Brand Management Software for Dummies

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BrandManagement
Software
Bynder Special Edition
by Stephanie Diamond and
Emily Kolvitz

Brand Management Software For Dummies®
,
Bynder Special Edition
Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., The Atrium, Southern Gate Chichester,
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Contents at a Glance
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
CHAPTER 1: Getting Started with Brand Management . . . 3
CHAPTER 2: Introducing Brand Management
Software. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
CHAPTER 3: Embracing Brand Guidelines. . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
CHAPTER 4: Staying Consistent with Brand
Templates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
CHAPTER 5: Deploying Your DAM Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
CHAPTER 6: Facilitating Brand and Creative
Approvals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
CHAPTER 7: Ten Tips (or So) to Elevate Your Brand. . . . . 55

v
Table of Contents
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
About This Book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Icons Used in This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Where to Go from Here . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
CHAPTER 1: Getting Started with Brand Management . . . 3
Understanding the Value of Brand
Management. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Recognizing the Personal Connection . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Looking at How Technology Is Changing
Brand Marketing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Understanding Brand Management Basics. . . . . . . 7
Telling Your Brand Story. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
CHAPTER 2: Introducing Brand Management
Software. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Utilizing Brand Management Software. . . . . . . . . . 12
Surveying the brand management
software landscape. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Looking at software types being
deployed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Reviewing the Seven Steps to Buying
Software. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Assembling a team. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Planning your timeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Aligning your software purchase with
strategic business goals and objectives. . . . . 16

vi
Identifying critical requirements. . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Comparing the best solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Talking to references. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Making a decision. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Getting the Most from Your Implementation. . . . 18
CHAPTER 3: Embracing Brand Guidelines. . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Documenting Your Brand Guidelines. . . . . . . . . . . 22
Evaluating your current guidelines. . . . . . . . . . 22
Identifying the channels you occupy
and looking for new opportunities. . . . . . . . . 23
Adapting your guidelines to suit your
varied channels. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Distributing your guidelines to everyone. . . . . 25
Benefiting from Using a Brand Portal. . . . . . . . . . . 26
CHAPTER 4: Staying Consistent with Brand
Templates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Leveraging Brand Templates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Reviewing problems that brand
templates solve. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Customizing collateral made easy. . . . . . . . . . . 32
Features to Look for in Brand Template
Software. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Utilizing an unlimited number of
customizable templates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Being print-ready. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Providing localization support. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Integrating with other features. . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Using a simple in-line editor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

vii
CHAPTER 5: Deploying Your DAM Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Looking at Strategic Requirements for
Your DAM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Benefitting from a DAM library . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Taking the next step. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Controlling Permissions and Access. . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Sharing and Collaborating. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Measuring Your Brand’s Content
Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Account overview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Asset statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Usage statistics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Presentation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Reports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
CHAPTER 6: Facilitating Brand and Creative
Approvals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Creating Faster Approval Cycles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Structuring Creative Workflow. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Viewing software functions you need
to structure workflow. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Getting started with improving
creative workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Getting a Bird’s-Eye View of All Approvals. . . . . . . 53
Measuring Your Team’s Brand and
Content Creation Cycle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
CHAPTER 7: Ten Tips (or So) to Elevate Your Brand. . . . . 55

1
Introduction
I
t has become increasingly clear that those marketers
who continually update and reinvent their brand expe-
riences are the ones who will own the future. Welcome
to Brand Management Software For Dummies, Bynder Special
Edition.
About This Book
In this book, we cover several topics, including the
following:
»» Why brand management matters
»» How to prepare to purchase brand management
software
»» Why you need to document and update brand
management guidelines
»» How brand templates make content creators more
productive
»» Why you need a brand library
»» How to manage creative workflows to reduce time
taken for content approval cycles
»» Ways to take your brand to the next level

Icons Used in This Book
Throughout this book, different icons will be used to
stress some extra important stuff. Here’s what they mean:
The Tip icon highlights information that can
make doing things easier or faster.
The Remember icon points out things you need
to remember when searching your memory
bank.
Where to Go from Here
Like all For Dummies books, you can read the chapters in
any order that suits you. Start anywhere you like. If you
want to find out more information beyond what’s in this
book, visit https://bynder.com.
2

3
Getting Started
with Brand
Management
B
randing is a subject that is both complex and yet very
straightforward. You create a brand image and your
customers tell you what it means to them. Before the
web, marketers had more control over their brand image
and reputation. Communication with customers was lim-
ited to such things as sponsored ads and contests. Customer
feedback was confined to a few channels like snail mail and
letters to the editor. Customers had no way to compare and
share opinions with each other across the globe.
Chapter 1
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Considering connections with a
brand
»» Delving into brand basics
»» Persuading with storytelling

