Back to Bold: The Basics that Built Canva into a $40B Brand
- Built on YES
- Aug 22
- 7 min read
How mastering the “boring basics” like Value Prop, Audience, Segmentation, and Beachhead... turned Canva into a $40B brand.
Quick Guide: What You’ll Learn
100 Rejections and Still Bold → Canva’s founder resilience story
Value Proposition → The billion-dollar promise: design made simple
Target Audience → Serving the “Forgotten Crowd” (aka everyone but the pros)
The B*Y Reality Inventory → Apply Canva’s basics to your own biz
Conclusion → Back to Bold: build lasting businesses on the basics
Is it a vibe? Was it their marketing strategy? Was it a resilient founder? Was it because they were in the right place at the right time?
Or… did Canva master the basics?
So many founders (hi, me too…) chase complexity. We think we need fancy funnels, shiny new AI tools, “growth hacks,” and a better logo. That’s what we call Business Bedazzelment, aka Shiny Object Syndrome.
But, Canva’s rise proves something different: business fundamentals aren’t beginner tools, they are BILLION DOLLAR TOOLS. Cough $40 BILLION with over 220 million users to be exact.
Let’s break down Canva’s Bold Basic Biz Strategy and what you, as a female founder or entrepreneur, can actually apply to your own business today, as in, right f*cking now.
Melanie Perkins, CEO and Co-Founder of Canva, talks a lot about her journey of resilience and relentlessness when it came to securing funding for Canva.
The pushback was absolutely brutal:
“Too simple.”
“Too competitive.”
“Too small to matter compared to Adobe.”
And, let’s be real, she’s a female founder building a global tech giant. That’s not bias, that’s fact. The data backs it up…women-founded startups still get less than 2% of VC funding.
But Melanie knew what she had. Clarity became her greatest asset. Canva’s vision was simple: make design simple for everyone. With a clear value proposition, a focused audience, and a disciplined beachhead strategy, she built traction until the right investors finally paid attention.
Value Proposition:
Democratizing Design for Everyone
Canva was born when Melanie realized the design software she was teaching at the University of Western Australia was overly complex. Students just needed something that worked, not a six-week course to make a flyer. Who the f*ck has time for that?!?!
Instead of building more bells and whistles, she built simplicity.
Canva’s core promise:
Democratizing Design for Everyone
Canva makes designs simple for everyone
Just a quick lil’ point here:
Notice they don’t say: “A robust SAAS, browser-based collaborative visual design platform.” Gross.
This vision and mission aren’t just about creating new user-friendly tools, but letting everyday people create quality and professional design visuals without the need for expensive software or overly complicated training.
Canva nailed it. “Democraziting Design for Everyone” and “Canva makes designs simple for everyone” are the most anti-jargon examples of how to say exactly what you are doing in a way that’s memorable and repeatable.
If your friend, client, or even a 7th grader can’t repeat your business promise after hearing it once? IT’S NOT CLEAR ENOUGH.
(Need a refresher? Revisit the Built on YES blog: WTF is a Value Proposition?)
Target Audience:
Serving the Forgotten Crowd
Here’s where Canva flipped the script. Take notes….
Since Melanie Perkins had firsthand experience of the pain points of teaching people how to use this complex software, she actually discovered “the forgotten crowd.”
Instead of chasing professional designers (Adobe’s bread and butter), they went after the Forgotten Crowd: everyone except the pros. Teachers making worksheets. Solopreneurs making pitch decks. Small businesses making flyers. Bloggers and content creators who “just need a damn graphic.” The Forgotten Crowd isn’t actually everyone, it’s everyone except the pros.
Canva wasn’t built for everyone. It was built for the people who were overlooked and underserved.
This is a huge lesson for founders to stop copying everyone else and find YOUR audience. Canva didn’t chase the design professionals. They went after everyone, but them. If Canva had copied Adobe, they wouldn’t have gotten as far as they did. Adobe’s design professional audience is not Canva’s Forgotten Crowd.
(Need more on audience clarity? Revisit: Stop Copying Everyone Else.)
Segmentation:
Quality > Vanity Metrics
If you’re a Canva user, you are using one of their pricing plans…
Canva’s segmentation strategy is one of its superpowers, and it’s totally basic. Instead of blasting the same offer at everyone, they built tiers:
Freemium (get hooked for free)
Pro (for solopreneurs + small biz owners)
Education (teachers + students, free access)
Nonprofit (mission-driven orgs, free access)
Enterprise/Teams (larger organizations)
Reminder: Canva’s audience is NOT Adobe InDesign’s audience. Adobe InDesign is a “professional page layout application for print and digital publishing.” Their segmented pricing plans are for Individuals, Students and Teachers, and Businesses. These can also be further segmented into paying for just InDesign or their full Creative Cloud suite.
