Here are 10 tips to design FASTER in Canva!
Ready, let’s do this!
Hi my lovely people, it’s Natalia and welcome back to my channel where I help you create
better content and grow on social media!
Let’s jump right in…
1.
Use Shortcuts
The best way to be faster at doing anything is to use shortcuts and it’s no different
in Canva.
When you master them, they speed up your workflow and you end up claiming hours of work back
simply because you click much much less.
The key here is to use them as much as you can even when it feels uncomfortable because
that’s the only way that they become second nature to you.
You can effortlessly switch between tools, duplicate elements with a stroke of a mouse
and navigate layers seamlessly.
The whole process becomes smooth and you work in a rhythm that helps design effortlessly.
And at the end of the day, you want your focus to be purely on creativity, and not on managing
the platform itself.
Start with the basic ones that you know from other apps like CTRL+C for copying, CTRL+X
for cutting and CTRL+V for pasting, then move on to other useful ones like CTRL+G for grouping
(more on this in just a moment so keep watching!), CTRL+B, CTRL+I for bold and italics.
And speaking of, don’t go to the left panel to add text to your design.
Just press T and a text box pops up!
Zoom in and out of the design by using ctrl + scroll up/down or Ctrl + +/-.
One of my favorites that really speeds up the workflow is CTRL+D which lets you duplicate
quickly or, better yet, you can just select something and then hold ALT and drag the element.
When you’re in need of a shape, again, don’t go looking for it yourself, just click C for
circles, R for rectangles (or squares), or L for lines.
There are also super useful shortcuts for positioning which normally takes a few more
clicks so it’s best to speed it up.
CTRL+ opening square bracket [ brings your selected element forward, while CTRL + closing
square bracket ] sends it backward.
If you add ALT to both these combos, you’ll bring it all the way to the front or send
it all the way back, respectively.
You can also Tidy up three or more selected elements quickly with Alt + Shift + T.
To upload images, whether from your drive or a browser, just drag them into the editor
or again, CTRL+C and CTRL+V them into Canva.
When you’re creating content consistently, every minute spent in Canva counts and shortcuts
can really help you flow through designs quickly and efficiently.
Now, the second way to do this is to
2.
Use a Brand Kit
A quick disclaimer here, a Brand Kit is a Canva Pro-only feature but the majority of
this video will work for a free user as well so stick around for the rest of the tips and
I actually have a Brand Kit alternative coming up in a moment too.
As a Pro user, all of your crucial brand elements belong in one place, because there’s no
better way to keep a cohesive brand image and design quickly.
It’s your one stop shop to make sure your graphics echo your brand identity flawlessly
and it’s super easy to set up.
From the homepage, in the Brand Hub, you can add a new Brand Kit and fill it with all the
crucial elements of your brand like your logos, color palettes, fonts, images, icons and graphics.
This then becomes a repository for those key brand assets that you can easily access from
the left panel within the editor, making your design process so much quicker.
Not only is it all organized in one place so that you can grab your essentials from
there easily when you create from scratch, but it’s also allowing you to smoothly adapt
any templates from the Canva library to your brand guidelines.
As an example, you don’t have to click and change each color individually, you can simply
go to the Brand tab and shuffle the colors by clicking your palette.
Those little actions that you perform every day add up very quickly and you don’t even
realize how much time you’re wasting on them while designing.
By the way, if you want to test the power of the Brand Hub and see how it speeds up
your workflow among all the other incredible features, check out my link in the description
box which gives you 45 days of Canva completely for free!
Another way to design much quicker and manage your branding efficiently is to
3.
Use Folders
Have you ever spent time scrolling through your Uploads tab and couldn’t find that
one photo that you really needed for a design?
If so, chances are you’re not using Folders and it’s slowing you down BIG TIME.
When your Canva account is organized with folders, your process becomes so much faster.
Think about it.
When every single visual asset has a place, it’s much easier to design quickly because
you’re not wasting time on looking things up.
The two folders I recommend for everyone to have are Brand Assets and Personal Photos
if you have a personal brand, or Product Photos if you’re selling products.
The Brand Assets folder is a great alternative to the Brand Kit, because you can keep your
crucial files there without having to rely on Canva Pro.
It may not be as convenient and as efficient as a Brand Kit, but it’s still very useful
and makes your design quicker.
You can upload an image of your color palette in there and by using the Apply Colors feature,
make templates match your color scheme.
To do this, just add your palette from the particular folder through the Projects tab,
then right-click it and hit "Apply Colors to Page”.
It acts the same way as your Brand Kit palette!
