Mind Map Maker

Mind Map Templates

Mind Map for Risk Identification

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Mind Map Template for Creative Thinking

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Mind Map For Workflow Improvement

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7 Step Sales Process Mind Map Example

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Digital Marketing Mind Map

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Team Charter Example

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Website Building Mind Map

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Mind Map Template

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Mind Map Template

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What is a Mind Map?

A mind map is a hierarchical radial diagram invented by Tony Buzan. It’s used as a tool or a visual technique to structure and organize thoughts and ideas. In addition to the use of keywords, mind maps also use several other graphical elements such as symbols, color-coding, images, and the spatial arrangement of branches to visualize ideas and concepts.

Mind maps make it easier to process and memorize information, generate new ideas, and portray an incisive overview of any topic. They are widely used for multiple purposes across industries, including brainstorming, decision-making, problem-solving, note-taking, planning, gathering, and organizing data.

How to Make a Mind Map?

1. Choose a platform to create your mind map. While you can do this by hand using a pencil and paper, you can also use a mind map maker like Creately where you can access intuitive mind mapping tools and pre-made mind map templates.

2. Identify the starting point of your mind map. This should be the topic or the subject your mind map will be created around, and it should be placed in the center. You can either use a symbol, image, or keyword to represent this central idea.

3. As you brainstorm around the identified topic and come up with associate ideas, add them as branches around the center. There is no limit as to how many branches you can add, and as you dig into each of these themes you can add child branches and explore them in greater depth.

4. As a best practice, try to keep the ideas you add as brief as possible. This lets you generate more associations, compared to longer and specific phrases.

5. Color code each of the branches on the mind map to visually categorize, highlight, and analyze the information. You can use Creately mind map maker’s preset color themes to quickly color code your mind map.

6. Add visual signifiers such as images, icons, and symbols to explain your ideas in more detail. In Creately’s mind map maker, you can find images with built-in Google image search or add them straight from your device to create more data-rich mind maps.

7. If you are collaborating with others, you can quickly share the Creately workspace link with them or add them as collaborators to start brainstorming together. With live mouse tracking and synced previews, you can keep track of the ideas they add to the mind map and provide your feedback with contextual comments or in-app video chat.

Mind Map Symbols

Mind maps mirror the structure of a brain cell with branches reaching out from its center, evolving through patterns of associations. It contains a central theme and associations represented by objects such as nodes and connectors and in some cases icons or images.

Central theme

The central theme or the main topic of the mind map is usually represented by an image that is closely associated with the subject matter you are exploring with your mind map. This can also be represented with a circle shape with the topic written in the middle.

Associations

These are the branches radiating from the center of the mind map. These are represented by curved lines. The thickness of the line can be used to indicate the weight of the association in the hierarchy of the mind map.

Keywords

While mind maps summarize information, they use single keywords instead of sentences to represent the facts. Using keywords you can label each of these branches. These keywords can be placed on the branch line or you can use a node at the end of the branch to place it on.

Mind Map Resources

How to Make Mind Map for Perfect Elevator Pitch

Building a perfect elevator pitch is extremely important if you wish to sell your new startup idea to investors. It’s do-or-die situation for your business and future. Mind mapping will help overcome...

How to Do a Case Study Analysis Using Mind Maps

Mind mapping helps in many situations. It can be used for work, for organizing a personal or family schedule, for setting your life goals and of course, you can also do a case study analysis using mind maps....

Visual Problem Solving with Mind Maps and Flowcharts

Everyone has problems, and we spend most of our working lives solving them. For those who find this quite negative, problems can be also termed as Issues, Challenges or Opportunities....

Using a Mind Map for Social Media, Blogging, and Content Marketing

The internet probably wasn’t designed to be a virtual playground for social media and content marketers, but it is now. Yet, as it constantly evolves and we communicate more, an entirely new set...

Mind Map Examples to Visualize and Organize your Ideas

Fine-tuning your business process? Planning a project? Organizing your assignment? Whatever the situation, mind maps are a great way to visualize the process and execute it smoothly. Below are some mind map examples.....

How to Use Mind Maps Effectively in a Meeting

Want to be a super star in meetings? Want to impress your boss by providing great summaries of meetings? Learning to use mind maps in meetings will help you achieve that goal. We already added some meeting.....

Mind Maps for Effective Business Thinking

Every project kicks off with a basic idea; and ideas evolve into viable projects only after intense brainstorming. There’s a gap between the initial idea and project execution, and this gap is filled typically by brainstorming.....

The Best Ideation Techniques for Remote Teams

Every organization needs a steady supply of fresh creative ideas to stay relevant and ahead of their competitors successfully. As necessary as it is, generating good new ideas isn’t as easy as getting everyone in the team into a room .....

FAQs About Mind Maps