Distributing marketing asset to regional teams - Time-consuming and error-prone
In large and global organizations, marketing content creation is often produced and managed by in-house agencies, often with the help of external service providers such as agencies, photographers, film production studios, etc., and generally managed by the corporate marketing organization. Once produced, digital assets such as brand photography, brochures, print-ready PDFs, etc. are stored in a central repository such as Dropbox or Sharepoint, if you’re lucky. These tools offer rudimentary search and sharing, so manually requested assets can be shared via Sharpoint and Dropbox download links. So far…well…so good.
The larger the organization, and the greater the number of potential users requesting marketing data on a regular basis, the more time-consuming it becomes to manage and control shared assets. Standard office storage solutions, such as Dropbox or Sharepoint, do not include features to manage the digital rights and licenses of requested assets. It is impossible to control the time period, region, and channel (print, online, film) for which the requested asset is made available to a requester.
The biggest time waster is the manual management of released assets. Huge, confusing Excel spreadsheets are often used to keep track of which user or regional marketing team has requested what data for what purpose, or what happens to the requested material if the approved usage rights preclude further use.
Self-service portals as an integrated feature of DAM systems
As project managers for the media and packaging service provider Amagoo, we implemented an asset request management tool using the DAM solution from US-based Northplains, additional modules and project-specific in-house developments.
Users from internal or external teams can now easily search the DAM for marketing data, collect it, and submit a request to use the asset, specifying the purpose and duration. These requests are managed in a searchable list in the DAM and can be quickly and conveniently approved or denied with a single click. Once the request is approved, the requester receives a secure link to download the collected assets, along with usage rights. All requests are managed in a searchable history list, so asset requests and their status (approved or rejected) can be tracked at any time, along with the list of requested data, and exported as reports for further analysis.
The entire request process is now integrated into the DAM, where all corporate assets are centrally managed. This eliminates the need to email requests, manage external lists to track usage, and manually email download links. With this fully automated process, organizations not only save time and money but also ensure that usage rights are respected and that the company’s brand identity is maintained.
