What to do with Old Business Cards

Last year during a training course I was delivering, I was asked, “Janine, What do you do with your old business cards?” I asked the attendee to clarify, 

“Well, it’s just that I have 5 shoe boxes filled with business cards in my home office and I was wondering, what do you do with all those old business cards you’ve received from the networking events you’ve attended?”

My brain screeched to a halt. Wow. I’ve been in business for so long, I forgot that some folks haven’t set up a system on what to do with a business card that they find lying around in their office or home. Okay. Here you go. this is the 3 Box System that I use for old business cards that I stumble across as I clean up paperwork in my office.

Get yourself three boxes from a discount store. you know the $1-a-box kind that they use for kid’s pencils? Looks something like this:

 

Label your three boxes with the rather unimaginative titles of:

Box#1

Box#2

Box#3

Literally, those are the labels I have on mine. Then each time you find a business card on your desk, in a pile of papers, in a drawer or in a box of stuff on the floor of your office, place it into Box #1.

Now, if you are like my attendee mentioned above and you have 5 shoe boxes filled of old business cards with no memory of who the people are or where you got the cards from, just fill up Box#1 so you can comfortably close the lid and work through those cards week-by-week until you’ve acted on each one of them. When you empty the box #1 of all the cards, refill it again from your shoe boxes. More on that in later articles, first let me share the overall system with you.

Box #1 Business Cards (Prospecting)

  1. Put all the old business cards you can find into Box #1. If you have more cards than the pencil box can hold, find a storage box (a shoe box is fine) to hold the rest of them until later. Just fill up Box #1 making sure the lid can close.
  2. Make the Call. Then, on the day and time that you scheduled your Prospecting Hour, grab Box #1. Open it, grab a business card and call the number on the card asking for the person who is on that card. What is the point of this phone call? To connect with the person who gave you the card, of course.  
  3. Leave a Message. If you get voicemail, leave a message like this: “Hey, Jane. I was cleaning out my desk today and I stumbled upon your business card. You know what is embarrassing? I can’t even remember why I got it, but it was important to me at the time otherwise I wouldn’t have made a point of keeping your card. Any chance we can schedule a phone call and catch up on your latest projects? Please give me a call back and I hope to chat with you soon.”

  4. Text Them. After leaving the voice message, text them on their cell phone and let them know you left a message. Be sure to include your Name in the text since they probably don’t have you in their phone. I usually leave a text like this: “Hi, Jane. Janine Bolon here. I left you a voice message. I look forward to chatting with you.”

  5. Email Them. Then, I email Jane a quick message like this: “Good Afternoon, Jane. I just left you a message on your voicemail to let. you know that I would like to reconnect. Please let me know your availability.“
  6. Connect on LinkedIn. My favorite social media platform is LinkedIn, I go onto my account and search out Jane’s name and make sure she and I are connected. If we aren’t, I’ll request a connection. If I don’t find her on LinkedIn, I’ll go to Facebook and ask to be her friend there.
  7. Enter Jane’s Information. I put Jane’s name, phone number and other pertinent business information into my contact list and Master CRM (Contact Relationship Management) Spreadsheet. I place her business card in Box #2.
  8. Repeat with the next card. I repeat steps 1-7 until my Prospecting Hour is over.

 

Pointers for Prospecting with Old Business Cards

  • Throw away the card if you call the numbers on it and they no longer are in service
  • Throw away the card if you call the number and your contact no longer works there
  • Throw away the card if the person you contact tells you that they are not interested in connecting with you (I’ve only had this happen once in 40 years!)

Box #2 Business Cards (Follow-Up)

After you’ve spent an hour prospecting your old business cards, you will now have a group of cards in Box #2 where you are waiting to hear back from people to find out if they will schedule time for a call, or in my case, give me their address so I can send them a card.

What you do is wait 2 weeks before you attempt to contact them again. Do this calling during your Follow-Up Hour. Grab Box #2 and call all the folks you left messages for 2 weeks prior (that date will be in your Master CRM Spreadsheet)

The activity is exactly the same with minor differences in the script. It looks like this:

  1. Open Box #2, grab a card.
  2. Call the phone number. 
  3. No answer? Leave a message:

    Hey, Jane. It’s Janine Bolon, again. I left you a message about two weeks ago and I’m still interested in connecting with you. Any chance we can get on a phone call and catch up on your latest projects? Please give me a call back. (leave your number). I look forward to catching up soon.

