Digital Asset Management: 7 Tips for Creating an Organized Image & Media Library

Here are seven simple tips for organizing your digital assets.

1. Evaluate Your Needs and Conduct an Audit of Your Current Media Library

A good starting point for creating a digital asset library is to evaluate your business needs.

What types of digital media do you need, and for what purposes? How do you want to portray your brand image?

As you define your goals and needs, consider what's already available in your brand assets. For example, if you want to create a more refined brand image, you might want to add more paid, high-quality images to your media library.

Getty Images offers polished, high-resolution photos that help build trust and authority.

2. Create a List of Image Priorities

After identifying gaps in your existing media library, you can start looking for visual content to fill those gaps.

For example, if you find yourself using the same images over and over in your social media content, you might begin a search for more images to add variety to your posts.

As you discover what you need, list it out. This will be the list you'll refer to when finding the right imagery for your brand.

Here are some pro tips for choosing images to add to your media library:

• Find free stock images. You can find professional-looking free stock images on Pixabay, Unsplash, and Pexels.
• Consider splurging on paid, quality stock images. If you're looking for more refined images and better search filtering options, you might enjoy sites with paid stock images. Getty Images and Adobe Stock are great options.
• Use relevant keywords. The right keywords can elevate your brand image search experience. Find keywords that relate to your business and industry. For instance, if you're a financial services organization, try searching for words like finance, banking, or fintech. As you get deeper into your search and reveal relevant results, it'll fuel your creativity as more keywords pop into your head. And you'll get results that are even more on target.
• Look for photos that incorporate your brand colors. During your search, prioritize images that complement your brand's color palette. This will help you maintain a strong, consistent brand aesthetic. But don't be too concerned with finding an exact color match. Even if an image features only one of your brand colors, it'll still create a consistent, cohesive look.

Take a look at these visually pleasing, royalty-free images on Pixabay that you can use to enhance your blog, website, and social media content:

3. Create Categories and Folders for Your Visual Assets

Categorizing your media files is a must if you don't want to go through the hassle of searching through unorganized digital assets.

You likely need visual content for different needs, so it helps to categorize your images based on those needs.

Original Photography

You might use original photography for specific branding, marketing, or advertising purposes. These images showcase your products, services, or company events, providing a personalized touch to your business's visual content.

In-office shots and team photos are also examples of photography that creates a welcoming, authentic experience on your website.

You might also want to capture employee celebrations, awards, and office get-togethers to showcase your company culture and build trust with your audience.

These types of images should be in their own folder so you can easily find them when you're ready to share them.

Stock Images

Stock images are great for companies that don't have the time or budget to hire a professional photographer.

You can use these visuals to supplement your marketing materials, website, and social media posts.

You might also need to access stock photos when you have a time-sensitive project or test various visual concepts before committing resources to a full-fledged photoshoot.

Store these images in their own separate folder for those instances when you need visuals for niche or specialized topics that may be challenging or expensive to capture through original photography. This can help you streamline the content creation process.

Graphics

Graphics include illustrations, icons, or infographics that help you communicate complex topics and concepts visually. And when it comes to marketing campaigns, graphics tend to perform the best.

You'll likely pull these out when you need to create visually appealing content for presentations, reports, and marketing campaigns.

Sticking these into their own designated folder provides easy access for marketing teams.

HubSpot seamlessly implements graphics into its blog posts, making content more enjoyable.

Brand Imagery

Brand images represent your company's visual identity. They include your logo, branded visuals, or any imagery that communicates your brand's unique qualities, values, and messaging.

Incorporating these images in your media library ensures easy access to visual assets that uphold your business's distinct brand identity and messaging in all marketing and communication efforts.

Videos

Videos are another visual asset you want to categorize in your media library for business.

These include your promotional videos, advertisements, tutorials, product demos, etc.

Other types of videos are:

• Team bio videos
• Event videos
• Employee training videos
• B-roll
• Evergreen clips
• Stock videos

Consider creating a folder for each type of video so that your marketing team can easily access, edit, and repost them.

You might also want to include a custom thumbnail with each file so it's readily available when it's time to upload your video. You can either have a separate thumbnail folder or keep them with each video.

Organizing videos within your media library allows you to efficiently manage and access your video content.

This means you can seamlessly integrate them into your website, marketing campaigns, and social media posts.

Audio Content

Podcasts, audio advertisements, and voiceovers are examples of audio content.

You'll likely use this type of media to engage with your audience through storytelling, interviews, discussions, and brand messaging.

4. Set Out to Organize Your Media Files Over Time (Not All At Once)

If you already have an established media library or some form of one, it can be overwhelming to try to organize everything all at once.

Your current media library may be disorganized, have duplicate files, and have a lot of people adding files to it.

So, instead of tackling the organization's process right now, start with the new materials your organization makes today. Then, gradually work on your old files over time.

Another key tip is don't get rid of your old system of managing files. Keep it in place until your new system is complete.

5. Use a Digital Media Storage Platform

Digital media library software allows you to store files like images, video, audio, and other media in one centralized location.

Currently, you may be storing your business media directly on your computer or a cloud storage platform.

However, these systems lack specialized organizational tools like efficient tagging, categorization, and metadata management.

They also don't have advanced search capabilities that allow you to quickly locate specific media files based on keywords, tags, or other customized search criteria.

Unlike digital media library software, the typical compute or cloud storage platform's file storage system doesn't enable easy access to media files for collaborative editing and sharing.

When searching for the best media library software, consider these factors:

• Ease of use
• Storage capacity
• File type support
• Security features
• Collaboration tools
• Integrations

Filecamp is a digital asset management (DAM) solution that offers all of the above features, allowing you to manage all your digital marketing assets with a user-friendly platform.

6. Create a Logical File Structure

For an even more organized media library, design a system that categorizes your media and image files based on purpose, category, and accessibility.

This will help team members in different departments easily find what they're looking for.

Previously, we discussed how to categorize your assets by type. But we didn't cover using a taxonomy or creating a file naming system.

Here's what that looks like: