How to Create a Brochure in Canva

Brochures are a very valuable marketing tool. Whether shared online or printed out, they help attract potential clients and get your messages across in a visually appealing way. There are many types of brochure folds but for our tutorial, we’re going to make the trifold one. Trifold brochure is folded twice over the middle section presenting six panels where you write about your product, brand story, or your business information.

For this tutorial, I will use this Canva brochure template from Design Bundles and show you how to customize it according to your business need. We’re also going to cover the different parts of a brochure and show you which side of the design is the front cover, back, middle and the inside pages.

Step 1- Open template

Open the file location of your downloaded template from your computer. Open the PDF included in the download. There are 2 designs available, I will choose the "Classy" template. Click on the Download button.

It will open a new window. Click the “Use Template” button to access the template.

This will automatically create a copy of the template and save it to your Canva account. Just like any brochure template, this is a2-page design brochure. There's an outside page and an inside page.

Before we start customizing, let's identify first which side of the design of the outside page is the front, back, and middle to ensure the proper placement of texts and photos.

Step 2- Customize your brochure

You can easily modify the brochure's layout to make it look exactly as you need it to. This includes uploading photos of your product, adding your own text, and personalizing it by changing fonts and colors in just a few clicks.

Upload your own photos

We're going to create a florist brochure so we’ll be using photos of flowers I've found in the Nature photos category on Design Bundles. In choosing photos, make sure to only use images that share a similar theme or color palette. I already uploaded the photos earlier so we'll go to upload, click the photo and drag it inside the image placeholder.

You don't need to delete the sample photos anymore. Once you drag the photo from the uploads gallery over the placeholder image, it will automatically replace the sample photo. Just adjust the placement of the photo and center whichever part you want to show.

Edit text

The template has a holder text that you can use as a guide. This is perfectly lined up to help you put the text in the proper place that when it is folded as a brochure, it will align correctly.

Double click on the text box> ctrl/⌘ A and start typing your own text to overwrite the sample text. Replace all the sample text with your brand's story and business details, and delete any texts that are not needed.

Add your business logo

Your logo and name should be shown on the brochure in a conspicuous position- on the front or back covers if possible.

If you have a Canva pro account, you can upload your own logo and use it in your design. On the left panel, go to Logos> Upload an image> upload logo> drag logo to your design canvas, then scale and position it appropriately.

To wrap up our tutorial, remember that a well-designed brochure includes these basic elements:

Brochure cover image

The cover image should showcase your best product in use. For our brochure, the main image shows a bride's hands holding a bouquet of flowers from our flower shop.

Slogan

Your slogan can be displayed on the front cover, at the bottom of the cover image. It's your brand tagline that represents your product or service in a short quote.

Product photos

Select several of your product photos that could be shown all over your brochure positioned above, under, or beside the body texts to split up different bits of content and add visual appeal to the layout of your brochure.

List of products & services

This is a section where the clients can see the bulleted list of your products and services at a glance.

Details of your products

Discuss the details of your products by breaking them up into smaller paragraphs to improve readability. You can explain here why people should buy your products and what sets you apart from other brands.

Client's testimonial

This is optional but including a client's testimonial confirms the value of a product or service and can attract new buyers.

Logo

Including your logo in a brochure creates a visual symbol that represents your company's vision and helps people remember your brand identity.

Contact information

This is one of the most important elements in your brochure so customers could reach out to you about your product or service. This includes your business name, an address, a phone number, an email, and a website if available.

There you have it. I hope with this tutorial, you can now create an awesome brochure for your business.

Next up, check out our tutorial on making highlight covers in Canva and using text effects in Canva.