Graphic Design Tips for Beginners

Now that social media is becoming more and more vital to successful marketing plans, many people find themselves needing to be a graphic designer in addition to the many hats they’re already wearing. Professional graphic designers are brilliant at what they do and nothing will compare to their honed set of skills, however, there are ways that smaller organizations can get by without having one on staff. Reserve contracting with a graphic designer for big projects like branding, website or logo design. That’s when you’ll really need to have top quality images that are evergreen. But for everyday graphics for social media or small events? You’ve got this. Social media is fast-paced and graphics never have to be perfect, so with the following pointers on how to create your own graphics, it’ll be smooth sailing!

Design Objective

Right away when you’re creating any graphic, you’ll want to think about the purpose of it and who the audience is. The majority of the time, if you’re designing for social media, regardless of the platform, the objective is to be eye-catching. Ask yourself what you’re hoping the audience gets out of this. Is it to enhance the details of the event, add something visually pleasing to an informational post, or make the information easier to digest via infographic? Sorting out the “Why?” first will give you a direction to head in and get your creative juices flowing. It’s always a good idea to keep it simple when you start the design process. Busy graphics can be dizzying and have the opposite effect that you’ve intended, allowing the information you’re sharing to get lost in the noise. Fashion designer Coco Chanel famously said, “Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off.” Apply this to graphic design as well. Less is more.

Graphic Trends

Of course, trends will change from year to year and design can be subjective, but it’s good to be aware of what’s performing well to keep as a guideline when creating graphics. Here are some of the top trends we’re seeing for this coming year.  A huge positive shift that we’re seeing is more inclusive graphics. Gone are the days of depicting just one race, gender or age group. More and more, organizations and brands are finally representing marginalized groups and showing more diversity in marketing images. In addition, in light of standing out among all the noise and making a statement, bold background colors and colorful icons have been making a splash. As we’ve blogged about before, we can’t stress enough how short attention spans have become. The flashier and more powerful the content, the better it will be received. Graphics also don’t have to just be text overlayed on a background. Feel free to mix it up by personalizing popular memes to library topics for levity, or sharing quotes from authors and thought leaders. You can also repurpose your posts by taking a screenshot of a post that performed well on one platform, and re-posting it onto another. There are many ways to keep graphics fresh and interactive, and the easiest way to keep up with the trends is to see what other leaders in your community are sharing as well for inspiration!

Design Tools

Now onto the technical side of things. Being creative and having design ideas is all good and well but don’t mean anything if you don’t have the tools bring them to life. The shift toward social media marketing has opened the door to many free design tools that are intuitive and easy to navigate for graphic design novices. Click here for a list of 24 design tools for creating graphics. Whoa—That’s a lot of tools! The majority of these programs are web browser based so all you need is an internet connection and a free account to start creating. A lot of the technical details that are second nature to graphic designers like sizing or optimization for web are all taken care of for you through these platforms. They make it as simple as possible giving you templates sized correctly for each social media platform, extensive image and font selections and straightforward editing tools. There are options for creating simple gifs or animations so that your graphics are interactive. And the finished graphic can either be downloaded or shared directly to social media if you link your accounts. Easy as can be!