Long Pinterest pins are very popular on Pinterest and do very well. These pins are very easy to create and here is a tutorial on how to create long Pinterest pins using Canva.
Jump to video tutorial or Pin It for later
Why create long Pinterest Pins?
When well managed, Pinterest can generate lot of blog traffic. It doesn’t happen overnight and one needs to work on it. To attract readers to blogs, beautiful pins are the key and long vertical pins in particular.
What tools do we need to create long Pinterest Pins?
There are many tools available to create long vertical pins. The most popular tools are Canva and PicMonkey, however, Canva tops them all. Both Canva and PicMonkey are online tools.
Canva has a free version and a paid version. I use the free version and Canva not only is great for creating Pinterest pins but also graphics for other social media. PicMonkey had a paid and free version until a year ago and now it is a paid tool.
How to create long Pinterest pins using Canva?
Canva has pre-designed Pinterest graphics along with graphics for other social media. It also has many templates for Pinterest and uses 735px x 1102px dimensions. Unfortunately, Canva does not have any pre-designed templates for long vertical pins.
There are number of ways to create long vertical pins in Canva, using custom dimensions. I usually use 700 x 1250 or 700 x 1600 px dimensions. . Update April 2018 – Now I do 600 x 1260 dimensions. Recently Pinterest announced it would cut off long vertical pins in it’s smart feed and it’s recommended size is 600 x 900 or 600 x 1260. I personally prefer long pins, hence create 600 x 1260 long pins.
The easiest way is to drag drop images in the work area / canvas, add banner, text, save and download. All graphics designed in Canva are saved on Canva unless manually deleted.
I have two videos. One is the easy way of drag & drop images and the other is using grids/layouts. In the videos, there is some interruption in audio when I switched between tabs, between Canva main page and design page. I apologize for that. I am still a novice in video editing and am yet to figure out how to override recorded audio and re-record during post processing.
Video tutorial to create long Pinterest pins in Canva using grids & layouts
One major advantage of creating long vertical pins using grids and layouts is, the same pin can be reused to create other pins. Each time one needs to create a pin, create a copy of the original pin, replace images with new images, change the text, rename the file and save it. The first can be used as template to create pins in future.
In the tutorial, for banners (background for text) I used elements -> shapes -> square box. The same task can be achieved by changing background color as well.
Video tutorial to create long Pinterest pins in Canva, the easy way
This is the easiest way of creating pins. Drag and drop images on the canvas, resize, place a banner, add text and save it.
Why and how to hide long vertical pins in posts
Though long Pinterest pins are popular and look awesome on Pinterest, vertical long pins do not look that good in blog posts. The pins don’t go with the template or layout of the post or look odd when compared to other images. Therefore, the best way is to hide the long vertical Pinterest pins in blog post but available when pinning.
To hide the pins, all you need to do is add the below code
In WordPress blog, switch to ‘Text’, top right corner in post editor and in Blogger, switch to ‘HTML’, top left corner of the post editor. Wrap the image code with a div tag.
Hope the tutorial is helpful, happy designing beautiful pins and happy pinning!
Like the post or no time to watch the videos now? Pin It for later
Today’s post is part of my this week’s theme, New Year Challenge. One of the blog resolutions for this year is to create videos, cooking videos to be precise. I never considered doing video tutorials and once I figured out how to customize long vertical, pinnable images, I was meaning to do a video. I was going to do this post anyway but unsure whether to do it for BM or not. After lot of going back and forth, decide to post it anyway under this week’s theme. Though it is not a food post, it is indirectly related to food and food blogging. I hope that is ok.
This day in 2014: Shrimp Ham Fried Rice
This day in 2017: Moong Mag, Gujarati Style
Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this BM#84
Wow, Usha thanks for sharing, this post is definitely very useful for people like me. Thank u so much.
Am loving ur theme usha . have bookmarked all 3 of this series to browse thru and xperiment for myself thanks so much for posting !
Thats a good tutorial Usha and very much needed.
This is so helpful thanks
Thanks for the post, Usha. I have not focussed so much on pinterest compatible images and I am sure to come back to learn it in detail.
Lovely post Usha, thanks for doing this. I am sure this will be so helpful!..and you are so cool with the audio..:)
Usha, this is a very useful post and will be appreciated by many. Canva is quiet tricky to understand and I had ti use my 7th graders help in understanding it. They use Canva in school and he was able to teach me a few things that I was struggling with.
Wow, nowadays kids know a lot more about the current tools in the market than we do. Though I m using Canva since over 2 years, it is only in last one month or so, I learnt a lot more and realizing why so many in the industry prefer it. Yes, for a novice it is tricky but once you get a hang of it, it is fun
Very interesting and useful post, Usha. Am bookmarking this for reference.
Thanks for sharing such an useful post Usha. I have been putting off making pinterest-worthy images because it felt like too much work. Now I am going to follow your tutorial
Thank you so much it worked. one question, how do you hide other images from coming up for the pin button.
Renu, I have not figured that out yet. But I do like the choice the pinners get this way. They can pick the image of their choice, to pin. We as content creators should make sure all the images meet the ideal pin requirements.
Usha Thanks.Now I know how to use canva I did use but found it an hassle . Now I will try using your method.
You are welcome Archana