BusyTrip / Guides / Business card scanner without a CRM
Guide
A business card scanner that does not make you adopt a CRM
You wanted the card in a spreadsheet. The app wanted you in its pipeline view.
The pattern to watch for
Many scanner apps are free to scan and charge to get the data out: export to CSV is a paid tier, the sheet sync is a paid tier, and the contacts live in the vendor's cloud in the meantime. That is a CRM with a camera on the front. It is a fine product if you want a CRM. If you want a spreadsheet, it is friction.
How BusyTrip is put together instead
- The sheet is the database. There is no BusyTrip contacts screen to sync from. The row is written to Google Sheets first; the app's list is just a view of your recent scans.
- Drive permission is scoped to its own files. BusyTrip requests the narrowest Google permission there is for this job, the one that only covers files the app created. It cannot list or read anything else in your Drive.
- No retention. The card image goes to your Drive, the row goes to your sheet, and the copy on our side is deleted after the read. Deleting your account removes the account; your Drive is untouched.
- Plain columns. Name, title, company, email, phone, links, notes, industry. Import them into HubSpot, Pipedrive or Notion whenever you decide you need a CRM, on your terms.
When you do want a CRM
If you are a sales team with a pipeline, stages and follow-up sequences, a card scanner that feeds your CRM directly is the right tool, and there are good ones: CamCard, HiHello and ScanCardPro all pipe into CRMs. BusyTrip is for the person who does not run a pipeline: a founder at a trade fair, a consultant at a conference, a researcher collecting contacts for one project.
10 scans a month free, no card required. Results land in your own Google Drive.
FAQ
Questions
Can I still get the data into a CRM later?
Yes. Every CRM imports CSV or Google Sheets. Because the columns never change, an import mapping set up once keeps working.
Does BusyTrip see my other Google contacts or files?
No. The permission it asks for only covers files it created. It never requests access to Google Contacts, Gmail, or the rest of Drive.
Where is the data if I lose my phone?
In your Google Drive. The phone holds nothing except captures queued while offline.
What does it cost without the CRM?
10 scans a month free. Unlimited is $6.99 a month or $49.99 a year.