4
Now everyone can weigh in on what they think of your
brand. A good reputation nurtured over many years can
be wiped out with one major misstep on social media. In
this chapter, you look at the value of brand management,
its current state, and the basics that underpin it.
Understanding the Value
of Brand Management
Have you ever wondered why some brands come and go
and others like Coca-Cola are still around more than a
hundred years later? It’s because of carefully thought-
out brand management. If your company brand is man-
aged correctly, then every employee consistently carries
out the standards set by the CEO and brand strategists. In
addition, every agency and partner knows what the brand
stands for and chooses to do business partially based on
that understanding.
Recognizing the Personal
Connection
Branding relies on all sorts of intangible elements. When
your customer determines what a brand means to her, it’s
made up of memories, interactions, and a whole lot more
that can’t be put into words. You may control how the
product looks, but she decides what that actually means.

5
Branding is a product’s key differentiator.
You can beat your competition based on what
your customer thinks about your brand. In
fact, according to Forbes, 71 percent of B2B
buyers who feel that they resonate with a
brand personally will end up buying the
product or service. So much for rational
decision-making!
Looking at How Technology Is
Changing Brand Marketing
Technology has changed almost everything marketers do
when developing, managing, and promoting brands. For
many companies, a customer will connect with your
brand using the following:
»» Mobile devices: These include smartphones,
tablets, and so on.
»» Your website’s self-serving database of curated
online content: To collect information about your
company and make buying decisions.
»» Your software to evaluate your product: This
can include downloading free trials and samples.
»» An online payment technology: To make online
purchases.

6
To understand how technology is fostering these changes,
look more closely at what’s currently happening as a
result of brand marketers adapting their behavior to meet
the ever-changing needs of consumers. Notable exam-
ples include the following:
»» The rise of many channels with requirements:
Each new channel requires specialized assets
that conform to their platform. For example, you
need to create specific assets to accommodate a
Facebook ad that can’t be used exactly as they are
on other social media platforms.
»» An increase in people inside and out who need
access: More and more companies are being
developed to work with and handle products.
You need to be ready to accommodate them.
For instance, Amazon’s marketing team may
need access to your product content in a different
way than other vendors with which you work.
»» Greater customer control during the buying
process: Customers spend more time researching
products online before they ever talk to a sales
person. For example, the rise of content marketing
is a direct result of the need for marketers to have
information ready for the customer at every stage
of the buying process.

7
Understanding Brand
Management Basics
There are several strategic elements that must be docu-
mented to be able to communicate your brand to everyone.
They include your
»» Mission statement: Your company’s core purpose
and focus.
»» Key messages: Major messages that position
the product vis-a-vis the competition, for example,
“What makes us better?”
»» Defined target audience: The customer demo
graphic and psychographic components. Buyer
personas can clarify your customer’s makeup.
»» Tone of content: Your brand must always be
communicated in the same way to represent your
brand’s voice and personality.
»» Visual elements: These include colors, logos,
photos, icons, website, product shots and taglines.
(See Chapters 3 and 4 for more about this topic.)
»» Presentation templates: You can use approved
templates in programs like PowerPoint and Keynote
to create presentations.

8
Telling Your Brand Story
After you’ve documented the elements of your brand, you
need to turn them into an enticing narrative.
People are hard-wired to respond to stories.
Everyone understands a true narrative with a
beginning, middle, and end, so using your
company’s authentic story will help potential
customers respond to you taking into account
both their hearts and their minds.
To create your narrative, ask the following questions:
»» What do you want your audience to know about you?
»» What emotions do you want to elicit from your
company story?
»» How did the company get started and why?
»» Are there company heroes that customers need to
know about?
Finally, here are some tips that can help you develop a
compelling company story:
»» Start a conversation. You want two-way commu
nication, so ask your audience what they think
about the topic.

9
»» Use emotion-provoking visuals. The web
provides you with all the tools you need to
develop such things as Insta-stories, videos,
interactive messages, and so forth. Make sure
to use them whenever possible.
»» Create suspense. Everyone loves to guess what’s
coming next. Product launches and new features
lend themselves to this type of content.
»» Leave them wanting more. The old show business
adage: There’s always a “part 2” to look for!

