Learn some vital tips that can help your designs look better in Canva to , get more customers, sell more products, and gain more followers.
I remember when I first used photoshop and how complicated it was learning from trial and error when I was just a kid. Things have changed and there are more tools and access to resources more so today than ever before.
You may or may not be a designer at heart. Or you may have never designed anything before. Canva is a website that is open to everybody from 0-100 on the skill meter. It doesn't really matter if you are an artist who loves to draw or even a photographer/ videographer any one can easily learn the basics of simple and user friendly design.
With these 5 essential tips you will learn what to look for and how to craft something that looks awesome and that communicates your visual message the right way. Whether you're building the brand of your business or making custom content for social media to get more followers, or creating T- shirt designs to sell online, there are so many uses for Canva and the possibilities are endless.
Along with designing from scratch some amazing content you can also use an amazing pack of over 1,900 templates from youtube thumbnails, social media to E-book designs all in one pack by CanvaKits , that will speed up your work and just make things easier overall if you don't have the time to learn them.
1.The Idea/ Concept
The most important step in starting is to come up with an idea or a concept of what it is you want to create. Think about the following when coming up with your idea.
Who is the audience of this design?
How/ where will they see it?
What is the goal or purpose?
First you need to think about who is the audience of this design? Who will be seeing your fyler, add, post ect. This is important to know because you will want to create a design that falls in line with the target audience. If you're designing for a brand or if you are starting a brand, think about what that brand represents? What imagery will resonate with your brand audience? If you are creating a wedding invitation you may want to use elements that are softer, warmer and bring a feeling of joy and love. If you are designing something for a software brand you would want to use elements that represent that feel such as the correct font, color, imagery and so on.
How / where will it be seen? Is your design going to be printed on a card and sent out to people in the mail or is it going to live on a website or be turned into a video? It's important to know how the design will be used because it will affect the way you design it. For example if you know your viewer will only have a few seconds to view your design such as on a quick 10 second video or on an ad that is moving then you need to keep the message short and concise, straight to the point. You don’t want to overload your visual with too much information unless you know they will be able to sit down and really study it and ingest all the information such as in an infographic.
What is the goal or purpose? What kind of action or emotion do you want the viewer of your design to take or feel when they see it? What is your call to action or what is your impactful message? If you are trying to sell a subscription service on your website through your design, think about how the viewer will do what you want them to do in the easiest form possible. Do you want them to click on a link? Submit their email? How can you make them feel comfortable and compelled to do that? If you simply want the viewer to make a decision to come to an event what incentive do you visually embed in your design? Certain graphics and colors inspire certain emotions within us. How can you choose the right images and right copt text for this?
2. Understand Your Color Scheme
Luckily we live in a world of color…. How awesome. When i was young I always believed that in the old days the world was in black and white because thats what i saw when I watched old movies lol. In reality color is so important in design and can really convey one of the strongest emotions connected to your design.
Ideally you want to keep your color pallet consistent throughout your design and try to stick with 1 main dominant color and maximum 3 supporting colors. If you are using an image such as a photo/ video try to match the most dominant color in that image and work around what you have. If you are designing for specific branded content the you may think about the colors to represent convey the brand as it is known.
Certain colors evoke specific emotions and this is proven scientifically in a lot of studies. Here is a guid actually from Canva on their site that goes more into depth about this here.
You may also not need to overload your image with to much color depending on the design it's more effective to have less color to emphasize some other element more in the design. Also when creating logos think about how color affects the design and how it would look if it was reproduced without color, would it still work?
Check out Coolors, a sight that helps you build and save custom color templates. They also have millions of color scheme ideas that you can use and implement that would work well.
3. How to use Fonts
There are always so many fonts that may look good when you are searching for a font to use in your design. Sometimes we get the urge to use a lot of them and mix them together to get as much variety and style as we can in one design, but this is something you want to avoid. I recommend using no more than 2 different syles of fonts for your design and in certain cases maybe 3.
The reason you want to keep the font styles to a minimum is because it keeps your message and your design clean and focused. If you have too many it can get very cluttered looking and confusing.
Fonts are important in bringing out the style and mood you are going for in the design. Think about your main title and message , you may want to go bold and use a very artistic font and that's cool as long as you keep it direct and short as you don't want to overdo it. Then think about secondary messages that may contain more text such as an explanation or more description. You might want to keep it clean and simple to read. Luckily Canva already has a whole lot of fonts to choose form to fit your style.
You will want to have your fonts compliment each other creating a unique contrast between the two styles.
You may want to experiment with different fonts and look how they relate to your other visual elements and play with the connections between them and see what would work.
Take your time and you will start to develop an ability to see and know what fonts work well for certain design ideas and concepts.
4. Use Hierarchy in your design
You may not understand how to describe why some designs look really good and some just look cheap and poorly put together. One of the main reasons a good design is so good is because of the proper use of hierarchy in the design. Hierarchy is an order of importance in different design elements. It's like a road map for your eyes as they travel across your design absorbing it. It's a way to strategically place elements in order for your viewer to easily or more effectively understand your design's message.
For example you may want to understand spacing, color, size, legibility, balance and so much more. There is a lot that goes into a well thought out design but if you can practice re-arranging elements on your design to more easily appeal to the viewer then you can really pull them into your design.
Here is a great article that talks more about 6 important principles of using hierarchy in your design work that goes a little more in depth and is more specific.
5. Keeping Things Simple in your design
Lastly you want to simplify your overall approach. Have you ever heard the phrase “less in more?” Well in a lot of cases it's completely true. When people are looking at your design you want them to be interested in it. You may use a lot of different elements arranged in the right way but you need them to really be able to understand your message as quickly and as easily as possible.
While designing in Canva It can be very tempting to try all kinds of different elements and images to make your design look fancy but in reality it may just clutter the mind if your viewer by having too much of the true meaning and message can actually get lost in between the cracks of too many design elements on one design.
Ask yourself the question when designing “do I really need to add this extra shape?”
Or “ how can i make it simpler while still conveying the right message?” Practice designing with less and see how it affects your designs overall. Sometimes a complex design is needed for certain circumstances but a lot of the time you just need to keep it simple.