Five Awesome Visual Marketing Tools

Have you been looking for a great tool to create slick social media graphics & blog post content? Ever wondered how some smaller brands seem to be able to create stunning designs themselves? Well, the chances are these savvy organisations are utilising the powers of an awesome visual marketing tool. These tools have hit the mainstream marketing arena in the past few years, with the market leader being Canva. These tools typically come with a wide range of pre-built templates that will allow you to create a design for your social media posts, email marketing headers, display campaign banner ads, and much more.

If you are a little late to the visual marketing party, here are five tools that are well worth your attention, including free versions.

Canva

Canva has been the app of choice for many marketers for a few years now, and with good reason. A friendly UX, lots of templates, and free imagery & icons are a few reasons this app is so good. Canva offers templates outside of the world of social media and includes presentations, CV’s, business cards, flyers, brochures and many more. You get full control of your designs, add text, images, shapes, icons, colour, and pretty much anything you like to create your unique design.

Free version: Yes
Why we like it: The sheer ease of creating high-quality marketing graphics & content.
Web: www.canva.com

Easil

Easil is very similar to Canva in terms of functionality and capabilities. We like how they have categorised templates by size, theme and events. This makes finding the right template quick and easy and is certainly not as well presented in Canva. Easily also offers some fresh designs, so if you have been using Canva for a while, we highly recommend utilising this tool as well.

Free version: Yes
Why we like it: It provides different templates and designs to Canva, which is great if you lack design inspiration.
Web: www.easil.com

Adobe Express

The Express site includes the ability to create web pages and video content (as well as the standard image-based designs found on the other sites). Adobe has created a simple-to-use interface that doesn’t require the skills of its other products, such as Photoshop and InDesign.

Free version: Yes
Web: www.adobe.com/express
Why we like it: The ability to create videos and web pages.

Word Swag

Built primarily as an app, Wordswag allows you to create content when you’re out and about with minimal fuss. The other sites also have apps/mobile versions, but this provides value because it allows you to quickly insert content from your phone with a large range of library content. And not forgetting that you can take photos on your phone and upload them directly into your design via the app.

Free version: Yes
Web: wordswag.co
Why we like it: Its Android & iOS apps make it perfect for creating great content on the go.

Stencil

Stencil focuses on allowing users to create marketing content in a quick & efficient manner. They probably have the best library and interface for icons & graphics. This is due to the variety of the icons they include. If you search for ‘bike,’ you’ll see over 30 variations. This is a nice touch when comparing the variations available on the other platforms.

Free version: Yes
Web: getstencil.com
Why we like it: The variety of icons & graphics available to really create a unique design.

Final Word

While there is no substitute for professionally designed content, there is a place for in-house content to be produced using these tools. They increase efficiency and speed as well as provide a cost-effective way for small businesses, sole traders and local organisations to improve the way they present their brand without having to spend money they may not have available. Studies have shown that visual marketing content carries almost a 66% chance of the information in the post being remembered three days later. We all prefer image-based content, so grab one of these tools and give your visual marketing content the boost it deserves