Digital Asset Management (DAM) is a must-have software tool for any business that creates and utilizes large volumes of digital media assets. Many businesses manage vast digital libraries, from branding such as logos to product images, audio, and video. Added to that, the lifecycle of a digital asset may be complex. Each asset created will undergo cycles of creation, collaboration, and review before distribution. Once created, these assets need to be delivered via a content delivery network (CDN) to public websites. And, ultimately, many digital assets require KPI-metric measurement to assess their impact and performance.
Very commonly, digital assets undergo multiple review-update cycles, thus requiring them to be versioned and their lifecycle to be managed – from creation to archival. Add digital rights considerations to the requirements, and you can see why DAM software is an essential toolset for many businesses.
Enterprise DAM’s are usually sold as complex software, and choosing one requires an in-depth round of requirements gathering, browsing of many reviews, vendor meetings, and more. What customers need from a DAM has undergone tremendous changes, and frankly, most enterprise DAM vendors are stuck in the past. Our honest opinion – if you are considering an enterprise DAM, then don’t!
Seriously, we took a good hard look at customer feedback on price, customer satisfaction, and usability. Seeing the outcomes, we knew that there was room in the market for a small and lean vendor offering that would outstrip the goliaths. Our experience is that when enterprise-level software attempts to meet every requirement, it fails. It fails by corroding the usability experience by adding too many bells and whistles to one user interface.
We believe that DAM tools should be intuitive and meet key requirements, nothing more.
Choosing a vendor means having a clear idea of your requirements. A DAM system’s key function is to manage digital assets using modern Cloud-based technologies and provide secure, fast, and intuitive access. DAM managers, end-users, and developers should all be delighted to use the system because it does its job well and does only its job. When considering your DAM vendor, choosing a system that does not require a huge learning curve will significantly impact your teams’ enthusiasm for the tool.
Of course, the DAM must also fit your functionality requirements. Our research revealed that most businesses considering a DAM required:
Image and video conversions (e.g. TIFF > JPEG, flv > MP4) Dynamic resizing of images and a Content Delivery Network (CDN; that means your content delivered from our servers, optimized to serve the user from their region) Downloadable links for media (e.g. audio, images, pdf, etc.) Delivery of high-resolution images (with image zoom option for commerce) Delivery of media optimized for the endpoint (e.g. mobile vs web) Automatic scaling for peak-load within minutes to handle high volumes of traffic.
The assumption that enterprise-level DAMs will provide the best solution is flawed. There are several reasons why the goliaths so often fail; the top three are:
Many DAM systems enforce a fixed workflow. Workflows are a collaboration mechanism that ensures the right action is taken on the right assets at the right time. However, teams and workflows are constantly evolving units. This means that any complex workflow setup designed by anyone other than your team is redundant before it is deployed. Rather than shoehorning your team into someone else’s conception of a workflow, choose a simple or adaptable system. It may mean the difference between a happy well-functioning team or working with people who are tweaked out by poor ergonomics!
A common complaint about enterprise-level DAM systems is that they fail to meet performance expectations. Often this is because they are not architected for the demands of high-performance and media-rich internet experience. And, they do not or can’t provide adequate bandwidth or processing power. Consider a SaaS DAM managing product images for an ecommerce website; it may receive thousands of product media every minute from product suppliers around the world. It must handle uploads while simultaneously rendering hundreds of thousands of product media for use on websites and apps. In a scenario such as this, the scalable architecture of the DAM system is key to its performance.
When evaluating DAM systems, always stress-test them for peak load. It may be the difference between whether an ecommerce site survives the next Black Friday or those Christmas sales or not.
Our research revealed that SaaS DAMs hosted in the Cloud tend to perform better in these scenarios than one hosted within corporate IT infrastructure. This is because, with Cloud tech, capacity is scalable. That said, several SaaS DAM systems are not architected for scalability, and they crawl under the load.
The final key issue that is created by the bloated development teams so often found among the enterprise-level DAM vendors is over-engineered products. Product features that attempt to solve problems that are non-existent in the real world are responsible for many of the usability issues revealed in our research phase.
Over-engineered products hurt users. They place a massive learning curve in front of very busy and very effective people. Asking people to sacrifice their time to appreciate your wild imaginings is not the role of a DAM developer. If you are dedicated to your ROI, never expect your entire team to jump through hoops like performing ponies just to use a new software tool.
Shopping for a DAM vendor is a fantastic journey to be on because the right decision will significantly optimize your teams’ performance and ease their workflows. When searching for your next digital asset management software, consider ease of use, functionality, and performance. And, test that performance before you buy.
Did we mention that we entered the DAM market place determined to provide a lean and highly efficient DAM? FileSpin gives you the best set of features and open APIs to manage your digital media assets. Come trial our intuitive UX and stress-test our Cloud architecture. We exist to impress!