Rich Media Management

Join Widen at the Premiere of Createasphere Digital Asset Management and Explore the Global Issues of DAM with the Experts

• DAM 101- What is it and what you need to know
• dpBestflow – The Best DAM Resource on the Web
• The 21st Century Career: Digital Librarians, Archivists, Project Management and So Much More
• The Strategic Business Case for DAM: When, Why & ROI
• The DAM Admins Open Source Toolbelt - Free Tools You Need to Know This Year
• Distributing Rich Media: The Competitive Edge Is Knowledge
• Using Social Media in DAM
• Positioning of DAM
• Exploring the Process to Manage, Manipulate & Deliver Video Content

• The Role of Taxonomy & Metadata in Digital Asset Management
• Capitalization on Storage
• Metadata - The Message is IN the Media
• Reinventing Everything: The desktop paradigm moves to the web
• Rights Management & Content Protection of Assets
• Managing Worldwide Workflow: Digital Is a Global Initiative
• Order from Disorder: Taming the Digital Chaos
• Powerful Tools & Techniques for Enhancing Searching Capabilities

• Speed to implementation inside 30-90 days versus 6-9 months
• Low monthly subscription and minimal startup costs make it easier to budget
• Flexibility, adaptability and scalability to grow and change with client needs

• Greater ability to organize and find approved and available assets
• Greater ability to share and repurpose assets across multiple channels
• Greater ability to ensure compliance and consistency with approved assets

• Improved Operational Efficiency – streamlined digital supply chains
• Improved Brand Consistency – approved brand assets used in multiple channels – as opposed to communications coming from disconnected departments
• Improved Return on Marketing Investments (ROMI) – greater opportunity to find and reuse or repurpose existing assets and reduce re-work or costs of re-creating lost assets

As a marketer who markets products and services to fellow marketers, I thought it might be fun to share some best practices and or open up the conversation on the topic of using email as a primary communication method for B2B sales & marketing communications. Below is a list of resources and best practices for utilizing the email signature block to reinforce your message and brand, introduce your personality and further engage your intended target in 1-to-1 communication.     

Signature Block Marketing Best Practices and Resources

Bonus – Rich Media. Images and Videos speak volumes. A profile picture will help you connect a name with a face. Friendly images such as cartoons help you build a connection and bridge a communication gap oftentimes difficult to achieve without a conversation. Videos further enhance the user experience and accelerate communications.  

If there are other experiences or methods that come to mind when you think of Signature Block Marketing Best Practices and Resources, please feel free to share.

The recent KMWorld article DAM takes on many roles reports “The market for digital asset management (DAM) solutions remains robust, driven by increasing demand for rich media on Web sites, for marketing materials and in technical documentation. Ideally, assets for those purposes are managed centrally and published as needed to different destinations.”

KMWorld reports the annual market stands at about $600 million, and historically has posted double-digit growth. ABI Research forecasts the market to top $1 billion in 2013.

Feeding the DAM growth is the increased volume of rich media coupled with the wealth of devices to create, send and receive digital media. Furthermore, The Association of Graphic Solutions Providers (IPA) reports an increasing number of multi-channel targeted marketing programs have caused an explosion in the number of digital assets to manage.

Moreover, Frost & Sullivan reports that apart from the increased creation and use of digital media, the average file size of content is also increasing. To take the example of images, both the files size and the pure number of digital images taken have steadily increased each year. This is true for almost all media types from text to images and audio/visual content. The emergence and popularity of high definition video has been further fueled by the availability of numerous devices to receive content. This burgeoning demand has created a huge infrastructure challenge. High resolution images and video are storage and bandwidth intensive. For more on the DAM Market Overview and Challenges, download the DAM as SaaS 2.0 Whitepaper from Frost & Sullivan.
 

It’s a “Wired” World – Devices to Create, Send and Receive Digital Media

The increasing volume of digital media is again fueled to the increasing number of devices available to create and consume digital media. The mobile wireless market for handheld devices is another market that has become a huge user of digitized media. Interestingly, Widen worked with a 3rd-party market research company in the first half of 2009 for an analysis of digital asset management programs and social media. One of the questions asked was “What consumer electronic devices do you own and use?”  Just for fun, here are the results…



Digital Camera, Laptop/Notebook Computer, Portable Media Device (iPod) and Cell Phone with Camera are the most common electronic devices owned and used (n=94).


