Another DAM Podcast

Audio about Digital Asset Management

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The People Aspects of Digital Asset Management: Part 1

In October 2013, I gave a presentation on The People Aspects of Digital Asset Management (DAM) during the Createasphere DAM Conference in New York City. This was audio recorded so the presentation could be shared with you. Enjoy.

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor:  [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset Management. I am Henrik de Gyor, today I’m speaking about the people aspects of digital asset management. Here is a recording of the Createasphere DAM conference presentation that I gave in New York in 2013. Enjoy.

[0:19] I’m Henrik de Gyor. Some of you may know me. I recognize some of the faces.

[0:22] For those of you who don’t know me,  I am the Director of Digital Asset Management services. That means I am a consultant in the DAM space. I have been there for a few years.

[0:33] You may also know me as blogger at AnotherDAMblog.com and AnotherDAMpodcast.com. I did a few of those podcasts and blogs. Also authored a couple books and still working on others as well. I’m a regular speaker at Universities and lectures and conferences like this.

[0:51] Nominated DAMMY of the Year few times. Quick shot to the company I work for. We do a lot of all things aside from DAM. We are vendor neutral. We have offices all over the world.

This is the question that we ask everybody [What do you want to do with DAM?] because that is what you should be able to answer if you are going to get a DAM.

[1:11] It’s not just one of those check boxes where I need is a CRM, I need a DAM, I need a CMS. I don’t know what I am going to do with them, but I have to check that box. Couple of things that you want to remember is most organizations want to be able to search, find, use and then the thing most organizations forget about is you want to able to re‑use and repurpose those assets.

[1:33] In order to get other ROI, return on investments as much as possible on all of your assets. Or as many as you can, not just use it once, or archive at once. The other thing to keep in mind is that there is the asset and there is metadata. A lot of people forget about the information part. The metadata makes your asset searchable, otherwise they’re not.

[1:58] As you accumulate more and all of us are, you want be able you find them. Then you want to have accountability, meaning the people who are going to be doing all that information, adding the information, finding the information, delivering that information, and those assets together need to be accountable through use through groups and roles.

[2:17] Then the access, people who should be accessing those files and have the permission to do so. Those who can’t or shouldn’t, don’t, that’s the security part. Then the distribution download or delivery of those assets, because if you can’t deliver it to whatever platform you need it on.

[2:36] Why do you have a DAM? Is it manual? How much time do you want to spend? How many people do you want to do it with? The other things to keep in mind is you find a lot today and you will have a lot more tomorrow, about the four parts of DAM.

[2:51] There is four parts. You heard a lot about the technology. Every conference talks about the technology. Views vendors X or vendor Y, solutions X or solution Y. Some people will be talking about the information, the metadata, or the taxonomy.

[3:07] Some people will be talking about the process. Today I am going to talk about that part right here. The people which everyone forgets about. That’s why I’m here to talk to you today. I propose this talk to several conferences. This is the only one who was willing to talk about the people part. Interestingly enough.

[3:31] I am being a proponent for those of you know for the users. Specifically for the people who use DAM, not the vendors because there are not there for you, they’re there to make money, for the most part. There is a lot to talk about in as far as people are concerned.

[3:49] Most people, before they get the DAM, waste a lot of time searching. Remember, there is searching, finding and using. They search for stuff, but they don’t necessarily find anything. They have lots of silos, folder structures which magically will help them find something.

[4:08] Or at least the person who created the folder structure. Or the file naming convention that means something to the person who originally created it, but nobody else or is not shared by everyone else or used by anyone else. Then, there is reuse or reacquiring of these assets, because you can’t find it. You reacquire, relicense, you repurchase, or you recreate new ways for more money.

[4:26] The whole process of DAM search, find, use, reuse, repurpose it, otherwise you are wasting your time and you are wasting your people’s time. It goes back to the people. What you are trying to do for your people? You are trying to save them time, you are trying to save you company money.

[4:41] Typically, there’s access free-for-alls, because you have silos everywhere or you have everything of all then you misuse it. That increases your liability because oops we weren’t suppose to use that talent for the last five years. We only had a license to use it for one year.

[4:58] Oops, well I guess we had to pay one lawyer time and lawsuits, and settle that out of court. Some companies actually have a budget for that, literally. Their account, hundreds of thousands, millions of dollars to settle things at court, because they don’t fix their liability problems.

[5:13] DAM can and should fix your liability problems with the right management for your licensed assets. Things that you acquire from Getty, from Corbis, from wherever you are getting it. Or the talent that is creating your assets externally. Or the talent that is in your images or videos.

