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I first started using Pinterest in 2012, just two years after the platform was launched.

Back then, I used Pinterest to find DIY projects, recipes and interior design. Which is what a lot people still think of when they consider Pinterest.

But Pinterest is so much more than recipes and crafts, and if you’re a blogger, you definitely know that.

Pinterest is actually where I discovered my first blogger, who inspired me to start my very own blog seven years ago.

Back then, bloggers were just starting to realize the potential that Pinterest held for them, and how they could grow their traffic by utilizing Pinterest the right way.

Over the years, Pinterest has proven itself to be a highly valuable resource for us as bloggers.

For a lot of bloggers, it is our number one source of blog traffic.

For the last eight years, I have studied Pinterest and how to use it to build my audience and increase blog traffic.

When I started blogging, there were no tutorials on how to use Pinterest for blogging, how to design Pinterest graphics, etc.

Or at least none that I knew of.

For a long time, I was just figuring things out as I went.

I made a lot of mistakes along the way, but after nearly a decade I kinda sorta feel like I have the hang of this thing.

While I continue every day to learn what makes Pinterest tick, I’ve picked up a few Pinterest design tips along the way that always seem to hold true.

Even though the Pinterest algorithm might be forever changing, a few things remain the same: the design elements of a great Pinterest graphic.

When I first started designing Pinterest graphics, they were… less than ideal.

I don’t have any formal graphic design training, I taught myself everything I know.

It was a process, and it took me a long time and a lot of mistakes to figure out how to design great Pinterest graphics.

One of my favorite ways to learn what makes a great pin is straight from the source: Pinterest itself.

If you look at your Pinterest feed, you will notice that a lot of the pins in your feed have a similar aesthetic.

You can see which pins appeal to the eye, and ones that don’t.

Vertical pins with easy to read text, eye-catching images, and attention-grabbing headlines are the ones that probably appeal to you most.

That’s because those are some of the key elements that make a great pin.

In the beginning, my pins never gained much traction. They weren’t driving traffic to my website, and barely got any views/repins on Pinterest.

Here are some examples of my old Pinterest graphics, and why they didn’t work.

Now that we’re all done laughing at my horrifying mistakes, let me show you what my pin designs look like now…because I don’t want you to close this post now thinking ‘damn, this girl sucks’.

I suck at a lot of things- but I don’t consider this to be one of them 😉

How to Design Pinterest Graphics with Canva: The Ultimate Guide

I want to walk you through, step by step, the process for designing Pinterest graphics that convert to real blog traffic.

I’ve seen a ton of (really great) posts that go over design tips for Canva. But I thought I would make this sort of a hybrid post.

I’m going to give you all my best design tips for designing Pinterest graphics with Canva + walk you through the process from start to finish.

When I started writing this post, I set out to simply give you some design tips on how to create awesome Pinterest pins.

But as I was writing it, I realized that throwing design tips at you without explaining the process of how to actually create Pinterest graphics with Canva wasn’t really going to help you.

If you’re new to this whole thing, you might be kind of lost as to where to begin.

So we will start at the beginning and hopefully, by the end of this post, you will feel like you have a better handle on this.

Canva

Canva is my preferred program for designing Pinterest pins.

The great thing about Canva is that the learning curve is relatively low compared to other design software. Also- it’s FREE!

You can use Canva for free, or you can upgrade to Canva Pro for $12.95/month or ($119/year, if you prefer to pay for the whole year upfront) and gain access to their full library of tools + resources.

Some of the Benefits of Canva Pro

• Full library of tools: over 400,000 assets including images, graphics, frames, templates, fonts + more
• Brand Kit: create and store your brand fonts, colors, and logos for easy access while designing
• Magic Resize: Allows you to magically resize any design with just a click
• Shared Homepage: if you have a team, this feature allows for multiple people to access all of your designs
• Upload custom fonts

Once you get your account set up, either the free or pro version, you should see this homepage.

To get started with a blank Pinterest pin design, head up to the top right corner and click on that blue ‘Create a Design’ button.

If you don’t see Pinterest Pin under the suggestions in the drop-down, you can search for it.

Choosing this option will open a new window with a blank pin design that is 1000 x 1500 pixels.

Speaking of sizes, let’s talk more about the ideal size and format for a Pinterest pin.

Ideal Size + Format

Because Pinterest has a portrait-oriented interface, it’s important to design pins that are vertical and have a 2:3 aspect ratio.

Don’t worry if you don’t know what the hell a 2:3 aspect ratio is.

Pins should be vertical, taller than they are wide.

The ideal size for Pinterest graphics is either 600 x 900 pixels, 1000 x 15000 pixels or 600 x 1200, depending on what your preference is and/or how much space you need for the text you need to display on your pin.

For example, if you are creating an infographic you might need a pin that is a little taller than the standard 600 x 900. That’s when I would go with the 600 x 1200 size.

Canva makes it easy to size your pins correctly.

You can either choose Canva’s standard Pinterest pin size, 1000 x 1500 or you can choose your own dimensions.

