How Canva’s Marketing Strategy Turned a Simple Idea into a $3.5B Design Empire

The Dream Starter

It all started in 2007—not 2013 when Canva officially launched, but when a young Australian named Melanie Perkins was teaching design students at the University of Western Australia.

Every single student she taught struggled with Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. These tools were complex. They were expensive. They felt like learning rocket science just to make a simple social media graphic.

Melanie had a realization. What if...