It’s Tuesday. Someone just asked for last year’s Easter slides.
You’re pretty sure they’re somewhere. Dropbox? Maybe the shared drive? Or did you email them to yourself? You open a few folders, peek inside a couple of “Final_FINAL2” files, and fifteen minutes later… still nothing.
Most churches have a shared drive. Few have a working visual library.
Why Most Libraries Fall Apart
It’s not because people don’t care. It’s because the system that made sense once stopped making sense three staff transitions ago. A few common ways it unravels:
- Inconsistent naming. Easter-24-1.psd, Easter2024_FINAL.png, EasterSeriesSlides_reallyfinal.psd. Which one is the one?
- Zero tagging. Everything gets dumped into a folder called “Summer.” Somewhere in there is your student camp graphic. Good luck.
- No visual previews. Cloud drives show filenames, not images. You’re double-clicking just to see what’s inside.
- No ownership. Once a design is uploaded, nobody curates or cleans. Outdated versions sit there like fossils.
If you’ve ever rebuilt a graphic because you couldn’t find the old one, you’re not alone. It’s happening everywhere.
5 Signs Your Media Drive Needs a Cleanup
Build a Functional Visual Library
Forget perfect. Aim for findable. Here’s a lightweight system that holds up under real-life chaos.
(When someone new joins your team, they’ll thank you for this.)
Folder Structure Example
It’s time to make this practical. You’ve cleaned, tagged, and added context… now you need a folder structure that holds all of that together. This next section shows exactly how to set it up, why it works, and how it keeps your team from getting lost later. It’s the structure we use at our church, and it’s simple enough that even new volunteers can understand it right away.
Here’s one that works for most teams:
/Visuals
/Active
/Series
/Social
/Events
/Archive
/2024
/Series
/Social
/2023
At our church, we name our current working folder “Active” instead of labeling it by year. “Active” is where everything current lives; the folder everyone knows to start with when looking for the now. We used to name our main folder by year, which worked fine until the end of the year came. Then we’d archive that folder and accidentally bury evergreen content that should’ve stayed front and center.
By keeping an Active folder, we’ve created a space that always represents the present. When something seasonal or time-bound ends, it moves to Archive, tagged by the year it wrapped. That way, our timeless projects stay accessible, and our completed ones still have a home in the year they finished. It keeps the system clean without losing track of what’s still in play.
Your all-in-one platform for managing church communications. Streamline your workflows and keep your team aligned with Communicate. Communicate goes beyond events – plan actual messages, organize by campaign or ministry, and switch views to stay flexible. Ditch scattered tools and keep your team aligned with one calendar built for every message, channel, and season.
Get Organized: Two-Month Ramp-Up
Ready to get started? Don’t stress. Stretch it out over a month or two… small steps each week. Two months from now, you’ll look back and be glad you did.
Month 1
- Week 1: Audit and purge old files
- Week 2: Rename and tag consistently
- Week 3: Add preview covers and restructure folders
- Week 4: Walk your team through the new layout
Month 2
- Week 1: Clean up any leftovers
- Week 2: Add context notes for active campaigns
- Week 3: Create Archive folders for past years
- Week 4: Document the process and assign ownership
By the end of two months, everything current lives in “Active,” everything past lives in “Archive,” and everyone knows the difference.
Stay Organized: Yearly Rhythm Checklist
Once you’re up and organized, stay that way by creating an annual checklist. Here’s an example to get you started; but feel free to shape it around your own rhythms and team flow.
- January – Reset structure and naming conventions
- February – Tag missing assets and add preview covers
- March – Review “Active” folders for consistency
- June – Mid-year cleanup and volunteer refresh
- September – Archive completed summer/fall campaigns
- December – Final archive, backup, and prep for next year
Stick this list in your project notebook or pin it on the wall. It keeps things from drifting back into chaos.
Where This Gets Even Better
Even a clean folder structure has limits. Files in a drive are only as useful as the people who remember what they’re connected to. Real clarity comes when your visuals stay linked to the campaigns, events, and posts they support. When everything lives in context, your team instantly sees what’s active, what’s wrapped, and what’s ahead.
If your team uses a planning or communications tool like Communicate, you can take this a step further by attaching visuals directly to the projects they support. That way your assets don’t just sit in storage; they live inside the workflow where the work actually happens. Keeping graphics connected to your communications process prevents the slow drift back into chaos and makes your folder system even more effective over time.