Melanie Perkins stuck with it. She was set on creating a full “freemium” strategy so the basic tools could be used by everyone except the pros. By making the free plan genuinely valuable, Canva was able to build trust and habits among its user base. This opened the door for paid subscription services, additional features, and team usage among businesses. Canva created segments based on usage, not pressure.
And here’s the truth: numbers don’t equal impact. I learned this myself when I deleted half my Built on YES subscribers who never opened a single email. Smaller list, stronger community.
Reality Inventory: The 5 Filters for Segmentation
Desire: Who wants this most?
Readiness: Who is ready now?
Ease: Who is easiest to serve?
Energy: Who lights you up instead of draining you?
Alignment: Who matches your values and goals?
Beachhead:
Where Focus is Freedom
If you’re not familiar with the term “Beachhead,” here’s the real deal…
A beachhead market is one small, focused group you go all in on first, like an invading army securing the shore before pushing inland. But seriously, that’s how it got its name. Google it if you don’t believe me.
This concept right here is where the magic of business growth happens… It’s all about focusing on one very specific type of customer and committing to that one very specific type of customer.
For Canva, that beachhead was bloggers and social media managers. They were perfect because:
They had a constant, recurring need for design.
They were online sharers (built-in virality).
They were budget-sensitive (free plan = irresistible).
Your beachhead is where you gain the traction to grow. This is where you truly learn product-market fit and how best to truly serve your customers.
The other truly beneficial part of understanding and identifying your beachhead is that they are your customers who are right there, ready for you, with no marketing dollars spent. Canva didn’t really have a choice when it came to needing their beachhead to work… they couldn’t get funding. Their beachhead was a way for them to prove to investors that what they have is a game-changer for “Democratizing Design for Everyone.”
From there, Canva used Geoffrey Moore’s “The Bowling Alley” framework. Since they started with bloggers and social media managers, their next focus was on small business owners, teachers, and non-profits. They have similar needs as their first beachhead segment, but had a few tiny tweaks when it came to product features and creating foundational success and growth.
The concept of The Bowling Alley framework starts with your one initial segment and features, then as you add more adjacent segments (bowling pins - in this case), you slightly tweak the features or modify the product based on the other segments/pins around it.
When you are focused on your Beachhead, your focus is your absolute freedom to give yourself the opportunity to become an expert on your niche segment. Don’t worry about what or who you are leaving out because they will show up later.
The B*Y Reality Inventory:
Bold Business Building Edition
This reality inventory is all about the basics. Basics can feel totally boring AF, but boring is where freedom lives.
Here’s how to apply Canva’s playbook to your own business:
Value Proposition:
Clarity converts faster than clever. Ask yourself: What’s one promise my product delivers in 10 words or less?
Target Audience:
Stop copying, start observing. Serve the overlooked. Ask yourself: Who is struggling right now that the industry ignores?
Segmentation:
Don’t chase vanity metrics. Find your Swifties. Ask yourself: Who’s truly engaged, not just “subscribed”?
Beachhead:
Focus is freedom. Ask yourself: Which small group could become my loudest advocates?
Founder-Ready Lessons:
Clarity Beats Clever – Canva’s growth started with a simple, memorable promise.
Serve the Ignored – The biggest markets are often invisible until you look where no one else is looking.
Focus Wins – A tight beachhead audience is not limiting—it’s rocket fuel.
Segment With Purpose – One product can serve many markets, but only if you tailor each experience.
Let Your Product Market Itself – Build something so useful that sharing it becomes inevitable.
Conclusion: Back to Bold
Canva’s story proves that billion-dollar companies aren’t built on shiny business bedazzlement… they’re built on boring basics, done boldly.
Melanie Perkins stuck with her vision through 100 rejections, ignored the pressure to mimic Adobe, and focused on one forgotten audience with one simple promise: design made easy.
The result? A $40B brand used by 220 million people worldwide.
Back to bold. Back to basics. That’s how you build a business that actually lasts.
You’re courageous. You’re capable. You’re strong. Now go find your B*Y segment and own it.
Additional Case Studies by Built on YES:
Sources:
*NOTE: All the graphics and images you see above were created using Canva.
This case study pulls from publicly available articles, legal commentary, and founder data to provide insights into Canva’s business model strategy, including value proposition, target audience, segmentation, and beachhead.
Key sources include:
These sources support a broader understanding of Canva, the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition, Target Audience, Segmentation, Beachhead, and the tools you need to understand your customer and their needs as a founder.