[5:30] Then, they built silos. Each fiefdom has its own silos because it’s “their assets”. No, it’s not. It’s the company’s assets. You get a paycheck from the same company, right? So start sharing.

[5:46] [background conversation]

[5:48] [laughter]

[5:49] Fiefdoms? Oh yes, that is a politics thing. We can get into that. Then you have Communication with the right assets. That breaks down and is limited to file names and folder structures. Your storage increases, while your management decreases.

[6:09] After DAM hypothetically if you do it right, you can save money and time. More time than money necessary sometimes. You can reuse and repurpose your assets if you can find them and know that you can use them legally. Right?

[6:24] You can access your assets and the people who should have access, can access those files, if you use permissions properly. Role-based permissions meaning the functional role of this group can use those assets. The other groups that shouldn’t be using, because they don’t know what to use it for or how it should be used, don’t.

[6:44] They can see it and go “yes I approve that. It looks great”, and that’s it. Then you get the people like the right managers and things like that to clear those things for them.

[6:54] That can minimize your liability.

[6:55] You visit your legal department slightly less often. Your legal department shouldn’t fear when you come to them. And they should not call on a regular basis. They don’t like to see you when you have problems. They have enough problems already.

[7:11] Consolidating silos. Now, this is back to politics part, right? You get minimized fiefdoms if you actually communicate and share your assets. Some people don’t like that. They like ’empire building’, so that there is another breakdown of things that you have to do.

[7:28] You can communicate and even collaborate. This is a new thing for some. Most organization are drowning in assets, because they are only accumulating more. How many people are in this room are decreasing the number of assets they accumulate every year? None, because we all hope that we have a job tomorrow.

[7:49] The only companies that are decreasing the number of assets they have, won’t be employed or exist very long. One question that we ask, that most people can’t answer, unless they do their homework is how long does it take you to find an asset for a new campaign or project?

[8:06] That number should decrease as you get a DAM and as you increase the efficiency of your DAM. One organization which will remain nameless. A Fortune 500 took ten people 30 hours to find one file. Who thinks that is acceptable in this room? [no one] Right, I didn’t think so.

[8:28] The other part that DAM should be able to do is manage your IP, just because you can find it, can you legally use it. Most organization can’t do that because they don’t look at their rights and is not clearly defined in a templated fashion. That’s part of their metadata it’s like this is who you need to contact for that, in order to reuse that asset.

[8:51] This is how much we paid last time for it. This is what rights we have to use it. This is where we can use it or should use it, because we have all rights reserved. This is royalty free or whatever is public domain or whatever it happens to be.

[9:10] The other thing is metadata is not ‘automagically’ created. There is no metadata fairy. Still to this day. We’re still looking. Still haven’t found one. It still takes people to catalog and apply metadata to assets.

[9:29] An example is, when we license music when we go to iTunes, when we go to get a movie or an eBook from your favorite e‑retailer, we don’t look or assume there is so much metadata in order to find that file.

[9:48] We just think it looks so done, it’s already there. Someone actually applied that, well before you saw it. That’s why you can buy it. The most successful companies out there have metadata applied to all their assets. No matter how much you search for that file, you will find it. That leads to more sales.

[10:09] Shocking, isn’t it? If you can find it, you can use it. If you can’t find it, you can’t use it and they won’t buy it. They won’t be able to use it again. The other thing you have to keep in mind is there are three perspectives in every organization. At least three.

[10:26] There is the business side which cares about how much money is going in, how much money is going out. What value they are serving their customers and clients for their services or products. Are they delivering on time?

[10:39] Then, there’s the creators who want to do anything and everything with as much time and resources as possible until deadline comes.Then, there is the technical perspective that don’t get any feedback, don’t get the requirements they need to deliver the product that they need to deliver to the end users within the organization or externally.

[10:57] Neither of them, all three, don’t talk to each other unless they are talking amongst other organizations. The idea is these three circles do intersect, because they work usually within the same organization. They collect a paycheck from the same organization.

[11:10] They deliver probably the same products and services that people will use or do use, hopefully, but they don’t communicate enough. Often the DAM professionals sit in the middle or should sit in the middle of all three.

[11:28] They need to be able to communicate in their perspective, of all three, why DAM is important. Why they should see value in it, in their perspective. Including creative, including technical, including business, not just “it’s going to save you money” the creators and technical, they want to save money, but that’s not why they are there…

Click here to continue to Part 2 of this presentation

If you have any questions or would like to hear more about this topic, please feel free to contact me directly.

