You're invited: Product Photography & DAM (7/14)

If you’ve incorporated video marketing into your digital marketing strategy, chances are you’ve already noticed a change in how your users respond to your brand. Not only does a good video hold their attention a little longer, but when done right it brings a user into your world and turns them into brand promoters.  And that’s ultimately what digital marketing is all about, isn’t it?  But keeping up with this trend is about balancing the number of video assets you create with a storage and management platform that can keep up. Because let’s face it, video requires a lot more storage than other forms of content, and the quicker you scale, the bigger the challenge to keep on top of things becomes.  Before your video assets transform into a monster you can’t control, you need to have a system in place that encourages efficiency early on. To help you save time and resources we’ve highlighted a few things you can do to ensure that your video asset management is seamless.  How do you categorize videos? Losing content can be DAM annoying! Unfortunately, without developing a system that helps you to correctly categorize the video assets, it’s bound to happen.  To avoid spending countless hours you don’t have looking for a video buried amongst hundreds of others, use metadata tags, labels, and folders to categorize videos – depending on which video asset management software you’re using.  Globaledit’s video asset manager makes your life easier by using metadata tags that are searchable based on time, names, locations, and much more. . With such specific tags, you’d be able to find the exact video you’re looking for, without having to watch the hundreds of videos before it.  Where should I store videos on the computer? Where you store your videos is just as important as how you store them because it boils down to security, storage space, and accessibility.  You could possibly store them on your hard drive but, due to how large video files can be, storing them there will bring about storage challenges. And we’ve all been victim to the DAM frustration of sluggish PCs that result from an almost full hard drive. The frustration that coffee or even smoke breaks can’t soothe.  So, not only are you constantly moving and compressing video files, but you’re also battling slower production.  Further to that, when a project requires collaboration, security can become a major issue. How do you manage and track what is sent out and to where? Cloud-based storage specifically for videos provides storage while allowing anyone with an internet connection to access the video assets. That’s not to say that every cloud storage is created equal. To get the most out of your cloud storage, ask the service provider a few questions that may include:  Is there a limit to the file size I store at a time?  What is the upload speed and, Do you offer video-specific features like media streaming?  How do you organize an asset library? Organizing an asset library when you’re staring down an intimidating number of assets can be overwhelming. You’ve categorized each of them so now what? A good place to start is with the most-used video assets. To identify which ones those are, look through which videos are the most requested. If different departments are asking for the same video assets you can regard them as a top priority and start organizing those videos in your asset library first.  After organizing your most important videos, create a customer portal that will allow you to send approved images to distributors. This will save you time searching for images when they’re requested in the future. Another time-saver to consider will require that you create a one-stop-shop for digital assets by sorting through high and low-res imagery, and pre-defined-sized images for social media, in the different formats that may be requested. By cherry-picking the most popular images, you’ll create an efficient workflow for you and your team.  What is a digital asset management tool? A digital management tool helps busy creatives store, organize, retrieve and share their digital content from a centralized location. Digital asset management includes more than video asset management but includes everything that your digital content consists of. Looking for a robust digital and video asset management tool that can handle all of your storage and creative needs in one place? Our video asset management platform allows you not only to store, manage and collaborate on projects but to integrate with your favorite creative tools as well. We understand how much time is wasted clicking between different software and interfaces to complete one project.  After choosing the package that suits your storage needs, you and your team will be able to manage your video assets with an efficient video asset management tool.  Start your free trial today to experience it for yourself! 

Efficient workflows have become fundamental for the smooth running of operations for any business. But traditional workflows have especially paved the way for digital transformation by automating workflows and streamlining creative operations. According to workflow automation stats, digital process automation was valued at $7.8 billion in 2019 and is expected to reach $16 billion by 2025. In the motoring era of digital transformation, creative businesses have been motivated to relook their legacy methods as they are becoming more agile in a market that requires creativity and content on-demand. That’s also obvious why you’re reading this. Another interesting statistic shows that 94% of the enterprise business professionals prefer building workflow automation on a unified automation platform where all their applications are connected, instead of relying on disparate systems. And if you’re part of the 94% – you’ve hit the jackpot right here. Because here we’ll talk about how next-generation digital asset management (DAM) systems automate workflows to improve the efficacy of asset management – which is also referred to as a ‘digital asset management workflow’. OK, but what exactly is a DAM workflow? A digital asset management workflow is a series of tasks that guides the asset production cycle and helps to automate each step as much as possible to eliminate manual processes. From the time of asset creation up until distribution and preservation, the digital asset management process flow will highlight the activities on each step and alert for any prompt actions. The structure of DAM workflows can be customized with automation recipes based on the needs of your creative teams – and to ultimately boost productivity and creativity.    What are the types of digital asset management workflows? DAM workflows will look different for each business, but for creatives, the workflows would mostly look like a combination of these elements or entail them in full: Asset production Metadata framework management User permissions for access and control Editing and approval Asset distribution Data and insights analysis of assets How to streamline digital asset management workflows? The key to an effective DAM workflow is organized assets, structured digital asset management processes, and integrated platforms. Remember that unified platform we mentioned earlier? That’s it – right here. Digital asset management software has tons of features that automate and streamline the workflow process. And here’s how your business and creative teams can benefit: Creative project management Globaledit’s DAM workflow already has an added layer of security with its built-in project feature for full control over all your digital assets. This gives you the ability to view, allocate or reassign project tasks to creative teams with granular access permissions so you can manage what’s displayed on their workflow dashboards. Store and organize with metadata All your digital assets and process indicators are stored and managed on one central platform. And with metadata, you can upload and store assets using tags and keywords that’ll make them instantly searchable. This cancels out the wasted time of looking for files, as they are readily available and accessible to all team members and stakeholders. Fast-tracked approvals A quicker approval process means faster distribution times. With DAM’s workflow approval features, all parties involved in the creative process will have access to the asset to give comments and instant approvals. You can smooth out any bottlenecks as DAM’s workflow voting system allows parties to view, make comments and approve assets at the same time. It’s really a core feature for an effective and streamlined workflow. Tech stack integrations This golden feature enables you to connect your most used systems and apps to the DAM workflow platform with simple API integrations. Your team will be able to centrally work on multiple systems. From PIMs, DAMs, CMS and comms app channels plus more, you can truly create a seamless workflow experience Workflow automation recipes Last but definitely not least. Avoid repetitive tasks by setting rules, triggers and actions with workflow recipes. When these recipes are joined by tech integrations, each action on a system will prompt a task on the other system for action by the assigned team member. Find out how globaledit’s can help you affordably elevate your creative workflow operations with digital asset management workflow solutions.

If you’re a creative industry professional, working either in e-commerce, retail, media, a marketing agency, or any other business alike – you’ll understand the headaches of scattered digital assets, broken communications, and delayed delivery times. The ultimate cause of disorganized chaos and disrupted creative workflows. And no matter which tools you invest in, you still find yourself navigating through multiple platforms to create, store, locate and share your digital assets. So, here you are. Because you’ve obviously heard that digital asset management tools help streamline your creative operations. And we’re here to tell you exactly more of that. Digital asset management (DAM), is also commonly referred to as the ‘virtual hub’, ‘a single source of truth’ or ‘a truth repository’ where you can store and manage all your brand’s assets on one centralized platform. What type of brand assets do digital asset management store?  Your brand assets are considered your visual and creative assets – from images, photos, videos, audio, graphics, and even brand documents needed for creative processes. Globaledit’s digital asset management features have been creatively designed and developed to capture the stages of the asset content production cycle and to best cater to the needs of creative professionals. What are the features of digital asset management? Here we’ll dive into the core digital asset management software features that’ll help you scale your creative operations with streamlined workflow processes: Search One of the most powerful digital asset management features – is the search tool. DAM systems have enriched metadatawhich makes it extremely simple to store and locate digital assets. This is done by customizing your assets with tags and keywords most related to the content of your assets. By searching relative tags, such as file type, date, location, or keywords associated with the asset, you’ll be able to see the results in seconds. This feature is especially popular because it saves tons of time by no longer needing to spend hours trying to find what you’re looking for. Upload and download Part of digital asset management products is Syncing multiple assets in real-time onto the DAM system as content is being created and captured. Bringing in the element of metadata, by adding simple tags, keywords or rules, DAM will automatically sort the assets under preferred collections. Sparing the extra need of spending hours sorting and renaming files. When something goes up, it must come down. Equally, with uploads, there’s also a smooth downloading feature. At a click of a button, you can bulk export your files as an XMP file. Sharing and automated distribution Once the production process of your assets has been finalized and approved, you’ll be able to set up a workflow automation rule in your DAM to instantly share the finalized assets with team members, stakeholders and clients. This streamlines communications and speeds up distribution times. Flexible permission and user controls DAM has secure user control and protective rights features, meaning that you won’t compromise your assets and system when sharing externally. Protecting your assets with watermarks is also an effective way to make sure that your assets can’t be reproduced when landing in the wrong hands. Asset version control When you work with 100s and 1000s of assets, it means that there are quadruplicate versions of the same assets lying around. Increasing the risk that the wrong version may be sent to distribution. Digital asset management’s capabilities stretch to cater even in these situations – by preventing them from happening! DAM’s versioning control features keep every team member or stakeholder that is part of the creative process in the loop when changes on a specific asset are made. Fast-tracked approval channels You’ll agree when we say that the approval round is the largest roadblock when trying to get your assets to distribution quickly. DAM’s unique features include the ability instantly annotate or approve or kill an asset version before it gets stored in the asset library and reaches other stakeholders. Headless API integration The new era of digital asset management has become ‘headless’ in the sense that it can easily integrate with your existing tech stack of most-used systems and favorite apps and tools. Some of the popular types of systems used by creative professionals are WordPress, Slack, Google Cloud Storage,Photoshop, Akeneo, but there are so much more to choose from. Connecting these programmes with the use of respective API keys is smooth and painless. How do I organize my digital assets? The beauty of a digital asset management system is that it has a built-in visually intuitive asset library that organizes your digital assets for you. But – only if you have used the right platform integrations and workflow automation rules to effectively organize assets, as well as provide a clear portal of comms between collaborators to ensure assets are produced without any hiccups. Managing your creative workflow and digital assets shouldn’t be hard. And with globaledit’s powerful digital asset management tools, it won’t be. Get in touch with us to chat about flexible and affordable solutions to elevate your creative operations.

OK, so you’ve heard a lot about digital asset management systems, and that they can help you better scale the creative operations of your marketing, e-commerce, retail or agency business. But it’s a tech new to you, you’re a little wary – worrying if it’s the best fit for your business and teams – also it’s a big investment and can be daunting without the right guidance. We get it. So in this piece, we hope to relieve some of the pressure.  Consider this your simple ‘digital asset management best practices guide’. And you will see here why and how it’s something that you really need to add to your tech stack. First, let’s rewind a little bit. What is a digital asset management system? (If you know this already, feel free to skip this part).  A digital asset management system is an integrated space where you can easily store, organize and manage your digital assets. It’s a platform where team members and stakeholders can cohesively collaborate. What are digital asset management examples?  A DAM system is a hub for all your visual- and medial-like content assets. While it mostly focused on digital, visual and creative assets, DAM systems also make space for storing documents with Google Drive or Dropbox integrations. Examples of your digital assets are: Images and photos Videos or audios Graphics and illustrations Document reports, contractual agreements, KPI’s, etc. What are the core elements necessary for an effective digital asset management strategy? As with any type of system, it can’t work efficiently and serve its purpose when there isn’t a proper strategy in place. In the motoring era of digital transformation and the constant pressure to produce and deliver eye-catching content in a churning market – an agile strategy is a must to maintain a serene and creative ecosystem. Here we identify 5 steps to help you navigate and update your digital strategy when implementing DAM solutions.    Define your objectives First, ask yourself why you need a digital asset management system.  You can do this by identifying your pain points and measuring them against DAM’s best products and features to see how they can help you solve them.  Some of your pain points might look like: Constant disarray of digital assets Communication gaps between your teams and stakeholders Drawn-out editing and approval processes Increased distribution times Once you have determined the issues, you can structure the DAM system and its workflow automation recipes to better support and streamline your existing processes.       Audit your existing assets Take a look at your existing assets that are stored on the current systems, platforms, or apps you and your team use. You’ll need to establish an organizing and sorting process at the start to see if you want all your digital assets to be transferred to the DAM or only parts of them. Ideally, you’d want all your assets in one place – and with metadata, you can. DAM’s rich metadata cancels out all of the laborious processes of sorting and renaming your assets.   Create a structure for your assets You’ll need to create a structured naming convention for your assets to ensure that they are searchable and discoverable for all team members that use them. Enforcing this asset taxonomy will ensure that your asset will never be misplaced again.   Make a list of the existing tools and systems Not only do you need to look at your assets, but also the tools and systems that are currently used. If you were worried that you’ll need to do away with platforms and apps that are used on a daily basis – don’t be. DAM systems can seamlessly integrate your most used platforms onto the centralized platform with API keys. No migrating teething issues – seriously, pain-free. Allocate system project and management responsibilities While DAM is a unanimous system to encourage collaboration, you can control who sees and who does what. Because there are different stages in a digital content production cycle, there are different roles and responsibilities allocated to team members, stakeholders and clients. Accordingly, the digital asset management process caters to each step in the production cycle. Meaning that you can allocate access and responsibilities to the relevant parties – giving clear expectations and manageable tasks. How do you practice digital asset management? To master any system is an art on its own. But what sets DAM systems apart, is the simplicity and ease of use.  So, what are some of DAM’s best practices? To really get the DAM best out of your asset management system, you’ll obviously need to maintain a clean house to be able to maximize the benefits of a DAM system. You can do this by: Audit your assets regularly to address and maintain asset taxonomy. Maintain consistency of your assets, workflows, and processes (but always improve where you can). Leverage data and insights to identify your high vs low performing assets. By analyzing data and insights, you can copy or rewire methodologies to get the best out of your assets and boost ROI.  Maintain licensing and compliance so that the security of your assets and the work of your team members are protected at all times. This is however taken care of by your DAM system provider. Let us know what your creative business’ pain points are and we’ll show you how globaledit’s digital asset management solutions can intuitively and affordably, elevate your creative operations.

The phenomenon of digital transformation has about 40% of companies wanting in on the automation of graphic design processes. Why? Because another 40% of creatives spend about a full day per week on admin-related tasks. Sound accurate? For designers and design teams, you’ll know that a single day could’ve been used to refocus on more important projects and increase the ability to keep up with the constant demand for high-level content. You’ll also relate to the fact that being bombarded with requests for new designs, edits, and changes – can leave a deteriorating effect on your creative juices. We’ll bet that bottlenecks and ineffective system processes are only some of the reasons why you’re struggling to scale design assets and workflows for that high-quality output. But what if we were to tell you that you no longer need to imagine a world of centralized and organized assets, structured workflows, cohesive teamwork and real-time edits?  In the evolving era of tech – allow us to introduce digital asset management (DAM) for graphic designers. DAM is a creative asset management tool that has been developed by creatives for creatives – to help scale and manage the asset creation process so that there’s more freedom for creation and innovation. Let’s explore a little further, shall we? Why is DAM important for designers? Digital asset management software is a centralized platform that creatives, designers, and creative businesses use to store, sort and manage their digital, visual and creative assets.    It’s a one-truth repository for all your designs, graphics, images, illustrations, videos and more.  So, if you’re currently using a filing system with a naming convention that looks a little like this: ‘Product_Final’ ‘Product_Final1’ ‘Product_Final2’ ‘Product_Final3’ ‘Product_Final4RealThisTime’ You can probably already sense what we’re about to tell you – it’s time for an upgrade. What are the benefits of DAM software for design teams? Graphic designers play an essential role in the creation of visual and marketing assets. While the marketing team might be writing the content for that digital asset pre-distribution, the onus really lies on the designer to produce a beautiful image or video to go with- or even without that text. Whichever works best in the end. Visuals have become so important, that posts with images generate 650% higher engagement than those without images on social media. Now, imagine having a DAM system that intrinsically coordinates creative materials and streamlines workflows. An integrated asset library that’s filled and sorted with high-quality digital assets – ready to be repurposed at any given time. Your client engagement will be through the roof! Sales engagement is just one of the benefits that DAM solutions can offer. Here are some others:   Productivity and creativity boosts  Enhance your brand’s reputation (they say a good design accounts for 75% of a website’s credibility) Effective collaboration among designers and teams Streamlined, structured, and organized workflows More time and reduced costs What features does digital asset management offer designers? Digital asset management for graphic designers has a wide variety of features that’ll help prevent that admin-snowball effect – and give back more than that one day of capacity.   Simply store, find and share Easily store digital assets by creating your own unique search terms to be able to quickly find and share assets with custom metadata. Customized Collections Create collections of your favorite templates and fonts that you use on a regular basis. Real-time edits and approvals Annotate directly on the assets in the asset library that’ll give live notifications to team members or collaborators. You can also request instant approvals to speed up the GTM times. Get the right version out  Make sure that you’re working on the most recent version of assets by being able to compare versions side-by-side. Unlimited and secure storage Don’t worry about running out of storage – ever. DAM has secure cloud-based storage solutions, which means that you can save hundreds and thousands of assets without compromising their safety. The sky is your limit. Smart API Integrations Constantly switching between multiple software to design, communicate and distribute? Forget it. Integrate your most used channels and apps, like AdobePhotoshop and Slack onto the DAM software.  Creative Project Tracking Add structure to your daily workflows by assigning project tasks with deadlines. DAM has a built-in project feature that’ll give you a broad overview of projects, pending assets, and insights on asset performances. How can designers use digital assets management software? DAM software is compatible with Mac products, Windows – and even mobiles when creating and sharing content on the go. If you want to find out how globaledit’s DAM can elevate your graphic design workflow, chat with us at the bottom of our page and we’ll be happy to share more information.  

There’s a reason why digital content such as images, videos, and other creative media are called “digital assets.” The operative word here is “assets” – because that’s exactly what they are. Digital assets bring value to your digital asset library, even when they’re already ‘out of the door’. When studio creative teams are creating visual content, they’re actually doing so much more. They’re building resources and expanding an already-vast asset library. There are two things that can happen to those resources: Your vast digital asset library can become a hard-to-manage liability, brimming with resources that jam, clutter and frustrate creative workflows.  Or, they can become a true asset; one where visual resources can easily be traced, organized, managed and repurposed, to scale creative workflow output. So, what are the benefits of recycling content and how can an asset library help?  OK, but wait. Let’s rewind quickly:     What’s the difference between digital content and digital assets? Post-production-and-distribution content ultimately becomes a digital asset that’s preserved in a digital asset library.     What’s an asset library? An asset library is the centerpiece of a DAM (Digital Asset Management for the novices) as it creates, stores, organizes, manages, and retrieves digital assets. Getting there: What’s content recycling?   Content recycling is just a greener term for “content repurposing”. But, in its name(s), it basically implies the reuse of existing content that has already been approved and distributed to one channel, but then using and adjusting them again for content needed elsewhere. Think of all your digital assets as extra ‘mini-resources’ that are ready to be accessed within your DAM’s asset library when inspiration or productivity is running low. How does an asset library help with content repurposing? A cloud-based visual asset library has tons of perks, but these workflow recipes are particularly ‘right-up-there’ for content repurposing: Track your metrics with smart metadata By using metadata that’s already integrated into an asset library, you can track the metrics of your digital assets and strategically repurpose your content by looking at your high-performing assets. This will guide you on which assets can be repurposed as content, with predictable outcomes. More-so, by analyzing the metric data of your best-performing assets, you can scale those metrics against assets that aren’t performing so well. Doing this, you’ll be able to see how assets can be better adjusted to increase their performance values. Rest assured, the version is correct Have peace of mind that original assets won’t be replaced by any repurposed content.  Simply labeling the reworked asset with metadata will create its own original version. This will make it easier to ensure that the correct and most up -to-date version is distributed.  Collaboration made easy A next-gen asset library streamlines the content creation process with a centralized platform that helps collaborators quickly organize, search and source digital assets (with the right permissions). Content creation can be a slow task in itself, and even slower with plenty of collaborators digging in while waiting on long-pending approvals.   An asset library is a great tool to collaborate cohesively and accelerate the approval process.  What are the benefits of content repurposing? Let’s see: Slash production costs and scale your ROI: Quite the no-brainer. Why invest time and money when you have an existing asset library as a standalone resource with tons of pre-approved assets to choose from? Increased efficiency and distribution: By repurposing content, you’re essentially fast-forwarding the whole digital content production cycle. Can you just imagine how swiftly you will be producing repurposed content with an added collaboration tool?  We’re thrilled for you!  Brand consistency:  Maintain your brand’s reputation by ensuring consistency with DAM’s smart metadata and versioning features. Claim the benefits with globaledit’s next-gen asset library which can help you scale your repurposed content and digital assets effectively and securely. 

One of creative talent agencies’ biggest challenges is collaborating with talent, internal and external stakeholders and clients – whether it be the lack thereof, or the abundance of trails of emails, calls, or quick ‘check-in’ meetings. While you’re scoping for talent, you’re also chasing stakeholders and need to ‘hop on a quick call’ for client updates.  And we’ll bet that while you’re juggling all these balls, there’s a high probability that your digital asset management is placed on the back burner to ‘deal with later’. But, what if we were to tell you that you can bring your stakeholders, talent and clients under one headless DAM roof – eliminating those unnecessary time-suckers? Camera. Lights. Action – right, that’s our cue.  Collaborate on a new scale Headless DAM and its next-gen digital asset library create a single truth repository for all your digital assets with controlled access to stakeholders, talent and clients. The digital asset library’s workflow automation recipes can help you integrate and sync creative assets in one central place with centralized access. Here’s how: Automate uploads: no more manual uploads and spending hours naming and sorting your assets. Watch how your digital assets are uploaded into your digital asset library in real-time, while preserving the structure of your folders with its smart metadata.  Consistency is key.  Compare and manage versions: no need to go and find needles in haystacks – with an asset library’s versioning feature, you can view the latest and untouched versions side-by-side to ensure the correct version is distributed to the client.   Get notifications and set alerts on your assets: once markups have been done on an asset or a status of a project has been updated, you’ll be notified immediately with the projects feature.   Remain in the know.  Simply integrate your creative tools Break siloed comms by integrating existing creative tools and preferred client software with DAM’s smart API integration solutions into your asset library.  All the tools you need, in one place. Approve and kill, quicker Did we mention that digital asset libraries can remove those time-sucking impromptu meetings and back-and-forth emails? We weren’t kidding. Streamline your digital asset distribution process with DAM’s integrated approval feature by getting approvals from talent or clients instantly and securely. Keeping digital assets safe, secure and under control   Using a headless DAM’s next-gen digital asset library is as safe as you can get – with its cloud governance and built-in security compliance features, your digital assets won’t be compromised. You’ll be able to: Add watermarks onto your digital assets  Allow or deny access from collaborators Set expiration dates for user controls – once that project is done, there is no need for a stakeholder to have access to certain assets If you’re used to keeping digital assets on a hard drive or USB-stick, maybe rethink that. There are countless ways your data can become corrupted or compromised. Work with need-to-know access security With a next-gen digital asset library you control with custom access privilege settings, there really can’t be any uninvited prying eyes. Global edit’s project management extension features let digital-asset managers securely allocate assignments to specific collaborators, while also tweaking permissions to others that aren’t part of the circle of need-to-know stakeholders. This custom-access approach not only keeps assets secure, but it gives real-time visibility over assets with a clear picture of who’s working on what. Giving you full and transparent control of your digital assets. Put globaledit in the spotlight. We’ll show you how a next-gen DAM system can free up your creative teams’ talents like no other. Making collaboration easy and asset distribution faster.