Top Digital Asset Management Market Drivers according to ABI Research

• Increase in the need to collaborate workflows across divisions in an enterprise
• DAM systems no longer operate in a silo environment
• Move to nonlinear digital workflows will drive demand
• Improved operational efficiencies maximizes the ROI on a DAM system
• Increase in bandwidth, fall in the storage cost will boost the demand of DAM
• Continued effort in marketing initiatives will increase the demand for DAM
• Creative professionals adopt DAM tools
• New and emerging markets will drive the demand for DAM systems
• Adoption of digital media technology enhances the growth of the market
• Multiple channels of content delivery will increase the demand for DAM solutions
• Content is king: Premium content, HD and video services will drive the growth

Below is an excerpt from the KM World article, DAM takes on many roles by Judith Lamont, Ph.D., about UNICEF’s adoption of Widen Digital Asset Management tools and services. The full article provides three unique case studies from digital asset management vendors. The excerpt below introduces the digital media management needs from UNICEF and explains why they selected Widen DAM SaaS.

[Excerpt]

Rich media assets

UNICEF was founded by the United Nations in 1946 to help save, protect and improve the lives of children through immunization, education, healthcare, nutrition, clean water and sanitation. It delivers those services and material resources on a regular basis, and responds to emergencies throughout the world.

The UNICEF Web site is the primary means of conveying information about activities in which the organization is involved. With nearly 200 offices operating in 156 countries, and fundraising partner organizations in 36 industrialized countries, UNICEF has deployed a Web content management (WCM) system that allows distributed editing and publishing of content, and localization of field office Web sites.

As rich media, particularly video, became more prevalent, UNICEF also saw a need for a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system that could help staff members deal more effectively with the increasing number of digital assets.

"We drop professional UNICEF journalists and photographers into all sorts of places where children are affected by crisis, as well as serious ongoing challenges," says Alexander Struminger, executive project manager in UNICEF’s Internet, broadcast and image section. "Video is a good format for quickly telling complex stories and effectively feeding into news cycles, but we needed to be able to store, retrieve and distribute the files more easily."

SaaS delivery model

UNICEF had tried several approaches to DAM, including developing its own software, but usage of the systems had been limited. "One of the lessons we learned in our early attempts was that the way in which we rolled out the system was critical," says Struminger. "We knew we needed a good software product, but better software alone is never the answer. We also needed to facilitate adoption by involving stakeholders." After researching the available options and requesting proposals from best-in-class vendors, UNICEF selected the DAM platform from Widen Enterprises.

The software-as-a-service (SaaS) delivery model of Widen’s DAM platform removed the burden of installing and maintaining the software. UNICEF also took note of the company’s long history of high-quality service. "Widen helped us start out with a pilot project so we could introduce the product to a small group of beta testers," Struminger explains. "We made sure we had a group of motivated UNICEF stakeholders involved. This ensured early adoption and a sense of ownership by key stakeholders."

The system was introduced by UNICEF’s Geneva office at a gathering of UNICEF fundraising organizations, and several of the individuals involved in the pilot spoke enthusiastically about its merits. "This event changed the conversation," Struminger says, "and we realized it was the kind of advocacy we needed in order to get that vital adoption."

Other parts of the organization began to request the DAM system, and a global rollout is now in progress. Feedback has been very positive, and users are beginning to suggest new applications, like asset sharing between divisions, countries and partner organizations. Widen’s application for video Web streaming is also under consideration.

Users can quickly find video clips they need, along with scripts and shot lists. They can send those files directly to a journalist or news organization for review. UNICEF offices and partners can have access to up-to-date branding assets, as well as print publications files for localization, printing or electronic distribution.

"The robust search engine is really one of the keys to this system," explains Struminger, "and its ability to leverage metadata." Although the metadata and taxonomy needed to be sorted out as the system expanded, the Widen DAM system is now becoming the preferred distribution platform for digital assets.

Widen Enterprises draws its expertise from its own experience in pre-press workflow, so in addition to offering a software product it also has substantial subject matter expertise.