11
Introducing Brand
Management
Software
M
arketing departments are constantly being
bombarded with new channels, new formats,
and the pressure to create fresh and exciting
content. In an attempt to keep up, they have turned to a
variety of different software types to succeed against the
competition.
Chapter 2
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Examining brand management
software
»» Looking at the software
landscape
»» Reviewing the steps to purchase
software

12
In this chapter, you explore different types of software to
manage your brand assets and review the steps involved
in purchasing this type of software.
Utilizing Brand Management
Software
To understand what makes brand management software so
valuable, here are five key features that your brand man-
agement software must provide. You need the ability to
»» Create and utilize a central repository: The key
to a strong brand strategy is making sure it’s readily
accessible and convenient for stakeholders to
access the content they need, when they need
it — ideally from one central place.
»» Develop and update brand guidelines: The
software must house brand guidelines that are
consistent and updated automatically to ensure
that the most current assets are being used.
»» Control permissions: The ability to determine and
restrict who has access to different assets is key to
making sure that no content falls into the wrong
hands or is changed without approval.
»» Customize brand-approved assets: Users
around the globe need to be able to take

13
approved templates and customize them for a
local audience without starting from scratch or
using branding in an unapproved way.
»» Collaborate and distribute assets: Collaboration
tools are vital so that everyone who needs to work
on content can do so quickly and from any location.
Surveying the brand
management software
landscape
The brand management software landscape continues to
evolve. A variety of software types are being deployed to
meet all the unique company needs.
Before looking at the different types of software, make
sure you know what’s impacting the current brand man-
agement landscape:
»» Blurred lines: The lines that separate DAM from
other categories are blurring.
»» More choices: As the category deepens and
widens, more types of software are available.
»» Deployment options: Options include on-premise,
cloud and SAS, which adds another layer of
complexity.

14
»» Proliferation: The types of assets and channels to
accommodate are growing at a staggering rate.
»» Functionality: As brand management software
becomes a critical part of the ecosystem, users are
demanding more functionality and integration.
Figure 2-1 shows the growth of brand management soft-
ware since 2011.
Looking at software types
being deployed
Companies use a variety of different types of software to
manage their brand assets. The following are several
types being used:
FIGURE 2-1: The growth of brand management software.

15
»» Digital asset management software (DAM): This
type of software is used to control and manage brand
assets so that consistency and quality are maintained.
»» Content management system software (CMS):
This type of software lets you control and manage
content for publication.
»» Marketing automation software: This type of
software allows you to publish assets on a variety
of channels and monitor their reach.
»» Brand monitoring/reputation software: This type
of software looks for brand mentions and makes
you aware of customer sentiment or brand issues.
Reviewing the Seven Steps
to Buying Software
Buying brand management software is a complex under-
taking. To make it easier and to ensure that you cover all
your bases, here are seven steps you can follow:
Assembling a team
Your first step after you have decided to purchase software
is to gather together a representative team of stakeholders
who will be using it. Now is the time to make sure that

16
you’ve covered all departments and end users. You can’t
afford to leave any constituency out of the decision, or
your solution won’t meet everyone’s needs. Also, those
who have participated in the decision can act as champi-
ons when the system is implemented.
Planning your timeline
This process has lots of moving parts, so developing a
timeline is essential. Without clear deadlines, your team
can get bogged down and lose sight of the tasks that need
to get completed.
Aligning your software purchase
with strategic business goals
and objectives
At this stage, you want to identify the goals that your
company has for buying this software. They must be
aligned with your management’s strategy for success or
you won’t get buy-in from the top.
Create a list of measurable targeted outcomes that indi-
cate success. These targets require you to know where
you are currently, what needs to be improved, and to
what degree. If you’re using homegrown software, be
clear about what you want to replace.

17
Identifying critical requirements
To understand the critical requirements that your solution
must have, you need to identify the current challenges
that your assembled team faces. Be specific.
During this stage, have the team members
prioritize their key needs. Make sure to
challenge items on the list to shake out the
nice-to-haves from the need-to-haves.
You should determine if you want to move your on-
premise software to a cloud solution.
Make sure to identify all the other software
you use in-house to ensure that you can
integrate it with the new system.
Comparing the best solutions
At this step narrow the field to a list of vendors whose
solutions can meet your needs. To compile this list, look
at analyst reports, product reviews, and other objective
measures. Inspect all the material that has been used to
analyze each vendor.
Don’t forget to ask about who your desig-
nated support team will be after purchase.
You want to avoid a bait and switch.

18
Talking to references
When you choose a software solution, you’re also creat-
ing a long-term relationship with a vendor. Ask refer-
ences about the vendor’s response time, documentation,
training, and whether the vendor has met its budget. Also
ask about any hidden costs.
Making a decision
When you’re sure you have done your due diligence, it’s
time to make a decision. Be clear about how the imple-
mentation will roll out and what payments are required
in the immediate future.
Getting the Most from Your
Implementation
After you’ve purchased your software, consider doing the
following at the outset to get the most participation dur-
ing your rollout:
»» Planning training: To encourage adoption, plan
some training meetings right away to give selected
users a chance to champion the software.

19
»» Identifying a support contact person: Have one
person be the contact point for all questions. She
doesn’t have to field them; she must organize them
and make sure they are taken care of.
»» Documenting features of particular interest:
Don’t just leave users poking around the software
to eventually find the features of most interest to
them. Make a list of the most significant features
available to everyone. Creating an index or table of
contents for those features will help make sure
finding them is easy.
»» Conducting vendor meetings: Make the effort to
help your vendors learn the new system. It will
benefit you in the long run as much as it does them.