Listen to Another DAM Podcast on Apple Podcasts, AudioBoom, CastBox, Google Play,  RadioPublic, RSS, Spotify or TuneIn

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Another DAM Podcast: Three years later

This is Another DAM Podcast

And I am Henrik de Gyor.

This is the third anniversary podcast of Another DAM Podcast.

Thanks to you, I have been able to record:

And even create a book titled Another DAM Podcast Transcribed. Thanks to the DAM community who crowdfunded this through Kickstarter.

To everyone who made this possible… Thank You.

More to come…

Stay tuned.

Listen to Another DAM Podcast on Apple Podcasts, AudioBoom, CastBox, Google Podcasts, RadioPublic, Spotify, TuneIn, and wherever you find podcasts.

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Another DAM Podcast interview with Doug Mullin on Digital Asset Management

Doug Mullin discusses Digital Asset Management

Here are the questions asked:

  • How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
  • How does an organization focused on sports equipment use Digital Asset Management?
  • What are the biggest challenges and successes with Digital Asset Management?
  • What advice would you like to share with DAM Professionals and people aspiring to become DAM Professionals?

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor: [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset
Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor. Today I’m speaking with Douglas Mullin.
Douglas, how are you?
Douglas Mullin: [0:09] I’m doing well, thanks. How are you, Henrik?
Henrik: [0:10] Great. How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
Douglas: [0:13] I’m the digital asset librarian for Oakley Incorporated in
Southern California. I work for the design graphics department, which is one
of several silos of content producers. [0:25] I manage primarily final and master
mechanicals for the signage. I would see, let’s say, if you went to Sunglass Hut or
something, you saw the signage of the windows.
[0:34] I have master files, different regions, localities to download, to print their
own files. We also have product photography and video. We have several different
departments working with that.
[0:44] With my executive sponsor, I have a project to try to create a real enterprise
DAM program to bridge a lot of our content production silos. Those are
my two main functions of both working for one silo, currently and trying to build
more of a proper enterprise DAM program to bridge a lot of our content production
silos. Those are my two main functions of both working for one silo,
currently and trying to build more of a proper enterprise DAM system.
Henrik: [1:00] How does an organization focused on sports equipment use
Digital Asset Management?
Douglas: [1:05] As I mentioned, we have a point of purchase signage. Lots of
athlete photos get used. We have the signs that go up in stores that are selling
our products, road signs, billboards, bus wraps, and other things like that. [1:19]
We have, of course, a website, which has a lot of content. Content marketing is a
very big thing at a company like Oakley.
[1:25] We have an in-house photo studio. We have a team of photographers who
go on-site who shoot athletes at sporting events or for sponsored athletes for
events that have we have set up.
[1:37] We have a video team, as much the same thing and produce a lot of content.
Content marketing is a very big thing here. It’s pretty much what DAM is
about from our point of view.
Henrik: [1:48] What are the biggest challenges and successes with Digital Asset
Management?
Douglas: [1:51] For us, the biggest challenge really is user interface issues and
process issues. Currently running Artesia 6.8, which is a very powerful product,
but it is a bit of an older product. [2:04] The user interface is not up to current
standards. A lot of consumerization of the enterprise, people’s tolerance for
learning challenging systems has gone down a lot over the years. Certainly, at
Oakley, that’s an even bigger challenge.
[2:20] A really strong user interface is something that we need. As we look forward,
Artesia is going to go away, at some point, and we will get another product,
either from that vendor or from somebody else. It’s still undecided.
[2:35] User interface challenges are a big thing for us. After that is process. What
photos should be shared? What photos should not be shared? Which videos
should or shouldn’t be shared? There are lots of different factors that go into
that calculation. Is a product a current product? Is it a past product, is it a prototype
product?
[2:55] I would see the legal contract that we have with the athletes. These kinds
of issues be very complex. So, it’s an athlete, let’s say, a whimsy contest wearing
our board shorts, which are not yet publicly released, should we use that
photo? Or should that photo not be used because the product is not actually
publicly released yet, even though the athlete winning a major contest is a major
coup for us?
Henrik: [3:20] What advice would you like to share with DAM professionals and
people aspiring to become DAM professionals?
Douglas: [3:24] I think it’s very important to understand that this is very varied
profession, in which it is people, process, content and technology. It’s not possible
just to focus on any one of those. [3:34] Some people imagine that a digital
asset person is a bookish person hidden away in a corner just attaching metadata
to files. But in reality, it is much more difficult than that. You must be able
to interact with your end users to understand what their needs are. You often
have to be assertive about getting your content people are busy and you often
have to reach out to people, work with them to get content.
[3:58] The process issues are huge. Being able to understand the business in
order to help people solve those problems and come to an agreement about
them. Then, of course, at the technology side, you have to know how to talk
the language of the IT people in order to have credible conversations to be an
advocate for your own DAM health, so to speak. That is very important.
[4:20] There’s sort of a trend going on in the world today of…”marketing technologist”
is a phrase that I’ve heard a lot about. But people who come from the
business side of the company but who understand technology, and I think that
being a DAM librarian kind of fits in with that in certain ways.
[4:36] I very much come from the business side. I understand the people and the
content and process issues, primarily. But I’m also able to speak the language of
the IT department to be an advocate for my stakeholders for their requirements.
[4:49] In addition to that, there’s a lot of training opportunities out there in the
world today. DAM is growing a lot. There are a lot of people trying to learn
about it. There’s free webinars stuff that one can certainly see other opps. That’s
vendor sponsored and so it tends to be very solution focused and not always as
focused on the people, process, content, although people do talk about that,
of course.
[5:11] Then, there’s just great conferences at Henry Stewart and Createasphere.
I’m a member of SLA, which keeps me connected to the library world, the
Special Libraries Association. And then the DAM Foundation. It’s also, I think, a
great resource to learn a lot more about the profession.
Henrik: [5:27] Well, thanks Doug.
Douglas: [5:29] Well, thank you, Henrik.
Henrik: [5:31] For more on this and other Digital Asset Management topics, log
on to AnotherDAMblog.com. Another DAM Podcast is available on Audioboom
and iTunes.
[5:39] If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to email me at
AnotherDAMblog@gmail.com. Thanks again