"Our emphasis is on service and being with customers throughout their process," says Matthew Gonnering, CEO of Widen. "For example, we staffed our own video production studio to make sure we understood the workflow. Our product handles every major video format as well." That ability provides support to social marketing efforts, allowing the distribution of video to many channels. "We don’t just get our customers set up with the software and then part company," Gonnering emphasizes. "We are available throughout the entire time of our relationship."

View the full article from KM World: DAM takes on many roles

Do you ever get the urge of “I just gotta have it”...  Who doesn’t? ... Whatever “it” is.

Now when it comes to info, video clips and pictures, what do you do when you just gotta have it?

Applications like Facebook and devices like the iPhone have made that so much easier and have trained us to think that way. 

Now, how does this apply to digital asset management software?  The demand for rich media has been on the rise and will only continue to skyrocket.  If you’re responsible for creating, managing and distributing digital assets – the lifeblood driving brand awareness and revenue – you need to have a system that can satisfy the “I gotta have it” need for those that need it most. 

Search – Whether you’re a marketer, designer, web developer or salesperson, when you need a file – you just gotta have it now.  You can’t wait for someone else and you can’t waste time sifting through file folders or legacy systems.  Google has trained us to search by keyword and get the most relevant search results.  It’s expected.  Shouldn’t your rich media be the same way?

Preview – So now you got the file in front of you – print brochure, hi-res image, PowerPoint presentation, audio / video clips – don’t you want to actually see it.  It’s no good to you if all you get is a small thumbnail preview.  You want the whole DAM thing.  The ability to preview files saves you the time of waiting for a file to download, unzip or pull down off an FTP site. 

Transform – After you find the asset you’re looking for, you’re going to need it in different formats.  No marketer is running a single channel anymore.  You’re assets must be available for use in web pages, print pieces, catalogs, emails, blogs and social media.  Moreover, they're being consumed on a whole variety of devices.  You can’t always depend on a designer to convert the files for you or having the right software to handle every single file processing need.  Wouldn’t it be great if you could automate file transformation services?

Apply that mindset to a whole organization whose team is dependent on the ability to access, share and repurpose your digital assets – they all just gotta have it.  For those that don’t (or shouldn’t), a digital asset library gives you the ability to control rights, access and usage levels.

When it comes to producing and repurposing digital assets, a web-based digital asset management system offering the ability to access what you need, when you need it satisfies the hunger for “I gotta have it.”

“Spending Freeze,” “Cut Budgets,” “No New Spending.”  I hear these phrases on a daily basis.  I agree with you, times are tough and money is tight, but are you just going to stop marketing and creating files?  I want to meet the company that during a recession completely stops marketing and see how they come out.  I know you’re committed to your company and its financial stability, and so are we. Right now you need to be marketing harder but more efficiently. You need to cut costs so reallocate and spend wiser.

This line of thinking always baffles me when people are evaluating an installed software solution.  This “old school” approach was appropriate for the past, but has to have a huge justification in this new economy.  The costs are enormous compared to SaaS models.  Take the high cost of hardware, personnel to run it, third party updates and maintenance, massive storage consumption of video (hottest tool in marketing right now)… I don’t want to see that bill!  Then to top it off it’s an 8-12 month implementation?  To anyone who knows the evolution of software, also knows how out of date that “new” software is now. (4 upgrades a year with Widen at no extra cost of course.)

Hosted digital asset management software models are the new way of managing and distributing the rich media that is the lifeblood of your marketing and sales efforts.  Installed solutions are still trying to hold on to that age-old defense of web-based security and ownership.  You still own your assets, and the security is just as good, if not better.  This is why you are seeing all the major players in the DAM installed software side rolling out hosted solutions.  SaaS, cloud computing, digital asset management, social media... these are the terms of now!

CMSWire recently published an article Digital Asset Management in 2009: Trends, Features and SharePoint Integration.  The article had a few DAM players weigh in, so now I would like to continue the conversation by Keeping DAM Solutions in Check in 2009. 

What’s driving the adoption of Digital Asset Management solutions?  Moreover, how do you justify the purchase of a DAM system in this economy? 

Did you stop creating digital content?  No.

Did you shift the way in which you deliver content?  Likely.

Do you need to continue supplying the digital content that is the lifeblood of commerce and marketing to those that use and repurpose it to help your brands sustain?  Absolutely.

