Custom, branded Pinterest board covers can help with your branding, encourage viewers to stay on your profile longer, and maybe even increase the number of followers you get.
They also give give the eyes of your visitor a chance to ‘rest’ amongst all the visual clutter of the boards. This ‘visual rest’ is pleasing to the eye, and for visitors viewing your profile, it will be a more pleasant experience.
Having unique Pinterest board covers also allow you to make a great first impression with your branding.
Incorporate your colors, fonts and any other graphical elements of your branding to give the board covers a cohesive look-and-feel that’s similar to your website and other social media accounts.
If you include your board titles in your cover images, it’s easier for someone to quickly look at the different boards you have and what types of things you’re pinning. This helps them decide if you are someone that they want to follow.
They can spend less time clicking through all your boards, where they can easily get distracted and leave (or worse – leave right away because it isn’t clear what your boards are all about).
They can instead make a quick decision – while they’re viewing your profile – to follow you.
Pinterest changes up the size of board covers quite regularly. I recommend doing a quick google search of “pinterest board cover dimensions – year” to get the latest dimensions.
You can make your board covers in Photoshop or Illustrator, but if you don’t have these programs, Canva is a fantastic option for board covers. You can create a file using the ‘custom dimensions’.
In this tutorial I am going to show you how to make your Pinterest board covers using Canva.
Step 1: Create a File Using Custom Dimensions
Open up Canva (if you’re new to Canva, you can quickly set up a free account – it will be worth it – trust me!)
Canva is currently running both Version 1.0 and 2.0, so your view might be slightly different to mine. I am currently on Version 2.0.
You’ll be taken to the home page which will have a large selection of templates you can choose from. We’re going to skip these and create our own custom size of 600px by 600px. This currently works best for Pinterest, but that may change (knowing how often Pinterest likes to shake things up).
On the top right you’ll see a button that says ‘Custom Dimensions’. Click on that, and on the the little dropdown enter ‘600’ in each of the little boxes. Then click ‘Create new design’.
You’ll be taken to a new tab, with a blank page. Make sure to name your design (in the top bar) so you can easily find it later.
Now we’re going to start with your design. We’re going to design your first board cover, then use it as a template for the rest.
When designing your covers, remember two things:
1) Your covers are competing for attention with the rest of the page
2) The size of the board covers in relation to the rest of the page are relatively small.
Because of this, I recommend you keep your designs simple and clear.
You can use a solid colour, or a simple image.
In this example I’m going to use a solid colour.
You’ll notice Canva has multiple different menus. At the very top is the main menu, on the left is the menu to navigate between different elements for your design. Then once you have an element selected, there will be another menu just above your page to edit that particular element.
We are going to navigate to the menu on the left, and select ‘Elements’. Then within those options, select Shapes.
I’m going to select the solid square for these boards. You will see it will automatically pop on to your page.
Your next step is to resize the shape to fit your page, and then change the colour. When you click on your shape, a new menu pops up above your page. This menu will allow you to change the color of your shape. Click on the little grey block and select the colour you want to use. I’m going to go with this soft teal.
Now we are ready to add the text. You can use a script font here if it is easy to read (like in the example above), but I do recommend a simple san serif font (san serif is where there are no tiny extra strokes at the end of vertical and horizontal lines of the letter – Arial is a good example of a san serif font).
So, to get to the text we are going to left menu again, and selecting ‘Text’. Then select ‘Add a heading’.
Your heading will automatically be added to your page. You will see above the page is a menu specifically for your text. Here you can change the font, the size, the colour, and more.
Once you’ve added your text, you can add any other elements, such as your logo, or little icons.
As you move your elements around, you’ll see bright pink lines pop up – these will help you align everything neatly.
Once you are happy with your basic design, you can now duplicate your pages and then change the text. To duplicate, look just above your page, there is an option to ‘Copy Page’. Make as any copies as you need.
Edit the text on each page to your board names.
Once you are done, you can download your covers.
Go to the top menu, and select the down arrow next the ‘Publish’ button.
For ‘File type’ keep it PNG – that will give you the best quality.
For ‘Select pages’ keep it at ‘All pages’.
And there you have it – your very own custom Pinterest board covers to match your branding. (And it didn’t even take too long!)
*Note: It is very common with Canva to end up with blurry images, no matter what download type you use. If you find this happens to you, then a way around it is to screenshot each graphic. A bit of a pain, but this approach gives you very clear files!
