Are you interested in creating marketing materials at a lower cost? From social media posts to email graphics and edited photos, professional design work is often pricey and time consuming—but it doesn’t have to be! 

Enter Canva, a popular and free design tool featuring thousands of content templates to help you get started.

Many tour operators (not to mention FareHarbor clients and employees!) use Canva for their social media posts, customer emails, ads, and more. 

In this guide, we’ll share a few ways you can use Canva in your marketing strategy, plus examples from other tour operators to inspire you. 

Looking for additional marketing and design tips? Watch our recent webinar: Enhance Your Marketing Strategy with Canva & Goal Setting. 

Why Canva?

For starters, it’s free! While you always have the option to pay for Canva Pro to unlock more templates and features, you should have no problem using the free options to promote your business. 

Pro Tip: Try a Canva Pro 30-day free trial if you’re thinking about committing to the paid version of the tool. In many cases this can still be more cost effective than otherwise outsourcing your marketing. 

If you can’t find a free template you like, you can pay for templates as needed (usually for only a few dollars). When you purchase a template, you’ll be able to use, edit, and update it as needed without additional payments. This includes reusing it for future projects. 

Learning to use Canva is quick and easy, and the website offers many tutorials to help you get the most out of the tool.

7 Tips to Use Canva to the Fullest

There are pretty much endless possibilities when it comes to using this free tool, but here are some ideas to get you started.

1. Use Your Brand Colors

Chances are, you put a lot of thought into your brand color palette, so make sure it’s being represented in your marketing materials, as this helps customers recognize your brand.

On Canva, all you have to do is copy and paste your hex codes and you’ll be able to reuse your brand colors across templates.

2. Make Your Customer Emails Pop

Stand out in your customers’ inboxes by adding some color to your emails. Whether sending a confirmation, reminder or follow-up email, get inspired by this tour operator example of a message that is anything but dull. 

Add an image, some graphics, or a border to your message to enhance your brand image at every customer touchpoint. 

3. Showcase Your Best Images

Don’t feel like you have to rely on the stock images in Canva or those that already come with a certain template. Upload your own images to make your brand stand out. 

If you’re already investing in professional photos of your tours and activities, or taking your own, you want to make sure you’re putting them to good use. 

4. Make or Update a Logo

Need a logo refresh? Explore hundreds of templates that you can easily cater to your brand. From circular and square logos to graphically driven creations for boat operators, walking tours, and more, you’re sure to find what you’re looking for. 

5. Keep Your Designs Simple

One potential pitfall of using a tool like Canva is that you might feel overwhelmed by all the editing possibilities. A good rule of thumb is to keep your design simple by minimizing the number of shapes, colors, and fonts, and making use of negative space. 

6. Copy From One Design to Another

Rather than start from scratch on a new design, you can reuse elements from previous assets by simply copying and pasting to another template. You can do this with an entire template or individual parts of a design like the text, image, hyperlink, and more. 

7. Drive Clicks with Well-Designed Ads

Being such visual platforms, Facebook and Instagram are excellent places for ads, but it’s so important to make them look visually appealing with a clear call to action. You can browse Canva’s templates to create ads for each platform, and Canva will even help you format them to the correct size and ratio for each site. 

When it comes to marketing, tour operators often have limited time and resources. We hope using Canva will help you make the most of your skills and brand image to enhance the content you share with your audience.