Published on the 05/05/2015 | Written by Beverley Head
Online design software house Canva – which already boasts 2.3 million international users for its free version – has seen an opportunity to streamline the marketing design process…
Organisations are this week being invited to pre-register to use Canva for Work, which has been designed to support enterprise teams working on consumer-facing marketing materials. Canva says that the tool responds to pent up demand in the market. It recently surveyed 500 small-to-medium-sized business owners, and 87 percent said that they wished design was more efficient at their company.
Almost four out of five companies reported that they allow personnel who are not professional designers to develop customer-facing marketing materials. Canva is banking on these users needing tools that can guide them through the process.
According to co-founder and CEO Melanie Perkins, “Canva for Work will transform the ways teams work” and help achieve a more consistent look for marketing materials.
The new system, the first iteration of which is scheduled to ship in June, is intended to ensure that brand continuity is maintained in a campaign and allow teams to collaborate on projects, according to Perkins.
However she won’t say how much the service will cost – beyond that it will offer good value for money. Canva itself is an online tool that is available for free, though users pay $1 to use one of the catalogue of images that are available. According to the company more than 200,000 organisations already use the tool, and have developed over 18.5 million designs with it.
The new version has been developed with teams of designers in mind and it seems likely that Canva for Work will be offered as a per user subscription service. The system is hosted internationally by Amazon Web Services.
To fund the continued development and roll out of the system Canva has secured a third round of funding – this time a A$6 million investment from investors including Matrix Partners, Shasta Ventures, Blackbird Ventures and AirTree Ventures.
While the company was founded in Sydney, and now has a team operating out of the Philippines, it was born global and claims that 42 percent of its users are based in the US, including Canva’s chief evangelist, Guy Kawasaki, who once held that title at Apple.
Kawasaki is in Australia this week where he will meet the Canva team and also present a keynote address at Cebit.
