Design Better and Build Your Brand in Canva
A beginner’s guide to producing professional branding, marketing, and social content for businesses
Laura Goodsell
BIRMINGHAM—MUMBAI
Design Better and Build Your Brand in Canva
Copyright © 2023 Packt Publishing
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Publishing Product Manager: Vaideeshwari Muralikrishnan
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First published: January 2023
Production reference: 1161222
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
Livery Place
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B3 2PB, UK.
ISBN 978-1-80056-933-1
Contributors
About the author
Laura Goodsell is an award-winning Canva design coach and Canva Creator Ambassador (Canvassador) based in the UK. She helps small business owners to use and utilize Canva for their business and create branded graphics on a budget, as well as teaching them how to create passive income through digital products and template and element creation. Encouraging women to enter the digital world is one of Laura’s passions.
She has built her business around helping make design accessible and simple for all small business owners.
Laura’s aim is to help businesses become more visible on social media, focusing on design-based services, such as creating courses and challenges, training business groups, writing books, and creating templates and elements for Canva.
About the reviewer
Naomi Johnson is a self-employed digital designer and video creator. Her mission is to provide solo business owners with a comprehensive range of affordable design-based products, services, and training that enable them to simplify their lives and boost their income in a variety of ways. Entirely self-taught, she has particular expertise in designing journals, planners, and notebooks in both traditional and digital formats.
Foreword
I became aware of Laura Goodsell through her online work under her Business Design Academy brand and knew that she was one of a limited number of Canva experts here in the UK. Being a Canva Creator Ambassador reflects her knowledge and the trust that this global design software company has in Laura. In this book, Design Better and Build Your Brand in Canva, Laura takes you through the journey of creating your own visual branding – from the absolute starting point with an idea through to a full suite of digital assets, images, and expert tips to make the most of the software.
With easy-to-follow, step-by-step guides, you’ll be able to create your own range of professional images and graphics so that you and your business can stand out! As a business mentor, I recommend Canva to my clients, especially if they don’t have the budget or the like to know how to do things for themselves. This book will help to give you the skills, knowledge, and confidence to use this platform effectively.
From creating the essential elements for your business (logo design, social media designs, and designing with print in mind), expert tips on how to use the creative tools from within Canva, and Laura’s expert advice, you really will create the brand and images that will help you stand out in your field. You’ll feel more confident and be able to design your brand better!
As well as building your skills and knowledge of Canva, you’ll learn how easy and quick it is to create and develop your designs and brand, enabling you to build your business and increase your visibility – essential in the business world of today.
Become your own digital and brand developer, build your images, and build your business with Laura Goodsell, Canvasador.
Janine Friston
Founder and CEO, Female Business Network
Since I started More Than Just Mum Coaching and Mentoring in 2020, I have had a love for Canva. I use it almost daily for my life and my business. It’s one of the apps I use regularly for my membership program to create goal boards and many other designs too, such as social media graphics, posters for my in-person events, workbooks, lead magnets, goal tracker journals, my annual planners that I create and sell on Amazon, and presentations too. I literally use it for everything!
As a life coach and business mentor who mainly uses social media to grow my audience, and engage and communicate, it is important that I have a quick and easy-to-use application such as Canva.
Having grown up well into my mid-30s telling myself I wasn’t creative, Canva has unleashed a new version of creativity for me. I am passionate about creating vibrant, on-brand graphics that are in alignment with me, and that’s exactly what I get with Canva.
I first came across Laura in 2020 when she was recommended to me by a friend. Since then, we have supported each other in business, and she has always been so helpful. Laura has also delivered guest sessions for my membership program, to help the ladies that are members with the basics of Canva.
Over these past few years, I have watched Laura build her brand and business via social media, supporting hundreds, if not thousands, of small business owners to create a sideline semi-passive income, or to set up a new digital business through template and element creation. More recently, she has set up a membership program and created courses for all levels and challenges, one-to-one coaching, and graphics for the Canva library.
She is the go-to expert when it comes to anything Canva; she offers so much value and support to her community, and has an incredible amount of knowledge when it comes to this app.
In this book, Laura provides a step-by-step guide on how to Canva! As a daily user, I consider myself pretty good, but I have still picked up loads of super simple hacks and tips that are going to save me time and energy in the future. So, even if you think you know Canva, I’d highly recommend this book.
The book is broken down into simple chapters with summaries, making it really easy to follow. There are also screenshots relating to each step – Laura has definitely kept it simple! As a busy mum of two, I LOVE to keep things simple.
Even if you think you’re pretty good on Canva (like I did), I would highly recommend you make the investment today!
This book will save you time, and time is money!
Laura is the go-to expert for everything Canva, and I hope you love this book as much as I did.
Heather Palfreyman
Founder, More Than Just Mum Coaching and Mentoring
Helping women unlock their potential for growth and expansion in life and their career or business