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How can I use DAM to assist with preliminary research?


A Digital Asset Management (DAM) solution can be used for preliminary research even before considering other external sources/vendors to acquire new assets or before creating new assets. You may already have what you need internally, so it may be worth looking inside your own organization first. A DAM should be able to provide users with “for placement only” (FPO) assets for consideration in a project. These FPO assets could be watermarked by the DAM to easily discern between a lower quality FPO asset (which can not be published as is) and the approved asset for use in a project with the proper rights cleared.  Provided you have a fair number of assets for a project with enough metadata to find what you have on hand in a DAM, searching the DAM first may yield less research time for a project.

Realistically, once you acquire and/or create new assets, you may want to add them to the DAM in a timely manner so others may find them as well.  This makes it easier to reference and use these assets again whenever they fits the need of a project.

DAM users can create a DAM lightbox (or special collection) of specific assets found in the DAM for a particular project which could be shared and collaborated over with other DAM users, regardless of geographic location. These digital light  boxes could even be created and edited before meetings to discuss the project to streamline the process.

If you are worried you may be using the same assets too frequently across various projects, a report from the DAM can list of the number of downloads of assets or even a specific asset.

If you want to maintain brand consistency, you could store your organization’s logos in the DAM so the same, current set is easily searched, distributed and used from a single source (the DAM) rather than fragmenting distribution along with your brand.

How do you use DAM to assist with preliminary research?


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Digital Asset Management Los Angeles 2009 Conference

On November 9 and 10, 2009, I will be a guest presenter at DAM LA 2009. This is a two-day DAM conference held  in Los Angeles where I am scheduled to present on the following topics:

  • Dealing with Costs, Budgets and ROI
    • How do we budget for costs of implementing a DAM solution as well as the ongoing costs of operating a DAM? How can we measure return on investment in a consistent manner and justify the expenditure? We’ll explore real world cases and the pitfalls to avoid.
  • DAM and Change Management
    • As soon as we begin implementing a new DAM within an organization,we will need to deal with people, process and technology changes.
    • What about management issues? How do we evaluate employee competencies and their results?
    • What do employees need to do differently now than in the past? To whom do they report, when and how?
    • What skills are needed now more than ever?
  • DAM Career Planning, Qualifications and Hiring
    • Can people plan a DAM career? What does it take to be a DAM professional or Digital Asset Manager? We will explore resources available today to enrich our DAM knowledge and skills as well as explore the DAM job market.

If you plan to attend DAM LA 2009 conference:

Henry Stewart Events has offered $150 off using discount code for conference attendees and a discount for hotel guests.

I will tweet during the DAM Los Angeles Conference using #DAMLA09 as the hash tag, which you can search for, use and follow.

I look forward to meeting you if you attend the DAM LA 2009 Conference. If you can’t make it to the conference, feel free to send comments anytime.


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How do I explain what I do for a living with DAM?


People will ask you “What do you do for a living?” If you work with Digital Asset Management on a daily basis as I do, there are a few ways you can answer this question. You could:

  • Explain what you do in some detail, sometimes boring and/or confusing the average person.
  • Blab on and on, creating more hot air.
  • Give your elevator pitch: a simple, concise introduction to what you do for a living.

Before I had a simple explanation meant for the average person, I also confused lots of people (which is unfortunately really easy to do nowadays).  It took me a while to come up with this simple analogy. Here is how my DAM elevator pitch often goes whether I am speaking with an executive or someone I just met:

  1. An inquiring individual asks the question, “What do you do?”
  2. I reply, “I am a Digital Asset Manager. I work on Digital Asset Management.”
  3. The inquiring individual often says “What is that?”
  4. I say “Are you familiar with the iPod?”
  5. They often say “Yes,” unless they admit living in a cave since 2001.
  6. Whether that is the case or not, I quickly show them an iPod, scroll through its contents as I explain that “while this is meant for individual consumption of media (such as music, video, photos), I manage similar kinds of media (generally called assets). The big difference is we can share assets across an entire organization legally using a set of more sophisticated tools with a series of workflows, commonly referred to as DAM. This helps the organization save money by being able to search, find, use, reuse or repurpose what we already have in the DAM legally.” I show the how assets can be found using various information called metadata. With the case of music on the iPod by:
  • Album
  • Artist
  • Genre
  • Title

I answer any further questions they have, but that is my elevator pitch as to what I do for a living with DAM.

How do you explain what you do for a living with DAM as a user or administrator?


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Do you use permissions and roles with your DAM?