What to include in your business case for a DAM solution

Your team is done struggling with content chaos

You’re over endlessly searching for that one file you need. And you’re tired of redoing work because the wrong asset was used. You know that a digital asset management (DAM) solution is the answer but now you need budget approval and aren’t sure where to start.

We’ll walk you through four key points to include in a case for DAM and the business impacts leadership wants to know about. When armed with this information, you’ll be able to articulate why your team (and brand) needs a DAM system and how it will help your company reach its content goals.

Understand your why

You realize there’s a better way to manage your digital content but being able to connect workflow pain points to business outcomes isn’t always that clear cut. Gaining an understanding of why you need a DAM solution will make it easier to define and communicate.

Start by documenting your pain points and connecting them to business goals. If your team is spending hours trying to locate the right file to use in the latest ad, having a centralized, searchable source for all of your content will save both time and money.

Or maybe you’re paying for separate file sharing, content storage, and collaboration software. Consolidating these tools into one system will help your company see immediate savings with reduced subscription costs.

Here are some other common reasons teams invest in a DAM platform:

Ensure brand consistency. When content is kept in multiple locations it can cause havoc on your brand consistency. Having a single location where teams can confidently access content will help keep your brand aligned across channels.

Repurpose content. A lot of time and money is spent creating content. Have you thought about repurposing it? When design files are easily findable and accessible, they can be used for other projects - sometimes as is, or as a jumping-off point for a new design evolution.

Minimize usage risks. Copyright infringement is costly for both companies and consumers. Protecting your content from usage violations with DAM and digital rights management (DRM) can keep your content safe and protect your teams from incorrectly using copyrighted assets as well.

Determine your DAM users

Any business that relies on digital assets to build their brand or power their marketing operations can benefit from using a DAM system — and today, that’s almost everyone. Organizations of all sizes can take advantage of a DAM solution whether they’re looking to streamline content workflows, expand into new e-commerce channels, or create exceptional customer experiences.

Your why is likely to help determine who will use your DAM system, but these are some of the teams who commonly rely on it for their day-to-day work.

Creators:
Graphic designers, photographers, videographers, writers, and other creators looking to streamline their workflows.

Marketers:
Marketers use DAM tools to manage the files creators produce for their campaigns, product launches, and content marketing initiatives.

IT professionals:
IT professionals are responsible for integrating marketing technologies into a cohesive stack that reduces redundancies and improves collaboration between systems and teams.

Agencies
Agencies rely on DAM tools to safeguard client assets, increase productivity, and gain on-demand access to the up-to-date, approved content for campaigns.

Document your DAM use cases

Documenting your use cases brings your business case to life. Detailing your why and who in real-life scenarios gives each benefit context and makes them more relatable. Let’s take a look at three use case examples.

Organize content in one system

Files are often scattered across siloed platforms which leads to teams using outdated versions of content and means lost time spent finding the right file. Having a central library for assets makes it easy for team members and external partners to find exactly what they need – when they need it.

For this use case, consider how many teams need access to different content daily. Focus on what it will mean for your teams and work if files are easily accessible and can confidently be used.

Integrate your martech stack

DAM platforms integrate with other marketing technology (martech) — like a content management system (CMS) — to give teams secure access to assets from within the tools they use the most. This could be through an Adobe Creative Cloud integration that allows users to access DAM assets from Adobe programs, saving them time from downloading and uploading files. Or perhaps you’re looking to bring your products to market faster. Integrating a DAM system with a product information management (PIM) solution will bring together all of the information needed to launch your content across channels.

For this use case, consider the tools your users rely on the most. Where can you save time and automate workflows by syncing information across platforms?

Transform and reuse content

There’s no reason to task a designer with creating a whole set of file sizes manually when that can be automated. Within a DAM solution, permissioned users can convert images, videos, and audio files to other formats on the fly. Common file format conversions allow users to download specific file conversions that can be used for social media, slide decks, and webpages or cropped and resized as needed.

You can also use analytics to monitor content effectiveness. Once you know which assets perform well, you can look for ways to repurpose the content or bring it to life in a new way.

For this use case, think about how your assets are being used and whether or not you could get more from them. If many of your files represent single-use content, you could benefit greatly from giving more teams easy access to assets for reuse and repurposing.

Prove DAM ROI

There are many factors that go into proving DAM return on investment (ROI) but there are a few common equations to use to demonstrate wins.

Let’s apply this example in the equations below:

60,000 assets downloads per year

Four minutes to manually find and download each asset

4,000 hours per year spent asset fulfilling requests

Designer’s salary: £25/hour

10 hours to recreate one asset

Search and share time savings

This is the time a graphic designer or marketing team member spends finding, gathering, and sending digital assets to internal and external stakeholders.

(4 minutes) x (60,000 assets) / 60 minutes = 4,000 hours saved per year

Asset fulfillment savings

This is the time it takes to fulfill requests when there’s not a central content library available — not taking into consideration the time the requestor waits for the file in order to move their work forward.

(4,000 hours per year) x (£25/hour) = £100,000 per year

Asset creation and repurposing savings

This is the time spent creating new assets when teams could reuse or repurpose existing assets.

(10 hours to recreate one asset per week) x (52 weeks) = 520 hours

(520 hours per year) x (£25/hour) = £13,000 per year

Find more ROI considerations and impacts in our ROI models for DAM systems guide.

Setting your team up for DAM success

These four components will help you build your business case for a DAM solution. Keeping it simple, relatable, and meaningful to the business will go a long way in demonstrating value — especially in the long term.

Your DAM system is a key part of the ROI equation and it’s important to evaluate DAM solutions closely in order to choose the right one for your organization. If you’re looking for other ways to justify your DAM investment before starting your search, this guide has even more information including examples from major brands and how they use their DAM platform to power digital experiences.

And if you’ve already secured support for your DAM invest, congratulations. We’d love to show you ours in action. Get in touch to request a demo.

By Nate Holmes