If you want to choose your own dimensions, you can do that by clicking on the Create a Design button>Custom Dimensions.

ADDING A BACKGROUND

The next thing you want to do is give your pin a background. Whether that is an image, a solid color, a pattern, or even a plain white background.

If you want your pin to have a plain white background, leave it as is and move on to the next step.

Here is a video tutorial showing you how to create a Pinterest graphic, how to use the custom dimensions feature + how to add a background to your design:

 

Choosing the Right Images

Pinterest seems to really favor original photos and paid stock images.

That means that theoretically, your pins will perform better if you use paid or original photos.

Free stock photos tend to be overused and don’t perform as well as far as views, saves, and clicks.

Of course, there are the occasional pins that go viral using free stock images, but this is how I think of it:

Using a paid or original image makes you unique. Instead of using the same free stock photo that everyone else uses, your pins will stand out because your image isn’t that same overused stock photo that everyone sees on so many pins.

Choose images that are relevant to your niche, audience and topic.

This is probably an obvious tip, so I won’t lecture you on it.

Basically, don’t use a Christmas themed photo on a blog post about Spring cleaning, etc.

If you’ve subscribed to Canva Pro, you now have access to millions of premium images.

The image library on Canva is great, but I also use Creative Market to find a lot of the photos I use for my Pinterest pins.

I usually purchase styled stock bundles, which are great because you get a collection of images that you can use to design tons of Pinterest graphics.

You can snag photo bundles for as little as $5-$10.

Tips for Choosing Images

– Relevant

– Avoid Faces

– High Quality

– Sized appropriately (you shouldn’t have to stretch the photo too much to fill your design space, otherwise it could turn blurry)

Negative Space photos

Negative space photos, like these shown below, work really well for designing Pinterest pins. They allow you to add your text in the blank, (negative) space, which helps it to stand out and makes it easily readable to viewers.

You can find these types of photos by searching for ‘negative space’ or ‘minimal’ in Canva’s photo library. 

Once you have your background set, you can start adding text to your design.

Keep in mind, you don’t necessarily have to do this in the exact order I am spelling out here.

Sometimes I add my text first, and then my image. It all depends on your style and what is easiest for you.

When you’re designing Pinterest graphics, you really want your text to stand out.

Use easy to read fonts that stand out from your background. You never want your text to blend in or be too hard to read. 

There are some ways to really make your text stand out, which I’ll show you in this next video, and there are examples below.

 

Make Your Text Stand Out

– Overlays

– Highlight the Text

– Image Opacity 

 

Avoid Grammar Mistakes

Grammar mistakes on your Pinterest graphic could deter people from sharing it and/or clicking on it. I can’t tell you how many times I was about to save a pin and didn’t because there were too many glaring grammar mistakes.

It takes a few seconds to proofread your text and make sure everything is spelled correctly.

Grammarly is a free tool that can help you make sure you’re not making any spelling or grammar mistakes. This is also just a really great tool for bloggers/writers to have, in my opinion.

It proofreads your work for you, so you can save time checking for errors!

Choosing the Right Fonts

With Pinterest being a visual search engine, when you’re designing Pins you want to make sure that your pins are visually appealing and easy to read.

You also want your pins to really stand out in the sea of other pins.

Using bold, easy to read text will help capture attention and gain you more clicks/views.

You want the most important info to really stand out to people when they’re scrolling through their feeds.

Some of my favorite fonts for Pin headlines in Canva are:

• Open Sans Extra Bold
• Lato Bold
• Montserrat Classic + Montserrat Bold
• Anton
• Hussar Bold
• Bebas Neue
• Siffon

You’ve probably noticed that a lot of pins use a mix of script fonts and sans-serif fonts.

I do this on my pins as well. If you’re going to use a script font, choosing the right one is important.

Script Fonts:

– Thin + Hard to read = NO

– Bold + Legible = YES

So we’ve talked about fonts and how to really make your text stand out. But what about how to get people to click on your pin and read your amazing blog post?

WRITING HEADLINES

You can have a great pin design, and your fonts can stand out tremendously- but if your headline doesn’t give someone a reason why they just have to click through to your blog post, then it’s all pretty much for naught.

Great pin design is only half the battle.

Your headlines need to be killer as well.

If you’re struggling to come up with really enticing pin headlines, a great place for inspiration is your Pinterest feed.

You can search for your topic on Pinterest and see what other bloggers have come up with. You definitely don’t want to copy someone else’s pin word for word, but I often find inspiration from fellow bloggers and then use that to brainstorm ideas for my own headlines.

When I’m trying to come up with a good pin headline, I start with writing down the keywords I used for my blog post.

I write down all the variations of my keywords, and then I start to think about ‘what would someone type into the search bar if they were looking for this information’?

Then I write down all of those ideas.

This is a good starting point for me, and it allows me to brainstorm ideas and come up with really good, clickable headlines.

Your headline needs to:

– Be Enticing

– Be Specific

– Provide a Solution

– Use Keywords

– Offer a Freebie (if you have one)

– Include a Number (if relevant)

 

CHOOSING COLORS FOR YOUR PINS + HOW IMPORTANT IS BRANDING?