Do you need to do that in a way that minimizes cost and maximizes effectiveness in the areas that drive revenue?  DAM, you’re good.

Enough of the Q&A.  Let’s get into what’s big in DAM in 09. 

SaaS – While it’s hard to lose sight of the current economic conditions, let’s bring SaaS to the forefront.  Service is King… right?  In this economy, SaaS is not looked at as an alternative, but as the answer.  You’ve already answered the questions above, but how about these:

Do you have the financial resources for hefty capital expenditures on infrastructure costs?

Do you have the human resources (IT) to devote to “just another marketing project?”

Since SaaS is quick to deploy in a time when ‘time is of the essence’ and resources are limited, a cost-effective monthly subscription that can be budgeted for looks like a clear choice.

Widen understands the objection that sometimes you just need your digital content to be on-site.  The Widen Answer:  The Widen Appliance – an extension of the SaaS model with managed services on the client site.  Local access (for the creatives) and business continuity (for everyone). 

Let’s get a little more SaaSy with some highlights from an article from business technology publication ZDNet, SaaS model here to stay, say vendors. 

• SaaS solutions can be deployed without ramping up skill sets and infrastructure.
• Why deploy an installed solution that may take 12 months if it’s out of date by the time it goes live?
• Economies of scale and scalable resources.  You’re renting the infrastructure, but you own the content. 
• Stronger security, redundancy and reliability than most companies can achieve on their own.
• Not limited to simple applications, but a way to kick start a complex deployment.

Moving off the SaaS train to one of the hottest topics today...

Video - With the rise and popularity of consuming video – online and via mobile devices – organizations must look for video management solutions.  Not to the level required by traditional media companies, but lighter weight solutions for the marketer looking to publish videos on web sites and social media outlets.  Widen has added functionality to preview and transcode video assets, embed links to centrally control and globally repurpose and consume the most recent video asset, and cloud computing resources to scale with the demand.  
 
Collaboration – The new way of saying “Teamwork.”  Organizations are not siloed, or at least they want to break the habit of operating independently.  Creative, marketing, web, sales… they all need to be on the same page.  People want to be involved closer to the creation end of the digital asset life cycle and approval processes continue to be complex.  A web interface into the collaboration process is critical to teams both internal and geographically-dispersed.  With project collaboration comes workflow and reporting capabilities to streamline processes and hold people accountable. 

Recognizing the demand for creating efficiency in review and approval workflows, Widen created Backdrop, a web-based tool to automate the complex photography routing and approval cycles behind the scenes for photographers and creative approvers.  Separately, the Widen Project Collaboration application for the front-end of the digital asset library supports online reviews, annotations and versioning in one central repository to keep it all together and hold people accountable. 
 
Social Media – 70% of online adults use social media.  With the popularity and opportunity of rich media and social media together, organizations are inquisitively anxious and excited about how to use and manage rich media within social media. 

DAM supports marketers wanting to get into social media much the same way it’s used in the traditional sense, however requires stronger consideration over managing access levels, digital rights, and what happens when an assets leaves the system?  One solution Widen brings to the table, again, is embed links.  Another trend to watch is how social media will shape how DAM and other software solutions work by creating a stronger sense of community and more variety in the way digital media is published and delivered.
 

DAM = Digital Alligator Management

Let's say you build a big red barn. It's huge. Like the size of the Superdome. And instead of cows, you fill that barn up with alligators. Big ones. With big teeth. They are all over the place, just running free. Now, it is your job to maintain that barn. In addition to knowing the ins and outs of barn maintenance, don't you think you should know something about how to handle all those alligators inside so you don't lose a limb each time you go inside? You should know how to organize them in cages, how to feed them, care for them if they get sick, and how to handle them with the proper equipment. You need to know how to speak their language. Hey, alligators just need a little love.

That scenario is a little like some digital asset management companies that want to sell you some off the shelf software (the barn), but they really don't have any experience with the assets (the alligators) that are contained in their systems.

UPS says "What can BROWN do for you?" To play off that theme, I'll ask, "What can RED do for you?" (Widen's logo is red. But you knew that already.) So what can Widen do for you? Well, to put it simply... We know all about alligators. We've been raising alligators for over 60 years. Okay, enough about alligators already.
 

                                             
What can RED do for you?

