Consistency is a super important aspect of branding. And design is, obviously, a big part of that.
You want to make sure all of your design work is on-brand. So, how do you do that when different social media sites require different things?
The easy answer? Templates.
Done? Got your style guide all set? Great!
Next, you want to find out the best dimensions for all of the social media sites you’d like to post on. The Big Four for me are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.
And, because I’m a giver, I’ve collected the best dimensions for you. Here they are:
Social Media Templates – Sizes
Profile Picture: 500px by 500px
Cover Photo: 851px by 315px
Timeline Photo: 1200px by 630px
Profile Photo: 400px by 400px
Header Photo: 1500px by 500px
Shared Photo: 1024px by 512px
Photos: 640px by 640px minimum (I typically make mine 1000px by 1000px)
Pins in Feed: 236px by any height
Pins when Clicked: 600px by any height
Board Covers: 222px by 150px
Bam! Easy enough, right?
Now you’ll want to create blank documents to design your templates. It’s important to keep your branding elements in mind when you create the templates so everything stays consistent.
For example, I’ll use the same three colors (teal, hot pink, and golden yellow) for my blog images and social media images. I have separate templates for quotes that I share on social media than blog post images, but they have the same color scheme and fonts, so they stay on brand.
Once you’ve got your templates all ready, save them in a Templates folder with the name of the social media site and what the images is for.
So, for example, I’ll have a Twitter Blog Post Image Template and a Twitter Quote Template. That way everything stays organized whenever I need to access one.
So there you have it! Now go and create those badass templates.