While driving solo has its perks, being a creative freelancer comes with its own set of challenges not everyone can appreciate – one of the least-obvious yet most burdensome is when your creative digital assets scatter uncontrollably. Before you know it, all hell breaks loose and you’re steamrolled by an avalanche of unstoppable daily admin of your own creation. Top work. A freelancer’s unique sense of autonomy is what sets them apart from others. That said, managing your brand, creative workflows and centralizing assets –  while collaborating with external partners – are other common challenges many creatives are facing. Digital Asset Management systems (DAM) and asset libraries are a simple fix for bringing order to the spiraling chaos your daily work can turn into. With headless DAM, your creative assets, workflows and collaborations all come under single mode of total control while letting you scale your freelancer proposition competitively. Here’s a quick guide on setting up your freelance DAM asset library in 5 steps: Step 1: Better-organize and annotate digital assets If your OCD flares up and you find yourself manually obsessing over organizing your digital assets, we applaud you. Though manual OCD costs you a ton of time. If, hand-on-heart, you know your digital assets are in total disarray, we feel your pain. Well, fret no more as headless DAM makes it incredibly easy to quickly bulk-upload and migrate 1000s of assets from your existing digital assets digital library. How can you navigate 1000s of digital assets, versions copies and a jungle of files? A next-gen asset library cleverly associates  metadata to each asset, making it a breeze to organize, search and group assets by automatically correlating creative products together.  No need to spend hours renaming and sorting your assets.  Step 2: Integrate your existing platforms into your asset library Centralize your digital assets with a DAM’s painless API integration solutions from your existing platforms and apps (Adobe Photoshop, Email Management, CMS, Project Management systems etc.). It really is that simple. Step 3: Define and manage creative workflows Once the integration has been done, now the fun begins! Keep the momentum going by organizing your assets with DAM’s metadata feature where you can tag the type, date, location and any other preferred search term for your creative assets. But wait, there’s more: An asset library’s markup feature allows you to add real-time comments, provide feedback on creative digital assets or decide whether you want to ‘save or trash’ a version before it goes to distribution. Did we mention you can share the approved version directly with the client from your asset library? Easy-peasy. Being able to quickly search and locate your (most up-to-date) digital assets within your digital library will boost your productivity and streamline digital production output processes. You know what this means, right? Less admin. Less emails. Protecting your DAM creative flow. Step 4: Set up security for your assets and collaborators Ok, now back to being serious – and by being serious, we mean ‘protecting- -your-DAM-digital-assets’ serious. Fortunately, next-gen headless DAM platforms already have built-in security and compliance features, making it easy for you to: Grant or deny access requests from collaborators Set expiration dates based on estimated completion of production and revoke access from users who would no longer need to enter your digital library  Add watermarks onto your digital assets so they don’t fall into the wrong hands Step 5: Manage your brand by scaling your asset production output Even as a one-man band, you still somehow need to keep track of what you’re doing. An asset library also has a project management extension where you can create projects, update and monitor the progress and output. An asset library gives you a holistic view of your digital assets and products, as well as key indicators on areas that might be lacking within your digital production cycle. Hey, you’re doing great! By reading this article, it has put you already one step forward by reaching your business goals. Put back the ‘free’ in freelancer and let globaledit show you how their DAM’s next-gen digital library solutions can be a great fit for your freelancing business. 

This is our final article in our DAM Basics series— if you’re a startup hungry to scale creative workflows quickly, then this is for you. You’ll learn how you can achieve that using smart digital asset management (DAM) and a next-gen  digital library. If you’re new to this space, you might be wondering what a DAM is. If you’re a DAM veteran, perhaps you’re suffering decision-paralysis triggered by the multitude of DAM software in the market. For startups, selecting the right DAM platform before firing-up those creative workflows can make the difference between ‘hitting the gas’ with growth, or ‘hitting a glass ceiling’. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. Let’s start with the DAM basics. Some of these will be to some as obvious as charging your MAC before leaving the house to work in your favorite caffeine dispensary. If you know this stuff, fast-forward a little. DAM Basics 1: What is digital asset management? In short, a Digital Asset Management (DAM) software is, and as we like to call it, the ‘one-truth’ repository for your business’ creative digital assets.  DAM Basic 2: What are creative digital assets? Creative digital assets are considered media, images, videos, product catalogs and other non-textual related content used within your business.  Basic 3: What is  an asset library? An asset library is the centerpiece for all the processes that create, store, organize, manage and retrieve digital assets. How can an asset library help scale startup success? Startups can be hair-raisingly exciting and terrifying in equal measure. All that potential for growth, all of those big ideas—but also all of the risks and ‘what ifs’. What’s more terrifying than the potential for startup failure? The thought of failing because you didn’t get the DAM basics right. You may already have some traditional DAM system in place to manage and track the production of your creative assets – but do you find yourself often working on isolated platforms? If the answer is yes, then the chance of a disconnected team is probably high.    With a next-generation digital asset library inside of a headless DAM system, workflow automation recipes can help integrate and synchronize creative asset management and all of the stakeholders What’s a better recipe for success? Let’s dig in. Recipe 1: Centralize and organize assets Adding your digital assets to an asset library and organizing it with metadata tags, makes it simple to access and locate a file at any given time. Recipe 2: Add markups and track project status on creative assets Ease workflow by sending or receiving notifications on comments, markups and overall status of the performance of a project.    Recipe 3: Streamline team collaboration on assets Increase your team’s productivity by ensuring that they are working on the latest version of an asset without needing to tackle the first few 100’s versions first. The added quick ‘approve or kill’ functions will streamline workflow and the distribution of assets. Recipe 4: Manage your brand and content product output Globaledit’s asset library brings next-gen versioning features that give a bird’s eye view of all your assets and those your team has been working on – maintaining and ensuring consistency across your brand. Take back control of your startup by scaling it for success and eliminating disorganized chaos with a digital asset library. Connecting your tools to maximize efficiency Integrating your existing platforms and apps doesn’t have to be DAM difficult. From Adobe, CMS, Email and Project Management systems, an asset library has smart API integration solutions for painless platform migration and to streamline workflows. An organized asset library is key  To get the most out of an asset library, it needs to be organized properly. Here are a few tips and tricks to help you get started: Define a workflow Scale content creation Data-based folder names Labeling assets with meta-data Manage user access and controls Measure your asset library’s performance Don’t become a cyber-stat Cyber-attacks have been rated as the 5th top rated risk in 2020 and IoT cyberattacks are expected to double by 2025. Protect your assets with DAM’s built-in security, cloud storage and compliance features. With full control over the safety of your digital assets, your employees and users won’t be at risk. Wrapping up Wondering if globaledit is the right DAM solutions provider for carrying forward your startup goals? Instead of wondering, find out with a demo tailored to your plans, circumstances and creative workflows. Depending on your start-ups’ needs, globaledit can set up your DAM solutions with pricing that will suit your budget. Just ask and we’ll show you hands-on how globaledit integrated with your creative tech stack to ensure you can quickly ramp up digital asset distribution securely.

This is the small-to-medium business edition in our DAM Basics series on scaling creative workflows using digital asset management (DAM). This is for SMBs keen to streamline and organize business assets while accelerating creative asset production. We’ll cover why next-gen DAM software can and should become a core part of your business-growth strategy. What Is Digital Asset Management (and Digital Asset library)? Digital Asset Management (DAM) software is the ‘one-truth’ repository for your business’ digital assets.  If you’re still wondering what digital assets are – they can be considered as media, images, videos, product catalogs and other non-textual related content used within your business.  An asset library is the DAM heartbeat for all the processes that create, store, organize, manage and retrieve digital assets. Why is an asset library important for SMBs? Scaling and managing workflows pose real growth challenges for SMBs greatest. Many SMBs still haven’t discovered that a digital asset library (and not just any) can play a huge role in overcoming certain growth blockers. Here’s one of those growth blockers, for example: Creative assets create value. But the creative production cycle slows down as the more creative assets are collaborated on by more and more collaborators. From planning, creating and optimizing, to organizing, scaling and preserving—digital assets created at scale also scale communication, admin requirements, mixups, human error and the sheer time it takes to get things right. In such a highly competitive market for SMBs, it’s wise to manage digital assets smartly from day-one to avoid the DAM-admin snowballing effect. Not only does it relieve the admin burden, but it’s a great tool to bring your teams together to collaborate cohesively. How does an asset library actually streamline SMBs workflow? Streamlining creative workflows for SMBs is particularly tricky because many SMBs approach this challenge unguided for the first time. DAM. Here’s why: Remember the digital asset lifecycle? DAM workflow automation recipes can automate from start to finish Can’t find that DAM file? Quickly organize, search and source digital assets using clever meta tags Need to give quick feedback or approval on digital assets? There’s a feedback mark-up tool for that Assets need to go out quickly? DAM helps decrease production lead times. DAM and your SMB strategy  Another challenge for SMBs is creating an effective strategy to enhance business growth. Without DAM, the very process of organizing, creating and accelerating digital asset distribution can start to decrease the value of your rich media assets. If you are currently using in-house systems or isolated tools to manage your business and its digital assets, it is inevitable that at one point or another there will be disorganized chaos – and not to mention financial losses in some shape or form. Less is more, right? We get it. Asset libraries offer the flexibility and simplicity you need in your business.  How? Based on the scope of your business, your asset library can be set up on a month-to-month basis or long-term according to your budget. Forget about complex set-ups and lengthy migration processes, with DAM’s API custom integration solutions, it can blend easily into your existing systems or creative tools. DAM security must be a priority, always Did you know that 4/10 businesses experienced some form of cyber security breach in 2021? – Cyber Security Breaches 2021 The safety of your assets, employees and users should never be compromised. And with the two-factor security authentication, they won’t be. You’ll have full control over the security and access of your assets. Reduce to eliminate all these risks with a DAM asset library (seriously, we can’t help it).   Wrapping up If you are serious about taking your SMB to new heights, globaledit’s flexible and affordable DAM solutions are just what you need.  Seamlessly organize, assign and scale your digital assets in one place with globaledit.  

The wind changes direction fast in fashion and fashion retail, but if you’re reading this, you probably know this already. While you’re here, let’s talk about why and how you can manage your digital assets with an asset library.  Demands placed by consumers on the fashion-industry’s output, changes with the seasons – and with whatever trend’s hot (remember bring-back the 90’s?), so a lot rests on fashion-retailers’ ability to keep creative assets and workflows manageable, for quickly refreshing and re-organizing product lines.   No pressure! Statista reports that the apparel-market revenue in the US was approximately $1.55 trillion in 2021. According to the Consumer Market Outlook, it will likely increase to almost $2 trillion by 2026. If these projections are to come true, fashion retailers and creative partners will need to streamline with better creative-asset management strategies. That’s where a next-gen digital asset library can help. Let’s start simple: what is an asset library? An asset library is the centerpiece of your Digital Asset Management (DAM) software. It’s the ‘one-truth’ repository for all the processes that create, store, organize, manage and retrieve digital assets. Ok, but why is an asset library important for fashion retailers? You know better than us; a lot goes into generating revenue from creative visual assets. From dealing with constant product changes to dealing with a siloed network of partners, vendors, influencers and collaborator brands – and then some – it’s a lot of hard work. An asset library is a simple solution to reducing the admin headache, bringing teams together, reducing costs, scaling visual assets and having full control over your digital apparel assets.  Yes. A smart digital asset library helps achieve all of that with an all-in-one approach to creative asset management.  Don’t debate. Create and collaborate The workflow structure for fashion-retail creative teams can get messy with constant miscommunication or misplacement of files.  Time is money, and with each second looking for an unallocated file or arguing about the location thereof, you could have been creating more knockout visual content. Traditional digital asset management using folders, uploads and downloads creates a snowballing admin. Nobody needs that. A cloud-based visual asset library helps collaborators in different locations quickly organize, search and source digital assets using clever meta tags. Meta tags mean better creative asset management Using metadata tags means assets carry date created, location, date modified, creator and other other smart metadata for easily tracking, locating and sharing relevant assets. Even better, an asset library enables fashion creative teams and partners to collaborate effectively and work on the most up-to-date file versions, while also giving live updates and feedback on products. Forget migration teething pains, transferring your existing data and platforms with headless DAM integration, is quick and painless.  Another upside? No more flooded inboxes and unnecessary distractions. Create better and personalized experiences for your consumers Creative energy is DAM precious. The less time teams spend organizing and sorting your digital assets or personalizing consumers’ experience, the better. Did you know that 80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalized experiences? DAM can also be used to track product performance which cross-measures against creative performance metrics. Why is this important? Well, here you can monitor your consumers’ trends and scale your campaigns’ performances to identify areas that require a bit more personalization. Centralize, streamline and simplify content production Asset libraries centralize, simplify and fast-track the content product cycle in a myriad of ways. To give you an idea: You want to instantly upload assets to a central platform? Done. Identify the latest version of an asset? Here you go. Securely share and protect assets with the right people? No problem. Need instant approvals from collaborators? You bet. Gain better control over brand identity and sustainability Managing your products and brand has never been this simple. By being able to set asset rights, there is no risk of your content landing in the wrong hands, even by accident.  With globaledit, you will have complete control over your digital assets and see who has worked on them – allowing you to monitor and ensure brand consistency across the board.  

Digital asset management (DAM) for video-hungry industries brings a subtly different set of challenges. As soon as video production is in the mix, your DAM system needs full-blown media asset management (MAM) functionality to keep video versioning intuitive and practical. Without smart video versioning features, video versioning becomes a high-friction chore that gets in the way of producing profitable video assets at scale. And boy, do video assets get produced at scale today. Media Asset Management Software: Why Video Versioning Is Becoming More of a Challenge With smaller-scale video libraries and light video production workflows, manual video versioning can just about hold things together. At larger scales, manual video versioning becomes worse than just unsustainable—eventually it becomes an actual growth barrier. According to Wyzowl’s State of Video Marketing Report 2022, the quantity of video people watch has doubled since just 2018. Of the 582 unique respondents Wyzowl sampled as part of the report: 86% said they use use video as a marketing tool 92% continue to value video as an ‘important part’ of their marketing strategy 79% of non-video marketers say they expect to start using video as a marketing tool in 2022  With these kinds of figures in play, continuing with clunky, manual video versioning methods will no doubt incur a competitive opportunity-cost. For PR, media, marketing and merchandising, effective creative workflow management—that allows rapid distribution of original content—can become a key contributor in creating and sustaining competitive market advantages. Besides Easier Video Versioning, What Are The Benefits of a Modern Cloud DAM Platform? Here are a few of the usual benefits to expect from a modern DAM system that’s worth the subscription fee. One single repository for all of your digital media assets Top-tier security with customizable asset access rights (why is digital asset security so important?) More collaborative efficiency, control, agility and content scalability (how does a headless DAM system help scale content?) You know the score. Better, stronger, faster, less stressful. These benefits are exactly what you’d expect as a bare minimum from a next-generation cloud DAM platform. Global edit takes these perks further by bringing MAM functionality that enables a whole series of video creative workflow and video versioning perks. Once you discover them, you’ll kick yourself for having struggled on for as long as you did with manual video versioning. How Does a Next-Gen Digital Asset Management Platform Make Video Versioning Easier? Ok. Here’s the important part. How does globaledit make video versioning easier? Side-by-side video version comparison After you’ve uploaded your high-res video assets, you can add markup layers to provide collaborators with feedback. Watermarks get added automatically. Then you can dynamically view video versions side-by-side in a single intuitive view before approving priority assets that make the cut to be progressed to distribution. Easily store and find video versions using metadata What happens to video files that don’t make the grade in side-by-side versioning comparison? You can discard them on the spot. Alternatively, you can securely store in your video asset repository ready to be repurposed and edited. All of your video assets will be easily searchable via metadata tags based on location, time, names, and more. Delight Clients and Collaborators with Flawlessly Intuitive Media Asset Management If you work with large volumes of video assets, simplifying video versioning alone can break the glass ceiling toward better asset scalability. Request a demo and we’ll show you globaledit’s video versioning features in full flow. Or read about other ways to organize your creative workflow processes.

Next-gen digital asset management software needs to evolve as quickly as its users’ needs and the creative workflows that serve their clients. More than that, an uncompromising creative asset management tool should anticipate and design for emerging creative workflow needs. With eCommerce, fashion retail and media and entertainment overflowing with visual content, that’s what creative teams, marketers and visual merchandisers should expect and look for to scale both the quality, output and profitability of creative digital assets. If your creative production weapon of choice has an Apple logo somewhere on it, we’ll stick out neck out and assert that globaledit remains the best dam for Mac. What Makes globaledit the Best DAM for Mac? First off, if you’re in the market for a digital asset management (DAM) platform for Mac, you should decide if you want or need a headless DAM software or not. What is a headless DAM platform? Headless DAM means your developers can use APIs to integrate natively with other platforms in your creative workflow tech stack. In other words, a headless DAM system can be custom-developed to dovetail with your native environment, connecting processes and collaborators upstream and downstream into a single fluid workflow. Meanwhile, traditional DAM platforms do a good job of building digital asset repositories, albeit siloed and fragmented. Already using globaledit? Looking for API documentation? You’re welcome. Why is globaledit the best DAM for mac? Did someone say “Workflow Automation Recipes?” Mac users love brilliant design—and we don’t just mean visually. Brilliant design doesn’t have to be pretty. Apple products just happen to be beautiful to look at. At its core, stunning design is functional and the best design is almost invisible. Globaledit’s creative workflow automation recipes are exactly that. In short, they make your creative workflow management seamlessly manageable. Workflow automation recipe 1: Centralize and organize creative digital assets Custom integrate globaledit with Dropbox to automatically share approved assets into specific Dropbox folders. Your digital assets will stay synced too; if any updates are made in globaledit, they’ll be reflected in Dropbox. Workflow automation recipe 2: Track project status of retouched assets Traditional creative workflows require a post-production manager to match and send the right assets individually to the right collaborators. If you’re an Apple fan, this is almost as irritating as a smashed screen. Globaledit’s Projects custom integration lets you automate this instead of sending assets one by one. Need a retoucher to only view assets from specific, approved folders? Done. Workflow automation recipe 3: Streamline creative workflow collaboration Monday.com, Asana, Airtable, you name it. globaledit custom-integrates with any project management tool worth its salt. You know the rest. Say goodbye to delays, manual grunt work and admin while scaling quality visual content production faster. View a bunch more creative workflow automation recipes integrating Salesforce, WordPress, Marketo and Adobe. Here’s the kicker: globaledit’s DAM platform for MAC OS includes MAM If you’re using a separate media asset management system for video and visual media, globaledit will give you everything you’re used to in one space. Auto-interest and cloud-render video files using globaledit SYNC, delegate video production tasks alongside other creative asset deliverables, or give collaborations intuitive side-by-side comparison views for faster approvals with notifications.

This is the first of our DAM Basics series starting with creative asset management for enterprise. Want the DAM basics for SMBs or for startups? This is for enterprise marketing teams hungry to extract optimal value from their growing inventories of creative digital assets. The aim here is to help you understand what digital asset management is vs. creative asset management and how both can and should be part of your growth strategy. What Is Digital Asset Management (and Creative Asset Management)? Let’s start with the DAM basics of core definitions. What is digital asset management? (DAM) Besides being a bottomless resource for DAM puns, digital asset management (DAM) is a collection of processes that encompass creating, storing, organizing, managing and retrieving digital assets. What is creative asset management? Creative asset management is a subset process of digital asset management more concerned with the features that enable creatives working in media, marketing and production teams. To unify the two, you could think of creative asset management as “the work-in-progress DAM” as it’s sometimes referred to. Why are DAM and creative asset management important for large enterprise content and product marketing teams? Think of the avalanche of digital assets produced by enterprise creative marketing teams daily. Even traditionally photo and still-image oriented industries like e-commerce and fashion retail are turning to heavier rich media digital assets like video. Video is the number one format marketers used in their content strategy in 2021. Some e-commerce enterprise brands are even rolling out realistic, interactive 3D product modeling using CAD, STEP, or STL files. The results are impressive. Imagine zooming right inside a piece of footwear, street-view style, to the point where you can almost smell the leather. Terabytes of rich media assets require a DAM miracle. We said no DAM wordplay in this article, right? That didn’t last long. No more, we promise. As enterprise creative digital assets snowball almost exponentially, creative teams need to work minor miracles to keep creative workflows streamlined and scalable. Just consider all the moving parts of enterprise creative workflows that make up the digital asset lifecycle from creation, through to deployment and optimization. Digital asset planning Digital asset creation  Digital asset management Then distribution Optimization Asset preservation In enterprise creative workflows in particular, any one of those digital asset lifecycle stages involves further sub-processes. Sustaining high-quality content distribution at scale Without a clear, universal DAM strategy and creative asset management system in place, all the moving parts of production constantly drop out of alignment. For smaller teams, it’s not so much of a problem. For large-scale enterprise and global teams, high-friction creative workflows translate into massive opportunity cost. Confused feedback, lost digital asset files, mixups of wrong on the wrong version; constantly falling out of step not only diminishes content quality and value—it makes scaling content creation almost impossible. For enterprise, DAM security is an increasing priority Access control, security and cloud compliance. It’s always high on the list. The larger your digital asset libraries, the more valuable they are to would-be cybercriminals and rogue insiders, and the heavier the penalties for compliance gaps. The UK Government’s Cyber Security Breaches 2021 Survey discovered four in ten businesses experienced some kind of cyber security breach or attack. It’s no surprise that enterprises that want to master DAM and creative asset management prize latest generation cloud DAM solutions able to offer detailed user management, automated cloud governance scans and customized policy management. Defining a Clear Enterprise DAM and Creative Asset Management Strategy Without DAM and creative asset management, the very process of creating, collaborating on and retrieving digital media assets incurs new costs that start to eat away at the value your rich media assets are supposed to generate. Preventing the disorganized chaos, friction and actual financial losses means revamping your DAM strategy early before the scenario moves from loss-prevention to damage limitation. This is especially true if you’re currently using a traditional DAM strategy with traditional tools disconnected from one another. Wrapping up For enterprises serious about maintaining the kind of creative asset workflow fluidity that small businesses enjoy, it’s worth switching to a modern headless DAM platform. The rich availability of API custom integrations, workflow automation recipes and extensive security features makes a latest generation cloud-based DAM solution the way to go.

Ok, that’s the digital asset management pun taken care of in the title. If you’re a globaledit content regular, you probably groan at all the DAM wordplay by now, (or maybe it never gets old). Just like you groan every time you spend an entire lunchtime comparing video assets to track down the latest, usable version. That gets old pretty fast. Video Media Asset Management Should Be an Asset, Not a Liability You know video versioning in digital asset management for media and entertainment is a drag. Namely, the kind of drag that persists in even smaller video-creative teams. That’s because it only takes one person to put a foot wrong in the video-DAM samba for the music to stop. So what do you do? How about another Zoom meeting to align. Pass. Training away the video versioning problem (good luck with that) One approach for ensuring video and media asset versioning doesn’t unravel into total disorder is to get everyone on the same page. But, let’s face it, it sounds good on paper. Aligning anything from 10 to 100s of collaborators around the same video-versioning housekeeping and protocols is a pipe dream in practice. The bigger your video-creative team, the harder the struggle to manage clunky media asset collaborations and increasingly cluttered workflows. If just one person doesn’t get the ‘video versioning protocols’ memo, workflow efficiency breaks down. Even when all collaborators are all in-tune, video-versioning and managing digital media assets collectively is always high-friction. Ok, so what’s the solution? Let’s explore how cloud-based media asset management software simplifies video versioning to an effortlessly intuitive process that virtually runs itself. How the Right Digital Asset Management System Makes Video Versioning an Absolute Cakewalk What’s actually at the heart of the video versioning headache? It’s the fact that digital media assets have a habit of replicating. Yesterday there was one single video thumbnail in the folder, today there are five and tomorrow there may be 20. Here’s the kicker—they’re all identical. That explains the painstaking forensics you go through to find the right one. “If only I could view all video versions under one single thumbnail” Well, hold the front page, because you can. Out of the box, single-thumbnail version tracking is one of the baseline perks globaledit brings to your video digital asset management workflow. Better still, you also get to see: Which collaboration created which video version How many hours or days ago each video version was created Who uploaded or downloaded the video asset And who applied certain labels and changes In other words, if a video-team collaborator so much as breathes on any given media-asset version, everyone else will know about it. Don’t think of it as surveillance. Think of it as an intuitive, mutually-shared audit trail to simplify everyone’s work and video workflow. “If only I could use video versioning to distribute our best media assets” You guessed it. This is also a very real possibility with the right video media asset management software for creatives, freelancers and marketing teams. To give you just one example, globaledit’s cloud-based digital asset management software lets you edit, then compare and finally distribute creative video assets seamlessly, in a single workflow. Save and edit video assets: right inside your globaledit user interface. You can even include comments, ratings and markups. Easily compare video versions: either in an overlay view, side-by-side or in an asset-slider comparison view. Finally, distribute your best video version and media assets: using in-platform sharing and distribution to project partners and collaborators. Sound familiar? Maybe you’re already a globaledit user. If you are, here are some useful video asset library ‘how-tos’ to refresh and sharpen your globaledit DAM knowledge. What Will It Take for You to Make the Switch to the Right Media Management Software? Whether you’re a large enterprise, a small-to-medium business or a startup, video versioning friction and complexity adds up to frustrated teams at best. At worst it can also equal lost commercial potential. Especially if you’re not able to easily and consistently assess and distribute your best work. To see what video asset management success looks like with globaledit, read some of the case studies.