What should your digital asset management provider know? They should know about your digital assets. They should be experts in digital photography and photo composition. They should be intimate with color management and color conversion methods. They should know how to construct a solution that is built with assets that can be repurposed for different media. They should live with Photoshop jockeys that know all about color retouching and image manipulation. They should have intimate knowledge of rich media and video asset management. They should possess a broad range of prepress and premedia services. They should breathe digital asset optimization. They should live digital asset workflow management. They should be all about catalog production services. Your digital asset management solutions provider should know how you work with those digital assets because they have been doing just that since the Truman administration!  (Well, okay the assets were analog back then, not digital. But you get the idea.)

So it's not just DAM software as a service that Widen knows. Or brand management. We know that very well. But we also know content creation, production, photography illumination, manipulation, alteration, rasterization, conversion, color reproduction, composition, pagination, resolution and optimization. We understand how important your digital assets are to you because we live with them everyday.

Okay, I have to take off my sales and marketing hat and put on my Alligator wrestling boots and big kevlar gloves. it's time to feed the little digital assets. They grow up so fast, don't they?  

Mark

Hello all, I’ve been a guest blogger at Widen for awhile and want to catch you up on some of my previous blog posts.  Here’s a summary of some of my more popular ones:

The Shocking News of SaaS – Upgrades

Recapping an experience describing Widen’s four-time-per-year release cycle to a group of IT people – a feat unparalleled in the content management industry.  To an IT department where resources are very limited, they saw our release schedule as a real concern and liability.  However, that’s the beauty and a core advantage of Software as a Service – you don’t have to worry about upgrades. 


The DAM Middle Class

Commenting on Theresa Regli’s (CMS Watch) blog on Digital Asset Management about the lack of what she calls a “Middle Class” DAM software solution.  Theresa points out that an empty gap exists between smaller desktop solutions with price points under $5,000 and those enterprise solutions costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.  With the lack of options available to them, more and more companies are looking to hosted services – like the one offered by Widen – as the answer.  This is because SaaS solutions do not force customers to choose between functionality and price.


Digital Asset Management Implementation: Complex or Simple

Do you realize how complex a DAM implementation can become?  In many cases, it just doesn’t need to be that big of a deal.  Many vendors tell customers they need to invest months and months in planning and preparation for a DAM solution, define very complex processes and then spend tens of thousands on RFP development, vendor shootouts, risk analysis, consulting fees, and then the implementation and integration.  If all that worked then why are so many companies looking to migrate to a second or even a third DAM system?  That’s why the hosted or on-demand model works well…


You have the right to a quick, successful Digital Asset Management system implementation

How can any company trust a vendor as a future partner and service provider who can't even respond to a simple RFP and instead provides a list of weak excuses?  This is an interesting story illustrating how some DAM vendors don’t recognize that service starts before the sale.


My Take on DAM. Period.

DAM should be more than just a simple repository of rich media.  The DAM platform should be the base of your entire digital media environment.  DAM should feed all of your media portals and websites so partners, agencies, offices, vendors, your boss and your grandmother can go to the get the latest image, logo, commercial or brochure they need.  Right?  Read On.


What Have Vendors Got to Hide?

Have you noticed how hesitant most enterprise digital asset management vendors are to actually let potential customers see their products?  We have found that more and more customers are showing an interest in really digging in when evaluating our rich media management solutions and services.  (And you should…) Read on to understand why.


Digital Asset Management Software as a Service – selecting a partner

We talk a lot about hosted vs. installed software and it’s becoming more obvious why organizations choose DAM SaaS, but here are a couple more things to look for:  Support, Product Improvement, Cost, Experience, Ease-of-use (and do your users use it?), Features, Vision.


Accountability From Your Software Vendors

An interesting press release reminded me again of a key difference between traditionally licensed software products and those offered through the Software as a Service (SaaS) model – Upgrades.


Where have all the DAM SaaS Providers Gone?

There has never been a shortage of vendors claiming to offer some sort of tool to manage, archive or distribute rich media files.  Of the throngs of Digital Asset Management vendors that cloud the market, few competent pure play vendors and even fewer DAM as Software as a Service (SaaS) providers remain.  A landscape that has traditionally been characterized by companies who focused exclusively on providing solutions for managing digital media files has been taken over by the larger Content Management behemoths that have gobbled up the original inhabitants to offer DAM modules instead of solutions.

