Is Canva Good for Small Businesses?
Small businesses around the world use different tools to promote and market their products and services.
The majority of these businesses don’t have the budget (or the will) to hire design and marketing agencies to do the job, and prefer to do it themselves. They’ll often hire a relative who’s familiar with graphic design software or who thinks they know how to use Photoshop professionally. Others turn to the newer tools online. Back in the day, PicMonkey was popular when it was free. When it changed its <freemium> approach, Canva became its best alternative. Now, Canva dominates the market and is many people’s go-to for small design needs, and not just small businesses.
Many graphic designers discourage people from using Canva for their marketing design needs. The reason for this is simple: graphic designers need money, and they need work, which is very scarce. Businesses that use Canva can get the job done for a fraction of the price of a professional graphic designer. When more and more businesses do this, graphic designers are left with no projects to work on. But there's more to this rationale...
Canva enables anyone to dabble with graphic design, which consequently enables the industry to become saturated and overwhelmed with many many graphic designers. That's not a bad thing, if only you overlook the fact that most of these enabled graphic designers are not really graphic designers; they're people who know how to use the tool.
Graphic design is not about (just) knowing how to use the tool, but importantly how to use the tool the right way. Basic understanding of color, layout, and typography is essential for anyone who likes to call themselves graphic designers.
Most of the people who use Canva don't really care about that. They just want something appealing and quick at the same time to post on social media. And in all honesty, that's not a bad thing to want. Canva isn't bad for its capabilities. I'm pretty sure it has helped many businesses manage their design needs when they did not have budgets or design teams. It's a very powerful tool.
If you're a small business, we're neither going to encourage nor discourage you from using Canva. In fact, we're actually preparing guides on how to use Canva and similar online tools the right way so you can maximize the benefits of these tools. We are going to tell you, however, that you should use Canva wisely. The designs from Canva are not professional unless you've learned what good design is. If you use templates, you're going to encounter very similar designs on the web, so don't be surprised.
At the end of the day, Canva saves time and money for people who don't have them.
