Three Big Takeaways from Digital Asset Management LA 

There are a few big takeaways from last week’s digital asset management (DAM) Los Angeles event. The conference didn’t disappoint, delivering great content, networking, and education for the vast ecosystem of digital asset management professionals. The event is called DAM LA, the art and practice of managing digital media. However, the event covers topics like brand strategy, user experience, and digital supply chain, too. The expanding importance of digital asset management in today’s organizations means organizations from Google to the NFL to Blizzard Entertainment and the Los Angles Philharmonic need to stay ahead of the curve. 

What were the three big takeaways from DAM LA? It’s hard to nail down just a few, but here you go: 

1.The Central Role of Digital Assets:  

As organizations scale and rely on digital assets to tell their brand story and sell solutions, the role of the assets increases. Alan Sanders from Ceasars Entertainment Corporation talked about this in his session at the event, Unleashing the DAM: its Crucial Function at the Heart of Ceasars’ Empire.  

The team at Ceasars thinks about digital assets as part of a long-term vision for asset management into video and archival for non-marketing assets. That not only extends the life of assets but reframes the value they bring to the organization. The right DAM solution makes that possible and helps streamline access to those assets like product imagery, descriptions, and more across an organization. 

2. Customer Experience:

Who uses and interacts with your DAM technology today? It’s an ever-expanding group from creative teams to technical teams to marketing, and more. How can you maximize the customer experience for diverse needs and skill sets across an organization?  

The session Supporting Multi-Functioning Teams: How Digital Asset Management brings a Fresh Approach to the User Experience with speakers from Google and Amazon Lab126 shared best practices to solve this challenge. A solution works when it is used, so part of the challenge is to ensure you can deliver a positive customer experience for the teams using your DAM. Think about fielding questions at scale, meeting training needs, and more. Build your power-user base and ensure there is always a place for feedback to optimize the process for the DAM solution, and its users. 

Also think about data governance structure and how you document and update it. This will help build a better customer experience as clearly defined data governance removes inefficiencies and doubt for end-users. Remember, like most technologies, a digital asset management solution isn’t a “set it and forget it” so revisit data governance policies and structure to meet evolving needs.  

3. Doing More with Less 

Many of the sessions during DAM LA mentioned scalability, optimization, and efficiency. A digital asset management solution helps deliver all of those when done well. Efficiency is especially important because DAM solutions integrate with other key technologies like AI, CRM, PIM, eCommerce, and more to help organizations scale.

How important is efficiency? Well, “71% of marketers in one survey admitted their assets were stored in an email, 68% said they were on a USB drive and 55% kept their assets on a public drive, while a shocking 90% admitted to losing confidential assets over the past year.”  

If teams waste precious time looking for essential assets, that is a huge loss of productivity. Not to mention, a lack of organization and data governance means assets may never be recovered. That points to an even bigger challenge for scalability and optimizing assets.

The right DAM solution delivers significant value to an organization across different areas and functions.

Missed DAM LA? Head over to the Henry Stewart website to see when the next events scheduled.   

If you love to talk about all things digital asset management and more, check out the OneTeg blog. We’ll keep you up to date on digital transformation, iPaaS, the martech ecosystem, and more. DAM content always included.