Why you need to use Canva for creating Pinterest pins.

Last Updated on August 4, 2020 by scottkandh

Today’s blog covers using a program called Canva. This is a free program (that also has a Pro version to use for more photos). This program is useful for bloggers to make:

• pins for Pinterest
• headers
• logos
• posters, etc.

After your image is created, you can easily resize it to many other different formats that are available. This feature comes in very handy. For example, check out this pin that was made in Canva to make my first viral pin.

The last few months we’ve all all been fighting COVID and our restaurants are resuming to open their doors.

For instance, in the evening, I like to relax. I was watching television last night and I was inspired to create a pin when I saw an Applebees’s commercial. The one where a family is coming into an Applebee’s restaurant, the song Welcome Back is playing in the background, and a strong sense of relief that we’re getting back to normalcy in the United States as the commercial ends with Welcome Back America.

Certainly, this commercial inspired me so much with the words from Welcome Back that I had to create a pin to commemorate Welcome Back America.

My goal of this blog is to provide you with the framework for creating a pin. The hardest part about creating a pin is to conceptualize your pin and draw all of the aspects of it together to draw your ideas onto the computer.

Normally I would have straight to Power Point and start creating my idea in Power Point. From there it’s a three step approach:

Three-step approach for creating images in Canva

1. Put together a rough draft or go straight to Canva (Canva’s easier when all you have is just an image with no words).
   
2. After the Power Point draft is save it to a jpg file. Click on Save As, in the drop-down box change PowerPoint Presentation(*.pptx) to JPEG File Interchange Format (*.jpg) or use a .png format (the default format for Canva). To save all of the slides (as separate files) select All Slides. If you just want the one slide your on, select Just this one.
   
3. Next logon to Canva and begin making your changes and then download the final product.

The image I created in Canva is nicely formatted. Before I put the image into Canva, the size was smaller than the suggested format of 735 x 1100 ( if in doubt, select the size to 735 x 1100).

One of the habits that I would suggest to you using Canva is to change the title of your image by selecting the name to the left of the word Share. That way you’ll have for when it’s saved to your computer.

Click uploads and upload an image or video.

Navigate to the folder where you created the file(s) that you want to upload.

Drag the uploaded file onto the new page and being making changes and resizing it.

After making your changes, select download and save your file.