21
Embracing Brand
Guidelines
N
o matter what size company you work in, it’s
likely that they’ve spent a sizeable portion of
their budget on developing branding and creating
assets to distribute across a multitude of channels. Does
it then make sense to use homegrown processes to access
and protect that brand? Probably not.
This chapter explains why you should develop brand
guidelines and how creating a brand portal to protect and
distribute those assets is of great value to your company.
Chapter 3
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Evaluating your current brand
guidelines
»» Developing a brand portal
»» Managing updated guidelines

22
Documenting Your
Brand Guidelines
Brand guidelines are your company’s ‘rule book’ that tells
everyone how your branded assets should be used when
communicating with your audience. For example, if your
logo includes a blue background, the exact color blue (not
yellow or green) must always be used. Imagine if the Pepsi
logo was depicted in anything other than red, white and
blue. Customers would notice, and confusion would result.
The rules are there for a reason, and any quality brand
wouldn’t make ad hoc changes without good reason.
Yet, brand guidelines are useless unless everyone can
consistently access and deploy them. In this section,
follow four steps that will help you to get started with
documenting and updating your brand guidelines. The
steps are as follows:
Evaluating your current
guidelines
To start your evaluation, bring together all the stake-
holders who manage the brand. Having a consensus about
what the brand stands for and what feelings it should
invoke is important. Once consensus is reached, you’re
ready to evaluate the guidelines you currently have.

23
As you review your current guidelines, look at them with an
eye toward identifying what needs improving, updating,
and deleting. Because the web changes rapidly, it’s possible
that you’re missing new opportunities to communicate
with your target audience.
Identifying the channels
you occupy and looking
for new opportunities
To reach your audience, you need to know where they
currently consume information. It’s not enough to be
present on the major social media platforms. You also
need to identify the unique channels on which your target
audience spends the most time. These channels can be
the best places to get their attention, because platforms
like Facebook have so many competing brands vying for
their attention, that it’s easy to get lost in the noise.
Each channel has its own unique requirements, and you
should be prepared to meet them. Ideally, you want to
make sure that you’ve adapted to all their mobile require-
ments and special formats.
The popularity of channels on the web wax and
wane quickly. So it’s important to continually
survey your audience to make sure they’re still
interested in the channels you identified.

24
Adapting your guidelines to
suit your varied channels
To make sure you have thoroughly identified all your
channel needs, consider asking yourself the following
questions about each channel:
»» What is the tone to use with this channel?
»» What type of imagery does this community
respond best to?
»» Are there any additional needs or brand elements
I need to create for this channel?
Chapter 1 examines the key elements that go into creating
a brand, including mission statement and key messaging.
You also want to make sure that you document your
visual elements so that you have the right assets for each
channel. These elements include
»» Fonts: Name them and detail how you use them.
»» Colors: List what they are and how they should
be used.
»» Icons: Document the visual icons so that everyone
knows what they look like.
»» Logos: Detail size and placement. Make sure to
include all black and white, color, taglines, and
so forth.

25
»» Product images: Varied photos and drawings of
your company’s products.
»» Photos: Explain and provide examples of photo
styles you use.
»» Illustrations: Document your illustration style and
detail how visuals and photos work together.
»» Website design: Make sure to completely
document your website style and branding.
»» Imagery: Give examples of imagery that isn’t
acceptable, such as cheesy stock photos.
One thing that can be useful when document-
ing your assets is to list ‘what not to say.’
Define phrases, stories and descriptions that
should never be used.
Distributing your guidelines
to everyone
Before you distribute your guidelines, have your executives
review and sign off on a final version of them. You don’t
want to surprise anyone. After this is done, send out inter-
nal communications with links to your updated guidelines.
Keep an open mind as others review the
material. Prepare to respond to feedback and
be ready to revise if necessary.

26
Benefiting from Using
a Brand Portal
So how do you make all of your company’s branded assets
available to everyone? You use a brand portal. Brand portals
are databases that house approved brand assets and the
guidelines for their use. It’s a “single source of truth” for
everyone to use with the assurance that they are using the
most up-to-date, approved content.
The benefits of using a brand portal include
»» Self-service: Brand portals ensure that no staff
members waste their time requesting and sending
assets via email. Anyone who needs an asset can
grab it in their own time.
»» Real-time access: Without a portal that updates
content in real time, you can wind up having to
send updates in a static PDF. Doing so is wholly
inefficient and makes everyone less productive.
»» Security: A portal helps secure your branded
assets so that they can’t be misused or destroyed.
»» Permissions: A portal helps you control who can
edit an asset and who can’t. It establishes permis-
sions for different groups working together.

