How to improve internal collaboration with Digital Asset Management Software

Modern businesses rely on robust solutions to improve teamwork and efficiency to stay competitive.

Seamless collaboration and well-controlled processes give everyone a sense of shared purpose. When internal teams collaborate, people have control over their workload.

That said, only one in five of all employees feel that their work is under control every day, meaning there’s ample room for improvement.

When internal collaboration is done correctly, it leads to better team problem-solving and operational efficiency. Employees understand how their role contributes to broader business targets and impacts others in their organization.

This article will show how digital asset management (DAM) can improve internal collaboration.

Discover the many features DAM solutions can offer your business–allowing you to manage digital assets and navigate challenging projects more effectively.

Why use DAM software to improve your team’s collaboration process?

Poor communication, people working in silos, and working in different regions and time zones take real effort to make sure everyone is on the same page with progress and developments.

Poor communication costs businesses around 100 employees, an average of $420,000 annually. What can you do to reduce wastage and improve team collaboration?

Cue DAM software.

Managing your entire content creation process across multiple channels and teams can be time-consuming and challenging. DAM software can improve your team’s communication and collaboration regardless of where or what time zone they are in.

Plus, considering your best employees spend almost half of their time (45%) on collaborative work tasks, DAM platforms easily streamline projects and workflows, making team working more efficient.

Integrated workflows allow internal teams to achieve targets and gain a sense of self-satisfaction. When a job is completed on target and done well, it gives people a sense of accomplishment. It’s no wonder that 78% of employees say a more supportive and collaborative work culture motivates them to stay with their employer longer.

And when cross-teams ideate, create, and get final approval effortlessly–you achieve faster time-to-market.

“Not only did using DAM help us reduce stress levels, but it also increased team engagement when working collaboratively on a common project, as everyone involved can easily access the same file stored in one central location at any time from anywhere with their preferred device - thus further accelerating speed-to-market times and improving overall workflow efficiency throughout our organization.” -Maria Harutyunyan, Co-founder of Loopex Digital.

5 DAM features to improve internal collaboration

Collaborate and manage your entire digital assets with comprehensive DAM functionality.

Work together to get complete oversight of the whole content creation process.

Search and filter assets with ease

Some 72% of marketers say the number of digital assets they manage has increased over the past 12 months–making finding what you need somewhat challenging.

Paul from your marketing shouldn’t be spending vast amounts of time looking for a photo to include in the next email round-up to celebrate your tenth year in business!

Data from LinkedIn shows 55% of people take up to half an hour to find a single asset. Even worse, 22% report creating their own instead – risking duplicate content and assets being shared without formal sign-off.

Finding what you need when you need it should be simple.

Reduce time spent searching for assets with simple and effective DAM automation tools. Improve internal collaboration with limited resources and labor by simplifying search tasks and streamlining operations.

Picture this.

You want to distribute content across social media to promote a new product line. Your digital assets are spread across different shared drives and can only get immediate access if you send emails, share passwords, and convert files to a format you understand.

DAM software will give you simple and effective search and filter functionality. Quickly locate, edit, and distribute assets and save often-used search criteria. Search by text or other basic criteria, for example, your organizational language or file format.

“The biggest advantage we have seen of utilizing DAM software is that it simplifies the search process for retrieving any digital asset with ease,” says Maria Harutyunyan.

“This has helped boost individual productivity levels significantly since no time is wasted in manually searching for photos or videos across different locations on one's device or network drive.”

Reduce content inefficiencies

End-to-end content creation can create technical and process challenges–making internal collaboration even more critical.

“Collaboration is more crucial than ever in today's fast-paced digital age, particularly when it comes to marketing projects,” says Nick Jordan, Co-founder of Workello. “We, as a team, were always looking for methods to improve our workflow and simplify our processes for collaboration.”

“The increased effectiveness of our cooperation processes has been one of the main advantages of DAM software. We can collaborate easily and finish tasks more quickly if everyone can access the same resources. Because everything is available online, it has also become simpler to collaborate with team members who are in various places or time zones.”

Since the multi-layered content production workflow, the potential for reducing content inefficiencies increases.

• Get the best return on your investment and improve internal collaboration by:

  • Automating routine tasks. Set up prebuilt workflows and notify the next responsible person. Collaborate with team members when sending assets for approval. Give your employees a seamless user experience with an intuitive interface.

