Whether you’re a boss babe or a biz wiz who has a side gig or has turned their side gig into a career (Holla!!), chances are you have at least two go-to programs and/or apps that allow you to simplify your planning and streamline your workflow. These programs are amazing because they help you work smarter, not harder, which ultimately allows you to spend more time with your family and living life. A healthy balanced home/work life is #goals, right?

One of my favorite go-to programs and apps that I use almost daily is Canva. If you’re in the creative business, chances are that you’ve heard of this popular graphic design company. If not, allow me to introduce you!

Canva is an online and app based graphic design program that allows you to create items for your business such as business cards, infographics, brochures, and so so much more. The program is mostly free to use, which is one of the main reasons it’s so attractive to me. You can create an account and use a wide variety of templates, illustrations, fonts, etc. totally free. If you find yourself interested in their brand kit and unlocking their pro items (graphics, fonts, etc.), Canva does offer a 30 free trial of Canva Pro where you will get all of these features plus a few extra. After your trial you can opt to pay $12.95 per month or $119.40 for a year membership, which may be something to consider if your biz is especially design heavy.

I don’t do a ton of designing simply because I’m a photographer and not a graphic designer. *shrugs* I’m great at making you look pretty for my lens, but putting graphic elements together (while I like to believe I’m not terrible at it) isn’t my forte. My main designs are to promote my blog posts on social media – I use Canva to create templates for my blog on my Insta story and to create blog graphics for Pinterest. If you’re interested in upping your design game, I’m here with a super simple walkthrough on how to do it!

If you haven’t already, go ahead and download Canva’s free app from Google Play or iTunes. This isn’t mandatory, but I have found it much more convenient to do my designs on my computer and then open the app to save them directly to my phone’s camera roll!

ig story template

1. On Canva’s homepage, type Instagram Story into the search bar

2. Select a template that catches your eye

3. Edit the template with your own images (usually the main photo people would see when they view your blog) and change the fonts, colors, and illustrations to match your brand

4. Open the Canva app on your phone, log in, and download your design to your camera roll – Boom! You’re ready to add it to your story!

Pinterest pin template

1. On Canva’s homepage, type Pinterest Pin into the search bar

2. Select a template that catches your eye

3. Edit the template with your photo (usually the main photo people would see when they view your blog) and change the fonts, colors, and illustrations to match your brand

4. Click Publish to Pinterest and connect your account

5. Add a link to your blog and a blurb from your post in the description – Boom! You’re ready to publish your pin!

There you have it folks – Easy peasy as promised! Canva has so much to offer that it takes some experimenting and playing around with all of the design options and features to really learn the extent of what you can do and what works best for you. As you probably noticed from searching the two templates above, Canva offers a ton of different templates for all creative purposes so you don’t have to have a blog or be a photographer to use this program!

Canva is not paying me to share their services with you guys, I just genuinely love what they have to offer and it’s worked so well for me that I had to share them with you! When you have some flexibility during your work day, I encourage you to set aside some time to explore all that you can do.

Hang out with me on the Gram to see some of my designs in real time! Don’t be a stranger – I love it when people say hello!