27
»» Access to your experts: In the portal, you can
identify who is responsible for projects and to
whom you can ask questions.
»» Sales enablement: Salespeople need to meet their
customers’ needs for information and pricing at
lightning speed. Often the sales and marketing
departments don’t communicate as effectively as
they should. Using a portal, a salesperson in the
field can find what she needs in the portal. She is
assured that the pricing and content are reliable,
which puts less pressure on everyone.
A brand portal (see Figure 3-1) is more likely
to get used when its interface adheres to your
company’s own brand guidelines. When the
portal design is familiar, it becomes a com-
fortable, seamless way to manage content.
FIGURE 3-1: A brand portal example.

28
JUST GOOGLE IT!
To recognize the value that a portal provides,
imagine what staffers will do if they don’t have
access to brand guidelines from a central
portal. They might grab the logos they need
by searching Google and probably use the first
logo they find. But, they won’t have the context
they need or any guidelines on when/where/
how to use it.
Another big problem that crops up when a
portal isn’t deployed is the fact that a home-
grown nested file structure is often used to
store files. Just like on your own system, when
you store files on the fly you might put them in
the wrong folder. Multiply that mistake by all
those who use the system. In a portal, files are
in a structured manner that can’t be overridden.
Think of all the time wasted searching for files
and not finding them.
After all the money your company spends on
branding, should your staffers be reduced to
using the least effective and efficient way to
obtain, edit, and store assets?

29
Staying Consistent
with Brand
Templates
I
magine if every time your team members wanted to
develop branded content, they had to start from scratch.
Think about having to create a new design for each bro-
chure, webpage, or ad you wanted to use. Finishing it in a
timely fashion would be virtually impossible, right? Say
hello to the template.
Chapter 4
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Utilizing brand templates
»» Freeing up the time of content
creators
»» Uncovering ways to make
customization easy

30
A template is a design blueprint that tells the current cre-
ator where the standard elements of a branding docu-
ment or design should be placed. It also tells the designer
such things as what icons, colors, and fonts to use.
As a result, the branded content your prospects and cus-
tomers see is consistent and conforms to their expecta-
tions. This chapter examines how templates are deployed
in brand management software to help your company
save time and money.
Leveraging Brand Templates
Contrary to what you may think, templates don’t stifle
creativity. They set the designer free to focus on the
specifics of the content she needs to create. If an asset is
already approved, a creator doesn’t need to waste her
time creating it all over again. You don’t want your highly
paid staffers spending time on busy work. That’s too
expensive and inefficient.
Rather than having to spend the time trying to recreate
the layout for an ad that’s already been published, cre-
ators can select the template that has the correct images
and messaging and focus on what’s new and different.
The following sections look at how using brand templates
solves problems that your creators face and how to ensure
that revising collateral will be quick and easy.

31
Reviewing problems that
brand templates solve
Using branded templates makes the job of producing
content much faster and easier. It solves a host of major
problems that you might not even think about unless
you’re a creator who faces them every day. These include
the following:
»» Using unprofessional looking collateral: If you
don’t use approved templates, you run the risk of
publishing poorly designed material that presents
your brand in a poor light. Why spend money on
branded designs and then not use them correctly?
»» The need for costly re-dos: The last thing you
need to happen when deadlines are short is the
issue of having to redo something at the last
minute. Approved templates make this problem
less likely to happen.
»» Using out-of-date branded content: When your
system automatically updates templates, you don’t
run the risk of using outdated branding. You can’t
expect your creators to be aware of all the updates
that happen throughout the year. Likewise, your
partners can’t be expected to know what your
current branding includes.

32
»» The need for highly skilled designers for every
job: When you use templates, you don’t need to
call your top designers to work on every small job.
Templates make it easy for people in other
departments to work on approved assets.
»» Having staff members field constant requests
to email brand guidelines: Enabling self-service
on your system ensures that people can get what
they need when they need it, while also making
sure that the guidelines are up-to-date.
»» Using the wrong specifications: Most content on
the web must conform to specific text and image
requirements. For example, after you construct a
template for a Facebook ad, why should the next
designer have to look up and convert the images all
over again? She can just drop it into the template
and be assured that it meets the necessary
requirements, saving valuable time and money.
Customizing collateral made easy
Enabling faster creation of new brand content is a key
feature of any DAM software. Your software should have
the ability to
»» Be dropped into a program your designer uses and
convert automatically to the format he needs.

33
»» Allow any user to create new marketing collateral
that is on brand by defining template rules.
»» Take the burden off designers by freeing up their
time instead of making them reinvent the wheel for
each asset.
Features to Look for in Brand
Template Software
Your brand management software should have several
features that make it indispensable to your creative staff,
partners, and others working on assets. This section
looks at several features to consider.
Utilizing an unlimited number
of customizable templates
There should be no limit to the number of templates you
can create. In addition, you need the ability to be able to
»» Predefine template business rules (text blocks
and images).
»» Replace images with one click.
»» Have editable fields that can be altered without
template changes.