  4. After leaving the voice message, text them on their cell phone and let them know you left a message. Be sure to include your Name in the text -again- since they probably didn’t put you in their phone. I usually leave a text like this: “Hi, Jane. Janine Bolon here. I left you a voice message again because I know how busy life can be. I look forward to chatting with you.”

  5. Then, I email Jane a quick message like this: “Good Afternoon, Jane. I just left you a message on your voicemail. Let me know your availability over the next few weeks so that we may reconnect.“
  6. I put Jane’s business card in Box #3 and record on my CRM Spreadsheet that I left a message (LM), Texted her (TXT) and Emailed her (EM) on today’s date.
  7. I repeat steps 1-7 until my Follow-Up Hour is over.

Box #3 Business Cards (Connecting)

After you’ve spent an hour prospecting your old business cards, and an hour where you were doing Follow-Up on the Box #2 cards, it is now time to take care of Box #3 cards. This is the point of no return for your contacts.

After you’ve waited two more weeks, Grab Box #3 cards and call all the fols you left messages for the 2 weeks prior (the date will be on your Master CRM Spreadsheet). You will be calling these contacts during your Connecting Hour. Go through all the cards where folks haven’t gotten back to you with a time to connect via a phone call or given you any attention through email or FB messenger.

The activity is exactly the same with minor differences in the script. It looks like this:

  1. Open Box #3, grab a card.
  2. Call the phone number. 
  3. No answer? Leave a message:

    Hey, Jane. It’s Janine Bolon, again. I left you a couple of messages over the past 6 weeks and I wanted to let you know that I am still interested in connecting with you. Any chance we can get on a phone call and catch up? Please give me a call back. (leave your number). I am looking forward to catching up soon.

  4. After leaving the voice message, text them on their cell phone and let them know you left a message. Be sure to include your Name. My text looks like this: “Hi, Jane. Janine Bolon here. I left you a voice message. I don’t wish to be annoying or pushy, so how about we connect on FB messenger if that is easier for you”  (If you’re connected to this person through LinkedIn, use that social platform with them.)

  5. Then, I email Jane a quick message like this: “Hey, Jane. I just left you a message on your voicemail. Let me know your availability over the next few weeks so that we may reconnect. If this isn’t a good form of communication for you, then message me on FB.” (Or LinkedIn)
  6. I then put Jane’s business card in the recycle bin.
  7. Since Jane has chosen not to respond to me with the 9 messages I have left her over a 6-week period, I don’t follow through with her any longer. At some point she may reach out to me because I’ve made sure to connect with her on FB or LinkedIn, but I will move onto other business cards now.
  8. I repeat steps 1-7 until my Connecting Hour is over.

Tips for Leaving Voice Messages:

  • Don’t ever let exasperation, irritation or annoyance drip from your voice as you leave messages for your prospects – no matter how many times you’ve contacted a person.
  • Smile into your mirror each time you get ready to contact the person whose business card you are holding.
  • As you call each contact, act like you have all the time in the world to let them respond to you, remember, we are prospecting here. It takes time to nurture these relationships, you are planting seeds. Seeds sprout on their own timeline, rarely ours. It is going to take time and pateince before they sprout.
  • If you feel like you are in a rush, stop. Breathe. Do some calming techniques, but don’t ever prospect when you are feeling angry, frustrated or cranky.
The 3 Box System grew out of my personal need to gain control over the paperwork flooding my work space as my business expanded. 
 
At networking events, I’d have 5-10 people handling me cards and asking me to follow-up with them. It became obvious I wouldn’t be able to keep track of all this paper online (at least for the way my brain works) it calmed me down tremendously when I realized I could just move these cards from box, to box, to box as I let the weeks tick by.


At the end of each 6 week cycle, I am usually only tossing 2-3 cards. Usually, I have reached someone on the phone, I got an email, Facebook request or LinkedIn connection from my efforts. I’ve had LinkedIn connections that were 7 years old contact me out-of-the-blue using this system. You never know where your people will come from, but first, yuo’ve got to start the process by connecting with them.