Let’s say you’re an agency (or anyone else who needs digital asset management workflow), and you have a client who needs to login, comment, approve, etc. to their rich media.

With Widen’s Project Collaboration tool, you are able to route all kinds of files whether it be images, documents, or video (We all know how important video is), to any number of clients. These clients can then login to review, make comments, see comments from everyone else on the route, and even approve for use. All activity is time stamped and history is tracked. Furthermore, full versioning is supported on cases that need to be redone. Any asset that is uploaded with the same file name will be made into a version, saving the original copy. Take a document that is constantly being updated (legal dept, etc.) for instance.

A specific use case I came across recently was for an agency who works with live events and commercials. They need to post videos, give clients the ability to watch a full length preview, and either make comments for revisions or approve for use. This allows clients to make sure brand recognition stays consistent.

Matthew, Al and I had a call with a DAM analyst from Gartner yesterday – those DAM analyst you know… they're always on to something new!  We enjoyed sharing the ‘ole Widen update about our direction with video asset management, cloud computing, creating a more enjoyable user experience and appliance expansion among other top R&D initiatives for 2009. 

But then we got into the juicy stuff affecting marketing operations in 2009.  The type of marketing operations dealing with tight budgets, a change in spend and shift away from traditional ad mediums. 

Then the conversation shifted to YouTube.  (My favorite online hobby).  No doubt, YouTube, social media and the demand for rich media is changing the attitudes and behaviors of the workforce, marketing strategies and the corresponding demands on I.T.  It’s an exciting time to be in this industry!  What are your corporate governance policies on YouTube as a purposeful messaging medium?  Please share!

Our stance on YouTube is that it is an excellent destination site for video and serves the purpose for socializing and democratizing video content by providing a community for “like” videos.  However, it’s digital asset management tools that take the pain out of having to manage and repurpose video and other rich media content.  As Gartner has predicted, more than 25 percent of enterprise content will be images, audio and video by 2013.  How will organizations manage this content?  The simple answer is DAM.  In a tough economy, the more exact answer is DAM SaaS.  Hence, the reasons why we’re investing so much R&D efforts on embed links and cloud computing resources for offsite media storage.

Digital asset embed links allow marketers (who are shifting more toward online mediums) to repurpose images and video across all online channels while controlling their brand by maintaining the master file in one central repository.  Cloud computing allows us to offer our DAM SaaS solutions with on-demand scalability, while you budget for what you use.  As many of the analysts have stated, SaaS has the lowest penetration rate, but highest growth rates.  There are several (several may be stretching it) hosted digital asset management tools out there, but only one mid-market DAM company can claim the longevity and an evolving 60-year understanding in the makeup of digital assets.  Ok, Al Gore, we didn’t "invent" or "create" digital assets 60 years ago, but Widen was there...

Co-authors of the CMS Watch Digital & Media Asset Management Report, Theresa Regli and Kas Thomas, recently provided a great article to AIIM (The Enterprise Content Management Association) Infonomics, which helps technology professionals and business leaders alike understand the main differences between digital asset management (DAM) and web content management (WCM) systems. Additionally, the article defines several use cases for needing a DAM system. 

Here’s a summary of the article. 

Some confusion between DAM / WCM stems from WCM and enterprise content management (ECM) vendors promoting their products as DAM tools.  The truth is that most WCM vendors only offer a generic repository for binary files.  For those dealing with large amounts of rich media (images, audio/video, etc.), DAM tools are much more specialized to fit. 

In DAM, a piece of content becomes an asset when it’s been classified, indexed, versioned, secured, stored, reformatted, etc.  Digital assets are only valuable if they can be found and reused.  The key to search-ability is metadata.  Metadata is either automatically extracted (XMP, for example) or manually associated to assets. 

Established DAM vendors tend to be older than most WCM vendors.  Plus, DAM vendors have a broader understanding of the demands for scalability, storage and bandwidth in managing content.  DAM systems store files in a file system and the associated metadata is stored in a relational database.  Most WCM solutions (and light weight ECM tools, like SharePoint) store all content in a database, which generally doesn’t work for large rich media files.  According to the CMS Watch findings, metadata matters most in DAM more than any other content management technology.  Another unique feature offered by digital asset solutions not found in WCM solutions includes transforming and transcoding.  For example, converting a Windows Media File to a QuickTime or Flash Video file on the fly.  (The same goes for images.)  Other key features to DAM solutions include versioning, access controls via roles and permissions, navigation/search, review/collaboration and defining relationships between assets. 

