If you’re like me and don’t have a formal background in graphic design, you’ll love using this graphic design app called Canva. I rely on it almost daily—from designing Pinterest pins to creating printables. In fact, Canva is one of my go-to tools for monetizing my blog using Pinterest!
I like how user-friendly Canva is, but what I love most is its potential to generate multiple income streams. More than just a design tool, Canva offers opportunities to create videos, presentations, and graphics you can monetize.
Whether you’re looking to start a remote business, boost your income, or turn your creativity into cash, Canva is a fantastic tool to explore.
In this article, I’ll share 10 of the best ways to make money with Canva. Keep reading to discover more!
What is Canva?
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Canva is a user-friendly yet powerful platform where you can design and create almost anything, from school presentations, corporate videos, flyers and posters, website banners, social media graphics, and more.
Canva allows you to drag and drop elements from its library, choose font styles, upload content, and even animate graphics. And with all the new apps Canva has rolled out over the past several months, you can achieve professional-looking designs – without hiring a professional graphic designer!
There are many ways to play with Canva; all it takes is to let your creative juices flow to make your designs stand out!
Canva is extremely useful, making it an incredible platform to make money from. So, in the next section, I will show you 11 ways you can make money on Canva.
How to Make Money on Canva: 11 Best Ways
1. Sell Templates
Selling templates is one of the best ways to generate income from Canva. These include social media graphic templates, travel guides, business cards, brochures, workbook planners, etc.
I can just imagine how these templates can be helpful to different types of people and businesses. For example, if you own a travel agency, you’d want to get a beautiful template for travel guides and brochures to promote your business. Food bloggers also like to purchase visually appealing Pinterest templates to speed up their pin design process.
If you want to sell Canva templates, ensure they are easy to use and follow. Placeholders for texts, images, and icons should be easy to resize and customize. Also, make sure that these templates are easy to access (once payment is made, of course), so sell consider selling them on popular platforms like Etsy or your own website.
- Sell Printables
Printables are some of the most accessible but valuable things you can make on Canva. You can make and sell a wide range of printables, so choosing a niche and identifying your target audience is wise.
For example, you can design and sell number and letter tracing printables to teachers and parents. You can also create printables on meal planning for weight loss coaches or perhaps expense trackers for finance-savvy individuals. You can even create seasonal printables, like a Christmas Wishlist printable, Halloween paper crafts, or Valentine’s coloring pages.
Printables can be a great source of passive income. Julie Berniger is one fine example of designing printables on Canva and selling them online can be lucrative. Julie says she’s made extra thousand dollars each year selling printables on Etsy.
Her business became so successful that she decided to share her strategies through the Gold City Venture’s E-Printables online course, teaching others how to build their own printables business from scratch.
Julie also offers a free workshop to help you get started at no cost!
- Sell Low-Content Books
If you’re looking for much simpler things to design on Canva, consider low-content books. Low-content books are materials with zero to little content, like notebook pages, coloring pages, planners, and journals. In most cases, low-content books are physical products that customers can write on, but they can also have digital versions (which you can sell as printables).
Here are three reasons to consider designing and selling low-content books: 1). They require minimal writing 2). You need simpler designs 3). They’re cheaper and quicker to make.
Once you’ve made your low-content books, you can sell them on platforms like Amazon KDP. It’s fast and easy to set up; you don’t need to go through the traditional printing process, and you can make money passively from them, for as long as people keep purchasing or downloading your products.
- Design Custom Invitations
Although we now live in a highly digital world, there’s still nothing better than sending or receiving physical invitations to important events. And that’s the reason why designing custom invitations on Canva is still considered a hot market.
Designing custom invitations takes more thought and effort. For instance, wedding invitations tend to be more elaborate or sophisticated while invitations to corporate events should look on-brand and professional.
Apart from physical invitations, you can also design custom “editable”l invitations that you can sell on Etsy, Creative Market, Instagram or your own website. This way, users can customize the invitations before printing or sending them virtually to others.
So, if you’ve got an eye for good design, you can take this opportunity to make money on Canva.
- Print on Demand
Here’s a cool and inexpensive way to start a business using Canva: print on demand or POD. Print on demand is a popular business model where you can utilize Canva to create cool designs that would be printed on merch products like shirts, hoodies, caps, mugs, etc. You’d most likely have seen such items as giveaways by content creators and influences, promotional products by companies, or items sold on ecommerce shops.
