3 best practices for DAM from Kodakit
| September 23, 2019
Natasha Adams, CMO of Kodakit, joined us for a conversation about her best practices for digital asset management (DAM), based on her many years of experience leading marketing organizations.
For Natasha, DAM forms the foundation of successful marketing.
“I think a lot of people disregard the operational part of marketing, which is really the backbone. Without that foundation, no marketer can be successful. Asset management has been in my DNA for the last 10 years and I truly believe it will continue to be as I grow in these functions in marketing,” said Natasha.
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves! With that in mind, let’s dive into Natasha’s tips for successful DAM.
Best practices for digital asset management
1. Get your team’s buy-in first
It starts with the team. You can buy great off-the-shelf solutions, but without your team’s buy-in, those solutions won’t gain traction. The team has to be bought into what the systems can offer, and bought into plugging data into that tool daily and making sure they stay on top of their responsibilities when it comes to that tool, such as uploading assets with the correct metadata and in the correct folders.
2. Stay organized even as the team grows
As the company grows, it needs to grow with the same foundation and organizational structure. Make sure everyone is on the same page and knows what to do at every step of the process. Team members should be able to answer questions like:
- How are we naming files and tagging images?
- How are we letting people know there’s new content online?
- How are we getting our stakeholders involved and what’s the review or approval process?
3. Track your assets over their lifetime and learn from your metrics
Managing an asset doesn’t just end with uploading it into a DAM. With today’s tools, you can actually measure things like the uptake of these assets and how they are being used. Use these metrics to be honest with yourself and take responsibility for your assets. For example, if you’re a marketer and you’ve created sales sheets for the sales team, but no one is using them – use that information to move forward and work more effectively.
How Kodakit implemented DAM best practices with Canto
Kodakit chose Canto because it checked all of their boxes and enables the team to implement DAM best practices with ease.
- Full team buy-in: “Canto has all the components of how marketers want to work today. It’s extremely user-friendly and modern. Getting the full team buy-in for Canto was the biggest win,” said Natasha.
- Scalability: “We’re growing between 10-15x a year. We need something that works with our speed. Canto being really fast and turnkey was important.”
- Cloud-based and flexible: “Canto being cloud-based gives us tremendous flexibility and global reach. People have real-time access to the tool.”
- Room to grow: “Canto meets greater than 90% of our needs and we don’t even use the tools to the max.”
- Friendly price: “For a startup, it’s affordable.”
Using Canto, Kodakit has a centralized digital asset library that empowers their multinational marketing and sales teams to access any content, including documents, that they need – whether that’s images or slide decks or contracts. They also use Canto portals to share assets more quickly with outside partners and vendors across multiple countries.