Spoilers: there is a difference between DAM and MAM and it kind of matters. The blurring of the line between the two is partly owed to the way ‘digital asset management’ (DAM) and ‘media asset management’ (MAM) are used interchangeably. How much it matters depends on a few things. We’ll get to that. The ground-level fact about both is that they’re in hot demand. Projections for DAM market value in 2022 were $5.09 billion, growing to an estimated $9.42 billion in 2026. You can take MAM for granted as part of those figures, given that it’s essentially a subset of DAM. So, what actually are the differences and similarities between MAM and DAM? And what exactly is the overlap that clouds their distinction? DAM vs MAM: What’s the Difference? People who wonder ‘what’s the difference between MAM and DAM?’ might also be asking the question ‘should I use MAM or DAM?’. Let’s answer the latter as a route to answering the first. Digital asset management (usually) excludes video (but not always) MAM systems typically offer media asset management focused almost exclusively on video, though there are exceptions of more modern, cloud-based DAM solution providers that offer video media asset management as a nice extra with significant benefits. No prizes for guessing who (*cough*). That’s pretty useful when you consider things like: 1. In 2013 60% of marketers used to create at least one piece of content each day. Nobody seems to have updated this stat. Just imagine the figure today. (Source: eMarketer) 2. 80% of video marketers claim that video has directly increased sales. (Source: Wyzowl via HubSpot) With photo and video visual content likely to continue carrying brand and marketing strategies, an all-doing DAM and MAM platform is a no-brainer. Media asset management systems are essential for audio-visual production If you’re a video editor, your MAM system is priceless for storing video content while you work in offline editing tools environments like Adobe Premiere. If all you do is edit video, there are tons of dedicated MAM tools out there. That said, there are creative production DAM platforms that include MAM features like video versioning, auto-ingest and cloud rendering that some standalone MAM platforms may not offer. DAM vs MAM: How Are They Similar? Ok. That was the main difference between DAM and MAM. How are they similar? From the moment digital assets are created, through to maintenance and content distribution: Both help securely store and organize digital assets in one place Both optimize resources and content distribution Both simplify creative workflows and collaborative interaction Both help break collaborator silos (internally and externally) Both help moderate content ownership and access Whatever benefits you notice from your MAM solution, you’ll almost certainly also get on a DAM platform. The one exception might be custom integrations. Those can vary from platform to platform. Legacy platforms If you’re using a dated MAM platform that doesn’t provide true creative workflow automation, then it’s worth switching to a modern DAM platform that can. DAM Integration vs MAM Integration All of those handy custom integrations—into other tools like Slack, Airtable, Salesforce and WordPress—rely on a headless digital asset management platform. Headless DAM integration In a digital asset management context, headless architecture offers a single, unified media asset library with multi-context utility across teams, functions and systems. The ‘headless’ part means developer-friendly API availability (Application Programming Interface) for creating seamless custom integrations across entire creative workflows that include other apps in your creative tech stack. MAM Integration Ok, so how is MAM integration different? The answer is that it’s not really too different. Any video media asset management software worth its subscription fee should offer similar API-based open architecture. With that in place, you’ll achieve seamless communication between other tools. Ultimately, that’s how you keep your content distribution pace up, and cost of ownership down over time. Wrapping up: DAM v. MAM, Which Comes Out on Top? So. Which is better in the DAM vs MAM arena? There are two answers. The simple answer is ‘it depends’ on the nature of your digital business and needs. If you handle video and audio content exclusively and need smart integrations with editing tools, then a dedicated MAM is perfect. That said, MAM-inclusive digital asset management solutions like globaledit come with sophisticated integrations for audio and video creative workflows that legacy media asset management platforms can lack.

Where to start with photography digital asset management (DAM)? Most photographers and studio teams have at some time or other stared into a Mac or asset library with eyes glazed, asking this question. It all starts so promisingly. One day you’re naming your first few files. The next you’re having blood-pressure spikes caused by the cryptically-named jungle of folders in front of you. How did it come to this? The dawning realization hits you that it’s time to start getting a grip with smarter digital asset management. Digital Asset Management for Photographers: Why Is It so Complicated? Photography digital asset management starts the moment you click the shutter. From that moment, there are countless steps before your beautifully re-touched assets are fit for purpose. Why the organized chaos of your asset library eventually just becomes chaos When you’re at a shoot getting snap-happy with whatever it is you’re paid to snap, you’re in the zone. Meanwhile, your SD card is getting hit with dozens of photos that soon turn into hundreds. Back at the studio, you fire-up Adobe Photoshop and hunker down to some serious editing: Filters  and touch-ups Cropping and aspect ratio Maybe manual tweaks if you’re feeling really OCD As you get creative and obsess over filters, 100s of original photos turn into countless copies to discard, keep, rename and manage. Not only does it cost time and hard work, the creative energy you spend leaves little in the tank for organizing and managing digital assets. Why digital asset management is so hard Ultimately, actually managing digital assets loses out to the priority of creating, editing and delivering great work. You tell yourself “I’ll organize all these files later.” Often, that “later” never comes; your next shoot rolls in and your asset library takes another big hit. The result is what you like to call ‘organized chaos’ that you learn to live with. Managing folders and files is just the start Once you add a collaborative layer to managing digital assets, things get worse. Just the time it takes to send files back and forth seriously limits your ability to scale work.  Approval requests, uploads, downloads, collaborator communication, samples for potential prospects; it goes on and on. Time for a DAM reality check The truth is that it really doesn’t have to be such hard work and there are antidotes to the chaos. We don’t mean simply tidying folders and naming files strategically. No matter how diligently named, asset libraries eventually succumb to the creeping chaos. Finding smarter antidotes can be the difference between growth and stagnation. How to Bring Order to the Chaos of Manual Digital Asset Management Here are some good places to start if you’re serious about scaling your workflow, winning bigger clients and minimizing the grunt work. Stop relying on email for digital asset management workflows Email is an essential tool. We’re not telling you to switch to smoke signals. But we are telling you to think about how you’re using email. Log into your inbox once you’re done here and get auditing. How much time do you spend searching attachments and deciding which emails actually need your attention? All that time builds up and keeps you off of more productive ‘to-do’ items. Streamline your DAM tech stack If you’ve already stopped relying on manual backups, then perfect. Maybe you’re using Google Drive or Dropbox. It’s a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t go far enough. especially if you want to reduce redundancy in your workflows. Globaledit makes other cloud storage spaces almost redundant. Most of your workflow lives in one place, reducing countless moving parts into a simple integrated workflow. Maybe It’s Time to Switch to Dedicated Digital Asset Management Software (That Makes You Look the Part) Here’s the bottom line. As a studio or photographer, it’s painful to live with the day-to-day knowledge that you could be spending your time more efficiently on growth. That’s why you’re reading this. The punchline is that you’ve probably lived with this uncomfortable truth longer than you like to admit to yourself. Until you take a big step forward, the feeling that you could have grown better these past 12 months will linger like a bad client. Dedicated DAM software holds the key to unlock all of that uncaptured  growth. Why? At the most basic level, it helps increase efficiency while decreasing cost. Not to mention all the digital asset security, collaboration, access control and versioning perks. Start with a DAM demo. Trust us, you won’t look back Just ask. We’ll show you how globaledit’s digital asset management software for photographers and studios integrates with Adobe Photoshop. We’ll also show you how to search, track and securely store assets. All while collaborating with other people using on-platform communication and approval. No time-consuming uploads and downloads. No back and forth communication and delays. Just beautiful, powerful simplicity.

Why does digital asset management exist (DAM)? For a few reasons. One of the most overlooked is digital asset management security. For the talent agencies, apparel brands, ecommerce stores, and others that use DAM, ‘digital asset security’ can slip down the wishlist of ‘must-haves’ beneath things like pricing, integrations and the highly coveted user experience. Actually, it should be right up there with all of them. Why? Because DAM’s value is worth little if your DAM system can’t keep your digital assets DAM safe. Ok, so… let’s recap on why digital asset management security has become more critical than ever. Then we’ll explain the ‘how’ of setting up a secure DAM environment. Digital Asset Management Security: Why Has It Become Such a ‘Thing’? If you’re old enough to have created or owned non-digital data assets, you’ll remember that data security wasn’t much of a ‘thing’ before the digital era. Remember polaroid pictures? Each one was forever unique  Try going back to the pre-digital age and right-clicking an instant polaroid photo to make a copy or save it. You’ll struggle. Back then there was no need for watermarks on images and photos because the technology for instantly creating and distributing countless perfect new copies of something just didn’t exist. Today, digital asset management security has become ‘a thing’ because digital copyright and hacking are also ‘a thing’—as are the risks of your digital media and repositories falling into the wrong hands, or being accessed by the wrong people. “Of course I can send you that copyrighted image via Slack” Sometimes digital assets fall into the wrong hands by accident. Other times there’s bad-actor intent. The Guardian, UK, reported that in 2021 North Korean hackers stole $400m in digital assets. As the not-so-old adage goes; it’s not if you get hacked, it’s when. On a more mundane level it could be a new-starter sharing something with someone they shouldn’t via Slack or Dropbox. Or it could be an external partner careless being granted access to your media library. In either case, it doesn’t matter who or why. The risks can escalate into a rolling security fiasco resulting in reputation damage at best and legal disputes at worst. Not anybody’s idea of a good time. How to Create a Secure Digital Asset Management as Good as the User Experience If you’re already using a DAM system like globaledit, you might already benefit from things like: Built-in asset rights Auto-expiry dates Asset access permission settings Usage tracking Digital asset watermarks And more  Now it’s time to take those safeguards seriously and make sure you’re using them properly. Here’s some extra advice for configuring your DAM system environment. Know what your most valuable assets are The UK government’s Cyber Security Breaches 2021 Survey found that four in ten businesses (39%) reported having some kind of cyber security breach or attack. If your workflows involve sharing unedited videos or pre-retouch images, use tools with transport layer security and data encryption for secure sharing. Build your security in layers As we mentioned, it doesn’t take a North Korean hacker to ruin your DAM day (hackers from other countries of origin are available). Something like 35% of breaches originate from third-party vendors. Give as much thought to protecting networks, servers and digital assets from internal mishandling as from unauthorized external access. Find the balance of DAM security and user experience Asking teams to pivot to new passwords every few weeks is a drag, but it’s an important drag that actually holds valuable security impact. Whoever you collaborate with internally or externally, balancing DAM security and user experience is about compromise, trade-offs and finding a sweet spot between protocols and workflow. All that lands differently for different teams, so work it out between you. Find a DAM platform that designs-in all of that balance between security and user experience.

Let’s start with the jaw-dropper. Businesswire reported in 2021 that the global digital asset management (DAM) market reached a value of $ 3.88 Billion in 2020. The surge of DAM demand signals the growing importance of visual content—particularly for offline retail pivoting to online. Smarter digital asset management for e-commerce newcomers is about getting DAM right from day-one, before it all goes DAM wrong with snowballing chaos and complexity. For e-commerce veterans, it’s about maximizing digital asset management efficiency; to keep vast asset libraries workable, navigable and easily deployable with as few moving parts as possible. Whether you’re starting out or have been online as long as Amazon, it’s about scaling up meaningful e-commerce experiences while scaling down the cost, time and all-out headache of legacy approaches to digital asset management. Here are some of the ways to organize e-commerce digital assets. But first, the challenges smarter DAM solves for e-commerce brands. “Where’s that DAM File?”: Digital Asset Management Challenges e-commerce Loves to Hate Managing e-commerce digital assets is so dauntingly complex, studies have been done pin down the top challenges that are: Finding global assets Granting collaborator access  Granting partner access Repurposing digital assets Version control Sound familiar? Generally speaking? All of that can be summed up in three words: chaos and disorder. The more e-commerce content you create, the more chaos and disorder snowballs, the more collaboration falls apart. What Does Your e-commerce Digital Asset Management Process Look Like Right Now? The antidote to DAM chaos is to get organized. You’re probably already doing things like product information management (PIM) or using some of these best-practice methods for managing digital e-commerce assets. Using folder management to organize and find digital assets If you’re already using a date-based folder system as one of a number of ways of maximizing digital asset management efficiency, how is it working out? Honestly? What would you change? Or what do you wish was easier? Date-based folder names For example, you could be using a year-month-day naming convention—and why not? It’s intuitive and structured. For smaller-scale e-commerce stores, this approach works just fine. Once your asset library and/or your asset-management team grows, date-based folder management can reach its limits. At a certain point, simply navigating folders becomes a time-consuming task all of its own. Over a year, imagine how many hours you’ve lost. Descriptive file names The non-numeric approach to organizing e-commerce digital assets is to be descriptive. That way you can just search stuff, right? You can even add image width. For example: Product name + image width: womens-yoga-mat-2-960 This can actually be an effective approach to organizing folders and files, but it’s a best-practice technique that relies on further best practice of ensuring all collaborators actually stick to the naming format. At even medium-sized e-commerce content teams, manual error and variations can creep in, causing needle-in-a-haystack situations. Mirroring your website to organize e-commerce assets A common alternative to date-based digital media asset management is to mirror your asset folders in-line with website product categories and subcategories. This approach seems intuitive, though it doesn’t work for all e-commerce stores. What if, for example, your online store has 100s of products that include countless more sub-variants? That’s a lot of visual assets to store, organize and find. Getting Smarter About e-commerce Digital Asset Management To wrap up, remember the challenges we covered? Finding assets Version control Collaborator and partner access Repurposing assets You’ll hit hard limits with all of them when trying to organize and scale DAM workflows using even the most sensible traditional methods. Even if you keep tight best-practice rules, all the moving parts means constant effort, uploads, downloads, access admin and delays. Everything exists in different layers and locations. What does smarter e-commerce DAM look like? Whether you’re the e-commerce team trying to scale content and increase DAM ROI, or an external digital asset partner collaborating with them, Globaledit brings all the smarts. Imagine one visually-intuitive asset library. One multi-stakeholder comms and collaboration in a single, integrated space complete with user-comments. Discover how you can create e-commerce collections with custom metadata tags and more—all while collaborating securely and seamlessly outside of your emails and WhatsApp.

The market of digital asset management is expected to reach more than USD 8 billion by 2026. This is because of the increasing need to automate tasks to keep up with the rising content demand. A significant chunk of time across every team in an organization is eaten up by recurring tasks.  This is where a DAM comes in – it brings efficiency to the workflow and increases productivity of every team member. Here’s how you can use DAM to utilize its maximum potential: 1. Find your assets on time How many times did your team need to recreate an asset, just because they couldn’t find it on time?  If you had to measure the cost of reproduction of existing assets, it would justify the investment in a DAM software really quickly.  DAM allows your team to look for the right assets at the right time, just with a simple search. Need that picture with a model in red dress on a skateboard? It’s just a search away.  That’s the power of metadata. With a DAM, metadata is automatically set up with the ingestion of your assets. Your team can further define keywords and taxonomies to have a better result.  Similarly, file naming conventions and upload locations need to be frozen so you’re not left in the lurch later while discovering collaterals. globaledit’s Metadata allows automatic metadata tagging in bulk, so your creatives always have what they’re looking for, eliminating the inadvertent creation of duplicate assets. The result? A lot of time is freed up which can be used for creation of assets, helping the scalability of your content creation. With that, a huge cost of reproduction is saved. The ROI from a metadata-powered search is immense. 2. Control assets and monitor projects Project managers have a lot on their plate, from assigning roles to tracking deadlines, from sharing assets to streamlining the workflow. If you’re a project manager, you might’ve faced challenges while: Assigning the right asset to the right person Getting a centralized view of workflow  Sharing assets with third-party vendors Also, you have to make sure that creatives get access to only those assets that they’re supposed to. For example, a retoucher might need access to only the asset that has been approved by a stakeholder, rather than a complete folder.  globaledit’s Projects enables you to do all these tasks on a single platform. Be it controlling your assets, assigning roles, or tracking projects, you can perform every task related to project management on your DAM. 3. Automate recurring tasks Creatives are best at (and most happy) doing creative work. But the traditional workflow requires them to do many routine tasks, which can be easily automated. This can, on average, save 16 hours per week of each creative.  DAM can automate tasks like manually uploading and downloading assets, maintaining versions of assets, going through the long approval cycles.  For example, a DAM like globaledit has features like Sync to automatically upload assets while they’re created. This frees up the time of manually uploading the assets once the shoot is over. Not only that, it also lets you integrate your workspace with your favorite editing tools like Adobe Photoshop. This means editors can edit without having to move the asset to several different platforms.  Versions of edits through the approval cycle are maintained by the DAM itself. You can compare the versions with comments to select the best piece. Your team doesn’t have to look for the versions in their library or send back and forth emails.  Unleash Growth with DAM There are many ways to use a DAM, but it generates the maximum ROI for you when you use it the right way. Using its metadata to search for assets and project management features to streamline the project frees up a lot of time for your team members. This impacts the efficiency of your projects directly as your team can be more productive.  globaledit’s digital asset management solution gives you the key to success with its cutting-edge technology. Request a demo with us today to discover how you can utilize the DAM in the most powerful ways.

The unstoppable demand for rich media content is here to stay. The number of video content watched by the global population grew by 85% in 2020. The uber-competitive space of content-heavy media production requires technology solutions to enable creatives to produce content at the most optimum efficiency.  The Digital Asset Management (DAM) industry is expected to cross $8 bn by 2026, owing to organizations increasingly regarding a DAM as an indispensable weapon in their arsenal. And the reason is obvious. DAM eases the entire content creation workflow from ideation to distribution, unlocking maximum productivity while maintaining creative liberty. Let’s discover how exactly DAM can create highly efficient workflows for your organization. Why Do You Need an Efficient Workflow? There is a myriad of challenges faced by creative operations in the absence of a comprehensive content creation and distribution platform. Unprecedented demand for digital assets: With the explosion of social media and the number of consumer touchpoints, brands require top-notch creative assets at their fingertips. Expensive communication & collaboration: Studies show that organizations lose, on average, $62.4 million per year due to poor communication. Countless hours are wasted on emails and disconnected messaging tools. Brand Inconsistency: Growth in your business and managing multiple parallel projects creates room for brand inconsistency due to unstandardized assets being shared and distributed by your creatives.    Studies prove that 51% of creatives end up wasting time and resources duplicating assets. Moreover, they spend, on average, 16 hours a week on redundant, non-creative tasks. How Does DAM Maximize Efficiency From Start to Finish? Creating content is a rewarding but arduous process. Designing creative briefs, brainstorming ideas, collaborating on assets, and going through several rounds of reviews and approvals are just some of the stages before your content can see the light of day.  The fundamental reason for you to have in place an efficient creative workflow is to take the uncertainty out of the creative process and make your team work as a whole.  So how does a DAM help extract maximum efficiency from your workflows? Ideation & Discovery Ideating and creating briefs for your project and your creative professionals is rarely a smooth process. But with a DAM, the briefing and storyboarding processes become as smooth as possible, thanks to standardized and reusable templates that can be easily tweaked to suit any project. You will no longer find yourself searching in the dark and praying for the project to take shape in front of you.  Intake & Storage Managing hundreds and possibly thousands of digital assets manually is an invitation to creative hell. Not only do you create wide-ranging issues with asset upload and discovery, but you also actively become a laggard in the industry by not investing in a modern asset storage solution.  With real-time and automated ingestion of assets to the cloud, a DAM ensures secure and always available storage for your files. And with intelligent, metadata-based asset discovery tools, your creatives can leverage bulk tagging of videos and images, always finding what they’re looking for. Production & Approvals When all your production tools are integrated on a single platform, your DAM becomes a one-stop shop for your team and your workflows are no longer crippled due to siloed creation and collaboration. Moreover, your team can take advantage of granular editing directly on your assets. Advanced approval tools give reviewers instant ‘Approve’ or ‘Kill’ functionality, reducing the number of approval rounds for assets and improving project completion times. Distribution Curating assets for every digital channel or outside stakeholder can be cumbersome without a robust DAM. A DAM allows you to share curated asset folders with the desired internal audience and also share finished projects with agencies, vendors, and retailers. Your teams can focus on putting their best work out, leaving all the hassle of content curation and distribution to your DAM.  Wrapping Up A DAM that is built to create highly engaging customer experiences through a suite of modern, integrated production solutions is indispensable today. Organizations can no longer strive for success with outdated tools and processes. Request a demo with us today to discover how globaledit can maximize efficiency for your creative workflows. 

The integration of different software and the agile delivery of the results is the key to smooth digital experience.  Digital Asset Management (DAM) and Content Management Systems (CMS) are integral tools to make your business better when implemented congruously. These tools are the right combination and one of the beneficial system pairs when utilized for your business. Content management system is already used in many businesses, at the least, on their website alone. Let’s dig into various ways your business can squeeze in the benefits of these management systems. 1. Right Asset at the Right Time  Let’s take an example of your daily schedule on WordPress with CMS. When publishing a picture with a piece of content, you have to search through a library. What you see then is a mess, multiple images confuse you, and none of them is relevant to what you wanted it to be.  But there’s no doubt your CMS helps you publish content effortlessly. With the integration of DAM and CMS, you get the best of both worlds. You can make the process of deploying images quickly. The right asset at the right time is managed by these system integration.   2. CMS – A Good Publisher But Bad Storage Manager CMS is a great tool, which helps even a non-technical user to publish content online without much hassle. This management system is definitely an excellent platform to format, design and align the online world of your brand. Moreover, CMS drives the behavior and accurate metrics according to your needs.  But at the same time, the content management system is bad at storing your digital assets. Every blog post needs a cover image and other graphics to keep the audience engaged. The CMS doesn’t have the flexibility or room in its basic media library to store the data.  When DAM works with CMS, a rich metadata is added to each asset! This makes your process easier and solves all the issues that arise with storage. DAM works by storing your data while CMS efficiently manages your content. 3. DAM it! If you have a business that’s built on multiple SKUs, data management is difficult. You could use SQL database but this further would extend to need DAM for accessing the data by social media marketers.  DAM lets you upload your digital assets, tag, and track it for future promotions and present analytics easily. DAM does its functions efficiently and simultaneously provides access to CMS without any compromise, creating a single source of truth for your business.  CMS alone is unsuccessful when dealing with multiple SKUs, multiple platforms, and thousands of images. DAM is what helps you streamline your assets with content. 4. Keep up with the growth rate  Competition is wild. And for organizations to be seen, they need to be on their toes, constantly publishing relevant content and be organic. This is both expensive and time-consuming. And as the savior, DAM deployed with CMS is here to make your life easier.  CMS is beneficial with codefree and rapid production and publication of content to the entire world. While DAM on the other hand, helps you align and categorize these assets, thus, improving the rate of production. Here’s how:   Right digital assets can be found quickly with the help of DAM and reused multiple times. Producers don’t need to create new content for the same purpose. The creative assets can be copied and put in interesting ways. It can also help in various marketing campaigns by reusing the same image.  Your content is put in a better position by repurposing and reposting previous blogs, ebooks as case studies and white papers. DAM takes care of the entire management system smartly.   An Integration for Growth Acceleration  DAM helps you easily find and deploy your assets. Storage gets easier, content is repurposed and DAM helps you create a single source of truth while being able to function with CMS with no compromises. On the other hand, CMS is what eases your publication. Overall, DAM delivers digital experience smoothly and efficiently once deployed with a CMS.  globaledit, a DAM solution, allows you to integrate the DAM with your favorite CMS. Request a demo to take your digital content publishing to the next level.  