You don’t need expert designer skills to start your own POD business. Start by researching a niche you’re most interested in, then brainstorm concept designs that align with that niche. Use Canva to implement your design, then upload it to POD platforms like Printify, Redbubble, Zazzle, or Etsy.
The fun part is that you’ll only need to keep coming up with cool designs. When someone orders your design, the POD platform handles printing, packing, and shipping. You’ll earn a commission from each successful order.
- Design Logos
Designing logos is one of the easiest things you can do on Canva. You can create eye-catching branded logos for businesses thanks to Canva’s numerous logo templates and built-in apps.
Compile your logo designs into a portfolio, as potential clients want to look at them before hiring you. You can find logo design gigs on freelance platforms like Upwork or Fiverr. Or, if you have other graphic design skills, you can add logo design to your services, making you more marketable to clients.
- Pinterest Management
Pinterest is a highly effective platform for generating traffic. Businesses, bloggers, and solopreneurs hire Pinterest virtual assistants or managers to help them manage their Pinterest accounts.
The thing about Pinterest is that it is a highly visual search engine. As a Pinterest manager, you’ll need to design eye-catching pins and post them on your client’s Pinterest account. These pins typically require an image and text overlay, so using an easy tool like Canva can make your job so much easier.
Apart from designing pins, you can also sell Pinterest templates, which allow bloggers to easily and quickly design their pins. Or you could offer an overall branding package, which could include branded pin templates, logos, board covers, profile banners, etc – all of which you can do on Canva!
- Social Media Management
Social media management is a hot opportunity nowadays, as most people, brands, and businesses are on social media. Consistent posting on social media takes time and effort, which is why many brands and businesses outsource this task to social media virtual assistants.
As a social media VA, you’re expected to create catchy social media graphics to promote your client’s products and services, provide helpful content, and increase brand awareness. Canva is so robust that you can design almost any social media asset – from Facebook and Instagram posts to LinkedIn banners, reels, stories, and so much more!
If this sounds like a job for you, start developing a portfolio to show to potential clients. You can hunt for job opportunities on Upwork, Fiverr, or FlexJobs, or approach small businesses and companies directly.
- Canva Contributor Program
Canva is always improving, and one of the best ways to keep the app running is to crowdsource designs from people like you through the Canva Contributor Program. As a Canva contributor or creator, you can submit your original work to Canva, whether these are photos, images, icons, videos or illustrations.
When other Pro Canva users use your materials in their designs, you earn a royalty. The more people who use your elements, the more money you make on Canva.
Joining the Canva Contributor Program is a fantastic way to earn passive income from Canva. It’s free to join, and it’s a great way to boost your creative portfolio. You can sign up here to join. While the program is paused as of the moment, you can check back later and sign up when they open.
- Create Canva Video Tutorials on YouTube
When I want to learn something new, I usually go to Youtube for tutorials. The same can be said for people who want to learn how to use Canva, but don’t have the time or energy to spend going through each tool or feature.
As you master Canva, you can create video tutorials and upload them on YouTube channels. I love watching Design with Canva to stay updated with all the new trends and features. If you’re looking for something more elaborate, you can watch Webon for all the awesome text effects and animations. Perhaps you could get inspired by these channels and start your own.
Now for the best part: running a successful YouTube channel offers several income-generating opportunities. You could get paid for ads placed within your videos, make money through affiliate links, offer paid monthly memberships, or even branch out to creating more in-depth tutorial videos on Skillshare or Udemy.
- Canva Affiliate
We already know how awesome Canva is, but what about others who don’t (or maybe needs more convincing? You can make money by getting them to sign up for a Canva Pro account made through your unique Canva affiliate link.
Affiliate marketing is a fantastic ways to earn passive income. All you have to do is use your unique affiliate code on your videos, blog posts and social media content, and talk about Canva and how amazing and useful it is. Empower new and aspiring content creators to utilize Canva, then make money along the way!
Conclusion
I can’t say enough how much I love Canva and how this app has helped me with my graphic design needs as a blogger, even without professional graphic design experience! With Canva, I don’t need to use expensive and complicated tools.
Once you’ve learned your way through Canva, consider using this tool to make money. There are plenty of ways to earn an income from Canva, whether you want to design and sell printables and templates, offer social media and Pinterest management, or run your own Canva YouTube channel – the choice is yours!
Since Canva is always coming up with new and cool features, try to stay up-to-date to learn how you can use these new tools in your designs.
So, that’s how you make money on Canva, and hopefully, it inspires you to leverage your creative Canva skills and start earning!