34
Being print-ready
Even though a lot of content is created for online consump-
tion, you still have to print things like stationery, cards,
brochures, and so forth. Your software should be able to
»» Create and store print-ready PDFs.
»» Send print-ready media directly to print providers.
»» Standardize printing to cut costs.
»» Monitor the status and fulfillment of print jobs.
Providing localization support
Shouldn’t it be easy for your staff and partners around
the world to customize their brochures, cards and other
collateral? Your software should have the ability to
»» Change themes and styles with one click.
»» Select different language versions.
Integrating with other features
Your company has spent money on integrating a host of
other software that helps staffers do their jobs. Some
examples of this include Salesforce, Adobe Creative Cloud,
WordPress, and Google. In addition, your software should
have the ability to

35
»» Insert images from the DAM directly into templates.
»» Predefine which images can be used in templates.
»» Send files for review upon revision.
Using a simple in-line editor
Your staffers need to be able to make simple edits with-
out having to launch Adobe InDesign or other design
software. These features include the ability to
»» Use templates that can be edited via a web
browser with no software required.
»» Use a built-in advanced editor based on HTML,
so no plug-ins are required.
»» Processing from directly within the document.

37
Deploying Your
DAM Library
A
DAM library is a necessity for any company that
has more than a few branded assets to manage.
Having a search function alone makes it faster
and easier for staffers to find what they need.
This chapter takes a closer look at how to evaluate
whether you need a DAM and how to keep your assets
secure using permissions.
Chapter 5
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Utilizing a DAM library
»» Navigating permissions
»» Assessing content performance

38
Looking at Strategic
Requirements for
Your DAM
When thinking about bringing a DAM into your company
as part of your brand management strategy, you want
to consider the big picture issues that necessitate using
a DAM.
Do you have the following requirements?
»» You manage a web of agencies, brokers, and
distributors. If you’re a large company that deals
with a complex web of users from within and outside
the company, you need a way to organize and
manage your assets. Part of that includes making
sure everyone has what they need, but doesn’t have
access to anything they shouldn’t have.
»» You need to scale to support growth. If you
have a homegrown solution that is bursting at
the seams, you can’t count on being able to
continue as you are. You can’t afford to leave
your brand assets unprotected.
»» You need to manage a large collection of brand
standards and/or multiple brands. Your brand
guidelines and/or multiple brands need to be
accessed and updated in real time by all staffers

39
and partners. There’s no way to accomplish that
with a static PDF that you email to people upon
request.
»» You have to control collaboration with agencies.
If you work with an agency or multiple agencies,
you need to be able to control what is downloaded,
edited, and uploaded. Without a permissions-based
system, your assets aren’t secure.
»» You need to remove the burden of localization
from partners. You can’t expect your partners
to spend the time recreating an ad or some other
collateral. You need to supply them with a template-
based system that removes the burden of having
to know how your brand assets must be displayed.
Benefitting from a DAM library
If you’ve determined that a DAM will meet your business
requirements, you can point to enormous benefits from
bringing in a DAM library. You’ll see an increase in the
following:
»» Productivity: You save time because you don’t
have to search for assets. Everything is waiting in
your library to be used by marketers, designers,
and partners.

40
»» Efficiency: Teams can collaborate more efficiently
because no matter where they are located, they all
have access to each other’s work.
»» Security: Permissions and access are set up to
ensure that only the right people can get access to
materials. Usage rights won’t be violated.
»» Content optimization: You discover what content
is resonating using built-in analytics. Then you can
make sure to increase and repurpose those assets
to increase return on investment (ROI).
»» Positive brand experiences: These experiences
are controlled so that only the most current and
effective assets are used. This ensures consistency
across channels.
You’ll also see a decrease in two important factors:
»» Cost: Your assets are available to everyone 24/7 so
when your staff members are ready to work, they
don’t have to go searching for the appropriate
content.
»» Time to market: Templates and current assets are
ready and waiting so the marketing cycle time is
significantly shortened.

41
Taking the next step
You’re now at the point where you need to ask yourself
specific questions that’ll help you deploy your DAM most
effectively.
Don’t skip this step because it will help you
determine what you don’t need, as well as
what you do.
Here are a few questions to ask yourself about your DAM
library (see Figure 5-1):
»» Can a DAM solution be integrated with other
software used by my company?
»» Does the solution support the metadata and tags
we have? This of course requires you to know what
metadata and tags you already have and what your
users expect to see. You should also try to
anticipate formats you may need in the future.
»» Metadata is information that describes your data
and gives it context. Fields for metadata could
include such things as filename, content type,
usage rights, location, or even product name.
»» What kind of search needs do we have? Do we
need to do such things as ‘specific color search’,
text content search in documents, and multilingual
categories?