  • Standardizing content creation processes. Make sure all team members follow agreed internal processes. DAM software standardizes procedures for managing digital assets, making sure you get a consistent approach across all teams, regardless of where they work.

  • Analyzing your content management process step by step. Find out which areas of digital asset management take up the most time. Leverage operational capabilities by understanding which digital assets take the most time to create–allowing you to divide tasks equally amongst team members.

Asset audit trail   

Mistakes happen; it’s normal.

But taking positive action to try and reduce the number of mistakes will help you stay ahead of the game.

Let’s say you need to update a PDF to stay compliant with legislation.

With DAM, all actions made to assets or the metadata associated with the asset are tracked. Teams don’t need to waste time posting a Slack message to find out who has updated the pricing of a product or if the company logo has been changed.

Internal collaboration with team members is much more efficient. Teams have greater control by capturing and logging events that take place within a DAM system. Get evidence of actions taken against an asset, such as when it was created, updated, removed, and archived.

Make sure team members are working on the latest version of an asset–every time.

Boost team collaboration by having a digital asset audit trail on one centralized platform. Eliminate the time waiting for a colleague to start their shift to find the answer you need.

Take it from Lonza Group, who saved time and achieved incredible efficiency by implementing DAM software.

Zachary Harding, Head of Digital, says, “With Digizuite DAM, sales and marketing teams can easily collaborate and communicate both internally and with external sales and marketing partners.”

“DAM software has also enhanced our internal processes by streamlining the procedure for asset approvals and version control. As everything is tracked within the software, there is no longer a need for endless email threads or back-and-forth conversations about changes.”

Mobile view

Did you know that a staggering 97% of people across the US own a cellphone of some kind, and 85% of them own smartphones?

Mobile devices give businesses several opportunities to collaborate with colleagues. Yet, surprisingly, 39% of employees say workplace employees don’t collaborate enough.

Many employees use their smartphones to carry out work-related tasks. But that comes with risks that need to be managed carefully.

With Digizuite DAM, team members can collaborate using their mobile devices–giving greater flexibility, control, and security.

A best-of-breed DAM platform, like Digizuite, allows remote workers to collaborate securely with on-site teams. And as Digizuite uses token-based security, a token is validated on each API request, protecting assets with specific access rights and permissions when using a mobile device:

DAM platforms allow cross-teams and individuals to work together on the go without jeopardizing security. Assets can be edited, reviewed, and approved anywhere on a mobile device at a time that suits them.

Task Management 

Integrated task management workflows allow internal teams to get final approval faster and more efficiently.  As more content is being created than ever before, internal collaboration tools are no longer deemed a nice-to-have but a must-have.

Why?

Because a best-in-breed DAM platform allows everyone to work together toward a common goal.

Improve team working and manage your entire content lifecycle by streamlining task management processes.

Clear and transparent task management features give individuals a simple view of their workload, progress, and upcoming deadlines–improving team collaboration and efficiency.

“DAM software has revolutionized our collaboration process. We have a centralized system where all our digital assets are stored, and everyone has access to the latest versions of the assets. Our team can now easily search, find, and use the digital assets they need for their projects. This has improved our workflow and productivity as we spend less time searching for assets and more time working on projects.”

– Natalia Tomchyshyn, Marketing Director at Relokia.

Review and add annotations

Given the vast amount of digital assets modern businesses create and store, having a simple and effective way of adding annotations to individual assets can keep development on track while letting others know what you have done and why.

“We can also leave comments and feedback on each other’s work, which helps to improve the quality of our output. Another great thing about DAM is that it helps us to keep track of who is working on what. We can see at a glance who is working on which project and what stage they are at. This helps us to stay organized and avoid duplication of effort.” –Vaibhav Kakkar, CEO of Digital Web Solutions.

DAM systems provide review and annotation features that allow you to add written explanations or critical comments to assets.

Collaborate with teams, regardless of location, by communicating the thoughts behind an idea or explaining why a particular file has been updated.

Digizuite - A DAM that improves internal collaboration

The benefits of a connected, collaborative workforce are enormous. Manage your entire digital asset lifecycle by streamlining processes and reducing duplication by bringing people together to achieve mutual goals.

Give employees initiative tools to do their job well and collaborate with others. And when teams do their best work, it can boost productivity and, ultimately, your bottom line.

Want to learn more about how Digizuite DAM can improve internal team collaboration?

Book a 30-minute call with one of our experts today.