When asking my fellow marketing peers whether or not they are familiar with Digital Asset Management (DAM), 1 out 10 say yes. The rest have no clue.
80% of all world’s data has been produced in the last 2 years. Marketers are more challenged than ever when managing an increasing volume of content while having to prove ROI. As marketers pursue to engage and impress customers across multiple (online and offline) channels, they aim to take control over content production, content management, and knowing how and where it is used. Last, but not least, taking control of whom can get access to the content on specific channels.
The lines between marketing and IT are blurrier than ever. New tools are constantly emerging, while CMOs are shifting towards the CIO’s grounds. However, marketers are still in the dark cloud when it comes to DAM. When shopping for new technology, digital asset management solutions are never on the top of the wish list. Marketers tend to leave the not-so-sexy parts to CIOs.
Why should you give a DAM?
Digital Asset Management is about taking control of your treasured rich media content (also called digital assets) that hold a value to your internal and external communication. Digital assets exist in many forms (videos, images, graphics, documents and logos) and they are business critical in terms of delivering your brand promise to the right people, on the right channels, at the right time.
DAM solves known struggles in marketing teams as well as in the rest of the organization. For instance, most marketers waste time and resources in the process of searching, managing and sharing content. This is demonstrated in the frequent emails you get from colleagues asking for the corporate logo. Or when you see your sales reps using outdated materials in meetings. Or when your partners try to send bulk emails with large attachments. Or when you are launching a campaign and use large amounts of video, but the videos are not formatted for all devices and screen sizes. Your end-users wind up with a poor experience. Not to forget: you have different versions of the same presentation on your desktop called “final”, “new version” and “FINAL FINAL FINAL”.
You have lost control of your rich media content, and your digital mess keeps growing. This is where digital asset management proves its value.
Take control and stay afloat in a sea of content
Digital Asset Management helps you centralize all your digital content in one place, while automating and optimizing digital processes from a single source. DAM supports your marketing team with a unified platform for each step in the content life-cycle: production, editing, management, distribution and reuse of digital content across a host of channels (CMS, social media, brand portals, webshops etc.). Ultimately, empowering you to provide relevant and timely customer experiences. With DAM, you take control back where it belongs. In a matter of seconds, you can share real-time customer experiences with anyone, on any channel. There is only one version of each file. You also have the power to replace content, when it’s updated.
DAM is a long-term investment
Some may not find this area as ‘sexy’ as exploring new apps, marketing automation tools, or emerging social media channels. And let’s face it, adding metadata to each file is not the most thrilling part of your day. But you will thank your future self that you did, enabling easy search for everyone 5-10 years ahead. What clever marketers find out eventually is that the ‘not-so-sexy’ choice always pays off in the long run. In other words: It’s time to wake up and smell the DAM coffee if you don’t want to fall off the track. Behind your competitors.
Still not sure? Consider the following gains:
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Take control of your corporate brand – one place for all branding materials
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Reach your end-users faster with relevant content – create a better customer experience across all devices.
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Faster search and saved time in visual content management.
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Increased productivity leaving time for more valuable tasks.
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Avoid mistakes, removing bottlenecks and no more reproduction of content.
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Break down silos in your company.
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Use a powerful engine that supports your digital strategy.
DAM plays well with other tools
Think about your current software solutions and tools you are using every day to manage your brand. Whether it’s your CMS platform, social media channels, email marketing or webshop, you log into a new system each time. For each of these channels, you need rich media content to support your messages. So you upload the same image or video to all platforms manually. Wouldn’t it be easier if you could share everything from one place on multiple channels simultaneously? To get most value from a DAM, you should integrate with the platforms you use the most:
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Content Management System (CMS)
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Product Information System (PIM)
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Social media management tools
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e-Commerce
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Database publishing, catalog production
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Enterprise Resource Planning System (ERP)
Think about how much time and resources it usually takes for your team to create, format, upload, manage and share content for all these channels.
Visionary approaches for the win
Let me give you an example. One of Denmark’s leading retail chains chose to invest in a Digizuite™ DAM, which is fully integrated with their product information tool, webshop, app and customer club. Their time-to-market is faster than ever due to an automatic upload of all images that are automatically connected with product information. After approval, this information is visible on all external channels in the format that fits each channel. The retailer saves time in image processing and distribution, and their customers are happy because they are able to search and find products in a matter of seconds. When the company invested in Digizuite™, it was one of the most visionary efforts in Danish e-business. Today, the company is a proud winner of several e-business awards due to their ability of being one step ahead of competitors. Their success is caused by their approach of interconnecting key software systems to ignite intelligent data sharing to remove silos. The retailer has succeeded in understanding the necessity of a cross-organizational approach to digital. Their CMO and CIO work closely together, and that’s why they are the winners.
Get in the DAM game
It’s 2017. If you wish to stay ahead and bring operational efficiency, brand control and a faster time-to-market into your marketing department, DAM is not something you can avoid forever. By investing in DAM, you invest in growing the entire business. Customer experiences make or break a brand – if you are able to deliver the right content on right channels in the right formats, the customers will keep coming back. This is what we all want, but only a few succeed. Those who are visionary about digital and minimizing silos are the ones who win the golden medal.
Dear CMO – invite your CIO to play with you. You will be happy you did.
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Would you like to know how to get started with a digital transformation? Feel free to contact us.
