Social media. Love it or hate it, it’s not going away anytime soon. So for marketers that want to meet their customers where they are, they need to embrace it. A strategic social media presence impacts your brand awareness and can provide value to both B2C and B2B businesses. 

Visual content plays a critical role in modern marketing strategies. In fact, in 2020 74% of marketers reported that they incorporate visual elements in more than 70% of their content. That’s a lot of creative horsepower. But creating visual content can be expensive — so producing videos, planning an on-location photoshoot, or hiring a new designer, for example, can be a real challenge for marketing and creative teams. 

There’s a lot that goes into the decision to invest in new software. Who will use it? What do you need it to do? How much will it cost? How long will it take to set up? And so much more. In fact, the average Software as a Service (SaaS) sales cycle typically ranges between three to six months — and that doesn’t include a company’s initial internal research and discovery phase. In addition, the way teams buy software has changed. 

Today, savvy consumers don’t want to be sold to. They do more research up front — before they even speak to someone at a software company. But you know that. That’s what you’re doing now. You’re on a quest to find the best digital asset management (DAM) software out there. That’s why we’ve created this guide to help you with your search for the best DAM solution. 

Since all software is not created equal, this guide covers five things to look for in order to find the best DAM solution for your organization. So let’s get started.

Regular maintenance is an important part of keeping your digital asset management (DAM)  system operating efficiently and driving user satisfaction. Unfortunately, most DAM admins need to manage these duties on top of other roles and responsibilities — which makes finding time for regular maintenance a challenge. But with a little planning and guidance from our experts, you can keep your DAM system in top shape. 

If you’ve thought to yourself, “how often should I update …?” then keep reading.

Identifying the metadata fields you’ll use to organize the content in your digital asset management (DAM) system is an important part of the DAM setup process and ongoing maintenance. But we know that getting started can be a bit daunting.

You might wonder, how do I describe this asset? What will people search for? What type of metadata field should I use? 

Despite all those valid questions, getting started with metadata can actually be pretty simple. Just enlist your users to help. All you need are some Post-it Notes, printouts of assets, and cookies for this metadata brainstorm exercise.

Purchasing new software can be a big investment. And no matter how many bells and whistles a tool has, it will only be helpful if people use it. Fortunately, there are many ways to encourage the adoption of a new system, as well as long-term user engagement. From giving your system a meaningful name to collecting user feedback that informs optimization efforts.

Email is another great way to nurture and build user engagement. And when it comes to maintaining a digital asset management (DAM) system, email allows you to notify users of new content, reinforce standards, introduce features, or elicit feedback. It also fosters the relationship between the DAM admin and users by providing an easy way for users to reach out for help.

Keeping a digital asset management (DAM) system running smoothly requires continual maintenance. And gathering user feedback on what’s working, and what’s not, is an important part of any DAM maintenance strategy. One way to gather feedback is a user survey, which offers quick responses and an easy way to review and organize data. Another option is a focus group, which provides a more conversational opportunity for feedback. Either way, soliciting feedback from your users is a crucial part of DAM governance. 

A digital asset management (DAM) system is a powerful tool on its own. Acting as the foundation for content, teams rely on their DAM solution to centralize assets, collaborate across teams, provide secure access to collateral, and so much more. So there’s no doubt that the business case for DAM is there. But many teams are extending this value even further through digital asset management integrations. 

Quality content is a powerful market differentiator. It can help organizations resonate with consumers, strengthen their brand perception, and ultimately drive revenue. It’s no wonder that demand for outstanding creative work — from photography and graphics to copy and video — is at an all-time high. Organizations seeking to bring velocity to their creative workflows are increasingly turning to digital asset management (DAM) solutions, to store, organize, and manage their content.

DAM technology benefits are often based on different use cases — you can read about how Widen customers are using their DAM system in our case studies.  But across the wide range of ways that DAM systems are used, we've found these nine benefits to be universal.