What I love about this feature too is that when you pull elements from a particular design,
it gets added to the left panel of the editor below this line here and makes it accessible
with one click.
This becomes so useful for content creation!
As an example, I constantly use photos of myself in designs, removing backgrounds and
adding outlines like this to help reinforce my personal brand and my Photos folder is
always there when I need it.
No unnecessary clicks, no browsing for ages, just a moment and I’ve got them ready.
Come to think of it, I could also just remove all the backgrounds for my key photos, add
those outlines, export as transparent PNGs and upload them to a separate folder to shorten
the process even further.
Without being organized through folders like this, I would design much slower.
It’s worth thinking about those actions that you perform repeatedly when designing
to optimize your workflow as much as you can.
If you want to learn how to organize your Canva account to work for you, make sure you
watch this video next since I’m showing the whole process there, including setting
up your folders!
To access folders from the Editor, you have to go to the Projects tab and that’s another
goldmine to help you design faster in Canva so…
4.
Use Projects
My favorite way to speed up my design process is to draw from my previous designs to not
have to start from scratch each time.
Say I’m designing an Instagram post to promote a lead magnet but I’ve already created a
promo graphic to go on the landing page.
Why reinvent the wheel when I can just source some of the graphic elements from this previous
design.
I can simply go to Projects, find this design, click to apply it to a page and then rework
it to what I want.
It’s a significant way to create faster in Canva since it works for whole designs
as well as smaller parts.
I can use a graphic in different dimensions and repurpose it for a different platform,
I can grab a background I’ve recently designed to form the basis of a new graphic, or I can
simply use it as a template.
And speaking of templates, that’s another way to make your process much faster in Canva.
5.
Use Templates
And this point is two-fold.
First of all, the fastest way to design is to use the templates from the Canva library.
This is literally why they’re there and you don’t need to start from a blank page
each time.
They’re easy to customize to match your brand image, they’re already nicely balanced,
have an established font hierarchy and you’re working with designs that were built by experienced
creators and approved by Canva.
My tip to not spend too much time looking for that perfect template is to use the extensive
search capabilities of the Templates tab from the homepage.
It allows you to search by keywords from the search bar, browse by purpose here on the
left, or by keyword here at the top and then you have so many options to filter the results.
You can also star your favorites like this to then quickly pull them up when needed from
the editor using your Starred folder which you can find easily by going to our trustee
Projects tab under Folders.
The second part is using your own brand templates.
As a Pro user, any design you create, you can save as a brand template.
Once it’s ready, simply go to Share in the top right corner and click Brand Template.
If you can’t see it, go to More here and search Brand Template.
Mind you, there’s a similar option called Template Link which is used to share your
Templates with others which they can then use in their own Canva accounts so that’s
a different feature.
I use my Brand Templates to save time and batch-create content.
Whenever I finish mapping out my content for a month, two weeks or a week, whatever timeframe
suits, I know exactly how many of the different types of posts I have to create.
Say, for a months-worth of Instagram content, I have to design 4 carousels, 4 simple faceless
Reels, 4 single infographics and 4 talking-head Reels (which means 4 Reels covers to design).
There’s no need to start 16 different designs from scratch.
I can go into my Canva account and choose from a variety of different templates I created
over time for each of these post formats.
Since my Canva is organized into folders, I can go to a designated folder for that content
type like Carousels and just pick one.
It may seem like a lot of work at the beginning but it's definitely a huge huge HUGE timesaver
in the long run.
Besides, as your online presence grows and you get more confident creating posts, you’ll
build a bigger library of templates for yourself so the more content you create, the quicker
it becomes.
6.
Use Grouping
Group your elements to design faster.
When you create a group, you don’t waste time by selecting things accidentally or moving
every single item separately.
The quickest way to group is to select your elements and hit CTRL+G so once you’re done
aligning a bunch of elements that work together like a cluster of text boxes, your social
media icons or, like in this case, pages of a workbook, just group them to not mess up
the work you’ve already done.
They then act as a unit and you can balance the whole design much quicker.
I can make all the elements smaller, bigger, move them around with no hassle.
By the way, if you have many different elements in a design already and can’t simply select
what you want, click on any element, go to Position in the top panel and switch to the
Layers tab or just hit Alt+1.
From here, you can select what you want by holding CTRL to select individual elements
or CTRL + SHIFT to select a range.
From there, just right-click to group, or, again, just go for CTRL+G.
7.
Use Styles
This little brush icon in Canva is slept on!
It copies styles for you which saves so much time when designing.
Simply select an element like this text box, tap the Style icon, and apply it to another
text box.
But hold on, you can do it for multiple elements too.
I’ve got this list right here and changed my mind about the font.
