{"id":20168,"date":"2022-03-22T14:22:09","date_gmt":"2022-03-22T13:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.teamnext.de\/blog\/image-management-for-businesses-a-comprehensive-guide\/"},"modified":"2024-04-09T11:06:55","modified_gmt":"2024-04-09T09:06:55","slug":"image-management-for-businesses-a-comprehensive-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.teamnext.de\/en\/blog\/image-management-for-businesses-a-comprehensive-guide\/","title":{"rendered":"Image management software for businesses: a comprehensive guide"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Image management software for businesses: a comprehensive guide<\/h1>\n

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Reading time:<\/span> 18<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Table of contents<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Do you know what defines professional image management? And have you budgeted for that yet? If not, then this guide should be of welcome help to you.<\/p>\n

Since 2006, corporate spending on online advertising has increased more than fivefold. In Germany alone, digital advertising budgets amounted to over\u00a010 billion Euro per year in 2020.<\/p>\n

In addition to advertising budgets, corporate investment in digital content creation has also multiplied. So it’s no surprise that digital content is one of the most valuable marketing assets companies have today. In other words: We have fully arrived in the digital age<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But why is so little attention paid to the management of these very digital assets (images, videos, documents, etc.)? Why do many companies not care? And what means can be used to remedy this deficit?<\/p>\n

In the following sections, we’ll get to the bottom of these questions and show you ways to get even more out of your company’s digital media assets<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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What are digital assets?<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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There is a very important difference between a digital file and a digital asset. A digital file can be created by any employee. It does not necessarily represent real value to your organization. Whereas digital assets literally means digital assets.<\/p>\n

Digital marketing assets include intangible assets and creative works. They come as photos, graphics, videos, audios and texts, often in mixed form, i.e. multimedia content. Together, they form a total that has to be increased. Good digital asset management, always means maximizing the ROI (return on investment<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Due to the complexity and importance of this special field for medium-sized and large companies, it is generally recommended to use a professional image management software. In technical terms such a software is also called digital asset management system<\/a>. (DAM system or DAM platform for short.)<\/p>\n

\"What

DAM stands for digital asset management.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Why does my company need professional image management?<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Unlike a simple cloud storage<\/a> or file sharing service, professional image management software can be used to enrich digital marketing assets from your media pool with relevant additional information and metadata<\/a>. These are, for example, image descriptions (captions), keywords (tags), license information, copyright notices, references to consent declarations or campaign information.<\/p>\n

As a result, a company’s digital assets can be located more quickly and are available for immediate use by all employees with permission access for image management, regardless of location. Needless to say that this increases your team’s productivity. Your digital content production processes accelerate. And ultimately your media reach increases.<\/p>\n

In many companies, digital assets are not only generated and used within the marketing department, but often also within corporate communications, event organization, or product and industrial design.<\/p>\n

In a professional media management system, all types of digital assets can be managed and organized together. This also includes special file formats such as vector graphics<\/a>, multimedia presentations or RAW formats<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Why you shouldn’t organize digital assets via services like WeTransfer or Dropbox<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Typical cloud storage and file sharing services such as Dropbox<\/a>, Google Drive<\/a>, OneDrive<\/a> or\u00a0WeTransfer<\/a> often only focus on file storage or data transfer. With a cloud-based DAM system<\/a>, on the other hand, the range of functions is significantly greater than with conventional cloud storage.<\/p>\n

A principle of professional media management is to store all assets centrally in unique original versions. If the asset is needed in a different resolution<\/a>, file size, or file format, the system always reverts to the centrally stored original version to create the modified version of the asset. Even when creating albums, collections, or other curated compilations, assets are not physically copied, but made available virtually. In other words, no unnecessary copies are created that remain permanently in the system. Instead, file references are used to keep the system lean and efficient.<\/p>\n

Of course, contemporary image management is not just about efficient organization and secure storage. The functional area of release, distribution and tracking is at least as important. Access and editing rights can usually be assigned granularly to individual users or user groups of the image management. This makes it possible to better distribute digital content within a company. Thus, the degree of utilization of the existing media and image stock increases.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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The digital heart of your brand and corporate communications<\/h3>\n<\/div><\/section>
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In contrast to classic cloud storage, which focuses on mere file management, a digital asset management system<\/a> places the content at the center and seamlessly maps all relevant processes (archiving, structuring, distribution, implementation, tracking) around this core.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, cloud-based media management is the digital heart in an organization’s communication processes. Such a system makes it possible to speed up internal processes when working with digital assets, make them more efficient, and ensure the long-term usability of image or video files. After all, you can only achieve maximum ROI if the elaborately produced photo shoot or video unfolds its full potential of media reach and does not “gather dust” unused in a cloud storage.<\/p>\n

A DAM platform available online is more comparable to a well-structured, modern library. A library in which all relevant information can be found in a very short time and whose infrastructure makes it possible to easily duplicate results, distribute them quickly and publish them with little effort. By having a central distribution channel for your digital assets within your company, you also ensure consistent and uniform brand visibility, especially in decentralized structures.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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State of the art: What else characterizes modern image management?<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Modern image management software is usually cloud-based and features an intuitive user interface and a high degree of flexibility and security. Moreover, it is only up to date if the field of machine learning is an integral part. For conceptual classification: machine learning is the basis for the vast majority of forms of artificial intelligence. In practice, the use of artificial intelligence means an extreme acceleration of workflows. Work that previously could only be done manually and with a great deal of time can be performed fully automatically and simultaneously with high precision using an AI platform<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Until now, you may have created keywords<\/a> by hand, spent hours clicking through folders of photos to find a specific person, or repeatedly found that many files were duplicated and triplicated through your database. When you rely on an AI-powered platform<\/a>, these problems become a thing of the past. A media management system that has AI modules can save you a great deal of routine work by automatically recognizing people and objects and generating appropriate tags, or identifying duplicates as such as soon as they are uploaded.<\/p>\n

\"Symbol

Symbolic image: recognition of people in photos by artificial intelligence<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Intelligent file status management<\/h3>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Another feature that can speed up workflow is sophisticated file status management. If the administrative users can immediately see whether an image is still being processed, has been released for public reproduction or has also been blocked, the elimination of communicative necessities not only saves time, but there are also fewer “accidents” due to misunderstandings in the release process.<\/p>\n

In summary, it can be said that the introduction of modern media management speeds up workflows in such a way that new time freedoms are created, freedoms that can be used for the actual creative process. So not only do you reduce the production costs of digital marketing assets, but you always encourage the creative output of the entire marketing team.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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Best practices \u2013 for maximum added value in image management<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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In the next sections we would like to show you in a practical way how the change from a classic image database to a cloud-based media management platform will succeed without any problems. We start with the question of the right software solution.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>
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How do I find the right software solution for my business?<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/section>
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As with any IT project, you should take a close look at your specific requirements profile at the beginning of the selection process for a suitable digital image management system.<\/p>\n

When choosing the right system, the following questions can help you:<\/p>\n