As much as social media managers for non-profits are constantly repeating the mantra “content, content, content,” in terms of engaging words, what sometimes gets lost in the shuffle is the importance of “visuals, visuals, visuals.” After all, there’s a good chance the person running your website didn’t go to art school, and yet they’re expected to convey a powerful and important message with pictures, clip art, logos, video and more. And indeed, for a non-profit to stand out in the crowd, the visual content should be exceptional.
Fortunately, there are some great tools and apps that a non-profit designer or social media campaign manager can utilize to get your message across clearly and in a way that optimizes the possibilities for increased donation revenue and a surge in volunteer interest. Here are five such tools worth checking out:
- Canva
With templates for Facebook covers, social media post, blog graphics and much more, Canva makes it quick and seamless to crank out visuals that are beautiful and, most importantly, easy to brand. - Pic Monkey
For those amateur designers who eschew Photoshop due to its somewhat daunting nature, Pic Monkey is a great alternative. All the basic tools are already there—cropping, resizing, merging in text etc.—but it’s much easier to learn and nicely free of charge for the basic version. - Piktochart
If you plan on using infographics on your site or social media platform, Piktochart does most of the work for you. The templates come nearly complete—all you need to do is drop in your numbers. The drag and drop design elements are perfect for beginners, or the ambitious designer can choose a template and start from scratch. - Skitch
From the people that brought us Evernote, the Skitch app for Macs, PCS and mobile devices allows users to annotate text with shapes and sketches, giving new life to plain old words and creating verbiage that really grabs reader’s attentions. It’s also idea for marking up PDFs, images and screenshots for easy group collaboration. - Unsplash
Offering a limited collection of hi-res pictures for your website’s splash pages, Unsplash gives you to photos, delivered to your inbox every ten days just by joining their email list.
