What is Digital Asset Management (DAM)?

What is digital asset management?

Digital asset management (DAM) is the practice of administering, organizing, and distributing media files. DAM software enables brands to develop a library of photos, videos, graphics, PDFs, and templates that are easy to search and ready to deploy.

DAM originated in the 1990s when marketing went digital. As the volume of media files exploded, they became siloed in individual computers or mazes of shared folders. Marketing teams struggled to find and distribute their content for product launches and campaigns.

So, DAM pioneers studied the information management techniques used by librarians and applied them to media files. Widen was on the front edge of this trend. Our answer to these challenges was the Widen Collective®, an enterprise content management platform built around DAM. Today, more than 700 of the world’s most respected brands use our enterprise DAM tools to:

Centralize media files in a single platform

Automate time-consuming processes like metadata tagging and content distribution

Collaborate on content creation, review, and approval

Share assets through self-service portals

Analyze content performance and usage

Repurpose assets to maximize the return on investment

Protect brands from inconsistencies and image rights violations

Integrate marketing technology (martech) tools into one, content-centric stack

Who needs digital asset management?

Creators, including graphic designers, photographers, and videographers, use Widen’s enterprise DAM solution as a central repository for their files. Initial proofs can be shared, reviewed, and approved in the DAM platform through automated workflows. The final version can then be shared with marketers, salespeople, and e-commerce teams through self-service portals. Thus, DAM spares creators from fulfilling email requests for files. Instead, they can focus on creative work.

Marketers use DAM software to manage the media files creators produce for their campaigns, product launches, and content marketing operations. In the DAM solution, marketers can search for content by keyword, convert file formats, publish to multiple channels, and share assets with agencies, distributors, retailers, and other collaborators. Widen’s analytics reveal which assets perform best, how they’re used, and where they’ve appeared around the web. That feedback helps marketers make better investments in content.

IT professionals are responsible for integrating marketing technologies into a cohesive stack. With dozens of prebuilt integrations and robust APIs, Widen’s DAM software is the perfect hub. It connects to popular platforms for web content management, customer relationship management, social media management, creative work, and project management.

Benefits of digital asset management

Saves time at every step of the content lifecycle. DAM users can find, tag, clip, embed, convert, share, or publish assets with a few clicks.

Protects the brand by controlling access to content. Only approved, up-to-date assets will reach your social marketers, salespeople, and partners.

Eliminates bottlenecks by letting collaborators search and browse brand assets on their own. Nobody on the marketing team should have to spend all day emailing files.

Create once, publish everywhere, or COPE, with embed codes. If you alter a master file in the DAM platform, every instance of that asset on the web will automatically update, too. How cool is that?

Improves ROI on content by providing analytics on searches, downloads, views, usage, and engagement. You’ll know what to repurpose, what to retire, and what to create in the future.

Minimizes busywork by plugging DAM technology into other martech systems. Social marketers, salespeople, and others can access and search assets in the platforms where they normally work. No more downloading and re-uploading files.

What you get with digital asset management

Quick search, predictive search, faceted search
Automatic file conversions
Share links and embed codes
Collections and Portals
Customizable metadata and categories
Batch uploading and editing
Version control and auditing
Rights management
Adobe Creative Cloud integration
Project management and file sharing integrations
Image recognition and auto tagging
Template customization/localization
Do-it-yourself automation for custom notifications
Asset-level analytics
System reporting and dashboards
Asset archiving
Secure, scalable cloud infrastructure with AWS
Global content delivery network (CDN)
Enterprise governance controls
Granular roles and permissions

See how others are using digital asset management in your industry

Agencies
Increase productivity of marketing, advertising, creative and design

Food and Beverage
Encourage global brand consistency

Healthcare
Secure brand assets and support compliance

Higher Education
Centralize digital assets and get all departments on track

Manufacturing
Global distribution of brand assets

Media and Entertainment
House media assets and manage image rights

Non-Profit
Maximize marketing resources on a limited budget

Print and Publishing
Streamline production operations

Retail
Bring together assets from everywhere for multi-channel promotions

Sports
Connect with press and revenue opportunities

Travel and Tourism
Give the public and press approved brand assets

Digital asset management

Bring order to content chaos