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In the current market landscape creating content is how businesses stay relevant.
As professional marketers in the digital world, owning sales channels and navigating through social media also means constantly managing images, music, and videos for the purpose of posting and promoting businesses. However, this comes with its own risk. Many business owners are not well versed in intellectual property laws or how it applies to resources borrowed from the internet, be it an image used on one’s e-flier or piece of music used in the background of a promotional video.
This is where Digital Asset Management (DAM) comes into play and understanding this concept should be part of the marketing strategies of businesses.
What is Digital Asset Management?
DAM is the management, organization, and distribution of digital assets including managing the rights of use for the assets.
How does Digital Asset Management affect a Small Company and Why do you need it?
Every asset you use has an identity.
Is it a stock image? Did you download it from someone else’s website or another library?
Whatever the case may be, the identity of these assets is associated with rights. More importantly, the ownership of the rights determines where the said asset can be used, possible restrictions, the duration of use, and what it can be used for.
There can be multiple rights holders for assets that you need to consider.
For example, if it is a photo, these are some of the questions you need to ask:
- Who is the photographer?
- Was it a location shoot that required a permit?
- Is there a model?
- Do I need consent from the model to use his or her photograph?
Similarly, video and audio assets have talent, directors, and other contributing factors that need to be considered.
Using assets outside of their assigned rights or consuming someone else’s resources without obtaining permission, leaves your company vulnerable to possible litigation and financial repercussions.
Owning assets is not a simple operation either. You need to consider if you have multiple versions of the same asset, whether you know where to find the updated version, and whether you are in a position to share the asset with clients.
How to determine if you need Digital Asset Management?
Every company’s situation is going to be different. There is no one-size-fits-all solution or a cookie-cutter way to evaluate needs.
The fact is that specialized Digital Asset Management systems are typically more expensive than simpler, consumer-focused solutions such as Dropbox or Google Drive.
However, the benefits of a DAM solution, even a basic, ‘no frills’ solution provides the confidence that you are working with the correct assets, can search and consume assets, and that the security settings are in place to protect your data. A DAM solution provides easy access to your assets while ensuring proper versions and asset rights are managed. If not a necessity, it is certainly a prudent choice.
How do you currently manage your assets?
If you have suggestions, or questions, feel free to reach out.