I love good branding as much as anyone else, but I think when it comes to Pinterest graphics, it’s okay to go ‘off-brand’ if you want to.

Branding is really important for certain aspects of your business, but when it comes to Pinterest- how important is it to stick to your branding?

There are a lot of bloggers who stick to their branding in their pin designs. Their pins are immediately recognizable because they use the same fonts, colors and overall designs on all of their pins.

Someone I think does this really well is thesideblogger.com. Her pins are instantly recognizable in my feed. Here are some examples of her pins so you can see what I mean.

I think it’s really up to you whether or not you want all of your pins to be ‘on brand’.

There are some really successful bloggers who throw branding out the window when it comes to pin design.

Your success on Pinterest is not going to be determined by whether your pins are always the same fonts, colors, and style.

If building a brand and being recognizable on Pinterest is important to you, then brand away!

But if you want to play around with different styles, I say go for it.

Choosing the Best Colors for your Pinterest Graphics

Bright, warm colors like pink, purple, yellow, red, orange, and brown tend to do really well on Pinterest- while cooler tones like blues and greens tend not to perform as well.

I am sure this has something to do with the psychology of color, but as I’m definitely not a psychologist, I’m not going to get into that 😉

This is certainly objective advice, though. If you think that cooler tones like blue and green will really play well to your target audience, or if they are important colors for your niche/topic, try it out!

When it comes to Pin design, there are no hard and fast RULES. You have to find what works for you and appeals to your specific audience.

ADDING YOUR URL OR LOGO

Always make sure you add your full URL or logo (or both!) to your Pinterest graphic.

Typically, I add my full URL to the bottom of my pins.

Pin images are a lot larger than the pin descriptions underneath them. You want to make sure that even if someone doesn’t read your pin description or if the description gets lost somewhere in translation, your actual Pinterest graphic still points to your website.

You can place your URL or logo anywhere that makes sense to your design.

 

SAVING YOUR IMAGES + SEO OPTIMIZING

THE CORRECT FORMAT

I would recommend saving your pins in PNG format, which is a higher resolution than a JPEG.

If you have the option to save as a PNG, I would always recommend doing so. If you use Canva, you can always save in PNG format.

TIPS FOR SAVING YOUR PIN DESIGNS

I’ve found that it helps me stay organized to create dedicated folders on my computer for my Pinterest pin designs.

For example, I have separate folders for:

1. Photos I use specifically for Pinterest pins

2. Design Elements, Illustrations, etc.

3. Fonts

4. Completed Pinterest Pins (pin designs that are ready to publish to Pinterest. This makes it a lot easier to find them when uploading to Pinterest)

Once you save your pin designs, it’s important to give them a title that clearly states what the image is about and what content it links to.

For SEO purposes, you want to try to include your keywords in your image title.

When you first save your pin, it’s title is probably something random and not relevant to what the pin is actually about. 

If you use Canva, it will save as the first line of text you typed in your design, unless you change the title in Canva before saving.

Save Time with Pinterest Templates

Pinterest templates are a great way to save time designing Pinterest graphics.

I’ve made it easy for you with my collection of Pinterest Templates. You get 10 templates for just $5!

These templates are fully customizable and ready to edit in Canva. I’ve designed each of these collections with paid stock images, which are included with your purchase.

You can change the fonts, colors, and photos if you want, but otherwise- all you need to do is add your own text and your Pinterest pin is ready to publish!

Check out my full collection of Pinterest Templates here!

 

Once you’ve designed the perfect Pinterest pin, what comes next?

If you are happy with your design and have saved it in PNG format with an SEO title, your next step is to publish it to Pinterest.

Before you hit publish, I would highly recommend checking out my post on the best Pinterest strategy to increase blog traffic + force your pins to go viral.

The worst thing you could do is publish your pin and then do nothing. You need to have a strategy in place if you want to generate substantial blog traffic from Pinterest.

Some important things about using Pinterest to increase traffic:

• Your image title, Pin title, Pin Description, and Graphic should all include keywords
• You can and should use hashtags in your Pin description
• Joining group boards can help increase your traffic + help your pins go viral
• Using Tailwind to schedule your Pinterest pins + share via Tailwind Tribes is one of the best things you can do for your success on Pinterest

I go over all of that and more in my Pinterest strategy post, so head over there to find out exactly how to tackle Pinterest after you design your Pinterest pin in Canva.

Don’t forget to grab your 5 free Pinterest Templates before you go!

Click the link or the image to snag your free templates

I know that was a crazy long post, but I hope you feel like you have a better understanding of how to design Pinterest pins with Canva.

I also hope that those video tutorials were helpful! I am by no means a ‘Youtuber’, so forgive my poor video editing abilities. I really just wanted to show you guys the basics of designing Pinterest pins with Canva.

Let me know if this post was helpful to you in the comments!

As always, thank you for reading and supporting.

XO, M

 

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