How to Make Pinterest Images and Pins with Canva

One of the best ways for driving traffic quickly to your blog or website is to master the search engine Pinterest.

Pinterest is way under-utilized by so many bloggers and website owners and yet it is a very powerful search engine.

In this post, we teach you how to make Pinterest images with Canva, so that they stand out!

(Please note this post may contain affiliate links. I may earn a commission if you click them and make a purchase. I only recommend products that I have tried).

Why Pinterest Images Are Worth Creating

Getting traffic through Google can take time and so I am sure you are interested in Pinterest when I tell you that you can drive traffic almost instantly to your site?!

With every blog post, you create, I would recommend creating 1 large Pinterest image (or even 2) so that you (and your site visitors) can easily Pin these in the future to your own Pinterest boards.

Having a Pinterest image that includes text on it means that you have a strong visual that also has an explanation of what the image will lead viewers to. If someone sees your stylish image on Pinterest, you have a chance to guide them to click on the pin and to your website!

If you also use a tool such as Social Media Warfare, you can also set the description on your Pinterest images for when other people also Pin your images (you can learn about this in our Pinterest Pro course).

Why we use Canva to Make Pinterest Images

What is Canva: Canva is a graphics design package that is extremely easy to use, even for novice users. You can basically drag and drop images and just edit the text on the pre-made templates and you are ready to go!

Is Canva just for Pinterest Images: No, not at all. You can use it to design Facebook, Instagram and other social media banners.

Create posters, invitations, business cards and a whole load more. For this blog post though, I will focus on explaining about using Canva for Pinterest images.

How much does Canva cost:  Canva is a free or paid product, depending on your needs, The free version though should be sufficient when you get started. There are tonnes of free templates and images.

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Getting Started and Creating a Pinterest Banner

1. Create a free Canva account

Go here and create a FREE Canva account so that you have a login. This login has the benefit that any templates you make will then be saved under your login details for any time you return!

2. Create an empty Pinterest template

When logged in, then enter “Pinterest” into the box on the screen where you are asked: “What would you like to design”.

As you begin typing the word Pinterest, you will soon see an option saying “Pinterest Graphic” show up. Click the “Pinterest Graphic” option.

3. Select a Canva Pinterest Template

Now on-screen, you should automatically see a selection of Pinterest Canva templates that you simply click on to get it to populate your design in the middle of the screen.

Make sure you click on one that says “Free” if you want to do it for free. There are dozens of free templates to choose from!

4. Starting the Pinterest Image Design

I am going to make a Pinterest image for Valeria and her hobby site worldbellydance.com. I have clicked one of the templates and you can see below where I am at.

So, select the template you want for your design for your site.

Next, you will probably want to change the main image in the graphic we are making. Above you can see a photo of a watermelon.

For a belly dance site, I will need a belly dance photo so I am going to click on UPLOADS on the far left of the screen in the black vertical bar.

Okay, so you click on “UPLOADS” and then select your image.

Then I am going to double-click the middle of the design template:

Are you still awake?

You still with me? hang in there :)! Not far to go. You can do this in one minute the next time, once you are used to Canva!

Now DRAG your image over the template, over the top, and drop it! This is what will happen below!

Next, we need to change the text on the design.

Canva is brilliant as you can just click the text and start changing it. Everything is so easy that you do NOT need to be a designer to make great graphics as you can see!

You might also want to change the font color or background color. Select the colors palette.

Finally, you need to give your image a name to make the image good for SEO.

So try and include a few of the keywords that relate to your blog post. I have made the new Pinterest banner for a post for Valeria on Egyptian Raqs Sharqi so I have included those 3 words in the image name: egyptian-raqs-sharqi.jpg

After you have named the image, download it and then add it to your blog post.

So how did your Pinterest Banner turn out? Please feel free to post a link in the comments at the bottom of this post to the blog page with your Pinterest image to share your design with others!

You can see the image that I created above live here on World Belly Dance.

Canva Free v Paid Options

If you are starting off blogging and have a tight budget, I recommend only using the Free version of Canva.

The free version is plenty good enough and it is what I used for the first year when I built this site you are now reading.

Most of the Pinterest images you see were designed using the free version.

The real benefit of the paid version of Canva, in my opinion, is the “resize” feature that they recently added.

Imagine that you now want to use the same graphic that you created for Pinterest, to convert it to a Facebook banner, into a business card, logo, Etsy shop cover, Linkedin banner, and so on.

The resize feature enables you to easily convert and adapt the same design you have already created to these other design styles. I find it extremely useful in that it saves a huge amount of time.

As a blogger, you can create one design and use it for your Pinterest image, your WordPress featured images banner and for your Facebook banner (if you wish to also promote your blog post on Facebook). I make these 3 things and it takes very little time. I love it.

With the paid version of Canva, you also get access to the 400,000+ extra image library, illustrations and templates. You can also find some other excellent Blogging resources here.