Related Articles

Listen to Another DAM Podcast on Apple Podcasts, AudioBoom, CastBox, Google Podcasts,  RadioPublic, RSS, Spotify or TuneIn

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Another DAM Podcast interview with Paul Riggio on Digital Asset Management

Paul Riggio discusses Digital Asset Management

Here are the questions asked:

  • How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
  • How does an organization focused on music use Digital Asset Management?
  • What are the biggest challenges and successes with Digital Asset Management?
  • What advice would you like to share with DAM Professionals and people aspiring to become DAM Professionals?

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor: [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset
Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor. Today, I’m speaking with Paul Riggio. Paul,
how are you?
Paul Riggio: [0:09] I’m doing quite well, thanks and yourself?
Henrik: [0:14] Paul, how are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
Paul: [0:16] I basically fell into it because I have a background in music, music
for TV and commercials more specifically. I was looking for a system to better
access my back catalog of music. [0:30] Once I started down that path, I found
that it was a much larger task than expected. Also found that other people
wanted it, as well. I started a company called, TuneSpring, that really houses
the music of multiple companies and makes that accessible. It was out of
need, in short.
Henrik: [0:52] How does an organization focused on music use Digital Asset
Management?
Paul: [0:56] Basically, if you’re familiar with Pandora or any of those services,
what we have to do is somewhat similar. We have to tag, similar to video or
photos, give some sort of descriptors. Basically, my company puts all of this
information together to make it accessible. That’s how we’re involved in it.
Henrik: [1:17] What are the biggest challenges and successes with Digital Asset
Management?
Paul: [1:20] In general, I’d say one of the biggest successes is the fact that you’re
able to do more with your life outside of Digital Asset Management. Specifically,
for our business, it’s very hands-on. I’m consistently, along with many of the
people who use our system, we’re consistently asked for specific types of music.
[1:43] Putting a system like this together, which also incorporates video, in terms
of synchronization with audio and video, this system makes review and approval
very, very fast, and the ability to put playlists of tracks together very quickly. The
success is the ability to service clients at a very high level, and also have a life,
and be able to access that from anywhere.
[2:10] The challenge, I would say, especially with a system like ours, which is web
based, having to run through multiple iterations of browsers. Having to deal
with a lot of the technical aspects has been challenging. Also categorization is
always something that comes up.
[2:27] In our particular system, you’re able to search the music of multiple providers,
but each provider actually tags their own music. They’re all responsible for
their own tagging. We give guidelines and we provide different keywords that
we suggest, but everybody can tag the way they want to tag it.
[2:48] It was challenging to get to a place that would be both flexible enough for
individuals who might, say, have tags that would describe music specific to their
area. Even music that would be in different parts of the UK, for instance, might
have different descriptor that we wouldn’t use here in the states.
[3:08] Working out that system to be flexible enough to handle specific keywords
and that sort of thing was one of the many challenges.
Henrik: [3:17] What advice would you like to share with DAM professionals and
people aspiring to become DAM professionals?
Paul: [3:21] Basically, like I said in the beginning, it’s something that was based
on need for me. I think, even if it’s something that you’re not sure how to approach
the business, essentially, look from the place of need, which is a little
bit broad. But it starts to come to light and as one experience the world a little
bit. [3:41] Essentially, again coming from a place of need, I would say one of the
things that I did was I really had to deal with a lot of my peers, who work within