42
The next sections look at some key DAM library functions
in more detail.
Controlling Permissions
and Access
The idea of controlling permissions and access may seem
simple, but it’s one of the keys to the success of a DAM
library. The following are some features to look for:
»» Secure login: Each user must log in with a
password, making the login secure.
FIGURE 5-1: Deploying your DAM library.

43
»» Defined user profiles: This function gives the
administrator (admin) the ability to create custom-
ized profiles for special users who don’t fit the
predefined roles.
»» Access control: The admin can control which users
have access to which parts of the system.
»» User profiles: The admin can assign permission
roles to users to better control user administration.
»» Single sign on: This feature gives your user the
ability to sign in with company credentials, making
their usage more secure and trackable.
»» Google sign in: This feature gives users the ability
to sign in using their existing Google credentials,
thereby identifying them and making their
access trackable.
Sharing and Collaborating
As the universe of people and channels that need to be
accommodated grows larger every day, sharing and col-
laborating is a must-have. You want to save users the
time it takes to work on unsecured zip files, email trans-
fers, and file transfer tools.

44
So, what are some of the capabilities your DAM must
have to make sharing and collaborating easier? They
include the ability to do the following:
»» Share media both publicly and privately.
»» Add watermarks.
»» Limit and revoke access to shared media over time.
»» Secure sharing of sensitive data.
»» Share a saved set of filters.
»» Share assets by tagging a group instead of
individuals.
»» Show a group only their assets and no others.
»» Create a landing page with content based on user
groups or teams.
Measuring Your Brand’s
Content Performance
Without being able to measure your brand’s content
performance from within your system, you won’t know
what content is used most. Your understanding of how
your users are deploying your assets would be hampered.
Knowing how your content performs externally on your

45
website and across various channels is important — but so
is knowing how your content performs internally. Being
able to measure your content’s performance allows you to
answer questions like: “Do sales reps utilize sales enable-
ment content?” and “Do stakeholders read and utilize the
brand guidelines?”
This section examines some features that you’ll want to
look for when you’re evaluating software to measure
your content’s performance.
Account overview
To start, you want to see if the software includes a dash-
board overview of things like account usage and most
popular assets. Using a dashboard function makes your
work easier and more productive, but not every software
includes this function.
Asset statistics
This tells you about your library assets. It should include
such things as the ability to see the following:
»» Total account storage used
»» Asset bank storage used
»» Number of total assets
»» Assets and storage by type

46
Usage statistics
Analytics give you data-driven insights into how your
users are uploading, viewing, and downloading your
assets. It should include the following:
»» Total views and downloads
»» Uploads
»» Shares
»» Searches
Presentation
Your system should have the ability to represent statistics
in formats such as pie charts, line graphs, and filter bars
(provides the ability to only display the type of asset you
search for).
Reports
Generating reports is a key function. It should include the
ability to do the following:
»» Generate or download quick overview reports in
PDF or PNG.
»» Generate or download data specific reports based
on individual graphs or numeric data.

47
Facilitating Brand
and Creative
Approvals
M
any creators and designers working online today
feel squeezed between the need to be creative
and the need to meet impossible deadlines. Does
it make sense to hire talented people and not let them do
their best work? They wind up doing more managing than
creating. That’s a waste of time and money!
Chapter 6
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Simplifying approvals
»» Structuring creative workflow
»» Reviewing performance

48
It’s a fact of life that the fast-moving nature of the web
requires you to streamline your content creation, creative
workflow, and approvals. Missing deadlines costs money
and can affect the customer experience.
This chapter looks at what you need to consider when you
try to streamline content creation from start to finish
while maintaining quality output.
Creating Faster Approval
Cycles
Greater attention to creative workflow is a direct result of
the ever-growing demands placed on everyone involved
in brand management. Your best course is to create faster
approval cycles so that no one is idly waiting for someone
else’s approval. Figure 6-1 shows the approval life cycle.
Currently, the main challenges that slow creators down
include the following:
»» Too much feedback coming from different
people: The increase in vendors, partners, and
channels makes it critical that feedback is struc-
tured and under control.

49
»» Difficulty keeping incoming requests priori-
tized: The speed at which new content is required
makes it a necessity to be able to prioritize
everything in the queue.
»» Lack of critical information needed to get the
project underway: This is a common one. It’s
impossible to start a project without any context
FIGURE 6-1: The approval life cycle.