E-commerce and retail brands have the necessity to have an online presence, which calls for the centralized management of their digital assets. As your business grows, the requirements for a smooth workflow also grow. Without efficient operations, you risk facing roadblocks that can be easily avoided. Considering the competitive nature of the e-commerce business and the rising demand for digital content, you need to fast-track the rate of publication of your online content. This can be achieved with integrations of your existing systems, which can drastically improve your team’s productivity.  Here are some creative tools that work with your DAM to align, sort, control, and publish content: Content Management System (CMS) and DAM A content management system (CMS) is integral to the online marketing efforts of any brand, especially e-commerce and retail brands that need to have a significant online presence. The content management system (CMS) helps you create, publish, and edit the content on your website. In other words, it’s foundational to the administration of your website and web content like blogs. The demand for rich media content has grown 80% compared to 2019. In this scenario, the management of media content can’t be ignored. This is where its integration with DAM becomes almost unavoidable. While CMS publishes written content seamlessly, it’s not the best fit to store, search, or share media content across your online channels—tasks that are possible with a DAM.  For example, with the integration of DAM and CMS, you can add metadata to media files accompanying the written content, helping you to search for the files later. Not only that, having relevant metadata also helps you in ranking on search engines. This, in turn, helps your business get new organic customers. With DAM, you can significantly increase your publication rate. This is because your team can find the assets when they need them, without getting frustrated for hours. All the media files of your business that require editing in the CMS are available in the DAM. This integration provides you with a swift way to share files in the CMS. The overall productivity of your team increases, resulting in the creation of a successful brand. Product Information Management System (PIM) and DAM Detailed information about products is the key to converting a lead to a paying customer.  This is where a PIM comes in—it stores rich information about products with minute SKU details. This makes managing product data and catalog much easier. However, PIM doesn’t include digital assets such as product images and video. PIM provides you with a single source of truth for product information, but without the accompanying media assets, there remains a constant back and forth. On the other hand, digital asset management software (DAM) helps in storing the rich media assets, including product images and other marketing collateral. Integrating the two directly results in an unbreakable synergy. Firstly, you ensure brand consistency across all channels as you have access to the product information and media assets on the same interface. Secondly, the integration significantly reduces the time required by your team to distribute the content. But more importantly, it also reduces potential human errors when sending product information to different channels, regardless of the size of your catalog. This also helps you analyze the reason behind your top-performing products by having a bird’s eye view of the pictures, descriptions, and sales analytics at the same place. Is there a certain kind of description that’s performing well? Is it the angle of the image? It’s not just the distribution process that becomes easier, you also gain clarity on where your brand is headed. Enterprise Management System (EMS) Globally operated e-commerce businesses use an EMS because it simplifies the management of their international trades. This functions across customers, partners, and suppliers. EMS provides real-time data that helps make quick and smart business decisions using up-to-date information.  The integration of DAM and EMS brings the following operations on a single platform:  Sales of your business Finance management HR management Inventory management  This provides access to necessary crucial data required for both the employees as well as the management. Project Management System (PMS) Every e-commerce platform needs a Marie Kondo hand when it comes to project management. And this is exactly what the integration of DAM and PMS helps you with—keep your projects on course.  The project management system helps you clear out the mess of deadlines, important projects, potential client meetings, and timings overlapping. On the other hand, DAM helps you keep all the necessary client information including brand style guide and other brand collaterals at the same place, helping your team access client information smoothly.  The integration of the two allows your team to: Keep a track of ongoing projects on the same interface Manage project from the start till the end Hit deadlines and milestones timely. For example, if you have an upcoming product launch, PMS and DAM together will help you sail through the product shoot to the social media campaign. With globaledit, you can seamlessly integrate your favorite platforms, be it a CMS or an email management system. Request a demo today to learn more.

In today’s hyper-interactive marketing and brand communication space, it’s hard to survive without having a robust Digital Asset Management system (DAM). With all the efficiencies and business benefits it brings, implementing a DAM is not a one-shot job.  Narrowing down how exactly you can maximize value from a DAM can be daunting, owing to hundreds of use cases a DAM can fulfill. It needs careful considerations to perfect both the initial setup and the subsequent refining and tweaking of the system to your organization’s unique demands. Let’s look at a few things you can ensure to get it right. How Should You Manage Your DAM? Picture this: Your organization has green-lit a shiny new DAM and expects to create a smooth workflow with it. What do you do now? Implementing a DAM will require you to clearly define the ways of working that will guide your team on using and maximizing the system.  Here are five tips that can help you ensure you’re getting the most out of your DAM: Define a Workflow A successful DAM allows you to create highly customized and detailed workflows. With the help of a solution like globaledit’s DAM, you can standardize all the processes underlining every stage of your workflow – from automating project briefs and simplifying collaboration to approving assets and archiving them. Defining your workflow is the very first and the most critical step in deriving the most value from your DAM. Control Who Can Access What When dealing with hundreds or thousands of digital assets, it becomes imperative that users can access only the files that they need. Whenever you’re implementing a new DAM, access controls need to be clearly defined to prevent misuse of assets that can harm your brand consistency in the worst case. With tools like Collections, you can create custom access rules by mixing and matching user permissions as you like. Manage Metadata & Taxonomy Metadata sits at the core of intelligent and instant discovery of assets. But to use it to its full potential, you need to ensure that proper metadata and keywords are being populated for every asset before they’re ingested into the system. Similarly, rules for file names and file locations should be clearly defined. A DAM admin can be appointed to review whether users are following the rules and send assets back to them in case changes are needed. The DAM admin can also be responsible for initial training of the users and regular review of the defined processes. Build an Asset Library Your valuable digital assets are not supposed to be haphazardly dumped on the DAM system. You should utilize albums and folders to organize your assets and make sense of thousands of images and videos. With globaledit’s Sync and Versioning, you can be rest assured that your assets are automatically ingested during production itself and always remain up-to-date.  Measure DAM performance No tool is good enough until you can measure its usefulness. For measuring how successful your DAM system is performing, you need to track metrics like asset performance – where users can score each asset on its usability and relevance – and the speed of approval rounds that quantifies the efficiency of the entire asset lifecycle process. Harness DAM for Explosive Growth A DAM provides multiple benefits for your employees, your brand, and the ROI for your business. Harnessing automation to prevent wasted hours, standardization to ensure brand consistency, and streamlined workflows to maximize ROI, a DAM is downright essential if you value scalable growth. Request a demo with us today to discover how you can enrich your workflows with globaledit. 

Companies with a heavy focus on creative operations, especially those in the fashion and retail space, need to constantly be on top of managing thousands and even millions of digital assets showcasing their products. You need to ensure your creatives are working in the most efficient manner possible. That’s where DAM comes in.  DAM streamlines your creative operations so that your team can perform at their peak and not get frustrated with the logistics of creating, collaborating on, and distributing product collaterals. Let’s see why using a DAM platform effectively is equally important as implementing one. How Does DAM Help Your Customers and Your Creatives? DAM is aimed at a very fundamental tenet – taking the uncertainty out of your creative operations. From shooting product images and videos and collaborating on multiple editing tools to sharing final approved content with stakeholders, your designers, editors, and marketers have a lot on their plate. DAM streamlines your entire asset lifecycle so your creatives don’t waste hours on redundant tasks.  When your team is busy producing great content and acing project management and content distribution, your business ends up cutting down GTM time and your products get in front of your customers faster. Your ROI goes through the roof and your brand recognition gets bolstered. How Can You Use Your DAM to the Fullest? Once you’ve successfully managed to jump the budgetary and leadership hoops and implemented a brand new DAM software, it’s natural to be confused as to how you should go about using it. You need to clearly put in place specific ways of working that will help you and your team derive the most value from your DAM. Step 1: Define a Workflow Picture this: Your brand needs to fast-track the launch of your latest winter collection. To even begin work on this project, you need to define a clear flow of steps from ideation to delivery. globaledit’s DAM allows you to standardize every stage of your workflow with its suite of industry-leading tools aimed at streamlining the entire process and simplifying life for your creatives. Step 2: Define Asset Permissions With multiple projects running parallel for different apparel lines, it becomes essential to allow people access to only what they need for their own projects. Collections allows you to group together different assets in contextual groups which you can share with targeted people in your team. They can then view and edit only the assets in that group. Step 3: Define Metadata and Taxonomy Rules Metadata allows fast and accurate discovery of assets. But you need to clearly define the rules for populating the metadata for digital assets Similarly, file naming conventions and upload locations need to be frozen so you’re not left in the lurch later while discovering collaterals. Globaledit’s Metadata allows automatic metadata tagging in bulk, so your creatives always have what they’re looking for, eliminating the inadvertent creation of duplicate assets. Step 4: Build an Asset Library Once you’ve defined your workflow and worked out access controls and taxonomy rules, you need to organize your assets in albums and folders, to make sense of the thousands of files. globaledit Sync helps you with the automatic ingestion of your files to the cloud in real-time and Versioning helps you maintain an easily navigable collection of each version of your assets, each with its own edit history. Step 5: Measure Your DAM Performance After all the steps you go through from producing and distributing product images and videos, you need to prove that the organization’s investment in the DAM software was justified.  DAM allows you to track asset performance with your creatives being able to score every collateral for usability and relevance. DAM offers a powerful way to maximize the potential of both the tools at your disposal and your creative team.  Schedule a demo with globaledit today to find how our innovative solutions can help transform your creative workflow.  

Every organization is going through a fundamental upheaval. Knowingly or unknowingly, from rigid enterprises being run in siloes, organizations are transitioning into ultra-collaborative and digital-focused creative teams. Consumer demands and industry standards are far outpacing the traditional pace of organizational innovation. Conventional storage solutions, even cloud-based ones, are not well-equipped to deal with the demands of modern creative workflows. Today’s creatives require more than just data repositories. They need an organized workflow powered by comprehensive digital solutions that help leverage thousands of digital assets, multiple running projects, and globally-distributed teams—and not get bogged down by them. Digital Asset Management systems or DAMs satisfy this very need and go even beyond streamlining workflows. Let’s look at how exactly DAMs can organize your creative workflow. What Is a DAM System? A DAM system helps a company store, organize, access, and distribute its creative assets, in a centralized and cloud-hosted repository. Typically composed of a suite of products, DAMs aim to bring order and simplicity to your chaotic workflow. With the DAM industry estimated to reach $8.1 billion by 2026, DAMs have never been in more demand.  Digital Asset Management was born out of the need to manage innumerable digital assets as organizations grew in size and scope. With time, DAMs have evolved to encompass every stage of the creative workflow and have also taken over branding and marketing responsibilities.  As your business grows and you take on more projects, it can become extremely difficult to be able to make sense of the sheer scale of the content your teams need to work with. This quickly leads to precious hours wasted in searching and duplicating content, scattered collaboration, brand inconsistency, and doing redundant tasks.  How to Use a DAM to Organize Your Workflow? The most critical aspect that a DAM needs to take care of is organizing your content. With automation and AI-powered features, DAMs help you give a method to the madness, organizing processes scattered all over the place into a cohesive flow.  But how exactly can you do this in every stage of your creative workflow? Store and Find Your Assets Easily With growth comes challenges. Right from uploading your digital assets to a database, you are bound to encounter pain points. You can use unlimited cloud storage and intelligent, metadata-powered search to never run out of space and ensure that your creatives can always find the assets they’re looking for..  Use DAM for a Unified Production Shuffling between multiple tools and communication channels might sound familiar to you. It’s another reason your team might not be performing at its maximum potential. With a DAM, your team can produce all content and communicate on a single platform, seamlessly integrated with all your favorite tools.  Collaborate Directly on Your Assets It’s a pain to depend on back and forth sharing of one version after the other simply to get your edits across to a team member. DAMs can help your team ditch outdated platforms with on-platform chat, and use tools like Markup Editor to enable granular collaboration directly on your assets.  Remove the Grunt Work for Employees Creatives spend, on average, 16 hours a week on routine tasks. Imagine if they could automate uploading of assets, maintaining versioning, and the multiple approval cycles, and just focus on creating brilliant work. It will translate to happier employees, more projects being completed, and more ROI for your organization.  Ensure Brand Consistency When your digital assets are always up-to-date and standardized to the latest brand guidelines, your creatives find it a breeze to find and work on the latest brand templates. With a quick ‘approve or kill’ functionality, any changes can be approved instantly. Your content will always be on brand, no matter the campaign or channel your assets are being used in.  Leverage DAM for Scalable Growth A vision for growth is absolutely essential if your organization hopes to tackle the challenges that come with scalability. A DAM solution that’s right for your business will ensure that you’re well-equipped to combat these challenges. Globaledit’s cutting-edge asset management solution not only organizes your workflow but also guides you across the asset lifecycle. Request a demo with us today to discover how you can easily organize your existing workflow.  

Digital Asset Management (DAM) solutions help organizations store, organize, access, and distribute their creative assets, in a centralized & cloud-hosted repository. With modern creative workflows increasing in complexity, DAM solutions are near-indispensable if you want your enterprise to scale with the growth of the overall industry. With the DAM industry set to grow to $8.1 billion by 2026, organizations need to reassess their existing systems and solutions. The industry’s accelerated shift towards remote work and automation has disrupted traditional workflows. It’s more relevant than ever to leverage the functionalities and superior benefits DAM can bring to your creative workflows. Let’s look at how DAM can not only plug existing inefficiencies but also unlock unexplored avenues to generate value. What does DAM do? As organizations grow in size and take on more clients and projects, some typical challenges surface naturally — countless hours wasted on operational tasks, duplicating assets due to inefficient search systems, scattered communication & collaboration platforms, and overall brand inconsistency due to lack of standardized systems. How does a DAM solution tackle these challenges and many more? Modern DAM solutions offer the following features to revamp your workflows: Store all your assets in a single, secure repository Use intelligent metadata for fast and easy search Ensure access control with granular and customizable permissions Collaborate directly on videos and images across teams and devices Ensure assets are always up-to-date and consistent with your brand Archive expired assets with automated rules Why Does Your Organization Need DAM?   It’s important to fully understand what a DAM solution can do for your organization before investing in one. The benefits offered by a solution that’s right for your specific needs can be manifold. Let’s look at some of them: Unlimited cloud-based storage: As you grow your business, your asset storage needs will be taken care of with a globally accessible cloud-based ingestion system like Globaledit Sync. Fast Asset Discovery: With tools like Metadata, your creatives will no longer waste precious time searching for assets, translating to enhanced productivity and increased ROI as you scale your client base. Seamless Collaboration: Production, editing, and communication don’t need to happen in silos. Marketplace Integrations allow your team access to all their favorite tools on a single platform. Asset Lifecycle Management: A DAM solution enhances not just your creative workflow but the overall journey from project initiation to asset archival.  Brand Integrity: When your assets are always up-to-date with Versioning, your brand communication is on point, every time. Accelerated Approvals: You no longer need to go through 2-3 rounds of approvals. With tools like Approvals, your team can review asset versions side-by-side and approve or kill actions. Prepare Your Business For Growth   With growth comes a flurry of challenges but also an opportunity to unlock hidden value for the business. As your brand takes shape and your business grows, there is a real possibility of hitting scalability roadblocks that can threaten to eat into your profits or even dismantle your processes.  With a successful DAM solution that is suited for your unique needs, you can prepare your business to manage these challenges and more, and overcome them to take that next step in your journey. The adoption of AI, automation, and newer cutting-edge technologies in asset management solutions is raising the bar for what DAM can do for creative organizations.  And with rich media assets, especially video, taking center stage across platforms and content types, DAM is more relevant than ever.  Request a demo with us to discover how globaledit can help you with your asset management needs.

Creative workflows need to be optimized and streamlined for them to be an ‘asset’ rather than a ‘liability’ to your creative professionals. As a creative agency or media house, you always find yourself grappling with how to manage your creative assets better. Your ever-growing asset libraries make it a mandate to use a robust digital asset management (DAM) solution.  But the industry standards and consumer demand for increasingly immersive audio-visual content have now created the need for a specialized Media Asset Management (MAM) solution.  But what exactly constitutes ‘media assets’—video, audio, photos, or all of them? Media Asset Management: The Age of Specialization MAM is a niche subset of DAM, highly focused on the unique features needed for managing audio-visual assets like videos, audio, and images. MAM does for media assets what DAM does for general digital assets including documents and sales collaterals.  Video content has long been the dominant format, dictating not only marketing and business strategies but also internal communication and training programs in virtually all production companies.  But even then, the importance of images and audio has not been reduced. The success of your creative outputs hinges on video, image, and audio equally.  A photoshoot or video shoot goes through multiple stages—production, storage, transcoding, adding metadata, editing & collaboration, and delivery or broadcasting. These increasingly complex steps require your asset management solution to be advanced enough to handle both the technical and visual aspects of the entire creative process.  As a result, a successful MAM solution needs: Seamless ingestion and storage of your media assets Quick and easy search with analytics-powered metadata Granular access & security controls Streamlined collaboration tools and Versioning control Integration with your organization’s existing tools and technologies Your team might already be using a DAM or even a MAM solution for creative workflow management, but is it really the right one for you?  Is it helping you find your media assets when and where you need them, enabling granular collaboration, and integrating the system with your existing software environment?  What Qualifies as Media Asset Management? Media asset management helps you manage rich multimedia files including video, audio, and photos. It’s designed to handle high volumes of rich media and create a seamless workflow for your organization. MAM largely deals with the following media files: Photos represent the visual identity of your brand and hence, play a key role in communicating your unique brand voice.  Audio plays its part as well, as countless brands have shown with their iconic, timeless themes and motifs.   Video offers your customers a highly immersive medium to connect with your brand.  The right MAM solution for your team needs to take a holistic view of your entire media asset library and enable you to tell an engaging and complete brand story. It needs to extract actionable insights from the tons of data your production generates. And it should be able to do the heavy lifting of intelligently keeping your videos, images, and audio at your fingertips and managing multiple approvals. As we discussed earlier, you need to ensure that whatever MAM solution you’re choosing, it should be able to handle the requirements of your organization and should scale with your growth. Owing to the increased complexity of managing rich media assets as compared to documents, your chosen system should also be built around audio-visual assets  from the ground up. With a comprehensive MAM solution, your media assets are automatically ingested and made cloud-ready to be shared with curated stakeholders. Automatic metadata generation and analytics-powered search save you hours of hunting for existing content.  Moreover, collaborating on videos and images is easier than ever with comment layers and asset ratings. Once your creatives have leveraged assets from all your favorite pre and post-production tools, approvals are a breeze with side-by-side comparisons between asset versions. Managing media assets, especially rich video files, is not simple but with globaledit’s video management solutions, you can be rest assured that you’re part of the future and primed for growth and scalability. Talk to us so we can partner with you on your quest to master MAM.

Asset management solutions enable creative teams to store, access, and distribute their digital assets in a centralized repository. Propelled by the increasing importance of Digital Asset Management (DAM) solutions, the size of the industry is expected to reach $8.1 billion in the next five years.  Creative workflows surrounding rich media production and distribution have evolved rapidly and have made robust DAM solutions indispensable assets for organizations. Traditional data repositories and basic asset management solutions are not sustainable in today’s world of complex and layered digital assets—especially video files. The right asset management solution for your organization’s unique needs will not only plug existing leakages in your creative workflow but will also unlock new avenues of value generation.  What are Digital Assets and Why Do You Need DAM? Digital assets include everything from videos, images, and audio to presentations, PDFs, and design mockups. With the explosion of social media and ever-increasing customer experience demands, the growth of video has far outpaced other media.  With creative workflows compounding in complexity and globally distributed teams fast becoming a reality, every stage in your asset lifecycle is being impacted. From production and storage and discovery to collaboration, approvals, and distribution, there are innumerable ways for things to go wrong. The very purpose of a DAM solution is to streamline this entire workflow and make your life simpler. In addition to accelerating all stages of the creative process, DAM solutions also produce enhanced value through intelligent search and seamless integration & collaboration.  With your creatives no longer spending more than 10 hours a week on administrative tasks, you will find your team completing more projects on time and within budget, contributing to the bottom line.  What Does a DAM Solution Actually Do? What are the features of a DAM solution that make it so essential for your business?  Store all your assets in a single, secure repository Use intelligent metadata for fast and easy search Ensure access control with granular and customizable permissions Collaborate directly on videos and images across teams and devices Ensure assets are always up-to-date and consistent with your brand Archive expired assets with automated rules But how does this translate to actual functionality for each stage of your creative workflow?  Production: Your creatives don’t need to manage multiple tools & platforms to create content. Seamless integration with all your favorite tools ensures all production takes place on a single platform. Storage: High-res assets like videos can quickly fill up your storage space. Cloud-based DAM solutions with unlimited storage and advanced versioning capabilities take your mind off storage woes. Collaboration: Your team members can discover, edit and comment directly on videos and images from any device or location around the world. Approvals no longer delay project completion, enabled by side-by-side asset comparison. Distribution: Sharing assets with your media partners can be done from anywhere, owing to cloud-based publishing. Access controls ensure asset security so you can share what you want with exactly who you want. Measurement & Archiving: How do you measure which assets are performing better and are leveraged the most by your creatives? Detailed analytics allow you to generate these insights. When needed, automated rules can be used to archive assets to avoid unnecessary clutter. What is the ROI for Your Business? It all comes down to the return on your investment in a DAM solution. The business benefits you can reap from a successful DAM implementation are manifold: Optimized Workflow: The productivity benefits from an efficient workflow alone are immense. Organizations worldwide can save over $5 trillion annually by automating routine tasks and speeding up time-to-market. Brand consistency: When every asset shared from your organization is up-to-date and automatically aligned to the latest brand guidelines, customers consistently get the experience they demand, and your brand value benefits as a result. Long-Term Savings: Your initial investment in a DAM solution will be recouped many times over due to non-duplication of assets, enhanced communication & collaboration, and analytics-powered asset performance measurement. Scalability: You’re investing in an asset management solution for the long term and as your organization grows and your asset demands increase, a DAM solution will ensure it scales with your growth.  Request a demo with globaledit today to discover how our asset management solutions built for creatives can benefit your organization.

Globaledit, the leader in Creative Workflow Management solutions announces a new, comprehensive integration with Adobe Photoshop to allow for a more seamless creative workflow experience.  The globaledit integration with  Photoshop allows users to manage creative projects, scale output and collaborate without leaving Photoshop. This integration revolutionizes the way creatives manage digital assets in crucial post production steps. Users will be able to streamline communication with peers, manage tasks by project priority, access markup layers, comments and other notes, update project statuses,  receive notifications when you have new work to complete, manage versions in real time, and focus on creativity without switching between tools.  Users will also be able to save versions of their creative from Photoshop to globaledit and load markup layers, without leaving their workflow management tool. The integration with Photoshop is part of globaledit’s focus on its workflow automation and creative ecosystem, one of several tailored solutions for the core users of globaledit.  For more information on how to get started, check out this quick guide to the plugin.

If the year 2021 has been about one thing, it’s learning from 2020’s disruptive forces and adopting essential best practices for tackling future challenges. Creative workflows were turned inside out by the pandemic and creative professionals were forced to reckon with new challenges that came with permanent remote working.  In order to achieve consistency within your creative workflow, you need to take an inside-out approach towards optimizing all aspects of your workflow. A consistent workflow eliminates chaos and confusion and standardizes processes to ensure your team works as a whole. The importance of consistency in creative workflows has grown immensely, not just as a band-aid for ‘the new normal’, but also to anticipate and solve the challenges yet to come. From Creative Asset Management and a streamlined collaboration system to minimizing approval timelines and automating routine tasks, let’s take a look at how exactly you can arrive at a consistent creative workflow. Creative Assets at Your Fingertips It turns out that 51% of creatives waste time in producing duplicate assets and almost 40% of creatives don’t have a single source of truth. With solutions like Sync and Versioning enabling real-time access and up-to-date assets, you’re always on top of your game.  Your assets are available to you whenever you need them. You can share them with the right people by creating custom Collections. Not only that, Metadata makes your asset search extremely easy. A successful creative asset management automatically increases your workflow’s consistency by eliminating human error and standardizing asset management practices. Collaborate to Dominate Working with hundreds of assets uploaded by dozens of team members, you need a robust collaboration framework powered by innovative tools working in synergy. With Markup Editor, your creatives can annotate directly on assets and communicate within the ecosystem of connected tools without having the need for countless emails. Projects power your project management needs with features like targeted asset permissions and role-based access. Again, eliminating needless emails and thus strengthening communication and collaboration taking you a step further towards a waste-less and hence, consistent creative workflow. Automate the Redundant Any creative workflow management solution is incomplete if your team members are spending 16 hours a week on operational tasks. Not only does this lead to precious time being wasted, but it also leaves room for ambiguity, the very antithesis of consistency. Collections allow your assets to live in a virtual folder where you can leverage powerful analytics by sorting them based on rule ratings, retouching status, dates, metadata, comments, and more. Your creative workflow is getting improved daily simply by adopting a more consistent system, which is what an ideal approach should be.  Create a Consistent Creative Workflow A consistent creative workflow is achieved when a family of tools work together to achieve a single source of truth, remove redundancy in processes, enable simplified asset discovery and leverage the power of analytics-driven collaboration.  By streamlining all aspects of your creative workflow and automating the non-creative, operational tasks, you open the door for consistency to grow organically in your workflows and your organization. You’re no longer struggling to make sense of what is where and can focus on harnessing your creatives’ limitless potential, saving hundreds of hours, and contributing to the bottom line. Your creatives are energized in the absence of your old, tiring processes and complete more projects within the stipulated budget. Your clients are happier, your brand grows and your revenue grows as a result.  Request a demo with globaledit today to unlock the potential of a consistent creative workflow.

