.5 Research Question The goal is to improve the existing solution by creating an application that transforms the tangible physical cards, and make an easy-to-use application. Questions we need to ask ourselves and want to explore during this project: i. What is the architecture and shortcomings of existing digital business card applications? ii. What are the requirements of the digital business card application? iii. What is the architecture of the proposed system? iv. How efficient is the existing system? 1.6 Justification Digital business cards are the way forward because they are more amenable to newer forms of work. A digital business card being so customizable makes them perfect for this. Our business and working relationships will become more transient and the way we network has to reflect that.
For millennials especially, it’s arguable that the concept of physical business cards simply doesn’t make sense when the rest of their lives are so deeply enmeshed with social media. It seems doubtful that the traditional model of business cards will continue to be relevant. For freelancers and students, they provide an inexpensive means of sharing contact details without the commitment of designing and buying physical cards. For those who work in creative industries, the benefit to digital business cards is twofold. Not only do you get all the other benefits, you can also create a direct link to your portfolio that your prospective client can immediately click through. This means that the networking you do can connect to your talents far more quickly, making commissions easier to secure.
1.7 Scope and Limitation Business cards remain an essential marketing tool across a variety of industries for various reasons: they can improve the legitimacy of your brand, increase your brand awareness and improve your bottom-line. This application will allow you to easily share your details with other users directly or through their email if they don’t have the same app. The system will also make it easier to generate online networking opportunities. Digital business cards also allow for more space/fuller profiles, meaning you can easily incorporate your social media links. Some limitations of the business card application include that the user will not be able to fully customize their individual business card as they will be limited to a couple of templates to pick from between updates.