Adopters of DAM systems include companies in manufacturing, retail, hospitality, consumer products, national/global brands, ad agencies and broadcasting. 

A few of the DAM system use cases listed in the article include:

• DAM Library or Photo Archive
• Brand Management
• Marketing Asset Production and Distribution
• Ad Production
• Catalog Production
• Short Form Video Production
• Broadcast Video Production

A complete list of common scenarios can be found in the CMS Watch Digital & Media Asset Management Report

A press release issued Monday by Gartner predicts 25% of content that workers see will be pictures, audio or video.  The consumer adoption and proliferation of video at home is driving the demand for its consumption in the workplace.  With 90 million viewers (73% of internet users) watching a video at least monthly, Gartner VP and distinguished analyst Whit Andrews said that companies who fail to adopt video risk alienating themselves from customers that start to request video communication services.  According to a Gartner survey in July 2008, 44% of enterprises have adopted digital asset management software technologies and 22% plan to implement a DAM system in 2009 to be more agile in managing and incorporating rich media into their marketing operations and communications. 

Is video production and video asset management a priority for you in 2009? 

If you can conduct your own internal study to gauge the demand for video communications, does your organization…

• Encourage the use of web 2.0 and/or social media?
• Use video for customer communications? Internal training? CEO messages to employees? Press and investor relations?
• Have an internal video production department?
• Have the infrastructure to support a high volume and high demand of video?
• Plan to increase the use of video in marketing communications in 2009?

Stephen Powers of Forrester recently published a Q&A document for information and knowledge management professionals giving stronger consideration for enterprise DAM solutions titled Get Ahead Of The Rich Media Management Curve.

Powers answers four key questions concerning DAM technology:

1. Can we use an existing content management solution to handle rich media assets?
2. What is the difference between DAM and Marketing Asset Management (MAM)?
3. Where do organizations typically run into problems around DAM ?
4. How should organizations approach a metadata strategy for DAM?

To answer the first question, Web Content Management (CMS) and Document Management (DM) systems are only short term solutions and do not provide accommodations for the processes that are defining features for DAM systems, including:

• The ability to automatically transform assets eliminating the need to store different formats of the same asset
• Access large numbers of files in remote offices
• Create a powerful, searchable library with the ability to automatically read and extract metadata

To answer the second question, Forrester defines Marketing Asset Management (MAM) as a subset to DAM where MAM focuses on the needs of marketing professionals, while DAM accompanies the needs of marketing, IT, creative and operations.

In the third question, Powers reports that organizations run into problems with DAM because DAM system implementations require specialized experience to succeed.  This lends itself to the growing popularity and success of on-demand DAM systems / Software as a Service to handle the implementation, training, support, upgrades, roadmap, and integration.  DAM SaaS organizations can better demonstrate how their solutions satisfy the specific use cases during the RFP process, can help publicize the system to drive user adoption during the launch phases and help organizations leverage best practices for metadata strategies during the implementation phases. 

Access the full article at Forrester.com and learn how to approach a metadata strategy for DAM programs.

I caught a great article for search marketers the other day titled The Search Visibility Plan, Not Your Average SEO Campaign, by Will Fleiss.  The article builds a case for digital asset management solutions to help search marketers leverage rich media content for blended search.  No marketer can ignore the power that search has in our daily lives.  Furthermore, no marketer can ignore the growing adoption and hunger for images and videos by online content consumers.  Fleiss maintains that having searchable content in different mediums distributed to your customer’s virtual hangouts and resources will become more important. 

Digital asset optimization is the term for leveraging rich media and its associated metadata for blended search.  The article gets into defining and constructing a Search Visibility Plan, which is the umbrella strategy for all online efforts from the standpoint of search.  For any piece of content that is found in search, you benefit from the visibility.  Fleiss explains that DAM should be considered a sizable chunk of your Search Visibility Plan because it allows the distribution of content to run smoothly.  More specifically, when digital assets are well organized and easy to find, they can be distributed and used more effectively in online channels.  What’s more, a DAM system helps marketers ensure that the digital assets are used by only those who have permission and are used within the rights and release dates set for those assets. 