Creative projects are extremely grueling and demanding. It’s no doubt that creative workflow management tools simplify the tasks for your creative teams by automating operational work and streamlining the complete workflow.  However, finding the correct tool can be a difficult task depending upon the performance, usability, and how it enhances your workflow. With so many tools and solutions, how do you decide which tool is right for you?  Tools To Empower Your Workflow  Sync helps you to automate the upload of your creative assets as you create them during a shoot. It cuts down the traditional waiting time to receive assets at the end of the shoot. With a one-time hassle-free setup process, you get all the assets right at your workspace. Best for: Photo studios, agencies, and in-house production team at the production stage Markup Editor is a revolutionary tool for creatives like photo editors and retouchers. Markup Editor makes the review and approval process seamless as it lets you access, highlight the required changes, drop comments and finally approve the work in one single common platform. Best for: Photo studios, agencies, and in-house creative team at the review and approval stage Collections helps you organize and manage your creative assets in one place. The greatest challenge of a creative team is to find the right assets, at the right time. Instead of looking through multiple files and folders, you can create a “Collection” based on your requirement like project, client, and product, which helps you find all the relevant assets at the same place. Organizing and tagging these assets with the help of efficient creative tools makes it easier to assemble, search and administer while foregoing the risk of losing or reproducing pre-existing assets based on labels like active, archived or expired.   Best for:  Photo studios and marketers throughout the creative process Versioning helps you compare the different versions of an asset and pick the best one. Not only can you view the final assets, but also view comments, ratings, and markups on individual files. You can easily track the edits with Versioning and pinpoint any missed edits. It keeps the entire workflow transparent and streamlined. Best for: Creative agencies at the post-production and approval stages Metadata enables you to search for assets faster with the help of expandable tags and asset recommendations, update and export metadata in and out of the application in bulk. You can easily find files on the basis of metadata tags like location, time, asset description, and so much more.  But Metadata is not just a search tool. It also helps you keep track of the process, providing you enough data to help in decision making. Not just that, you can easily share files with other teammates, as well.  Best for: Marketers, media and entertainment industries during post-production,  Watermarks are essential to enhance the security of your original assets. This tool allows you to watermark pictures easily with texts or symbols so that your organization has the sole proprietorship. You can create watermarks including brand name or logo and further customize them to any size or pattern. Its flexibility allows you to hide the watermarks based on your audience selection.   Best for: Any enterprise company, retail and fashion industries during the distribution phase Approval Galleries allows talent and management to “Approve” or “Kill” assets according to studio obligations—in just a click after you integrate “Collections” or a part of it into an approval gallery to be reviewed by stakeholders. Inbuilt data analytics allows key people to see the entirety of live statistics on the platform and assign roles to your team members and grant permission for access to these assets in one place. You can further automate the process of choosing assets individually to determine what performed well or underperformed as per targets by providing real time insight to speed up the production timeline.  Best for: Producers, marketers, and retail display managers during the review and approval phase Projects automate the process of managing roles and assignments individually while also keeping a tab on the progress. Simply create a “Project Assignment” and a creative brief to keep track of your workflow. By having maximum control over your assets, you can assign roles and permissions to share or hold back information through folders, assets, and even workspaces from specific users and decide which part of the asset is visible to the user.  Best for: Art directors, creative directors, management during the workflow process Pinpoints lets you share very specific assets with your team members through a unique link and alert notifications on emails. You can then share the link anywhere, be it Google Sheets or a creative workflow software. Everyone assigned to an individual project can add and view comments, ratings and markups.  Best for: Creative management, talent management, retail display management, brand management teams throughout the workflow. These easy-to-use tools can help simplify your creative workflow management to a great extent. A single platform that automates a wide range of processes can take a lot off the stress quota of your team members while slashing production time and budget.  Request a demo with globaledit to help us identify the specific tools that your business needs.

Monitoring metrics like the estimated deadline in comparison with the actual one determines the pace at which your project moves and should move and the creative bottlenecks that should be solved, which ultimately helps in slashing down the time for future projects. This makes measuring the creative output with key performance indicators a significant part of your creative project. When the actual budget is less than or in alignment with the estimated one, the value of creative output by your organization is also made clear. This enhances the ROI and helps secure future opportunities and profit while also gaining customer loyalty. This can only be done by enhancing your workflow process and continuously measuring creative workflow output. But can you really measure the creative workflow output? The answer is a definite yes. Let’s take a look at how you can do it. Why Do You Need to Measure Creative Workflow Output? An effective creative workflow includes these primary phases: Conception of the project, definition, execution, review and approval, and the final project distribution. Several processes are implemented for these particular phases based on the type of content you produce, which differs from company to company.  Standardizing work intake is important to effectively measure your output. Here’s how having a standard work intake process and a measure of creative output help the entire process to flow smoothly: Clarity Enhanced and Improved Efficiency If your team members have a better understanding of how project proposals are brought forward, their participation will be higher and more effective. A standardized work intake enhances clarity, which in turn increases efficiency that helps speed up the process of creating and approving proposals. Higher Quality Standardizing work intake helps to clarify the exact information that is required in the proposal and also the clear reason behind it. This leads to higher quality work while also decreasing the approval time.  Unsurpassable Consistency  A standard work intake process includes a single source implemented by employees to forego chaos and confusion that follows if you use numerous tools and software for a specific purpose, breaking the chain of consistency. The utilization of common tools and templates will help maintain consistency in proposals.   How to Measure Your Creative Workflow Output Prioritization of projects and tasks is important in a creative workflow to determine whether something is a value-add. Let’s take a look at the basis on which the workflow output should be measured for maximum efficiency: Identify Urgency Urgency is the stipulated timeline within which clients want their deliverables. It is the timeline within which the tasks have to be completed for the next process to begin quickly and efficiently while also retaining the quality. Identifying urgency is important to work on the immediate important projects.  The scales used to measure and define urgency are critical, major, medium, and minor, critical being the most urgent. Calculate Priority Priority is a term that is dependent upon the impact and urgency of a project. Anything with a high impact and high urgency gets a higher priority whereas a low impact and low urgency gets a lower priority. You can measure the impact based on the following aspects:  Business impact Customer experience impact Brand awareness impact New market impact Deadline A high business impact, customer experience impact, brand awareness impact, and new market impact have the highest priority with deadlines being rigid and urgent.  A low business impact (less than targeted potential), customer experience impact (low value), brand awareness impact (rebrands), and new market impact (minimal) weigh the lowest and have a deadline that is made flexible.   Assign Schedule  For the workflow process to operate within the stipulated time and various tasks to be completed in the process, it calls for a fixed schedule. Adhering to this schedule can help deliver the project on time or even faster. With the help of assigning and monitoring the schedule, you can also determine creative processes that take longer to finish and why while working on the same.  Communicate Schedule  Once you have determined the schedule, communicating it to the team members who are responsible for delivering the work, is a necessity. Clear communication and cooperation make the process much more efficient leading to a high-quality output that has been envisioned by your team.   How to Increase Your Creative Workflow Output to Get Better Results There are certain steps that you should follow from the get-go to have a clear idea of the output at the end: Clarification of project scope for a clear-cut vision about the client’s product statement and perception. Having a systematic approach often saves the team from missing out on important details. Use a creative brief template to monitor each phase of growth and provide a better framework that eases the communication process. Assign roles and responsibilities according to every team member’s skillset, thus facilitating healthy team management. Chalk out your creative workflow for a better understanding of the end product. A blueprint streamlines the process making it a smoother ground for communication within the team and with the client as well. Keeping track of creative workflow output right from updating metrics to reviewing creatives will ensure a step-by-step review and documentation of the entire creative workflow. Measuring creative workflow output is a necessity in the digitally expanding world wherein the creative processes are getting much more refined and streamlined in accordance with the requirements. Consistency is key and in order to deliver consistently good work output, it is important to periodically assess, compare and work on areas to see how far you have and can go.  

Creative projects are best executed when they’re divided into phases and task orientedThe reason lies in the simplification and optimization that these phases provide. Else, the creative workflow becomes chaotic, confusing and inefficient quickly.  According to a globaledit analysis, 50% of their enterprise and mid-market clients are interested in optimizing and simplifying their workflows to focus more on the critical objectives. That’s exactly what creating phases does—simplify and optimize.  Here are six phases that’ll streamline your creative workflow and increase its efficiency.  Phase 1 — Project Intake  Traditionally, project intake involves the creation of a brief that identifies the goal and requirements of the project, timeline, budget, and other primary information.  You can optimize this phase by creating brief templates and getting all the key information at the onset of the project. This helps save time in potential sessions where several meetings have to be held while also waiting for the client to agree with the given input. This phase is the most crucial step as it lays the foundation of the workflow. Based on the clarity of the requirements, automating downstream tasks becomes easier and streamlined. From assigning and scheduling tasks to tracking progress, project intake remains the foundation of the following steps.  Automation streamlines the process of gathering feedback and creating briefs. Depending upon the requirements of the requester, dynamic intake forms with flexible fields can be generated. Automated reminders and feedback are directed to a central hub to kickstart projects immediately. Phase 2 — Discovery Discovery sets up the foundation of the project. It involves everything from researching on competitors for product differentiation to identifying the risk areas, mitigating them and setting goals for different phases of the project.  This helps in optimizing the creative workflow process while also enabling the client to know what to expect during each phase of the project.   Phase 3 — Concepting The stage of concepting is not homogenous. Clear-cut objectives for a project do not always lead to the same ideas by two different creatives. It involves a lot of brain-racking, sharing of ideas, sometimes a combination of these ideas that finally lead to the concept that has to be implemented.  With the number of ideas communicated in this phase, a creative workflow management tool like globaledit makes collaboration simpler and easier. It brings all the project materials and creative assets into one place making accessibility and locating these files easier than ever. Being able to comment on drafts also makes it easier for all the stakeholders to be aware of the progress of this phase. Phase 4 — Implementation After conception of the project, the implementation phase begins. But before that, tasks and resources have to be assigned to team members, which is one of the defining factors of project efficiency. How do you accurately set your team structures and responsibilities without any delay?  Again, a creative workflow management software will be your savior here. Project assignment and tracking are not difficult when a central dashboard keeps it organized for you. These solutions also allow you to share content and collaborate on each project layer with granular control, updates, comments, and feedback.  Phase 5 — Production If you’ve optimized the previous four phases, production won’t be too chaotic. You can also leverage creative management tools to make this phase much smoother, faster, and efficient. For example, having metadata assigned to your assets automatically will make the post-production, searchability, and distribution seamless.  From set up and uploading assets to editing and retouching, all the steps of production of assets need to be optimized for maximized ROI.  Phase 6 — Close-out Close-out includes getting feedback from the client and key stakeholders, making the required changes, and handing out the final piece. This phase includes the most grueling part of the workflow: review and approval. How do you ensure that you gather accurate feedback from the client or stakeholders?  There are various tools and creative workflow management software like globaledit that involve a single platform where clients and coworkers can collaboratively comment, vote, and provide feedback on various assets. They can illustrate the changes required with Markup Editor where annotation can be added to one or many assets.  Once the project is completed, you can have an overview of project metrics like time taken for overall approvals and edits, the number of versions of assets per project, and the overall length of the project cycle for future predictions regarding similar projects.  Globaledit helps you in every stage of your creative workflow by serving your unique business needs. Request a demo to find out how.

The value of the digital asset management market in 2020 was estimated to be USD 2,962.2 million. Digital Asset Management or DAM software creates a centralized space where organizations can access their digital assets.  Creative DAM solutions help teams and keep exclusive materials relevant by centrally storing large amounts of digital and branding content which leads to enhanced security, organization, and searchability of these assets. It empowers employees to be equipped with data that truly matters! How Does a DAM Deliver ROI Investment in DAM solutions, just like any other business investment, should reap some profit for your organization. This is assessed by the return on investment (ROI). Getting a higher ROI is based on sharp decisions. The proper implementation of a planned DAM solution delivers a guaranteed ROI. Here are three ways the implementation of a creative DAM solution helps increase the ROI of your business: 1. Reusability of Assets  With the volume of assets produced in companies, it’s common for creatives to face difficulty in finding an asset at a particular time. How do you find the exact file where the model was wearing a red shirt against a white background? Not being able to find the required assets ultimately leads to the unnecessary reproduction of similar assets. So, there are two kinds of losses incurred: expenses of reproduction and the expense of earlier production. DAM solutions help save time and cut the cost to reproduce assets. This also reduces the wastage of already existing assets.  By tracking the usage of digital assets and analyzing them according to the measurements of a campaign helps deduce the true value of an asset. 2. Optimized Search Having your highly paid creatives search for assets manually through the archives is not the best use of their paid time and puts a strain on finances. DAM makes it easier to find digital assets with the help of keywords and metadata which significantly reduces time spent looking for specific files. DAM also helps bring efficiency to the approval process. 3. Compliances and Commercial Rights There are usage terms, intellectual property(IP) rights, and legal regulations for every set of original and unique data. Complying with these usage terms, verifying the usage information, tracking information regarding the usage of your assets are all within the purview of a DAM solution.  It is crucial for a company to invest in DAM solutions that ensure compliance through rights management as it helps in detecting mistakes that can become a heavy dent in the budget and can also land in legal battles. Additional Benefits Of DAM Every penny that goes into business matters. So does any third-party agency cost that can be reduced with the implementation of a creative DAM solution. They help in eliminating or minimizing the cost that goes into the transfer and management of content. It also increases the transparency within an organization.  How to Select a DAM software for the Best ROI? The following factors will help you while finding the perfect creative DAM solutions that work for your organization: The DAM system should be flexible and versatile to achieve effectiveness in enhancing business goals. Diverse metadata can help the searchability of an asset to enhance reusability purposes. Choosing a user-friendly DAM with simple navigation systems and a simple user-friendly interface makes it easier to grasp the tools by employees and improve operational effectiveness. For example, globaledit provides an intuitive user interface that your team members can get accustomed with easily. Your organization can measure the ROI with the reduced admin work and time saved, while you as the leader of your team or your organization can measure the ROI with the reduced frustration and the happiness of your creatives in finding information easily. Increasing your ROI requires keeping up with evolving DAM trends. It is important to work in close coordination with your DAM provider to tailor solutions according to your organizational needs to reap maximum benefits.  Talk to us to find out how DAM solutions can help your unique needs.

Be it for an ecommerce store or a company’s social media, the importance and demand of visual content are increasing exponentially. In 2020, the majority of content marketers said that more than 90% of their content included visuals. This is no surprise since visuals like images and videos play an integral role in driving sales and capturing attention.  However, the increasing demand creates equal challenges like efficiently producing a high volume of assets at a low cost. This is where workflow automation comes in. Automation solutions for photography studios optimize every aspect of production and make it scalable, cost-efficient, and streamlined. You can save up to 30% of yearly revenue with an efficient workflow. Importance of Workflow Automation for Photography Studios Instead of spending days perfecting a shoot, automation can help you wrap it up in minutes. This turnaround time is significant when you’re dealing with a large volume of assets. The faster you create photos, the faster it can hit the market, which means you are making the asset profitable sooner. As a result, photography studios are shifting towards creative workflow management to handle their everyday projects. Here are some important benefits of automating your workflow: Keep a Track of Clients  It can get overwhelming to manage the records of multiple projects with various clients at the same time. A creative workflow management software can relieve you from this pressing issue by taking care of the admin tasks. Most DAM solutions will have a dashboard that shows the active jobs and the progress of the work for all your clients at one glance.  You can pace up your projects in accordance with the deadlines. For example, you can create workspaces and collections per client in a DAM solution like globaledit. This ensures you have all the assets in one place without the risk of losing an important file.  Organize Information  Creative workflow management software and enriched metadata allow you to find assets exactly when you need them. Sorting can be automated based on rules of metadata and other tags.  You can easily organize files by the date of their creation, edited date, asset information, and the like. This allows you to retrieve the information you want just when you need it. Create Consistency Automation provides the opportunity to create repeatable templates. From angles and lighting to camera settings and edits, you can store templates for different types of shoot. This eliminates human error, ensuring consistency in shoots of a certain type.  Not only this, by having a bird’s eye view of all the assets and visual language, you can maintain brand consistency. For example, Amazon has set standards for product images where product photographs must have a white background with 85% of the product appearing in the image. On the other hand, eBay allows a light grey background.  Similarly, image requirements can vary from client to client, and having a depository to maintain the records will make the task much easier. Manage Revisions  and Approvals One of the key issues faced by photo studios is being able to manage edits. How do you avoid confusion and know exactly what to change?  This is where a creative workflow management software significantly helps you. For example,  Markup Editor allows you to add annotations directly on your assets. You can use the brush tool to highlight a section and include comments to minimize any potential confusion.  Automation solutions like file Versioning significantly ease the post-production tasks. You can maintain a record of iterations of an asset, allowing you to compare different versions side-by-side with their own comments, ratings, and markups. Once you have a set of assets reviewed and edited, “Image Approval Gallery makes it easier to “kill” or “approve” assets and stay in constant touch with your creatives. Create Rich Content  With increasing competition, high-quality images are non-negotiables to drive sales. But you can take it up a notch by including rich content like 360-degree images, which show a boost in conversions by nearly 47%.  But the creation of such images is costly and time-consuming with traditional photography. With automation solutions like camera integration with motorized rigs, the output time can be as low as three minutes, making the production faster than ever.  Promote Creativity  Research shows employees spend up to 16 hours per week on admin tasks that could be automated. That’s two full working days.  As the repetitive admin tasks get automated, extra time and energy can be channeled towards exploring creativity. This includes more A/B tests or trying out different methods for the shoot. For example, you save a lot of time with the help of features like Sync that lets you upload assets during the production, as you create them. Not only that, you can customize file extensions as you import them—think about all the time saved in separating raw files from the processed ones.  Above all, workflow automation makes operations simpler and easier to access for all. It helps meet deadlines by cutting production time and creating consistent results. Ready to automate your workflow and make your production more efficient? Request a demo with us to learn how we can help.

Over 90% of marketers say that the majority of their projects don’t move along efficiently during the content creation process. This data proves the need for an efficient creative workflow in organizations.  Meeting deadlines with quality and creativity intact is only possible in a robust and streamlined system. That’s exactly what creative workflow management solutions help in creating. From role assignment to review and approval—a creative project management system keeps creative workflows on track. It sets up responsibilities and steers the work in a direction that helps save time and money.  How Is Creative Workflow Being Adopted? The workflow automation industry is expected to reach $18.45 billion by 2023, which points to the rapid adoption of the system. Creative workflow management solutions are being implemented across various industries. Few examples include: Branding and advertising agencies Digital creative agencies Graphic designing firms Enterprise in-house agencies App development companies According to a report, 66% of project managers have expressed their intentions of using workflow management tools extensively given adequate support from their organizations.  Benefits of Creative Workflow Management Solutions Creative workflow management solutions help project management and creativity to coexist.  Implement in the Entire Creative Process  Do you have to use a different tool to track time and another for review and approval? Creative workflow management solutions are built specifically for the creative process and help throughout the lifecycle of a creative asset. Here’s how:  Definition and ideation: According to a report by Project Management Institute, 37% of projects fail due to the lack of clearly defined objectives. Creative asset management solutions help set initial goals clearly, which in turn, helps in assigning responsibilities and tracking progress. Creation: During the creation process, creative project management tools promote collaboration. From managing files to tracking time, these tools offer a 360-degree approach. Review and approval: This can be the most time-consuming step of the creative workflow without a system in place. With review and approval tools and the ability to comment, you get to receive feedback in an organized manner and respond accordingly.  Reduces Cost  Workflows with defined goals and assigned responsibilities boost productivity, which reduces additional costs by sticking to the stipulated budget and avoiding budget overruns. With a creative project management tool, 43% more projects are completed within budget. Project planning becomes a smooth sail as workflow management software can help predict deadlines with the help of AI, including constraints like cost, schedule, and scope. Establishes an Effective Communication System Poor communication not only hampers the quality of work and the time taken to meet deadlines, but it also costs businesses a tremendous amount of money. According to a study, companies with over 100,000 employees have faced losses of over $62 million due to poor communication.  With an efficient management solution, you facilitate effective communication among the team that helps maintain transparency, keeps team members organized, and boosts productivity. It ensures that everything “flows” smoothly, thus avoiding confusion and chaos while working. Encourages Feedback A management tool not only invites feedback from the team but also allows your clients to input their requests directly into the project database themselves. This leaves no room for confusion as the requests are recorded exactly as envisioned. Creative operations can benefit to a great extent from creative workflow management solutions. The tools facilitate success while narrowing your goals and focus, hence improving the rate of success as observed by major companies who adopted these tools.  Request a demo to accelerate your creative workflow with us.

After one of the most unpredictable years in living memory, 2021 looks to be the year when we learn many lessons from the unprecedented shifts in technology in 2020. Creative workflow management systems got stress-tested like never before in the year the Covid-19 pandemic turned the world on its head. Although the next 12 months could see a return to normality, some stitched-together solutions from 2020 could become part of the furniture this year. Work from home makes a centralized asset hub more important Few people could have predicted that for many of us our homes would become our offices at the start of 2020. Working from home wasn’t invented in 2020, and it didn’t take a global pandemic for the notion of some work-life balance to trigger a relocation to a more homey setting. However, it will be forever remembered as the year when a huge chunk of people suddenly had to get to grips with the limits of their home broadband as well as Zoom meetings, Slack chats and a host of other apps and forms of communication. Even after the virus will be banished, though, the trend towards work-from-home looks set to continue, which is why 2021 will be a big year for Digital Asset Management (DAM). Team members on any particular project could be scattered across a dozen different locations, but that won’t change the fact they will need access to the same creative assets. Creative DAM acts as a central hub for all assets required for creative production. This year will improve many DAM systems’ functionalities to take into account more permanent remote working arrangements.  Making files, dates and creative assets more accessible no matter where a team member is will be key in 2021. Using DAM for brand consistency Although the trend towards online shopping and e-commerce was very much on an upward trend before 2020, the pandemic confined most people to their homes, with a large part of their purchases being made online.  Most significantly, the uptake rate in online grocery shopping accelerated in 2020, and studies show that this could be a tipping point for e-commerce. Previous online grocery shopping skeptics have had a taste of it in 2020 and liked it, meaning 2021 looks set to be the year when those abnormal rates start to become the norm. And with increased commerce online comes the need for more digital marketing across the many different platforms that find themselves in front of consumers’ eyes daily. DAM will play a huge role in omni-channel marketing this year as brands try to grab consumers’ attention wherever they are looking. A DAM allows marketers to create different content for relevant platforms that retain consistent brand identity with a centralized source of assets such as logos and branding. Greater reliance on automation for creative workflow DAM helps you find relevant assets at the touch of a button. Still, given that creatives might need to use that asset in several different programs, it must be compatible with the various platforms it gets used on. To do this, it requires metadata and tags be added, which will allow for it to be repurposed for each particular use. Automating this process is essential to the smooth running of creative workflows, but studies show that only 6% of users of DAM systems are on board with AI. That gives enormous scope for an increase in reliance on automation in 2021. Integration for greater efficiency With an increasing number of SaaS players, it is more important than ever that whatever creative software you use, it is compatible with other platforms.  Software integration is crucial to an efficient, creative workflow. While software purchases should be carefully considered and weighed up, this year could also see companies putting significant stock in plug-ins and APIs. This will make software investment much more valuable if users know that content can be created and shared seamlessly across different programs and platforms. While 2020 may be a cautionary tale for making predictions, it seems that the many ways we were forced to adapt to new ways of working quickly have encouraged us for what’s to come next. Many of the last 12 months’ developments were already in the pipeline and had been accelerated by outside events. In 2021 comapnies should adapt trends which have made workflow management more efficient and sustainable.

You may know that old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Well, when it comes to processing, editing and sharing images using your software of choice, storing the metadata in an XMP file ensures those “thousand words” aren’t lost. If you frequently work with RAW images, you’ll know that there can be a varying amount of tweaks and retouches involved. Keeping track of all these changes is the job of the XMP file. XMP files allow you to transfer your image metadata, ratings, tags, keywords, geolocation, and other attributes about the image outside of the actual JPG, CR2, or other file. The XMP format is a standard way of recording these data so that other programs can carry all of the additional data you added to your images. An XMP file acts as a roadmap for the editing process of a RAW image. This means that when the image file is shared in another application that is different from the one it originated in, the XMP file will allow it to be read.  Often an XMP file is known as a “sidecar” file, meaning it travels alongside the RAW file to make sure that all the metadata is retained through editing and sharing.  This is especially beneficial when files are shared across different applications. For example, if a RAW file is edited in Lightroom, those changes are recorded in the XMP file. If the image is then opened with Photoshop or Bridge, the XMP file means that the original edits are not lost and the image appears as intended by the creator. Compatibility can be a major stumbling block when sharing image files, therefore, storing metadata on an XMP file is one way around this. Another benefit of using XMP files is that it allows you to store important information about an image which will follow it through a series of edits, often involving multiple applications. You can create the RAW file in your chosen application, add metadata to it such as geo-tagging and file info on who or what is in the image and assign it to a particular category. Storing that information in an XMP file will make sure that all that information follows the image file wherever it goes, making filing and organizing your images much easier. Most creative work doesn’t live in a single piece of software. You might start by capturing images in Capture One. There you might do your quick selects, add job information, and other relevant data. Next, you might organize the files using Adobe Bridge. From there, you might pass the RAWs off to a retoucher and get back a finished TIFF file. When you to import this into your DAM – the TIFF file may no longer contain the job information, photographer, talent, or the other metadata you meticulously added earlier. This is where XMP files save the day — when you import them into your DAM, your software can read the metadata and append all of the missing information to the asset.