No worries, just select again, go to the Brush Icon, and then drag to select the range and
apply.
So effortless!
It also works with images, videos and shapes so you can copy your Effects, filters, corner
rounding, borders and so much more!
By the way, I regularly share Canva tips like this on my channel so hit that subscribe button
to never miss a useful trick!
8.
Have copy ready
One of the best design tips I can give you as a content creator and a marketer is to
always start with copy.
Your messaging is so important and it’s much easier to design with text ready, not
the other way round.
Design should always serve as a way to get your points across in an engaging, visually
striking way so preparing your copy beforehand is so important.
This is the reason why my general workflow for content creation always begins with writing
first, then designing after.
Based on the content map for a given time, I write my scripts and captions, planning
out what text I’ll have to include on my graphics.
Then, jumping into Canva becomes much easier because I can quickly design around it.
Sure, I have to make my copy slightly shorter or longer from time to time, but it’s still
a much better process than to start with the design.
Otherwise, you go into Canva and instead of just focusing on creating the visuals, your
brain has to switch between two distinctive tasks - designing an engaging graphic and
writing an effective copy.
This is inevitably going to slow you down so optimizing this process is so important.
Also, make sure not to add too much text on your graphics and videos since they should
be super easy to digest for the viewer!
9.
Use the same design
This is one of my favorite ways to design quickly, always have ideas ready and it may
be slightly out of left field.
When I know I’ll be producing a lot of similar individual graphics for the same purpose,
I just use the same design instead of creating a new one each time.
I simply add new pages or copy them over to adjust.
Probably my two most used designs here are for my Reels Covers and for these YouTube
title animations which you’ve seen all throughout this video.
I find it so much more efficient to design by copying because I reuse the same types
of templates all the time and it’s so much quicker this way.
While my carousel templates make more sense as standalone designs since they have multiple
slides, graphics like covers are repeatable and help me maintain a consistent feed on
Instagram too.
Moreover, when I record Reels on the fly, I don’t have to pick and choose, and then
create covers, I just jump in my aggregate design, switch to the Thumbnails view here
at the bottom, and see what I like for this one.
This allows me to design super fast, especially when I only have my phone.
Mind you, there’s a limit to how many pages and elements you can have in one design, so
once you can’t add any more, just create a new design, copy one page over and keep
going.
I know this may not be for everyone but this is my way of optimizing my workflow even more
for creating similar designs and especially when creating content.
One downside is that I’m much less likely to get those cute design milestone badges
that people often share in Canva groups so if you’d like achievements like this, then
definitely skip this tip ;)
10.
Use AI
It won’t be a surprise to you in 2023 that AI has the power to speed up and simplify
tasks that normally require a ton of time and effort.
Luckily, Canva is developing its amazing AI toolkit and it would be a shame not to use
it to your benefit.
Here, I have a few of my favorites.
With Magic Expand, you can extend an image beyond its borders which is so useful because
you can correct clumsy cropping, add more space to tighter shots, or, probably most
importantly, turn a vertical image into a horizontal one and vice versa.
This saves you a lot of time browsing and searching for the perfect images to give you
enough negative space to fit your text.
To do this, select a photo of your choice, go to Edit Photo in the top panel and Choose
Magic Expand.
Then, select the aspect ratio like Whole Design here, Click Magic Expand and choose your favorite
out of the generated images.
A fantastic way to design faster in Canva is to use the Magic Assistant.
It’s hidden here under this little magical icon and gives you access to the most popular
actions and features quickly.
My favorite thing it does though is that when you scroll down, it suggests graphics or photos
to match the vibe of your design.
For example, if you’ve used a photo from the library in your presentation, it can show
you others that look very similar or are from the same photoshoot!
No need to scroll and scroll to find the perfect ones!
Within the Assistant, we have Magic Write, which you can use to create copy for designs
quickly.
You can use this one to generate something new like a list of tips, or a paragraph talking
about a specific point but I want to show you the suggestions when I select an existing
piece of text and then utilize the Assistant.
Now you have a few cool options like summarizing or expanding which is great for when you need
a bit more or a bit less text for your design.
You can use Rewrite to paraphrase, fix any mistakes, and change up the tone a little
bit.
As a Pro user, you can also add your Brand Voice description to your Brand Kit and then
use your own brand voice from the Brand Tab in the editor, making your text even more
custom and relevant.
Frankly, there are so many other great AI features in Canva so make sure you watch this
video right now to see how Canva Magic can improve your content creation even more.
Subscribe to my channel for more Canva content and marketing strategies and hit the thumbs
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Can’t wait to see you… next time!