Although I was excited to get my first batch of Firmology business cards (free from Moo!), I dislike carrying them around and dislike collecting business cards from people I meet. The cards just end up as wasted paper in scattered piles at the office, at home, in my laptop bag or straight in the trash.
As soon as I get home from a business meeting or networking event, I search for the person on LinkedIn (all small business owners should be on LinkedIn) and toss the business card aside after sending them a contact request. The one good thing about having the business card is that I can directly input the person’s email address into the contact request screen when LinkedIn verifies whether I know the person or not.
Enter LinkedIn’s relaunch of CardMunch. CardMunch is an iPhone app that “connects the physical world of business cards with the digital world of LinkedIn profiles.” The app is very simple to use and focuses on three main functions: capture a business card, add the contact details to your iPhone’s contact list and be able to get access to LinkedIn profiles.
Capture a Business Card. CardMunch’s core functionality is the ability to scan a business card using your iPhone’s camera and adding it to your mobile rolodex. Once scanned, the app will search the LinkedIn database and map the business card info with the contact’s LinkedIn profile including photos of contacts, common connections, past work experience and education.
Add Contact Details to Your iPhone’s Contact List. Once the card is scanned and mapped by CardMunch, all the contact details can be added directly to your iPhone’s contact list. This feature in itself is worth downloading the application. Adding a person’s contact information manually to your contact list takes time and can be painfully awkward when fumbling around trying to exchange information at a business meeting or networking event.
Access LinkedIn Profiles. My favorite feature is the ability to get access to the contact’s LinkedIn profile, which gives you the ability to send a connect request in addition to viewing photos of contacts, common connections, past work experience and education. Why wait a few days or weeks to send a contact request after meeting someone when you can connect with them instantly when the conversation is still fresh in your mind or sometimes more important, in your contact’s mind?
Bonus Feature: Add Notes. While waiting for the business card to be processed by CardMunch, you can add some notes about the person you met and future conversation triggers, just like you would if you wrote them on the back of the business card.
With these great features, you can throw all of those business cards straight in the trash, or better yet once you get the hang of it, scan the card and give it right back to the person. You’ll save a tree and save them a business card (just make sure their culture wouldn’t be offended by this practice).
LinkedIn is the #1 social networking site for business professionals with over 135 million members worldwide and over 2 million companies have company pages. The company was founded in the living room of co-founder Reid Hoffman in 2002 and went public in May 2011.
-To contact the writer on this story: Philip Nowak in Chicago at philip.nowak@firmology.com.
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