You can’t rush the creative process, we’re often told. Whether it’s crafting content, finessing a photo or imagining the right image, time needs to be taken.  However, while quality is key in any creative project, it’s equally vital to keep on top of all aspects of the process to complete it on time and on budget. Sure, the creative process can’t be rushed, but that doesn’t mean missing deadlines due to poor project management. The best way to do this is with a reliable project management system. This will allow you to track tasks, share creative assets and conduct real-time reviews on what’s working and what isn’t. Keep Things Flowing Effective creative workflow management is essential to the formation and completion of any project. Bringing creatives and marketers together to focus on a defined goal can be a time-consuming process. However, with a project management system,  there is a more efficient flow of resources, ideas and communication. All members of the teams can get an overview of what is happening, from inception to delivery. Creative workflow management means everyone can contribute ideas and review progress as the project is going on. It cuts out the need for various proofs to be sent back and forth for approval and sign-off. That whole process can take place in real-time, with revisions able to be completed much quicker. Creative workflow management can allow you to set deadlines for projects and individual tasks within those projects. You can assign tasks to team members and track their progress to make sure everything is on schedule. Closer Collaboration The collaborative aspect of a project management system is one of its most significant selling points. Not only does it allow multiple inputs into a project, but it also allows for creative assets to be shared and accessed more easily.  Digital asset management (DAM) allows for a centralized store of assets, such as images, artwork, graphic files and video footage, or just about anything which can be used in a creative project. An innovative digital asset management solution will allow that library of assets to be made available to all creatives on a team, whether working remotely or in an office setting.   Creative asset management allows for closer collaboration and sharing of ideas. Increased Integration From a purely practical point of view, having countless different applications from a range of various providers can lead to a bumpy ride for your project.  Downloading individual apps can be expensive for a start, and there’s no guarantee that they will work smoothly together. Given that the creative projects involve a range of different apps such as photography software, illustration and design platforms and video editing suites, it’s essential to have a project management system that will allow them all to seamlessly integrate. Increased Revenue   A steady workflow, greater collaboration and increased integration can contribute to the quicker completion of a project. However, because creative project managers can constantly review a project, increased speed does not mean decreased quality. A project management system allows for a significant volume of projects to be completed and approved by stakeholders. Real-time reviews and revisions mean you can get feedback from stakeholders along the way to make sure you are delivering to the brief. This not only saves on time but means you can deliver the project on budget and to the required specifications. That allows you to take on more projects, safe in the knowledge you can provide and generate more revenue. 

What is a PIM? PIM stands for Product Information Management, a system that manages your content for marketing and selling purposes. PIM systems are typically used for e-commerce businesses, and for good reason. A PIM can store all the data of your e-commerce company from SKUs, to product images, and descriptions of items.  The e-commerce industry is growing rapidly, especially in these unprecedented times. Because shopping and retail have shifted more online, it’s imperative that businesses that want to grow to scale have a PIM to manage their daily needs.  Why is having a Product Information Management (PIM) system important? Think about what goes into selling a physical product online. If you’re buying an electronic, you’re going to want the details of the year, make, model, reviews, photos, etc. On the contrary if you’re buying clothing you’re going to want to know the material/fabric used, size, color, etc. Keeping track of all of these things to make sure the consumer is getting the best possible description of a product is difficult; nearly impossible if the product is sold in different languages, through different vendors, or in different variations.  That’s where a PIM system comes in. A PIM can help with sales organization, up your revenue, and make sure the right products are being shown to the right potential customers. A PIM can even go as far as cross-selling and up-selling products when a customer is already interested in something. It’s the ideal way to keep track of products and increase conversion.  Does a PIM help with efficiency? The traditional way an e-commerce business keeps track of their inventory/product is through spreadsheets. Numerous spreadsheets spread across departments show how much a specific item sells, the details of the item, even the previous conversions. Unfortunately, this takes endless hours and manpower to keep track of these spreadsheets.  With a PIM system in place, a company can organize sales information and have classification of products. The PIM system will internalize all of the information and give your business a workable solution for understanding your inventory and sales. It also helps when working with creative assets to help sell your products.  How does a PIM system work with a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system? When you consider everything that goes into an e-commerce company, the most important thing is the creative assets. No product sells without images. Hence, you need a DAM to be able to support your creative asset needs. For example, if you have a PIM system and join that with a DAM system like globaledit you will be able to facilitate a workflow that is coherent and multifaceted. Using globaledit as a DAM will enable you to store creative assets that feed into your PIM (and vice versa), you’ll be able to easily search for images via custom metadata schemas, edit, comment, and share on images, and even create versions of the best images that will lead to conversions. Having a DAM system is essential when using a PIM system because they work together to create an efficient and effective workflow. Learn more about our products here: Creative operations process makes perfect or New Webinar! Ramping Up your eCommerce Production Workflow

Cloud Asset Management, in its simplest form, is managing what’s stored in the cloud as it pertains to your business. For example, if your company has a creative sector (marketers, retouchers, digital asset managers, etc.) they can store assets within globaledit. In this case, since globaledit runs on cloud governance, your Cloud Asset Management (CAM) system for your creative assets would be globaledit. Having Cloud Asset Management for your business ensures that processes run smoothly and securely within the cloud infrastructure. Is there value in a Cloud Asset Management system? In short, yes. Having Cloud Asset Management ensures that you have visibility and control over all of your assets. Let’s say your creative assets were stored within globaledit, you would be able to use the integrations of the software to control your assets from ingestion to distribution. This provides you with unparalleled control over what those assets are being used for. What are the benefits? The first thing to consider when looking at Cloud Asset Management is automation. The process of asset discovery and inventory of assets is automated because there is one source of truth for all of those assets. With Cloud Asset Management, you will no longer have to spend endless hours looking through data. Instead, your business is becoming self-serving in a sense because you’re feeding the data you need into the system. Another important part of Cloud Asset Management is accuracy. If we’re talking about creative assets, you’re essentially removing human error when searching for, editing, commenting, or rating a visual. The key here is that there’s visibility across the system. Asset accuracy ensures the optimization of your business by taking the guesswork out of data. Lastly, a Cloud Asset Management system ensures your assets security. Cloud Asset Management systems allow your business to see potential risks to your cloud infrastructure. That way, you can act before the threat occurs, make sure your company’s assets are always safe.

Omni-Channel Marketing. It’s a term we’ve all heard over and over again. But really, what is omni-channel marketing? How will it help your brand? How do you put omni-channel marketing to use properly?  Those are all questions we’ll be answering here to help you understand how to grow your business.  What is Omni-Channel Marketing? We’re connected to our devices: phones, tablets, laptops, etc. Why? Because the internet is a place where things are constantly changing, evolving, and growing in order to help user experience. Bottom line is, the more convenient something is for the user, the more likely they are to come back. Hence, omni-channel marketing. Make the user experience so seamless from point A to point B that they can help but come back to experience it over and over again.  Omni-Channel Marketing is a solution that looks at the entirety of your brand rather than just mobile, desktop, and tablet experiences. It looks at the transition between platforms and how a user moves from one place to the next. More than Omni-Channel Marketing, we’re looking to create an Omni-Channel experience.  How can you create an Omni-Channel Marketing Experience? Essentially an Omni-Channel Marketing Experience is how you market, sell, and help customers. It’s an integrated experience, meaning no matter where the customer is, the experience is the same. So, when your marketing, the messaging, imagery, and branding need to be the same across the board. When engaging in an Omni-Channel Marketing Experience, your social media, website, all allow for interaction with the company.  For example, let’s say a potential customer sees a social media post that peeks their interest. That customer should be able to be routing directly onto the website where the experience would be the same. They would receive the same messaging, same visual branding that engaged them in the first place, same goals and objectives. The channels all work together to hook the customer.  To build a truly successful Omni-Channel Marketing Experience you need to connect your product, marketing, and customer success.  Omni-Channel Marketing Strategy: Content “Content is King.” We’ve heard that time and time again. But, it’s true. Content is the first thing a potential customer sees. You want your audience to understand your message first and foremost. What does your company do? How can they help? How can your company create a good experience for them? These are all important points that content marketers want to tell their audience.  Customer Most importantly, you have to have a deep understanding of your audience. If you’re trying your hand at Omni-Channel Marketing, you have to know who you’re marketing to. Learn everything there is to know about your potential customer. What do they search for? What do they like? What do they buy? Once you know your customer, you can gear your content specifically towards them.  Integration As mentioned, all Omni-Channel Marketing needs to work together. You need to make sure all of your systems work together to give the customer a seamless experience. Making sure your technology stack works together is key.

Organizations are churning out marketing materials more than ever. No matter what industry you’re in, creating visual assets is essential to a successful business. However, keeping track of all of your assets and organizing them properly can be difficult. Digital asset management systems (DAMs) are the center of operation for these organizations.  Choosing the right DAM comes down to ease of use and efficiency. You have to choose a DAM that allows you and your team to produce marketing assets, both photo and video, quickly and seamlessly. Rather than using multiple different softwares to achieve one goal, a DAM can centralize your work and cut your production time in half.  When choosing a DAM, it’s important to take into account the needs of your organization. Globaledit was built by creatives, so we know the difficulties you’re facing and we’re here to help.  For Your Work In Progress (WIP) Globaledit offers streamlined ingestion of your assets, automatically appends metadata allowing for advanced search where you can build collections of your favorite assets and then streamlines sharing or download. Having a bird’s eye view to all of your assets is important. When you upload or download (in bulk) take advantage of custom metadata to append any special tags you care about. Metadata becomes a key part of how your assets are easily searched, filtered and saved for later use. This will slash the time you spend searching and working on visuals because we understand having the right photo or video at your fingertips is essential. To shorten your creative workflow, you can add a new collection based on your search results and filters, then choose to share or download. Once team members have eyes on the right photos or videos, leverage globaledit’s voting and rating system. This allows you and your team to simultaneously choose assets, find what’s best based upon team consensus or that one special approval and move on.  Scalability Security and enterprise solutions are at the forefront of globaledit. When choosing a DAM for your organization, one of the most important things to consider is the security of your assets. Globaledit has top-tier security to ensure your assets are always safe. With globaledit’s asset rights, you can set expiration dates, grant or deny access requests, track usage, watermark, and more. Prevent the use of unauthorized, expired, or inappropriate media.  Customization If you’re working with globaledit, the interface provides you with an incredibly easy way to use the markup editor. While in the interface, you simply press the pen icon to enter the Markup Editor. Once activated, you can swipe through your team’s imported images and see current markups. You can then make your own markups in the editor by using the brush tool, comment section, or text. You can create versions of your visuals to see what is most up to date, and archive for later use.  Customer Service Globaledit prides itself on becoming part of your organizational needs. Once you choose us to become your DAM we are there with you every step of the way. From recreating a more functional creative workflow, to hours of customer support and onboarding, we want to make sure your organization has all the support you need.

Hey creative community! What will you be doing on May 3rd – 4th? Globaledit will be attending the Henry Stewart DAM event in NYC: the world’s largest conference dedicated to Digital Asset Management and Creative Operations. We think you should join us and here is why… DAM NY 2018 will feature 100+ speakers and 60+ sessions covering topics like Metadata, Integration, AI, Automation, Creative Operations, Corporate Archives, Video Workflow, Rights Management, Semantics, Governance. Want another reason? Co-located at the DAM NY event, on May 3rd, is the Creative Operations. It is a great opportunity to network with your creative community and share best practices. Our very own creative operations guru, David Iscove, is participating in a very exciting panel “What’s in your Creative Ops Toolbox?” If you’re serious about Creative Operations, this is an event that can’t be missed. You will also have a chance to check out a live demo of globaledit, the essential creative collaboration platform, at our booth! See for yourself why brands like Asics, Rent the Runway, boohoo and Warby Parker have made investments in tech to create efficiencies in their photo production processes. Finally, don’t forget to use the code GLOBALEDIT100 to save $100 on your registration! SESSIONS NOT TO MISS: MAY 3rd, 9:40 AM – 10:10 AM – David Iscove’s TechLab   How to sync capture software to embed and deliver custom metadata into your DAM In this TechLab, David Iscove, Solution Architect for globaledit, will show you strategies to collect custom metadata prior to the point of capture in order to embed and deliver valuable product data to downstream users of a DAM. MAY 3rd, 11:20 AM – 12:20 PM – Panel with David Iscove What’s in your Creative Ops Toolbox? A Scenario-Based Approach Co-panelist: Lauren Luscombe, Creative Resource Director, Netspend Moderator: Kevin Brucato, VP, Creative Operations, Prudential The panel will use a scenario-based format to go behind the curtain and explore which tools the panelists identified as must haves for their Creative Ops Toolbox.

Does your brand’s demand for visual content exceed your production team’s capacity? Does the combination of volume and speed have you looking for better ways to manage post-production workflows? If you are a creative on a daily hunt for answers to these pressing questions, join globaledit at the Digital Assets & Content Leadership Exchange presented by Insight Exchange Network on January 22 – 24, 2018 in New York City as we explore the solutions and challenges faced by the creative ops community today. The event will explore two parts of the creative process: strategy & monetization and implementation & stewardship. Network with us, share experiences and hear stories from industry experts at brands like Revlon Cosmetics, NBCUniversal, Hasbro, Facebook, World Wildlife Fund and many more. Additionally, don’t miss out on two presentations from our thought leaders: January 22, 2018 – 9:10 AM   Mathieu Champigny, CEO at globaledit Today’s digital commerce requires creative production to move faster, and for digital assets to be made smarter. Creative production leaders are now tasked with designing and implementing digital content management solutions with the future in mind, from smart digital assets to the breakthrough of Artificial Intelligence. Mathieu will explore the topics of digital creative asset production challenges, review industry-leading practices and future technologies. January 23, 2018 – 9:35 AM David Iscove, Creative Production Solution Architect at globaledit In today’s fast-paced creative production environments, metadata has more value than ever before, enabling automation to accelerate your time to market and analytics to inform future creative ROI. But unlike the traditional approach to administrative and descriptive metadata where enrichment occurred post asset creation, new sources of relevant data, such as product and sample information, can be captured upstream prior to the creation of an asset to then feed downstream value. David will show you how to identify and capture both this valuable upstream product information and downstream creative feedback to provide more value and automation to your creative assets as they move to market. To learn more about the event, visit the Insight Exchange Network website. Use the discount code GE200 for $200 off this event until 1/22/18  

Top brands, leading organizations, and fast-growing startups are investing in creative operations to scale and fuel growth. That’s why the Henry Stewart Events is hosting their Creative Operations event in Los Angeles, co-located at the Henry Stewart DAM LA 2017. This gathering is a great opportunity for the creative ops community to network with their peers, share experiences and learn best practices from industry experts with frontline experience. Brands like HBO, The Coca-Cola Company, Farfetch, Nickelodeon, and Beachbody will be in attendance. In 2003 globaledit release the very first cloud-based collaboration platform offering essential work-in-progress features to create efficiencies in creative production workflows and processes. We are pioneers on creative operations and this is why we are honored to be participating in several sessions during the Creative Operations Conference in LA on November 14, 2017. We look forward to seeing you at one or all of our sessions. Segmenting hi-res and low-res workflows to accelerate creative production What is in your creative ops toolbox Securing buy-in for investments in creative ops technology For more details visit the Henry Stewart DAM conference website. Use the discount code GLOBALEDIT100 to save $100. REGISTER NOW. Here are the details of our panels: Tuesday, November 14, 10:20-10:50 am PDT   Accelerate Creative Operations: Segmenting Hi-Res and Lo-Res Workflows Segmenting your hi-res and lo-res workflows can accelerate your review and approval, post-production processes, and creative asset delivery. Join David Iscove, Creative Production Solution Architecture & Implementation Manager, to learn real-world techniques and dive deeper into the specifics of creative production. David Iscove is a seasoned professional with 10+ years experiences as a digital archivist, workflow solutions architect and asset manager at companies such as Activision Blizzard, EMI, and Universal Music Group. ************************************ Tuesday, November 14, 2:20-3:40 pm PDT What’s in your Creative Ops Toolbox? An Interactive Session In today’s creative environment, where the stakes are high and the challenges are real, each of us needs our Creative Ops Toolbox to get the work done. Every successful marketing and creative leader has their own key “tools” which help them sort through the complexity that modern-day creative execution demands. Many think of these as their “Swiss army knife for success”. Automated Workflow, Data Analysis, Agile Methodology, and Business Acumen are a few examples of the “tools” that these leaders depend on to be successful. In this interactive panel discussion, we will go behind the curtain and explore which tools these industry professionals have identified as must-haves for their Creative Ops Toolbox. These tools include: Technology for identifying and overcoming pitfalls in your creative process Creative harmony through a balance of technology, process, and business acumen Meaningful reports and dashboards drawn from a set of data A standardized intake process to drive efficiencies in your workflow Agile project management which keeps your processes nimble Real-time content production. What you need in order to keep up. Augmented and Virtual Reality, what’s next on the horizon? Change Management: Embrace the change Moderator: Kevin Brucato, VP, Creative Operations, Prudential Panelists include: Clair Carter-Ginn, Partner, Forecast Carin Forman, Director, Digital Photo Services, Home Box Office, Inc. David Iscove, Manager, Solution Architecture & Implementation, globaledit

Creative Operations is in demand. An increasing number of brands and organizations across all sectors are recognizing the importance of “creative operations” – the tools, systems, and methods that maximize the productivity of “creative staff”. That’s why the Henry Stewart Events launched a conference dedicated to Creative Operations, co-located at Digital Asset Management New York. This is a great opportunity for every member of the Creative Operations Community to meet with their peers, share experiences and hear from a leading team of experts with hands-on, frontline experience of the latest thinking, best practices and best-in-class solutions necessary for ensuring end-to-end solutions. We’re creative ops veterans: Since 2003, we’ve been constantly innovating to help our customers – some of the top brands, retailers, media and entertainment companies, and advertising agencies, accelerate creative production. This is why we chose to sponsor the Creative Operations Conference co-located at Henry Stewart DAM Event. This year, we are thrilled to announce that our CEO Steve Kalalian will deliver an insightful talk entitled “Darwinism in Creative Operations” (Thursday, May 11 at 12:35 pm EST). Also, Sandie Roberts, VP of Content & Technology Operations at Rodale, will join us for our TechLab session to discuss how she uses technology to streamline ingestion and optimize content for downstream delivery and usage (Thursday, May 11 at 9:40 am EST). We hope to see you there! Use the discount code GLOBALEDIT100 to save $100. Register now. Here are the details of our panels: Thursday, May 11, 9:40-10:10 am EST Accelerate Creative Operations: Capturing Assets and Metadata Upstream Large-scale creative operations must effectively manage incoming content from multiple sources, teams, and partners. To do this right, brands are leveraging technology: Platforms that are flexible enough to provide multiple options for ingest, yet powerful enough to enforce an organization’s delivery requirements, often in the form of metadata enrichment/validation or file name convention rules. In this session, Sandie Roberts, VP of Content & Technology Operations at Rodale, will discuss how she uses technology to streamline ingestion and optimize content for downstream delivery and usage. Sandie Roberts, VP of Content & Technology Operations, Rodale David Iscove, Creative Operations Specialist, globaledit ************************************ Thursday, May 11, 12:35-12:50 pm EST Darwinism in Creative Operations Creative Operations has changed tremendously over the past 20 years. Those who do not evolve, by inheriting superior traits, will inevitably become extinct. Those who do will prosper from the process of natural selection. Join Steve Kalalian, CEO of Industrial Color Brands, to learn about the single most important evolutionary trait of successful creative groups: acceleration.

The first West Coast conference dedicated to Creative Operations is happening in San Francisco on April 10-11. This is a great opportunity for you and 200 of your peers to convene, learn, and share experiences with each other. You will learn from seasoned experts at leading brands, including Calvin Klein, Google, Amazon, Lonely Planet, Michael Kors, Oakley, Wieden & Kennedy, and many more. Since 2003, we’ve been accelerating studio production for our customers, some of the top retailers and media and entertainment companies, and we saw this event as a great opportunity to connect with the growing creative operations community. This is why we chose to sponsor it and participate in two panel discussions. Here are the details of our panels: Tuesday, April 11, 1:15-2:00PM Workflow solution – Find the tool to boost your team’s creative process!   Moderator: David Iscove, Creative Operations Specialist at globaledit Panelists: Molly Gallagher, Creative Services, Creative Operations, Consultant Yasaman Golban, Creative Operations Manager, Firewood Marketing – Google Inc. Jennifer Pentes, Senior Director, Client and Creative Services at Lonely Planet —————- Tuesday, April 11, 2:00-3:00PM Online Proofing, Review and Approval Tools Panelists: Dickson Bueno, Director of Creative Operations – Americas, HH Global Patti Fox, Creative Project Manager, Scout Steve Kalalian, CEO of Globaledit Shannon Leighton, Senior Project Manager, Global Prairie We hope to see you there! For more information on The Creative Operations Exchange 2017, visit: http://www.insightxnetwork.com/creative-operations-exchange-2017.html

On Thursday, January 26th, globaledit and Industrial Color Brands teamed up for the first 2017 Creative Operations Breakfast with Communication Arts to highlight new trends in Photography & Advertising. We were delighted to welcome Patrick Coyne, editor and designer of Communication Arts magazine. Communication Arts (CA) magazine has been the benchmark for creative excellence for nearly six decades, even as so many competitors have fallen by the wayside. One vital component of that excellence has been the magazine’s long-running annual competitions, which are judged by some of the industry’s top creative professionals. Coyne outlined the philosophy and mission guiding CA, and presented examples of the latest trends in advertising and photography, along with anecdotes and insights on how the jurors are chosen for their famed annual competitions. Coyne described the jury selection process at CA and how they select the winners. “It’s a fun and fascinating process, just to see what [the jurors] pick and how they narrow it down…” He also illustrated the types of trends they see when reviewing submissions. “Something [we see] especially in photography but also in illustration is how quickly visual trends show up.” Watched the video recording: The Creative Operations Breakfast series brings together creative leaders to address key issues and challenges faced by creative production and operations professionals today.

For six consecutive years, The Boss Group, Cella Consulting & In-Source have teamed up to benchmark the in-house creative community. The 2016 In-house Creative Services Industry Report is full of insights, as always. How are in-house creative services teams becoming more strategic and handling their increased responsibility? What role are existing and emerging technologies playing in this transformation? And how can they be used more effectively? Mai Nozoe from alice + olivia and Brendon Derr from The Boss Group joined us Thursday, September 22 and share their insights and the implications of these for your companies and creative teams. Watch the video recording: The Creative Operations Breakfast series brings together leaders in the creative production and operations community for a casual breakfast. ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKERS Brendon Derr – VP, Enterprise Solutions, Cella Consulting and The BOSS Group As the VP, Enterprise Solutions, Brendon Derr and his teammates have helped hundreds of Fortune 1000 organizations to optimize their investments in marketing and creative resources. He has helped companies like American Express, Staples, Coca-Cola, Verizon, Chevron, and many others to build, optimize and evolve their in-house agency capabilities. Brendon has been working within the corporate creative environment for more than 15 years. Mai Nozoe – VP, Creative Services, alice + olivia Mai Nozoe joined alice + olivia in 2013 to develop their first in-house creative department. In her role, she oversees all creative branding and global image direction of brand collateral and website. Prior to her current role, Mai served as the first VP of Creative Operations for Moda Operandi where she was responsible for developing their first branding print campaign and global photo studio operations. From 2005-2012, Mai was responsible for developing the first in-house creative department at Michael Kors. Mai holds a Bachelor of Science in Marketing and International Business from the Stern School of Business at NYU. She is also certified in Digital and Graphic Design from the Parsons School of Design. Globaledit is a cloud-based platform that empowers creative professionals to manage visual production at scale. Globaledit launched the Creative Operations Breakfast in 2015 to address key issues and challenges faced by creative production and operations professionals today.  

