Increasing Asset Value
Marketers now want to increase the lifetime value of digital assets. For this to happen, we must end the era of disposable content.
Digital mass personalization at scale requires more templating of outputs and more interrogation of DAM systems, perhaps even using AI to find the best performing and most reusable assets. ICP has seen marketers from its client base being held accountable to the re-use metric - putting DAM and the quality of metadata front and center to their needs. The more an asset is used, the higher the return on the original investment.
In 1963, this iconic shot introduced The Beatles to the world. This infamous picture from the balcony of the EMI building served as the cover for their first album in 1963, then the cover of The Red Album in 1973, was then re-created for The Blue Album, and then, reaching back into that creative weel, both used for Peter Jackson’s GET BACK in 2021. One iconic photo; first time as an introduction, a decade later as a tribute and an update. 60 years later as an event.
Two photoshoots. 60 years of marketing assets.
The most iconic brands in the world have similarly embraced "stealing from yourself" not only to achieve higher ROI but as a source of creative inspiration. Marketing assets need to work hard, and need to endure. It’s expensive to make new ones—you’ve probably fought with agencies about how to find efficiencies and scale. You’ve battled with production partners about how many versions of something needs to be made for how many platforms in how many markets. It’s because your assets are IMPORTANT. They take your brand everywhere, and entice new customers, invite them in, close deals. And they should be delivering returns forever– they’re long-term assets with long-term value. How do you put them to work after they’ve left the stage? Your assets have value as parent to new ideas, as coaches and guides and muses. But in order to leverage them for creative inspiration and achieve their long-term value, you must have them at your fingertips, and their full power must be appreciated, and that is the intersection of technology, people, data and process.
Andy Hopkinson, Strategic Director with Adstream, points out that even higher return on assets can be achieved with a connected technology ecosystem.
Based on analytics of assets placed into their platform, between 18 and 48% of a client’s material never gets used.
Despite this, brand managers often still think they have to produce something new.
“One primary reason for waste is that global and local workflows aren’t connected,” says Hopkinson. “Creative logistics are a challenge, especially when hundreds of global markets, talent payments, and rights come into play. The workflow model needs to tie into the production and distribution. The data model needs to be lined up. Brands need to measure how well they unlock their assets.” Kristen Martini, Client Partner with ICP, reinforces Hopkinson’s point and takes it a step further. “Large global organizations often lack feedback loops. DAMs enable local markets to re-use content that they wouldn’t be able to create themselves. Instead they can spend their budget on localization and make their money go further.” Martini adds that when local markets within ICP’s global client base leverage managed services and in particular a brand steward, they can put their adaptation back into the DAM and inform global / central operations what’s being used and not being used, as well as help to inspire other markets with their adaptations. Ideally, production cost data would be mashed up with analytics about what got made and what got used. In a connected ecosystem, you can measure what’s being used and measure the return of your production investment. It can be as simple as storing production masters and being able to search and retrieve what’s performed well at the other end of the ecosystem - but even that is hard for most enterprises to get set up. “Production can and should be creative and innovative,” points out Victor Lebon, Chief Innovation and Strategy Officer with ICP. “How you adapt things can sometimes be even more creative than putting together the initial concept. Connecting production and DAM frees up more time to develop new concepts. Easy access to things that have already been done can also drive innovation.”
Victor Lebon
Chief Innovation & Strategy Officer | ICP
“Production can and should be creative and innovative. How you adapt things can sometimes be even more creative than putting together the initial concept. Connecting production and DAM frees up more time to develop new concepts.”
