How to create vCards you can append to your mail? [BLO001]

Have you noticed? People appending files with a .vcf extension to their mail right under their signature? Well these files are vCards. vCard stands for the abbreviation "Virtual Business Card" (.vcf file). A standard for exchanging contact information over the internet. Get ready if you want to know how to create one for your own.

Save the hassle and import

Gmail supports this standard and can exchange vCards as file attachments. You can import .vcf formatted files straight in your contacts list in gmail. When opening a mail containing a vCard (vcf) select the file and click 'add to contacts' to import. The fields are mapped and data added in your Gmail contacts list. No hassle of typing contact details manually. After import you can find the contact details by browsing to the label with date of import.

Your own vCard

But let's see how we can return the favor by creating our own vCard. First access your gmail account and select the contacts service. You can access as drop down underneath 'Mail' in the upper left in Gmail. You can also access contacts by indicating the service as from your services grid on the upper right next to your name.

Select 'new contact' to create an empty contact form ready for completion. Fill in your name, company, job title, address, phone, fax email, website Url. You can, when creating your vCard, also populate the 'information' field in your contact details. This could be extra info about yourself/company as well as additional addresses to whatever landing, promo or event pages.

Export the vCard 

Once completed you will find underneath the 'more' menu item, the option to export the vCard. Perform export only for the current 'new' selected current contact.
Three export formats will be proposed (Gmail is compatible with all three) :

• Google CSV format (for importing into a Google account)
• Outlook CSV format (for importing into Outlook or another application)
• vCard format (for importing into Apple Address Book or another application)   

Once exported. I propose to repeat the effort and export also in the two other vCard formats. Then you ensure compatibility with most mail clients and personal information managers.

Distribute now your contact information by appending all three vCard files in your email.

Takeaway 

If you want to save the hassle of attaching vCards each time you compose mail. You can automate by creating a 'Canned Response'. A canned response is a premade message ready for compose. I propose to create a canned response with your signature and all three vCards attached.

Video

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In a later post I'll come back to vCards and explain how you can generate a QR code as from these vCards to use on your business cards.

How to create vcards and append them to your mail? #apow

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