With over 25 million visitors per month and over 175 million users across all platforms, Refinery29 has become the fastest growing media company and today’s go-to place for millennial women looking for daily lifestyle & fashion inspiration. How does Refinery29 creative production team keep up with the increasing needs? For the 6th edition of the globaledit Creative Operations Breakfast, we asked Refinery29 team members Anne Cassard and Michael Ciancio to discuss the unique evolution of the creative production workflow at R29 over the past three high-growth years. Learn more about the behind-the-scenes of Refinery29’s creative production: Globaledit presents the Creative Operations Breakfast Series, a monthly event that addresses key issues and challenges faced by creative production and operations professionals today. ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKERS Anne Cassard – Senior Project Manager, Refinery29 Anne Cassard’s work at Refinery29 centers on establishment, enactment, and constant improvement of workflow and inter/intra-departmental processes for the Design and larger Creative teams. She also oversees the growth and development of the Design and Creative staff in response to the shifting pursuits and demands of the business. Anne has refined her interest in creative management through her work with R29 over the past three years, having previously gained experience in the businesses of fashion and finance. Michael Ciancio – Creative Director, Refinery29 Michael Ciancio heads up the Design team at Refinery29, overseeing all aspects of design across editorial, events and branded content. He brings diverse experience to the R29 team, joining from Wolff Olins, a leading international brand consultancy, where he helped major clients strategically and creatively change the way they do business. Michael was previously a grant-holder at FABRICA, the Benetton design research center based in Treviso Italy, where he worked alongside a wealth of international creatives, practicing product design and advertising.

Are you attending Henry Stewart DAM NY May 5-6 and its Creative Operations track on May 5? As the largest event focused on Digital Asset Management (DAM) and Creative Operations, it’s your best chance to meet DAM and Creative Ops experts and professionals, and globaledit will be a sponsor of the Creative Operations track. We’ll be on stage and at the exhibition to share insights and best practices to help brands and organizations better manage their creative production workflow and the digital assets that come with them. Plus use our discount code GE100 to save $100. Where can you find us?    1. At the panel discussion at the Creative Operations 2016 track Steve Kalalian, CEO of Globaledit and Industrial Color Brands, will be on stage to share his insights on today’s use of technology for Creative Operations management. Don’t miss his panel discussion! Theme: Creative Ops Technology: Same Destination, Multiple Paths When: Thursday, May 5, 2016, from 11:50AM to 12:50PM Where: New York Hilton Midtown Hotel, 1335 Avenue of the Americas, New York.   2. Exhibition Stop by our booth #12 on the exhibition floor to get a private session with our Creative Ops experts, get a workflow diagnostic, and see how we can help you take control of your creative production. When: May 5-6, 2016, from 9AM to 6PM Where: New York Hilton Midtown Hotel, 1335 Avenue of the Americas, New York. See the full agenda of the Creative Operations 2016 track here. Unable to attend the Henry Stewart DAM event? No worries, you can contact us here with any questions you have.

  At our fifth edition of the Creative Ops Breakfast at globaledit HQ on March 24th, 2016, Carrie Roberts, Director of Creative Operations at The Body Shop, and Dan Cohen, VP of Marketing at Republic Records, shared their strategies, tools, and techniques for leading successful creative projects from ideation to delivery. Check out what they had to say: Globaledit presents the Creative Ops Breakfast Series, a monthly event that addresses key issues and challenges faced by creative production and operations professionals today. ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKERS Carrie Roberts has over 15 years experience leading and executing creative projects for various companies and clients. Before leading the U.S. creative operations team at The Body Shop, Carrie was Director of Creative Services and Head of Production at Exposure America, where she was developing brand campaigns, events and content such as Nike, Converse, Dr. Martens, and Coca Cola. Dan Cohen has over 20 years experience in the music industry, working at various record companies, an independent marketing company and independent distribution company. He recently joined Republic Records (home to Ariana Grande, Lorde, Pearl Jam, The Weeknd, and more) as the Vice President, Marketing. Over the course of his career, he has worked with a wide array of artists including LCD Soundsystem, Gorillaz, Daft Punk, 50 Cent, and Chrissie Hynde, as well as chart topping campaigns for Alabama Shakes, The Decemberists, Five Finger Death Punch, All Time Low and Tyrese.

For our fourth installation of the Creative Ops Breakfast at globaledit HQ on February 25th, 2016, Scot Safon (former EVP/CMO of The Weather Channel, CNN, and TNT) and Christopher Grakal (former VP of Image Management & Technology Strategy at Turner Broadcasting) shared their perspectives on how to maximize the combined power of creative, tech and business teams. > Check out what they had to say: Globaledit presents the Creative Ops Breakfast Series, a monthly event that addresses key issues and challenges faces by creative production and operations professionals today. ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKERS Scot Safon is a brand consultant and media executive who has served as the Chief Marketing Officer of CNN Worldwide, The Weather Channel, and TNT. He also ran the cable network HLN. He started at NY ad agencies, after getting his MBA from Cornell and his BA from the University of Virginia. Christopher Grakal is the former VP of Image Management & Technology Strategy at Turner Broadcasting. He has strong track record of creating strategy and building technology-forward systems and organizations that maximize the value of content, marketing, PR and sales assets. He’s also a thought leader on how technology is driving consumer experience, advertiser value and creative workflow potential.

For the third installation of our Creative Ops Breakfast Series, David Plavin, Creative Applications Service Manager at Resources IT, and Irene Yoo, Photo Manager at Food Network & Cooking Channel, discussed the specific tools and technologies that make professional creative production kick. From Capture One to DAM to Dropbox and Photoshop, panelists shared the indispensable tools that their teams use to get work done. What key solutions for creative production toolkit today How to evaluate your current tools and technology What upcoming technology to look into/for to improve your workflow Watch the full panel: The Creative Ops Breakfast Series is the breakfast lecture series for creative production and operations professionals to network and learn as well have a delicious breakfast. ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKERS David Plavin Creative Applications Service Manager Resources IT, a Publicis Groupe company David has been at the Publicis Groupe for over 20 years and currently serves as the Service Manager for Creative Solutions. He works with the Groupe’s North American creative agencies helping them become more productive by supporting a suite of applications. David has a strong background in production and creative development, which enables him to better understand the need of his clients. He migrated from publication design to technical support in a period of 35 years. Irene Yoo Photo Manager Food Network and Cooking Channel Irene is responsible for still photography production and asset management for Food Network and Cooking Channel shows and related entities. She has 7+ years of experience in the Digital Asset Management (DAM) field working with different brands and industries to streamline creative workflows. Matt Glueckert Host – Product Manager globaledit Matt uses his lifelong passion for creative technology to lead a development team define and design the creative production application of the future. Before joining globaledit, he was a creative technologist at Showtime where he managed the photo department, photographed boxing events, and developed DAM tools for non-geeks.

Companies are being asked to get higher quality results out of creative efforts, while at the same time having fewer resources and time as they had in the past. Those challenges, coupled with the inherently chaotic nature of creative production, have forced creative professionals to try to bring order to disorder so that they can achieve those goals in an ever-competitive marketplace. What is the progression of the ideal workflow? How do we move from an ad hoc, chaotic environment, to an efficient creative production machine? Who are the right people to manage each phase of the workflow? What is the best allocation of roles and responsibilities for maximizing results? In the second edition of the Creative Ops Breakfast Series (Oct. 22, 2015), Stephen Hunking, Director of Studio Services and Asset Management at Showtime, Wiesia Mancewicz, Principal at High Touch Studio, and Lauren Philson, Digital Assets Manager for The Rockefeller Foundation, joined us in our TriBeCa headquarters to share their experience in building creative operations processes and workflows, taking them to the next level, and discussing the challenges they faced, from internal obstacles to managing external and internal technologies. Watch the full panel to learn more about how to build the perfect creative production workflow: The Creative Ops Breakfast Series is the breakfast lecture series for creative production and operations professionals to network and learn as well have a delicious breakfast (the last event featured Crepes By-Suzette!) ABOUT THE GUEST SPEAKERS:   Stephen Hunking Director of Studio Services & Asset Management, Showtime Stephen has been working in the media industry for over two decades. He oversees the Studio Production and the Digital Asset Teams at Showtime Networks. These departments are responsible for everything from print to in-house photography, mobile apps, and the entire digital asset catalog for the company. Wiesia Mancewicz Principal, High Touch Studio Wiesia is a seasoned executive with over 15 years experience in eCommerce and web technology. She currently runs her own retouching company, High Touch Studio, specializing in image post-production for retailers and photographers. Wiesia previously worked as Director of Imaging at macys.com where she supervised operations and image post-production for one of the most successful web retailers in the U.S. Lauren Philson Digital Assets Manager, The Rockefeller Foundation Several years in creative production and operations led Lauren into DAM, where she now specializes in enterprise system deployments in both the private and public sectors. Lauren is currently rolling out a new DAM for The Rockefeller Foundation as part of a larger digital enhancement to evolve the esteemed philanthropy’s message through storytelling and compelling media. Previously, she implemented DAM and a suite of creative tools for e-commerce leader Gilt.com.

As brands and retailers are embracing new omnichannel strategies, the demand for product photography and visual content is exponentially growing. How do omnichannel strategies affect brands and their creative operations? What challenges are they facing? How do they (plan to) adapt to this new environment? In the first edition of the Creative Operations Breakfast Series (Sept. 22, 2015), Vanessa Holden, Independent Consultant and Former VP Creative Director at West Elm, and Jim Zdancewicz, Head of Creative & Content Production at eBay Enterprise, joined us in our TriBeCa headquarters to discuss how the multiplicity of marketing channels have impacted brands and organizations’ creative operations. As new channels and devices are constantly emerging, companies and creative production teams are trying to produce the best content that fits their brand identity and messaging. After years of rushing for new pop-up channels, Vanessa and Jim have noticed a change in companies’ marketing and creative production approach: Brands are now putting more strategic thought into their creative assets, focusing on producing core assets, while constantly innovating by experimenting with a multitude of asset types, formats, and channels in order to test and learn. This reality-check is mostly due to stagnant or shrinking creative production budgets, especially for experimental assets. Creative teams themselves have also evolved: Because creative teams and operations are more condensed, they also need to be more versatile. On set, every single link of the creative operations chain needs to be clear about the company’s identity, objectives, and key messages to be able to shoot, pick the right edit, and properly edit the appropriate assets for each channel. They need to understand the nuances of each channel to make better creative decisions on-the-go. Watch the full panel to learn more about the impact of omnichannel marketing on creative operations: The Creative Operations Breakfast series brings together leaders in the creative production and operations community for a casual breakfast.   Globaledit is a cloud-based platform that empowers creative professionals to manage visual production at scale. Globaledit launched the Creative Operations Breakfast in 2015 to address key issues and challenges faced by creative production and operations professionals today.  

As brands and retailers are shortening their supply chains and embracing omnichannel retailing and marketing, the demand for product photography and visual content is exponentially growing. Today creative production and marketing teams are constantly facing the challenges of producing more visual content (e.g. product photography, editorial), for a larger number of on- and offline channels, and in a shorter period of time. Finding technological solutions to these growing pressures has become critical for creative production professionals and their companies in a highly visually competitive market. Scale & agility are key in this new creative production environment. During a DAM Meetup about “Product Photography & DAM”, Deanna Bedoya (Lafayette 148 NY), Sara Mitzner (swimsuitsforall), Nikki Schiwal (J.Crew), and Jim Zdancewicz (eBay Enterprise) shared their creative production volume and process, as well as the solutions they are using or considering to produce more content better, cheaper, and faster.  More visual content than ever before Top brands and retailers like J. Crew, Lafayette 148 NY, swimsuitsforall, and eBay Enterprise capture more products and lifestyle photography than ever before: J.Crew shoots around 10-15 different looks a day, 50 to 300 images for each look; Lafayette 148 NY shoots 1,500 images per month; swimsuitsforall produces approximately 2,500 images month per month; and eBay Enterprise shoots from 3 to 4,000 images for their clients from different sets all across different locations. That’s just the beginning. Once photographed, in-house creative production teams have to review each individual shot and make their selects for eCommerce websites, catalogs, social media, and a myriad of other channels. As Jim Zdancewicz from eBay Enterprise put it: “I don’t envy being an art director these days when you’re looking at three or four times the images they used to, a couple of years ago, because the content channels are so immense (…)”. At Lafayette 148 New York, Deanna Bedoya mentioned shooting “about 1,500 images per month… we make 150 selects per web shoot (that’s 50 SKUs 3-ways), for catalog shoots it’s usually 120”. Sounds like a lot? It is. Some creative production professionals estimate that 10 times more visual content is being produced today when compared to five years ago. Why visual content is crucial to brands and retailers There are more products to sell. Sara Mitzner, Content Director at swimsuitsforall, mentioned: “the biggest change for us has been volume because we’ve grown so much as a business. When the company started out, they only had about 10 styles. Now we have close to 1,100 styles per season”. Customers are requesting more details about those products. For Deanna Bedoya from Lafayette 148 NY, “the expectations for eCommerce are only getting larger, not smaller”. As eCommerce is maturing and eCommerce customers are becoming more sophisticated, they tend to have higher expectations when it comes to the products featured online. In the past, companies used to shoot front and back of the product featured online, and that was it. Today, customers are looking for detailed photography for each individual item (zipper, buttons etc.), videos for each product, and more. To appeal to their online customers, more and more brands and eCommerce websites are now shooting each product from every angle, and zoom in on small details. The rapid growth of consumer channels. The proliferation of social media has encouraged brands to create dedicated imagery and campaigns for these platforms. According to Nikki Schiwal, J. Crew now does about 25 shoots per month for social media only – that cover everything from J.Crew, Madewell, and Factory. Deanna Bedoya from Lafayette 148 NY mentioned creating dedicated images for each social channel, such as original imagery for Facebook ”because it is not as cut and dry as eCommerce”. Technology solutions to produce more, faster, cheaper To increase their efficiency and productivity, brands and retailers are looking to leverage technology solutions to scale their creative production. A digital asset management software or a workflow platform is typically the first step to keeping media assets organized and the process flowing. Teams can store and distribute files quickly, track and control access and usages of each of their assets. Swimsuitsforall currently uses globaledit as their DAM system: “[We] have the image database on globaledit. That’s where all the final imagery lives (…). We actually have two offices as well, so using globaledit really helps in that regard”. Outside of digital asset management systems, brands are increasingly looking for cost-efficiency. At Lafayette 148 NY, Deanna Bedoya mentioned eying technology solutions to cut the production load and lower its costs. This leads brands to explore platforms like Looklet, for example, where you can “shoot all of your clothing on mannequins and have the company clone it on to models”. While these solutions are not quite there yet, brands are keeping an eye out for the latest and greatest technology to improve their processes in a very competitive world. These quotes were taken out of the NY DAM Meetup about Product Photography & DAM that was hosted by globaledit on Tuesday, July 14, 2015. Watch the full recording to learn more about product photography & DAM.

You’ve got your creative production under control – if not, here are three ways to get your creative operations on track, now time to take a creative break! Here are 6 inspiring exhibits to check out this month: 1. “The Rise of Sneaker Culture” (NYC) The first exhibition that includes approximately 150 pairs of sneakers, looks at the evolution of the sneaker from its beginnings to its current role as status symbol and urban icon. Brooklyn Museum July 10 – October 4, 2015 Hours: Thu: 11a.m.-10p.m. Wed & Fri-Sun: 11a.m.-6p.m. Entrance: $16 suggested contribution 2. “Emerging” (LA) All about new, upcoming artists who are bringing “a fresh perspective and creative techniques to professional photography.” Get ready for some unfamiliar names and jaw-dropping images. Annenberg Space for Photography Jun 6, 2015 – September 20, 2015 Hours: Wed-Sun: 11am-6pm Free Admission 3. “Light, Paper, Process: Reinventing Photography” (LA) Center stage at the Getty Center’s latest exhibition. Rather than focusing on the final image, this retrospective will spotlight the canvas on which the photo was printed and how that affects the end-result. J. Paul Getty Museum April 14 – September 6, 2015 Hours: Wed–Mon 10a.m.-5p.m. Free Admission 4. “Zoe Leonard: Analogue” (NYC) This ambitious project made up of both color and black-and-white photos was created over a ten-year period, and takes its cues from Eugène Atget’s iconic documentation of ancient Parisian neighborhoods disappearing under the onslaught of modernization. MOMA – Museum Of Modern Art June 25 – August 30, 2015 Hours: Thu-Fri: 10:30a.m.-8p.m. Sat-Wed: 10:30a.m.-5:30p.m. Entrance: $25 5. “Sarah Charlesworth: Doubleworld” (NYC) Charlesworth, photographer and pioneer of the “Pictures” aesthetics, used newspapers, magazines and other sources as her palette, isolating image fragments against lush monochromatic backgrounds to deconstruct how we are manipulated by mass media. The New Museum June 24 – September 20, 2015 Hours: Thu: 11a.m.–9p.m. Wed & Fri–Sun: 11a.m.–6p.m. Entrance: $16   6. “Folk Art and American Modernism” (NYC) Stylistic borrowings from outsider art have become something of a vogue among contemporary painters. Self-taught artists have long exerted a pull on Modern Art, especially in the United States, where folk traditions have played a large role in the nation’s cultural life. American Folk Art Museum July 18–September 27, 2015 Hours: Tue–Thu: 11:30a.m–7:00p.m. Fri: 12p.m.–7:30p.m. Sat: 11:30a.m.-7p.m. Sun: 12p.m.–6pm. Free Admission

Globaledit had the pleasure of hosting a DAM Meetup NY about “Product Photography & DAM” featuring a great panel of experts and professionals who joined us to share their experience and best practices: Deanna Bedoya, Director of Creative Services, Lafayette 148 New York Sara Mitzner, Content Director, swimsuitsforall Nikki Schiwal, Senior Digital Archivist, J. Crew Jim Zdancewicz, Head of Global Content and Creative Production, eBay Enterprise With the rise of multi-channel retailing and marketing, product photography is booming. Today’s organizations are documenting, photographing, and videotaping every single item and SKU for various purposes. This results in extremely high volumes of assets generated, and creates growing challenges for companies when it comes to storing, tracking, reviewing, retouching, and sharing all those assets while managing time restrictions. Learn more about the challenges big retailers like eBay Enterprise, J. Crew, Lafayette 148 New York, swimsuitsforall are facing everyday when it comes to product photography, and the best practices they’ve put into place to solve them. Watch the full video:

Thanks to everyone who came out for last night’s Industrial Color Brands gallery opening!  We celebrated artist Jean Jullien‘s installation ‘In Case of Ubiquity’, illustrations overlooking New York City from 22 stories up in air.  The French artist concluded his 6 month residency in New York by creating a visual diary with the city skyline as his canvas. The finished work is a clever, insightful narrative on the nuances of life in the Big Apple. Check out a few choice pieces below and the full gallery from the event’s photo booth here. The exhibition runs through May 1st at the Industrial Color Brands gallery in TriBeCa. Email gallery@industrialcolor.com to come by!

We hosted the Advertising Production Club’s ‘Integrated Media’ panel last night to learn what makes a good integrated campaign work and why. The outstanding panel discussed what drives a brand, how media is distributed and how the creative process travels from concept to consumer.  Check out the some photos below and the full album on our facebook page.

We had a great time at LeBook’s Connections Los Angeles event yesterday.  Hosted by our friends at Smashbox Studios, we got to rub elbows with the best in creative production at an incredible facility. We joined sister divisions Industrial Color, Fast Ashleys Studios and Impact Digital to present Industrial Color Brands and cheers at the after-party. Check out the gallery for a peek into one of the highest caliber industry events in the biz.

Join us at LeBook Connections Los Angeles next Thursday, January 29th! We’re excited to present at the show hosted by our partner, Smashbox Studios, in Culver City.  We’ll be sharing a booth with sister divisions Industrial Color, Fast Ashleys Studios & Impact Digital.  Hope to see you there! LE BOOK Connections January 29th 11:30am – 7:30pm Smashbox Studios 8549 Higuera St. Culver City, CA 90232

On October 16, 2014, the Advertising Production Club of New York hosted a panel discussion on ‘Mobile Mayhem’ at Parsons The New School for Design. Product Manager Matt Glueckert joined representatives from Google, Adobe, Drawbridge, and AKQA to present the globaledit iPhone app to the crowd of creatives. https://vimeo.com/109867396

Panelists from luxury brands Estee Lauder and Tiffany & Co. joined Mathieu Champigny, VP of Sales & Marketing at globaledit, to discuss the benefits of managing a large brand’s digital assets — and the difficulties that come with it. Check out the video below to gain sharper insights into the big picture of Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems’ implementation, the importance of metadata, a well-structured taxonomy and more. Panelists Abigail Meisterman – Metadata Architect, Tiffany & Co. Melissa Pandolfi – Manager /  Archivist, The Estee Lauder Companies Mathieu Champigny – VP of Sales & Marketing, globaledit DAM and Luxury Brands from globaledit on Viemo. This event was part of the DAM Meetup Group in NYC.

The Industrial Color Brands family gathered last night to host the opening reception for PDN’s “The Curator” gallery exhibit. We enjoyed hors d’oeuvres and drinks over some great photography from the six winning series.  Our guests and friends from Fast Ashleys Studios, Impact Digital, and Industrial Color took in the great views from our terrace and got a little silly in our photo booth. See some of the highlights below and check out the rest of the party pics here. The gallery is now open to the public through July 9th. Please email gallery@industrialcolor.com to schedule a visit.

Last night we joined the rest of our Industrial Color Brands family to kick off the summer with a Monday Margarita Mixer. We mix and mingled with our teams from Industrial Color, Fast Ashleys Studios and Impact Digital for an evening filled with tequila, taquitos, a killer terrace and of course a piñata. Check out highlights in the rest of the gallery here.

Last week’s Henry Stewart DAM Conference proved to be another great forum to engage with the Digital Asset Management ( DAM) community, see our industry pals, and meet new faces.  We also had the opportunity to present in one of the TECH LAB sessions during the show.  Product Manager, Matt Glueckert, took the stage to share our newest mobile and video features and discuss the future of workflow.  Check out the recording of his session below.  Matt also joined The Food Network, HBO, and Turner Broadcasting on a panel to discuss creative operations and the journey from ‘Cam’ to ‘DAM’. Thanks to everyone who stopped by our booth and let’s stay in touch! globaledit TECH LAB Session at Henry Stewart DAM Conference from globaledit on Vimeo.

Last night we hosted the world’s largest DAM meetup group right here in our TriBeCa headquarters to discuss collaboration tools and digital asset management.  Our very own Product Manager, Matt Glueckert, was on the panel alongside Megan Re, Photo Director, Food Network and Shane Vella, Technical Solutions Engineer, North Plains. The panelists reviewed the ever changing workflow processes that Digital Asset Managers need to adopt, and the challenges faced in implementing solutions.  A productive and educational evening was had by all! View a recording of the panel discussion below. And if you’re in the NYC area, sign up to join the NYC DAM meetup group here. Working with collaboration tools and digital asset management How do groups and teams work together with digital assets today? Can you collaborate with others on digital assets today? How about after or even during a photo shoot? How about with video? What collaboration tools do you use along with digital asset management (DAM) today? How do these collaboration tools work with your DAM solution? Can you work remotely and still collaborate effectively? What about doing all this on mobile devices? Find out the answers to these questions and more during our NYC DAM Meetup panel discussion on working with collaboration tools and digital asset management. -Henrik De Gyor, Co-Organizer

globaledit’s Product Managers, Matt Glueckert and Tommy Lionelli were in Austin this past week at the SXSW Interactive Festival to see the latest and greatest technology buzz the industry has to offer. The duo heard Google’s take on the New Digital Age, sat in on a conversation with Neil deGrasse Tyson, and had a chance encounter with the real Lucas from Venmo’s viral NYC subway ad campaign. The duo capped off their trip with an incredible experience at Pandora Radio’s send off party. With all that they saw at SXSW Interactive, the team can agree that there are some truly amazing technological changes erupting throughout the industry. globaledit is proud to be a part of it all!

A few lucky members of the globaledit team are on their way (literally!) to Austin, TX for the SXSW Interactive Festival. Product Managers, Matt Glueckert and Tommy Lionelli are headed to the largest music festival of its kind to mingle with the best in the industry and get a look at what’s next in the world of tech. SXSW’s take on this year’s event: “An incubator of cutting-edge technologies and digital creativity, the 2014 event features five days of compelling presentations and panels from the brightest minds in emerging technology, scores of exciting networking events hosted by industry leaders and an unbeatable lineup of special programs showcasing the best new websites, video games and startup ideas the community has to offer. From hands-on training to big-picture analysis of the future, SXSW Interactive has become the place to preview the technology of tomorrow today.” Matt and Tommy will be filling us in on their adventures along the way, so stay tuned for a play by play of all the Hi-tech happenings!

Tag Yourselves, Relive the Party Last week friends and industry peers of globaledit joined in a celebration. Together we sipped on our fabulous specialty cocktail “The Accelerator” and learned more about the journey we’re embarking on in 2014. The big theme of the evening was that we’re “ready” for what’s to come. We hope globaledit will make a difference in your 2014 adventure. Our team took some great footage during the event. Tag yourselves in photos in the Keynote facebook album. The following video is a recording of our Keynote presentation. You should also check out the footage from our celebration!

