Any successful marketing strategy will undoubtedly involve some kind of graphic design. But with so many other deadlines and requirements to meet, how exactly can marketers produce effective and professional-looking visual content?
That’s where an effective graphic design tool can come in handy. By leveraging these free online platforms, even marketers without experience in graphic design can create visually stunning content that can increase brand consistency and audience engagement.
If you’re looking to get started with creating your own visual content today, we’ll go over the top 4 best graphic design tools you can readily access online. Let’s dive in!
Why Use a Graphic Design Tool?
First things first: why exactly do you need a graphic design tool? Sure, you could always just hire the expertise of professional designers, but is there any actual incentive to making visual content on your own? The short answer is a resounding yes!
While graphic design tools will still require you to invest a little time and effort, the main thing to consider is that these tools also come with a handful of advantages. By leveraging free graphic design tools, you can:
1. Improve Brand Consistency
An effective graphic design tool can help marketers create consistent marketing content by helping store default brand templates for future use. Not only that, but graphic design tools can also offer design suggestions that can help improve your outputs.
2. Increase Audience Engagement
A graphic design tool can help increase audience engagement by helping your marketing content stand out against competitors. At the same time, a visually pleasing design can also help your content be more memorable to consumers.
3. Make Content Production Efficient
With features like poster templates and AI-powered tools, a graphic design app can help make content production more efficient.
4. Personalize Your Marketing Strategy
Because graphic design tools allow users to easily customize content, marketers can easily create personalized marketing strategies for different audiences.
The Best Online Design Tools for Marketers
For your easy reference, we’ve rounded up the most accessible and user-friendly design tools online:
1. Canva
Overview
Canva is an online design tool that helps users create different design types, from social media posts to PowerPoint presentations. Due to the app’s accessibility, Canva is one of the more popular design tools often used by anyone from students to social media managers.
Pricing (per month)
- Free
- Canva Pro ($15)
- Canva Teams ($10)
Standout Feature
● Customizable Text
While Canva’s font selections are not the most extensive, the app does allow users to further customize text by adding different types of effects.
Why we recommend it
Canva is a generally user-friendly tool that can help marketers with most graphic design needs. The app offers useful tools like brand kits and certain AI tools that can make content production much easier.
2. Adobe Express
Overview
Adobe Express is another user-friendly online design tool. Part of the Adobe Creative Cloud suite, Adobe Express features a similar interface to other editing platforms like Canva, including an easy-to-navigate drag-and-drop editor.
Pricing (per month)
- Free
- Premium ($9.99)
Standout Features
● Integration with Adobe Creative Cloud
For more advanced editing, users can easily integrate designs with other Creative Cloud apps like Photoshop.
Why we recommend it
While it’s essentially a simpler version of Photoshop, Adobe Express still offers a handful of features that will be useful for marketers looking to get started with graphic design. Particularly, Adobe Express offers access to an extensive list of Adobe Stock elements, which can help make the design process much smoother.
3. VistaCreate
Overview
Formerly known as Crello, VistaCreate is an online graphics platform that allows users to create different designs from print materials to social media graphics. While it shares similar features with other platforms, VistaCreate stands out due to its more cost-efficient pricing plans and generally simpler interface.
Pricing (per month)
- Free
- Pro ($13)
Standout Feature
● Customized Fonts
For users looking to design using customized fonts, VistaCreate allows the option to upload TTF or OTF font files for more personalized designs.
Why we recommend it
VistaCreate is an all-around easy design tool that can be used by most beginner designers, even without prior experience. Aside from common tools like free templates and design elements, VistaCreate comes with an option to include music in designs, which is readily accessible on the app’s Music tab.
4. PosterMyWall
Overview
PosterMyWall is an all-in-one social media design and management tool that is best suited for marketers looking to get creative with graphic design. While it comes with a variety of useful features like AI-powered tools, the app particularly offers an extensive list of 1M+ poster templates that can make designing social media graphics more efficient.
Pricing (per month)
- Free
- Premium ($9.95)
- Premium Plus ($29.95)
Standout Features
● Extensive Template Library
For an easier design process, PosterMyWall offers an extensive list of 1M+ poster templates for different categories, events, and specific design needs.
● AI-powered Tools
With its built-in AI-powered text-to-image generator and caption writer, users can easily save time by efficiently generating content for various needs.
● Social Media Management
To save time on managing different platforms, PosterMyWall also acts as a dedicated social media management tool to help access all your social media profiles on one convenient dashboard.
Why we recommend it
PosterMyWall remains a good choice for most marketers due to its versatile features. Not only can users create and design content on the app, but they can also directly manage posts on different social media platforms with ease.
Additionally, PosterMyWall comes with a handful of useful features, including a built-in AI background remover and an AI Images generator, which can make editing designs much more efficient.
What is the Most Effective Graphic Design Tool for Marketers?
When it comes to choosing a graphic design tool, your mileage will always vary. That said, we’ve gathered some of the key strengths of the top 4 graphic design tools online that can help you decide on the best tool for your specific needs:
1. Social Media Graphics – Canva and PosterMyWall
When it comes to social media graphics, we highly recommend Canva and PosterMyWall for their various free templates and built-in management tools. With PosterMyWall’s Content Planner, for instance, marketers can easily schedule and plan out different posts to be published automatically for more consistent posts.
2. Print Collateral – VistaCreate
For marketers aiming to publish printed materials, VistaCreate is a good online design tool to try out. Particularly, the app offers an extensive list of templates specifically for print, and also has partnerships with different printing outlets for an easier time ordering physical marketing materials.
3. Video Outputs – Adobe Express and PosterMyWall
For marketers looking to create more than just static graphic designs, Adobe Express and PosterMyWall can be great options for producing videos in MP4 with ease. Particularly, Adobe Express offers certain features for animation, while PosterMyWall comes with a built-in Audio and Video Editor for basic editing.
4. AI-Powered Features – PosterMyWall
While all of the apps we’ve mentioned have different built-in AI-powered features, we generally recommend PosterMyWall for those interested in content generation due to its accessibility and various AI tools.
Optimize Your Marketing Strategy Today
With the presence of these free online design tools, even marketers without experience in graphic design can now create the same high-quality and visually stunning content for different marketing needs.
So, take a look at these top 4 apps and let us know which one works best for you!