Bloggers - Move on over to Canva

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have a tendency towards faddy obsession. Exhibit A - Twitter!

I have often been a bit stumped when it comes to finding new ways to produce graphics for my posts. I've tinkered a little with Photoshop, but never having time to get my head around it I’ve often resorted to using photos straight from the iPhone. Or, worse, screen grabs from a Word document, when I’ve needed a picture in a hurry for a blog or social media post.

But not anymore!
Recently I moved on over to Canva…

Honestly – I’m like a baby who’s just discovered plug sockets! It’s a good job our browser at work is so outdated it’s not supported, otherwise all my process documents and reports would be generated via the medium of Canva!

I’m so excited by how easy Canva makes it to produce graphics, or add text to photos and then download them. And now they’ve even brought out an app for iPad! *bites knuckles*

I produced my first creation for my blog about perfectionism - but can’t wait to do more.

In this post, 6 powerful reasons you should include images in your marketing, Jeff Bullas explains that 'articles with images get 94% more total views'. Because of this I have always tried to include an image (of varying quality it has to be said!) in every blog post. It would be nice to think some of them were a little more professional looking though.

What is Canva?

Canva prides itself on enabling free, 'amazingly simple graphic design.' It is super quick to combine any number of fonts, photos, images and coloured backgrounds to produce a graphic image for any requirement. These can then be downloaded and shared via social media or used for blog posts, presentations, print etc. It is very intuitive *whisper it* unlike Photoshop (ahem!)

How to get started?

Visit: https://www.canva.com/ to sign up and you're ready to go.

Canva only works in the latest 2 versions of each browser so if yours is outdated you will need to update before you can get going with it.

I was planning to provide all sorts of step-by-step guides to get you going, but, do you know what? The Canva Design School blog is blinkin' awesome - get on there and read some posts and you'll be flying.

From beginners tips, to choosing fonts, to working with colours, images, backgrounds and shapes, they've got it covered.

I don't profess to know even a small part of it - but I can't wait to learn!

You’ll be pleased that I have resisted the urge to create an infographic summarising this post. Mainly because I am supposed to be doing an assignment about Pay per click advertising!

Hmmm…How can I work a Canva creation into that?!

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What do you think about Canva? Do you love it too? Or maybe you think there's a better tool out there? Let me know below...

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