Amidst our teams shooting runway shows this New York Fashion Week, we also brought a presentation right into our own abode. Industrial Color Brands proudly presented Adam Selman’s FW14 collection. Selman worked with stylist, Mel Ottenberg and collaborated with headphone designer, Skullcandy to deliver an impressive sophomore collection. Our gallery was filled with some of New York City’s most creative including V Magazine, i-D, Interview, Style.com, Vogue, Amy Sedaris, Lauren Esersky, Ladyfag, Jeanette Hayes and more! To view some photos behind the scenes click here, and check out the personal interview with Mr. Selman himself above. Until next time #NYFW…

Last night the Industrial Color Brands family got together for a good ol’ fashioned Holiday Hoedown!! We brought in 15 bales of hay and a four-piece Bluegrass band that brought the house down.  The folks from globaledit, Impact Digital, Fast Ashleys Studios, and Industrial Color captured the fun in our farm themed photo booth.  Check out the gallery here!

The globaledit team had a wonderful time at Ngage last week in Niagara Falls! Thanks to our partner, North Plains for hosting such a wonderful event loaded with industry leaders and thought-provoking sessions. Have a look at the video above featuring our very own Jody Martinez for a recap of the event as well as information about our partnership with North Plains.

Industrial Color Brands exhibited together at Le Book Connections New York in Soho last week. Representatives from all divisions, including GLOBALedit, Industrial Color, Impact Digital, and Fast Ashleys Studios were on hand to unveil new products and services and talk shop with the industry@f40s top creative professionals and brands. Thanks to all who stopped by our booth to learn more about our capabilities!

We’re looking forward to another productive Henry Stewart Digital Asset Management Conference at The Hilton New York on May 2-3. We will also be hosting some informative educational sessions (see below). If you have not registered yet, click here and use the globaledit discount code GLOBALEDIT100 and receive $100 off of registration fees. Brand Workflows and DAM – The who, what, where, when, and why Friday, May 3, 3:20-4:00pm A panel discussion featuring Steve Kalalian, CEO, globaledit on what the future holds for creative operations; what is already on the horizon, and what is just over the horizon. Tech Track: WIP – Controlling Your Assets from Capture through Production Friday, May 3, 11:20-11:50am Matt Glueckert, Business Development Manager, globaledit, will discuss current customers’ success and performance factors for implementing a solid WIP platform.

North Plains held their annual Partner Conference on December 6-7 in Toronto, at the Soho Metropolitan Hotel.  We were proud to attend, representing Industrial Color’s sales, product and marketing teams.  We heard about plans for 2013 and spent time with the North Plains team and channel partners from around the world.  There’s much more to come as we work closely together to offer customers the best work-in-progress and DAM solutions. Check out the photos from the conference here.  

The 2012 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show aired this week. There was no shortage of glitz and glamour as the very lovely VS Angels rocked the runway and brought in 9.3 million viewers. We are always very excited to be a part of this annual holiday show. Victoria’s Secret used globaledit to manage all the on-site show photography and behind the scenes footage. Check out the photos and watch performances by Rihanna, Justin Bieber and Bruno Mars from the show here.  

We’re still stuffed from yesterday’s Industrial Color office potluck! Lasagna, osso bucco, and meatballs, oh my! It was a fantastic culinary turnout. It was great to enjoy and share with each other. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!    Our office will be closed from Thursday 11/22 and Friday 11/26. For support help, submit a ticket to support@globaledit.com.  

This month GLOBALedit went to the Henry Stewart DAM LA show. We showed off LightTable to the West Coast while leading and participating in several panels and discussions. Check out our photos from the show: GLOBALedit Booth Day 1: How Creative and IT can Work Together, presented by Christopher Grakal, VP of Photo and Digital Asset Management, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc   Day 1: Work in Progress is DAM for Creatives, presented by Matt Glueckert and Aaron Holm of GLOBALedit and Industrial Color Software Day 2: How to Make Talent Approvals So Easy, Even Zombies Can Do It,  presented by Rick Zwicker, Director of Photography at AMC Check out this highlight video from the conference!  

Get to know Dan Fusaro, globaledit Software Developer and guy who likes to eat. Dan was featured on foodie blog Midtown Lunch recently and revealed his Downtown culinary savvy.  Here’s a peek of his interview: Favorite lunches downtown: … South’s on Church (btw. White & Franklin) for nachos. Their nachos are the greatest thing you’ve ever seen come out of a kitchen, time and time again. They take the care to layer everything nicely, cook it through, top with guac, sour cream, pico and plenty of jalapenos. I dare you to find a better plate of nachos anywhere. I finished these by myself on a dare for lunch once, I was never the same… Read the rest of Dan’s interview here as well as his top picks for a great lunch in TriBeCa.  

Next week the GLOBALedit team will be at the Henry Stewart DAM Conference in Los Angeles. Here are some highlights we’re looking forward to participating in: North Plains & GLOBALedit Strategic Alliance  Discover how we partnered to offer enterprises the best-of-breed solutions to seamlessly manage content. Educational Sessions Panel: New Approached to Building an Effective Strategy – What DAM has to Offer with Rick Zwicker, Director of Photography, AMC, Thursday, 11/1 @11:40am Panel: How Creative and IT Can Work Together with Christopher Grakal (Turner Broadcasting), Lisette Azar (CBS), Aaron Holm (Industrial Color), Paul Nicholson (Showtime Networks) and Chris Wittmayer (NASCAR), Thursday, 11/1 @ 1:00pm Case Study: Talent Approvals So Easy, Even Zombies Can Do It, Rick Zwicker, AMC, Friday 11/2 @ 11:50am Technology Track: Work In Progress is DAM for Creatives, GLOBALedit, Thursday 11/1 @ 1:30pm                            Rick Zwicker                       Christopher Grakal                        Lisette Azar                        AMC                               Turner Broadcasting                             CBS                                                Aaron Holm                           Matt Glueckert                                           Industrial Color                        Industrial Color Join us at Booth #8 and experience the GLOBALedit LightTable. We look forward to seeing you there! Register Now and save $100 when you enter discount code “INDUSTRIAL100′ “

Last week GLOBALedit presented at Createasphere at The New Yorker Hotel. The market debut of the GLOBALedit LightTable was a success! In light of the release, we offered live demonstrations to members of the digital asset management community while participating in panel discussions and case studies. Conducted Demonstrations with Industry Leaders at the GLOBALedit booth. Christopher Grakal from Turner Broadcasting Conducting Live Case Study with the New GLOBALedit LightTable Aaron Holm of Industrial Color Software Moderating Workflow Panel Featuring client BJ Gray from Victoria’s Secret Visitors Enjoyed Collaborating on GLOBALedit’s LightTable at Booth #214 Watch our exclusive interview and demo for DAM Coalition here. “

Congratulations to AMC and Showtime on your Emmy Award wins! We tuned in on Sunday night to watch the 64th Primetime Emmy Awards and to see them win big and take home statuettes. Showtime won for its Outstanding Drama Series, Homeland. Co-stars Claire Danes and Damien Lewis both went home with “Best Actor- Drama” and “Best Actress-Drama”. Homeland is Showtime’s first series to win top prize for an Outstanding Drama Series. Aaron Paul won the Emmy for “Best Supporting Actor – Drama” in AMC‘s Breaking Bad. Be sure to tune in to the season premiere of Homeland on Sunday, September 30th at 9PM on Showtime. Breaking Bad fans…we’ll have to sit tight until Summer 2013 for the final season! “

This weekend GLOBALedit teamed up with Microsoft at the Style Coalition VIP Influencer Lounge at The Empire Hotel for New York Fashion Week. We showed off the new GLOBALedit LightTable@f2 in the suite dedicated to showing how technology is affecting the fashion industry. Special guests, including industry bloggers and media outlets, were invited to partake in a Tech Meet Up, led by Steve Clayton, Editor of blog Next at Microsoft. The Lounge focused on the emerging technology trends that are contributing to the forward movement of the fashion industry. The Influencer Lounge was a perfect opportunity for us to share a sneak peak of our soon-to-be-released GLOBALedit LightTable@f3! Steve Clayton, Editor, Next at Microsoft; Yuli Ziv, Style Coalition, Founder & CEO Beth Keebler of Waggener Edstorm, with GLOBALedit’s Lindsay Rapoport, Marketing Director and Irene Yoo, Director of Product Management   Wesley Robison of PSFK.com checking out the LightTable?.   Thanks again to Style Coalition for hosting such a fabulous event! “

We are thrilled to announce our partnership with Style Coalition for #NYFW!   The leading blogger network has invited GLOBALedit and Microsoft to host their VIP Influencer Lounge at The Empire Hotel. Located next to the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week tents at Lincoln Center the 3-day event lounge will be a retreat from the runways. We teamed up with Microsoft to provide an experience focused on technology affecting the fashion industry by showcasing our very own LightTable ?. The GLOBALedit LightTable? is the first digital touch table that collaborates in real-time with the GLOBALedit cloud-based platform, bringing photo editing, image markups, layout creation and creative review sessions from the web to your fingertips. Inside the Influencer Lounge, guests will be be treated to hair styling by ted gibson and a showcase of accessories by Skagen Denmark and shoeline.com. Event presenter Style Coalition recently launched SC TV, their own channel of exclusive and original content featuring the digital world’s top beauty and fashion bloggers, and will be on scene to capture all the behind-the-scenes action at NY Fashion Week. Follow @globaledit on Twitter this week for our #NYFW coverage! “

On June 28th, GLOBALedit and the APC welcomed clients, agencies and industry leaders to our TriBeCa office for a special educational event on how web-based technologies are revolutionizing content management. We were excited to see many friendly faces as well as have the opportunity to present to APC members, agencies, and brands. The crowd gathered at 6PM at our 22nd floor office and cooled off with refreshments, enjoyed impeccable views from our balcony and said goodbye to a 90? day.   Guests were welcomed by Aaron Holm, VP of Industry Relations, who gave insight into how a platform like GLOBALedit fits (but most often stands out from) into generalized digital asset communities. Following was a demo by Matt Glueckert, who walked the audience through the process of initial digital asset capture, onto editing, retouching and approval all in under 10 minutes! Matt Glueckert, Business Development Manager Christopher Grakal, Vice President of Photography and Digital Asset Management for Turner Broadcasting, made a special trip from Atlanta to demonstrate how his team uses our new GLOBALedit App for Surface.  Christopher Grakal, VP of Photography and Digital Asset Management for Turner Broadcasting Left: Matt Peterse, Digital Production for Sony Music Entertainment and Chris Borgman, Owner of Chris Borgman Photography The educational mixer concluded with live demo stations where guests were able to experience GLOBALedit in more detail. Other notable highlights include a lucky raffle winner going home with a brand new iPad and the announcement of GLOBALedit’s donation to the APC Scholarship Fund. Matt Peterse, Digital Production for Sony Music Entertainment Left: Jim Sewell, Account Executive at Contemporary Graphics & APC Membership Chair. Right: David A. Luke, Business Development Director at DAL Consulting & APC Education Chairman Thanks again to the APC and to all of our guests who made this event such a success!   To view a fun video recap of the event click here. “

globaledit is proud to be a part of Henry Stewart’s DAM Conference 2012 New York. This year the conference is taking place at the Hilton New York on May 10th and 11th. Stop by booth #23 to experience the latest touch software on the Microsoft Surface table. We will also be doing live globaledit demos on the newly released Version 4 software on both the iPad application and the traditional web-based platform. globaledit will be participating in the following presentations: How the iPad has changed our DAM Consumption – The Next Chapter Handling ‘Work in Progress’ – how creative teams can use DAM Why DAM Doesn’t Work for Creatives Visit the globaledit website for more information about our platform. All DAM attendees are invited to attend the DAM NYC Party hosted at Industrial Color (22 stories above Manhattan for best views of New York City)! RSVP to DAM2012@industrialcolor.com today. For more information about CC52: The Exhibition, please visit cc52.tumblr.com. “

We were in London this past weekend to participate in Comic Relief’s amazing Sport Relief 2012. Comic Relief, a major charity based in the UK that drive[s] positive change through the power of entertainment”, produces this biennial campaign to generate massive awareness and funding for a variety of charitable causes by connecting sport, celebrity, family, and physical activity. On Friday, we were part of the studio audience for the Sport Relief 2012 telethon broadcast on BBC. The program featured major British sport and entertainment stars and generated over ?50 million. The funds will be spent by Comic Relief in both the UK and the world’s poorest countries. On Sunday, over one million people in hundreds of venues across the U.K. participated in the Sport Relief Mile, running 1, 3, or 6 miles to raise money through sponsorships. The London event, in which we participated, was hosted in front of the beautiful Buckingham Palace. Behind the scenes, the Comic Relief photo team used GLOBALedit to upload, edit, and distribute photography to press and media outlets across the U.K.. The team graciously allowed us to film their work in action during the busy production. Stay tuned for a Comic Relief case study video coming soon! For more information on how GLOBALedit can accelerate your event / production workflow, contact us at info@globaledit.com.\

Last night, we faced off against design agency Area17 in an epic ping pong tournament. Fueled by pizza from our favorite pie shop Saluggis and beer, members of Industrial Color and Area17 went head-to-head in a single elimination bracket. The final showdown came down to Seiji Ohashi, Industrial Color IT manager, and Kemp Attwood, partner at Area17. The two were neck and neck right to the end, and after a triple (or quadruple@f36) overtime Seiji took the crown! He got to take home a nice bottle of Buffalo Trace whiskey as the prize. Area17 is an interactive design agency located in New York City and Paris who specialized in creating modern interactive systems. Their design work on the upcoming GLOBALedit web application, the GLOBALedit App for iPad, and the GLOBALedit App for Surface has been truly beautiful and inspiring for both us and our clients. Many thanks for all the hard work and a great game; we look forward to the next round! “

Industrial Color will be attending National Retail Federation (NRF) 101st Annual Convention & EXPO on January 15th to 18th, 2012. We will be joining Microsoft along with our Surface development partner SevenSteps to preview the industry’s first digital table, which will work in real time with GLOBALedit. The new Microsoft Surface multi-touch system, the Samsung SUR40, features a 40-inch HD 1080p screen and relies on PixelSense, which uses the pixels of the screen itself to act as cameras and register both human and object input. The new Surface holds huge potential in the retail world as well as other communication and information based industries. We’re excited to be involved with this new technology and believe it will be a revolutionary and innovative tool for photo and video production teams to create and collaborate on content. The NRF Convention will be taking place January 15 – 18, 2012 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. Visit the NRF site for more information on attending the convention for exclusive sneak peeks and demos on what’s ahead for globaledit. Stay tuned for official announcements soon! “

On Wednesday we went to check out the new Lytro Light Field Cameras on Display at the 7th Annual WIRED Store in Times Square NYC. It was really great to get a hands on demo of the new camera and see how it works. It allows you to take a picture and to then focus and re-focus after the fact. You can then share your images online which allows anyone to interact and select new focuses in your images. You can see more and try it out for yourself here. Check out our photos from the event below! The three Lytro camera models will be featured along with more than 200 other hot new products. Visit the store between noon and 7pm Wednesdays through Sundays between Friday, Nov. 18 and Saturday, Dec. 24 to request a Lytro camera demo with one of the WIRED Store employee ?Ambassadors.? “

Last week we stopped by the Gizmodo Gallery opening at White Box here in NYC to check out everything from the 82-inch LCD touch screen, to the high speed automatic pancake-making machine, to a machine that will paint little anime cartoons on your nails. On display was a fantastic collection of iconic gadgets of the past as well as the latest and most innovative in technology including a variety of smartphones, tablets, and computers. Naturally, we had a great time looking around and playing with all the fun gizmos. Check out some of our photos from the gallery below. “

The 2011 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show aired nationally last week, shot here in New York City earlier this month.Victoria’s Secret used GLOBALedit to manage all the on-site show photography and behind the scenes video footage. We are incredibly excited to once again be a part of this amazing, ever-growing production! Check out the photos and behind the scenes video from the show, and watch the full episode here to view the elaborate costumes and catch performances by Jay-Z, Kanye West, Maroon 5, and Nicki Minaj.

Last Thursday, Industrial Color hosted its first GLOBALedit User Conference at our NYC offices. It was a huge success and a great opportunity for us to preview upcoming technologies and for everyone to network with and learn from each other. Organizations who participated: AMC Networks, Digitas, Food Network, Getty Images, HBO, J.Crew, NBC Universal Cable Group, New York & Company, Nickelodeon, Saatchi & Saatchi, Scripps Interactive, Showtime Networks, Starz Entertainment, Time Inc., Turner Broadcasting, Victoria’s Secret Stores, Victoria’s Secret Direct, Victoria’s Secret Pink, and Warner Bros. Image Lab A warm thank-you to everyone who was able to attend, and especially to our esteemed presenters: Stephen Hunking from Showtime, Maribeth Burton from Victoria’s Secret, and Christopher Grakal from Turner Broadcasting.

We visited this year’s New York Comic Con this past weekend at the Javits Center right here in Manhattan. NYCC is a four -day event that plays host to the latest and greatest in comics, collectibles, technology and gaming and is the second largest comic book and pop culture gathering in the country. We made our way through the aisles and crowds to see our friends over at The Walking Dead booth, where comic creator Robert Kirkman was posing for photos and signing autographs for fans. Also among the exhibitors we visited: NBCUniversal, Disney, Animal Planet (a division of Discovery), Warner Brothers, and Anchor Bay Entertainment (a division of Starz). Check out our photos/video below from our adventure at NYCC’11!

A major client of ours gives out some GLOBALedit love at the Creatasphere Entertainment Technology Exposition that took place this week at the New Yorker Hotel.  Here, he demonstrates the GLOBALedit Image Editor and its streamlined photo editing and viewing capabilities. Visit the Creatasphere website to find out more about the conference, and stay tuned for more GLOBALedit news!

Industrial Color Software is planning the 1st Annual GLOBALedit User Conference to take place in the Fall of 2011. We would love to get your feedback so that we can plan a great event. The survey should not take more than 2 or 3 minutes. Contact us at support@globaledit.com with any additional questions.

Yesterday evening, VP of Development Aaron Holm spoke at a fashion and technology meet-up presentation organized by Fashion 2.0. The event featured presentations from several retail-targeted technology companies including Clothia, ShopperSeeks and Stylect App. Aaron focused on GLOBALedit?s capabilities to greatly improve workflow and collaboration between teams in the retail industry. To learn more about the event and Fashion 2.0 click here. Have twitter? Follow the trending #fashion20 to see audience responses to the presentation. Thanks to Yuli Ziv and Fashion 2.0 for organizing such an interesting group of presenters. We are looking forward to the next meetup. “

Aaron Holm, Industrial Color Software’s VP of Development, will be speaking at this years PRIMEX Leadership Summit in Coral Gables, Florida. Aaron will be a panelist on Wednesday’s 5pm session PROCESS: Enabling Integrated Media answering the question – What are the best practices for operating an efficient, scalable, integrated cross-platform media production workflow? Senior executives from IDEAlliance and IPA members will be gathering at the Biltmore Hotel from February 23-25, 2011 to discuss the integration of print and digital media across the entire media supply chain and to learn about integrated best practices, efficient workflows, and profitable business models.

Globaledit will be hosting an interactive Lunch & Learn workshop with IO Integration at Industrial Color in New York City on Thursday, February 10, 2011. We’ll show you how you can save time and money by giving productions teams of any size the power to access and manage both images and videos from anywhere, anytime using Globaledit. Join us for lunch and learn how you can: Turbo charge your photo and video upload, review, and approval workflow Streamline library management using a easy, secure, drag-and-drop interface Use Globaledit to gain incredible workflow efficiencies like today’s top retailers and ad agencies Eliminate hard drives, DVDs, and FTP from the production workflow with built-in high-speed file distribution Leverage the powerful creative approval system favored by the world’s leading entertainment companies Try out Globaledit with your Production Teams! Exclusive, risk-free trial enables on-the-go review/approval – includes iPad application Click here to register today or call 408-996-3420 to RSVP – the event is free but space is limited.

Our good friends at the Aperture Foundation hosted legendary New York photographer Bruce Davidson last night at the Levi’s Photo Workshop in Soho. You can read more about last night’s event here at the Levi’s Photo Workshop website and learn more about the Aperture Foundation at their site.

Please join us and our partners at IO Integration for an exclusive Lunch & Learn workshop June 23 at the SOHO House in NYC. When: Wednesday June 23, 2010 10:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m. Where: SOHO House Seating is limited so register today! The Lunch & Learn workshop will offer strategies for gaining band control and demonstrate how advanced production workflows when integrated into your existing process can help you save your company time and money. For more information please visit www.iointegration.com/LL

Industrial Color Software will be at the Henry Stewart DAM Symposium in NYC May 20-May 21. This year’s Henry Stewart DAM Symposium will be held at the Hilton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. Our partners at IO Integration will be there providing GLOBALedit demonstrations and information.  There are also many panels and presentations that could be useful if you’re hoping to learn more about Digital Asset Management concepts, products, and best practices.  You can learn more about the conference and agenda by going to the conference website here. If you’d like to schedule a meeting to learn more about GLOBALedit or to find out some of the developments scheduled for release in 2010, please contact us by email at info@globaledit.com to schedule an appointment during the conference. This year, we’ve introduced video support, added Dropboxes to make it easy to get content from anywhere, and have an iPad app coming out in June that we can’t wait to unveil.  VP of Development Aaron Holm will be on location at the conference meeting with customers, partners, and the usual DAM suspects. If the weather’s nice, the party could even move downtown to our Tribeca offices for drinks on the terrace.

Victoria’s Secret PINK will be opening its very first stand-alone store in New York City@f2s Soho district this Saturday, March 13. Victoria’s Secret will be throwing a public grand opening party hosted by PINK models Behati Prinsloo and Chanel Iman. If you?re in the neighborhood, check out the opening of their store located at 565 Broadway, on the corner of Broadway and Prince. GLOBALedit has provided image management for all images PINK in preparation for the store’s upcoming launch including in-store displays, catalogue mailers, and other promotional materials.  The members of the marketing operations group of Victoria’s Secret PINK were able to collaborate with their retouching and print vendors throughout the country quickly and securely- distributing terabytes of campaign images back and forth. To learn more about Victoria@f3s Secret PINK, the worlds #1 loungewear brand, visit www.vspink.com

Aaron Holm, Industrial Color Software’s VP of Development and Integration, will be speaking at this years Createasphere / EXPLORE Digital Asset Management  conference and exhibition in Universal City, CA. On Thursday, February 18, Aaron will be speaking about managing worldwide workflow, the strengths and weaknesses of the current asset management technologies, trends that are driving innovation, and how high speed file transfer, social media , and asset management technology are converging into global digital workflows.  Aaron will also be moderating a panel discussion about capitalizing on storage Createasphere / EXPLORE Digital Asset Management is a two-day conference, held February 17-18, and is comprised of keynote presentations, expert panels, and educational sessions lead by industry insiders.  This conference is designed to bring together industry leaders, organizations and practitioners to define the future best practices of the entertainment, broadcast, gaming, advertising and media industry. If you are interested in attending this conference feel free to contact us for a discount code before you register.

For those who may have missed the the sexiest night on television” the first time, Victoria’s Secret will re-air its fashion show on the CW tonight at 9. Watch Alessandra, Doutzen, Miranda and Heidi strut down the runway as The Black Eyed Peas perform.  For a preview of the excitement click here  globaledit is proud to manage and support Victoria’s Secret’s Terabytes of very sexy images from photo shoots and campaign visuals while encouraging collaboration with their partners and vendors.

IO Integration will be showing globaledit at the Henry Stewart DAM LA show next week Monday Nov. 9 and Tuesday Nov. 10.  This years theme is “The Art and Practice of Managing Digital Media.”  If you are in LA next week, please stop by IO Integration’s booth and say hi.

We’re pleased to participate in this year’s IPA conference in Chicago which runs April 22-24 at the Westin Michigan in Downtown Chicago. The conference brings together industry leaders and provides sessions on color management, pre-media, cross media marketing, technology, and creative workflow.. We’re also very pleased to participate in the production of a cross media marketing campaign for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Metro Chicago. The campaign would utilize the IPA members, vendor sponsors, and conference attendees to execute the campaign consistent with its conference theme of ?Leveraging Cross Media Convergence? and utilizing the IPA status as the premiere pre-media workflow conference in the US. The photography and production teams will use globaledit to upload photography from multiple sites at high speed, choose selects from hotel rooms and offices around the country, and distribute high resolution files for retouchers using our high speed XFER file transfer system. This is an important campaign and we’re proud to be involved. On Wednesday, April 23 at 3:30 pm, I will participate in a panel on the Technology Track titled: Digital Asset Management: Making it Work. The focus of the panel is to showcase real world technology and examples of digital asset management systems providing value and changing the way people work. These themes are at the core of our vision and I’m looking forward to the session. If you’re in Chicago on the 23rd, please stop by and participate in the discussion.