DAM serves as a necessity for brand management and control for an organization’s brand assets.  Digital asset embed links are one way Widen is making it easy for marketers to leverage rich media in online mediums while at the same time making it easy to control rights and release / expiration dates.  Fleiss’ article ends with guidelines on creating a Search Visibility Plan, which includes these main topics:

1. Keyword Strategy
2. Search Engine Optimization
3. Mediums
4. Distribution Channels
5. Distribution Courses of Action
6. Measurement

View the Full Article and Template for Search Visibility

Stephanie Rose Ruff, Marketing Specialist for the Companion Products Group at Motorola, Inc, presented “What We Achieved in Enterprise DAM” at Digital Asset Management Los Angeles on November 11, 2008 at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel.

Hosted by Henry Stewart, the event was for those involved in the production, use and management of rich media and featured over 75 talks, case studies, panel sessions and interactive presentations.

Stephanie Ruff’s presentation addressed the business opportunities, challenges and solutions in digital asset management.  As a member of the Motorola Companion Products marketing team, Ruff’s experience “in the trenches” as an administrator for that division provided her the ability to deliver a dynamic presentation about how they established metadata taxonomies within the Motorola Collective.  Established in 2002, the Motorola Collective powered by Widen is deployed across the entire Motorola enterprise and supports 32,000 assets and 13,000 users worldwide including Motorolans, agencies, carriers, retailers, distributors and journalists.  Ruff is responsible for over 3,000 assets within Motorola’s Companion Products group, which is broken into five main categories: Mono Bluetooth Headsets, Automotive&Navigation, Music&Entertainment, Power&Personalization, and Digital Media.

In her presentation, Ruff explained how Motorola leverages the DAM SaaS technology from Widen to eliminate unnecessary costs and resources, improve reach across geographies and channels and save hours of manpower.  Ruff’s presentation focused on how she helped Motorola Companion Products advance the adoption of the digital asset management solution by establishing the Collective Guidelines for consistent metadata tagging standards across the organization.  Ruff instituted best practices in rich media management for Motorola by leveraging her technical education on how to maximize efficiency with database technology.

Widen’s expo and technology track presentation at the Henry Stewart LA Digital Asset Management Conference will feature a sneak peak at the new digital asset Embed Links technology.  If you’re planning to go to the LA show, be sure to check out a live demo of embed links in action at Widen’s booth #117. 

Embed links enable Widen Digital Asset Management users and online marketers to tie image and video assets to online mediums via unique web address, without placing the file in another location.  Every time a page loads that contains the embed link, data is transferred from the Widen DAM system to the online channel.  Embed links allow content consumers to instantly connect with rich media objects and ensures the latest content updates are always on display.


Marketing benefits of digital asset embed links include:

• One master repository for all images and videos used online
• All asset updates made in the Widen DAM system are dynamically published to an infinite number of online channels
• On-demand infrastructure scalability and “pay for what you use” services
• Consistent and accurate use of assets across all online channels

I'll be presenting "What's new in DAM SaaS" covering DAM as the foundation for online media publishing with embed links and the concept of “One Internet – One File” during the Technology Track at 2:15 on Monday, November 10.  My presentation will also include a look at DAM SaaS 2.0 with managed services on the client site using the Widen Appliance to accommodate internal creative workflows and will include an inside look at what “service” really means to a SaaS client using several customer case studies.  I'll be sitting in on the panel for the Brand&Marketing Asset Management Vendor Shootout at 1:15 on Tuesday, November 11. 

Widen has two customers presenting case studies at the DAM Conference:

Manny Cuevas, Director of Sales & Marketing for Level III Services, Inc. will talk about how the Widen hosted DAM system is used to deliver value-added services at 2:15 on Tuesday, November 11.

Stephanie Ruff, Marketing Specialist for Motorola, Inc., will present "What We Achieved with Enterprise DAM," addressing the challenges, business objectives and solutions to an enterprise-wide deployment of a DAM solution at 3:15 on Tuesday, November 11.

I hope to see you at the conference.

View the full conference program for Henry Stewart LA 2008