50
or guidance. This happens a lot. So knowing when
input is needed is vital for a smooth project timeline.
Creative workflow software clearly can’t do
the job. Neither can email, sticky notes, or
file folders. You need a way to manage every
part of the process, including adhering to
brand guidelines and using the most updated
assets. That’s where brand management
software comes in.
Structuring Creative
Workflow
When you set out to create and improve your processes,
you must consider lots of moving parts that impact crea-
tive workflow. This section examines the key software
functions and some tips that help your team succeed.
Viewing software functions you
need to structure workflow
When you’re considering brand management software,
here are some of the functions your software must have
the ability to do:

51
»» Document every part of the project from start
to finish.
»» Work directly within the software that your
creatives use (such as Adobe).
»» Organize project feeds to make collaboration easy
and to keep things like requests and approvals
together and accessible for all the stakeholders.
»» Pre-program the steps for approval rounds and
assign responsibility so that you keep projects
moving ahead.
»» Work with any file format with the system so that
you don’t need to download or convert files.
»» Mark up any files and maintain a visual history
of changes.
»» Receive real-time notifications so that last-minute
changes aren’t necessary.
»» Create configurable creative briefs that have
drag-and-drop capabilities so that you don’t have
to reinvent the wheel every time you start a new
project.
»» Build the processes your team needs to work with
and eliminate those that don’t.

52
Getting started with improving
creative workflow
Your creative team works in its own unique way. One of
the best ways to analyze creative workflow is to create a
map of your workflow process. Here are some other tips
to help improve your workflow:
»» Understand the way your team works best.
Gather all relevant stakeholders and discuss what
processes are working and encourage ideas for
change. Identify and remove bottlenecks from
approval cycles.
»» Make sure the software that your creative
people use is integrated into the creative
workflow system. It doesn’t make sense to
use a brand management software that doesn’t
integrate with software like Adobe. Be clear about
what integrations you need.
»» Be able to work from anywhere. Make sure your
system is accessible from all locations. Consider
switching from on-premise solutions to cloud
integration to speed up approval cycles.
»» Make every step visible for creative workflow
oversight. All creative projects should be brought
together under a central hub.

53
»» Automate approvals. Make sure that approvals
are automatically sent to people waiting for them.
Getting a Bird’s-Eye View
of All Approvals
It’s very important for managers to be able to get a big
picture look at all the projects under their supervision.
When you’re considering software to streamline and
speed up your approvals, consider being able to docu-
ment and control the following for each project your cre-
ative team undertakes:
»» Goal: You need a defined goal so that everyone
understands what the purpose of the project is.
»» Stakeholders: You need to identify the responsible
project leader and those who are participating in
this project. This defines who can see and edit
content.
»» Deliverables: Make sure you know what assets
need to result from this project.
»» Key data points or context: Verify what informa-
tion is required to participate in this job.
»» Deadlines: The date when this overall project
is due.

54
»» Stages: A list of the dates defined by deliverables
that triggers the next action in the project to
completion.
»» Content delivery: An automatic push of your
content to your DAM library as soon as the project
is complete should be a requirement of your brand
management software.
Measuring Your Team’s
Brand and Content
Creation Cycle
To ensure that your workflow is accelerated, you’ll want
to measure your team’s workflow cycles. You can do this
by seeing how frequently assets are downloaded and
used, but also by seeing how long asset approval cycles
take during various times of the year. Doing so will help
you to identify underused assets and those that aren’t
performing on par with others, and in addition, help you
plan out your creative workflow for upcoming quarters.
Collect and compare data from your social
media sites and from within your brand man-
agement software to uncover successful assets.
You’ll know which content is high performing
and should be repurposed in upcoming cam-
paigns and projects.

55
Ten Tips (or So) to
Elevate Your Brand
If you’re looking for some tips to make your branding
more effective, here are some:
»» Embrace relevant technology. Now more than
ever, technology is what connects your brand
with your customers. It helps them understand
what you do.
»» Align brand management with business
objectives. Ensure that the brand management
Chapter 7
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Utilizing technology
»» Striving for consistency

56
software you purchase can support strategic
business objectives now and in the future.
»» Endorse data and analytics. You need to measure
return on investment (ROI) and overall efficiency to
ensure that your company can beat the competi-
tion and give customers what they want.
»» Embrace real time. Stop emailing brand guide-
lines or keeping them in a static PDF. Everyone
needs to serve themselves.
»» Centralize your brand management using a
content hub. Utilize a central brand library that’s
easily searchable by everyone.
»» Be consistent. Documented brand guidelines
ensure that your colleagues and partners work
within your brand guidelines and use updated
messaging and assets.
»» Facilitate connections. Ensure your colleagues
and partners have access to the correct brand
assets when and where they need them.
»» Customize your assets. Organize brand-approved
assets that are right for your team and allow your
team to tailor assets to their audience.
»» Encourage collaboration. Streamline the creative
process with sharing, real-time feedback and brand
approvals.

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