In this quick 5-minute Canva organization audit, I take a look at Anna-Lisa Kinch’s Canva account to identify simple ways she can streamline her workspace.
Anna-Lisa is a wellness coach who uses Canva to create content for her business, her clients, and even her family, so her account includes a wide mix of designs, uploads, templates, and personal files.
Whether you’re juggling business and personal content or just feeling bogged down by an overflowing Uploads tab, this quick audit will give you practical ideas to apply in your own Canva account.
Resources Mentioned
- Canva Organization Roadmap
- Clean Up My Canva: The Canva Organization Course
- Canva Organization Consulting
- Organization VIP Day
Transcript
In this video, I’ll be doing a quick 5-minute Canva audit for Anna-Lisa Kinch, the founder of Thyroid Reset, based in Toronto, Ontario.
Anna-Lisa is a wellness coach who’s been using Canva since 2019 to create a wide range of content, not just for her business, but also for her husband’s business, her clients, and even some schoolwork that I believe her daughter has been creating using the same Canva account.
With that many hats to wear, her Canva account is understandably full, and Anna-Lisa shared that her biggest challenge is finding files quickly. She also mentioned that creating custom folders has helped… but from what I’m seeing in her account, there’s still a lot of opportunity to refine and simplify things.
Before diving into the organization itself, one quick tip I always recommend: make sure you’re filtering your Projects to show only your own content. Instead of using the default “Owner” filter, switch it to your account or brand, and in Anna-Lisa’s case, that would be Anna-Lisa Kinch.
Even if nothing has been shared with you or created by other team members, the default view tends to surface older designs that may already be filed away in folders, which makes things look more cluttered than they actually are. And since we’re trying to focus on the designs and images that haven’t been filed yet, applying that filter helps you zero in on what still needs to be sorted and get that Projects tab cleared out more effectively.
Let’s start by looking at Anna-Lisa’s folder structure.
She has already created a number of custom folders, which is great, but most of them are sitting at the top level, and that’s where it starts to feel overwhelming. Anytime you have to click “Show More” to see all your folders, that’s a sign the system could use some sub-folders.
She also has quite a few designs that haven’t been filed at all, some going back five years, which suggests the current folder structure isn’t really supporting her day-to-day workflow. It’s there, but it’s not being used consistently, which tells me it may need to be rethought in a more intuitive way.
One thing I’d recommend right away is setting up a dedicated Personal folder at the top level. Right now, there’s personal content mixed in with business materials, like the existing folder labeled Sarah-Anne’s Things, which I’m guessing may relate to her daughter’s schoolwork. That would fit well inside a Personal folder, and if Anna-Lisa is creating any personal designs of her own, whether for family, hobbies, or household use, those could be filed there too.
Creating that clear separation between business and personal content helps reduce visual clutter and makes it easier to stay focused when you’re working on business-related designs.
Next, some folders could benefit from clearer naming and better nesting. For example, there are two different folders for Evelyn Weiss, one labeled Evelyn Weiss and one labeled Evelyn Weiss PLR. These likely refer to the same source and could be combined and housed under a main Templates folder, since I happen to know that Evelyn provides Canva templates.
There’s also a folder related to a Facebook challenge, and that might make more sense inside a top-level Freebies folder, with subfolders for each lead magnet or challenge she’s offering. Similarly, there’s content for Thyroid Webinars and other presentations, and those could be grouped under a Presentations folder, with additional subfolders for each talk or topic.
She has a folder here labeled 2024 LM Morning Routine Meditation that doesn’t currently contain anything. It may have been created with the intention of organizing something specific, but then got abandoned partway through, and that’s something I see often.
It’s really easy to start a folder with the best of intentions, but if you don’t follow through, you’re left with what I like to call “orphan folders.” Over time, these accumulate and make your Canva account feel more cluttered and far less helpful.
So the broader takeaway here is: if you notice folders that are empty or no longer serving a clear purpose, don’t be afraid to delete them. A smaller, intentional set of folders will always serve you better than a long list that you constantly have to scan through.
Now let’s talk about uploads, because that’s where a lot of the overwhelm is coming from.
Right now, there are years’ worth of images that haven’t been sorted into folders, they’re just sitting in the default Uploads area.
And while Canva doesn’t let you organize images within Uploads at this time, what a lot of users don’t realize is that you can move images out of Uploads altogether. Just like with designs, you can select individual or multiple images and move them into any custom folder you’ve created.
Given the range of visuals in Anna-Lisa’s uploads folder, it may make sense to create a top-level Media folder that houses both images and video. Inside that folder, she could set up subfolders for the types of assets she’s working with most often, such as Headshots, Food Photos, Charts & Graphics, Screenshots, Nutrition Products, Videos, and so on.
Alternatively, if she prefers to keep things more separated, she could have two top-level folders instead: one for Images or Photos, and another for Videos.
Any personal photos, like family snapshots, would still be better off in the Personal folder we talked about earlier, rather than in the general Media collection.
Having that clear structure in place will not only make it easier to find what she needs quickly, but also help avoid the frustration of re-uploading assets simply because they’re buried. And moving forward, uploading directly into the right folder, rather than letting everything default into Uploads, will make ongoing maintenance much simpler for her.
Now, on to templates.
It looks like Anna-Lisa has collected a number of templates from memberships and other sources, but they’re not currently organized in a way that’s easy to use. As I mentioned earlier, I’d recommend creating a Templates folder at the top level, and then nesting subfolders based on the source website where the template was obtained, or she could instead organize subfolders based on the template purpose, for example, Instagram Templates, Presentation Templates, etc.
And just a gentle reminder here: not every template needs to be kept. It’s easy to fall into the habit of hoarding templates because they might come in handy someday, but having too many makes it harder to find the ones you’ll actually use. I’d encourage her to do a bit of decluttering and remove anything that no longer feels like a good fit.
Finally, a quick note about starred folders. Anna-Lisa has starred quite a few of them, but if you star everything, nothing really stands out. I recommend only starring the folders you access most frequently, so that the Starred section remains truly useful.
Overall, Anna-Lisa has laid some really helpful groundwork. With a few tweaks to her folder structure, especially reducing visual clutter at the top level, creating more intuitive subfolders, and cleaning up old uploads and templates, she’ll be in a much better position to find what she needs faster and keep her account feeling more manageable.
