Getting Started — First-time setup checklist

When you first set up a Brandkit account, work through these steps in order. Each links to a more detailed article.

1. Configure your account basics

Go to Settings › General and set your account name, default language, and primary domain.

2. Set up your portal

Pro and Enterprise editions only,
Go to CMS › Portal(s) to configure your public-facing brand portal — the site your users will visit to access assets.

3. Define user roles

Go to Settings › User roles to review and customise the access levels available on your account.

4. Invite your team

Go to Users › Invitations to invite admins and other team members.

5. Upload your first assets

Go to Assets › Uploads or use + Upload files in the Assets sub-nav to add your first files.

6. Organise into albums

Go to Assets › Albums to group assets into logical collections for easier browsing.

7. Configure downloads

Go to Settings › Downloads to control how users download assets — including whether a form or approval is required.

8. Review notifications

Go to Settings › Notifications to set up email alerts for key events such as new requests or uploads.

9. Set your theme

Go to CMS › Themes to apply your brand colours and fonts to your portal.

10. Launch and share

Once configured, share your portal URL with your team and external users.

To do (left-sidebar)

Overview

The To do section is your admin action centre. It surfaces items that need your attention and shows a live count badge on the left sidebar so you always know when something is waiting.

To access it, in Admin, click To do in the left sidebar.

What you’ll find here:

Pending requests

Users who don’t have automatic download access can request assets. Each request shows the user, the asset they want, and any message they included. You can approve or decline from here.

To configure who needs to submit a request, go to Settings > User Roles > select Role > update permissions.

Unapproved assets

Assets uploaded to Brandkit are always set to the Draft state by default and must be Approved before they appear in the Portal. This queue shows all assets waiting for review. Generally you should ensure the Asset is in the right Vault, have the correct Asset name, Metadata and Tags before you approve an Asset.

Pending contributions

If you allow external contributors to submit assets (via the Contribution link/work-flow), those submissions appear here for review and acceptance. You can accept, or reject individual files or all files as a batch. Once accepted we will create an Asset in a draft state for further review and approval.

To configure contribution settings, go to Settings › Contributions.

Tips

• Check To do regularly — the badge count on the sidebar shows the total across all three queues.
• You can action items in bulk for faster processing.
• Approving an Asset makes it immediately visible to users with the appropriate access level in the Portal.

OM3: Assets

The Assets section is the heart of Brandkit. It’s where you manage your entire brand library — uploading, organising, searching, and controlling what users can see and download.

Click Assets in the left sidebar to open it.

The default view is the Grid.

OM3.1: Assets > Grid

Grid

The Grid shows all assets in your library as thumbnails. It is the primary way to browse, search, and manage your content.

Searching and filtering

At the top of the Grid is a search bar that supports both keyword and semantic search. Below it, a row of filter dropdowns lets you narrow results by:

State, Source, Asset type, Licence, Album, Vault, Orientation, Credit, Extension, Added by, Collection, Blog topic, Brand guidelines, Category, Competitors, Help topic, Industry, Resources, SEO keywords

Use AND / OR toggle to control whether multiple filters narrow or broaden your results.

Asset states

Assets can be in one of several states:

• Active — visible to users in the Portal with appropriate access
• Draft — hidden from the portal and regular users; admin-only. Also the default state on upload or create.
• Unreleased — before their release date
• Expired — past their expiry date
• Archived - has been archived
• Deleted - has been deleted

Standard Filters

You can further refine your search results by selecting a standard filter dropdown to add an additional search facet (search parameter).

These include:

• Source
• Asset Type
• Licence
• Vault
• Orientation
• File extension
• Added by (the user that uploaded or created the asset)
• Collection ( filter by your previously saved collections)

Custom Filters

You can further refine your search results by selecting a custom filter dropdown to add an additional search facet (search parameter).

You set these up in (1) Settings > (2) Filters to match the way your company categorizes your own content.

An example for a Place Brand organization might be by theme:

Theme

• Live
• Work
• Visit
• Invest
• Study

Search Results

Sorting

Use the sort dropdown (default: Latest) to reorder results by date, name, or other criteria.

Asset cards

Each asset card shows:

• Thumbnail
• File name
• File size and dimensions
• Source (Uploaded, Created in Brandkit, etc.)
• A status dot indicating publish state

Selecting assets

Tick the checkbox on one or more asset cards to select them, or use Select all to select the full result set. Selected assets are added to the Basket for bulk actions.

Navigate to the Asset’s detail page

Click the Thumbnail or name of the Asset to open the Asset’s detail page.

In some cases if you have the Asset Preview Modal feature enabled in your settings (Settings > General) clicking an Asset in the Grid will open a modal with a further click of the More details button required to see the Asset’s page.

Pro Tip: If the Preview Modal option is enabled you can click the additional (far left) icon under the Assets in the Grid to open the Asset page directly.

Download and Share

You can also Download and Share one asset at a time directly from the Grid by selecting the Download or Share icon underneath each Asset in the Grid.

OM3.2 Assets > Albums

Overview

Albums are an important way to organise assets into browsable collections. Think of them as folders, but more flexible — an asset can appear in multiple albums, and albums automatically update based on the saved search query.

Go to Assets > Albums to manage them.

Creating an album

• Click + New album (top right of the Albums view).
• Enter a name and optional description.
• Set a Search Query
• Select an Image from the DAM for an Album Cover.
• Select Approved to publish
• Save.

Adding assets to an album

Assets are added to Albums automatically based on the saved Search Query in the Album.

To add a new Asset to the Album just upload or create an Asset and edit the metadata or tags so it meets the Search Query parameters for the Album.

e.g. if the Search Query is set to find Assets tagged with “Dog“, just upload a new image and tag it Dog (and Approve it to publish). Because the Tag matches the Album’s Search Query the new image will be shown in the Album.

You can also:

• Edit — change name, description, search query, album cover, or approval state.
• Delete — remove the album (assets are not deleted, only unlinked)

Albums in Portal

Albums by default are displayed in the standard Portal design layouts on the home page - but for Pro and Enterprise Edition accounts Albums may appear elsewhere.

Settings

• You can set Albums to appear automatically in the Portal when approved (all editions). This is the default setting for new accounts. You’ll find this setting in Settings > Albums.
• When you have access to the CMS features (Pro and Enterprise editions) you can selectively show or hide and re-order Albums in the CMS page editor for any CMS page where the Albums section is used.
• You can also show/hide albums in different sections (and on different pages) shown to different User Role Groups (Pro and Enterprise editions)
• Albums are sorted alphabetically in the Admin area. In the Portal you can change the sort order by moving them up or down the stack of Albums in an Album section of a CMS page (Pro and Enterprise editions).
• You can configure Albums to appear as centered and scrollable circular buttons or as a larger grid of rectangular images. These can be further styled with CSS in your Theme file (Pro and Enterprise editions).

Tips

• Use albums to mirror how your users think about your brand — by campaign, by market, by asset type.
• Setup Filters (Settings > Filters) first to reflect how you and your users categorize your content, then use those same Filters for your Album Search Queries.
• Album are generally visible to all Roles but Assets inside them are subject to User Role visibility settings.
• Albums can be shown to specific User Roles via Personalisation (Pro and Enterprise plans)