the industry that I’m in primarily music for advertising, but also music publishers
and that sort of thing.
[4:01] I’ve spoken with major music publishers and looked at what their needs
would be, and tried to formulate a system that would simply address everybody’s
needs. It’s dealing with other people and experts within the field, such
as I dealt with metataggers who used to work at Pandora.
[4:24] I’ve dealt daily and technically with companies that are excellent at automatically
turning audio files into multiple versions of those files so they can be
reviewed in things like Firefox, which require OGG files, and that sort of thing.
Basically, from there, it’s based on need. There are many systems in place that
are badly in need of help, both with tagging and we’re finding that…One of the
major publishers I spoke with, I’m [inaudible 04: [4:41] 57] their name, had a staff
of about a dozen people, not too huge. They’re constantly going through and
tagging a million plus track library. They will be doing that, if you start doing the
math, and getting down to the hours per person, it takes a very long time.
[5:12] There’s work to be found. I had worked a bit with Dan McGraw in the
beginning. He helped to organize and break down the system that is the core of
what TuneSpring is now, to have the ability to look at potentially an industry that
from an outside perspective having somebody come in and look at it and break
it apart was very helpful for us.
[5:36] Again, if you can’t hire experts to speak to experts and try to interview
people who do this all the time, and kind of pick up fields that seems to
have a gray area of massive amounts of metadata, music being one of those
huge areas.
[5:55] There’s a lot of automatic categorization coming up, which is phenomenal
and really, really helpful. It has a tendency to find songs that sound like other
songs based on a variety of factors. But the human element is one that I think
to get truly accurate tagging, especially with audio, which is something that is
happening over time, you can’t just sit and look at it. It’s a particular challenge.
[6:22] There was one cool thing that we came up with in TuneSpring, which was
the fader search, which dealt with the unique challenge where music is concerned,
which is typically with keywords that a track is either happy or it’s sad, or
it’s kind of sad or it’s kind of happy. You don’t really have tags for that.
[6:40] We came up with a range fader for mood, for the subjective terms like the
“size” of the sound. Maybe technically an orchestra is very large, but if they’re
playing a small, quiet session, they’ll sound quite small, whereas if you look at
the White Stripes, which is just two people, they can sound enormous.
[7:08] Dealing with those things that the person who’s searching can react to
based on the results was the thing that’s been very successful with what we
created, having that move the fader from moody to happy and hearing what’s
there and being able to have an opinion based on what the results are. It’s
something very industry specific.
[7:33] Also, there’s a great book I’d recommend, which I think a lot of DAM
people may or may not know about, which is “Everything Is Miscellaneous.”
That was something that was very inspiring to me in terms of looking at the
broader world of Digital Asset Management and what the challenges are and
will be in the future.
[7:51] It’s an insane world. We are a world that’s generating a lot of content, particularly
in the music arena, since you can make a track on your iPhone or iPad,
and probably on an Android phone, too. It’s ever expanding.
[8:10] I guess in a way what we’re doing is, we’re doing a subscription based
group source thing, having all of our individual companies tag their own music
while also offering the potential of hiring professionals, should they so desire.
Henrik: [8:27] Thanks, Paul. For more on this and other Digital Asset
Management topics, log on to AnotherDAMblog.com. Another DAM Podcast
is available on Audioboom and iTunes. If you have any comments or questions,
please feel free to email me at AnotherDAMblog@gmail.com.
Thanks again.

Related Articles

Listen to Another DAM Podcast on Apple Podcasts, AudioBoom, CastBox, Google Podcasts, RadioPublic, Spotify, TuneIn, and wherever you find podcasts.

Need Digital Asset Management advice and assistance?

Another DAM Consultancy can help. Schedule a call today