For modern brands, the pressure to personalize is growing fast. Did you know 85% of users now expect tailored digital advertising? Today’s digital consumers want delightful experiences, personal journeys and engaging content. To truly connect with them, businesses must dynamically tailor content to individual users’ specific interests, needs and pain points.

Though personalization may feel like an unstoppable wave, taking the opportunity to build more personal, engaging digital experiences for your brand brings enormous benefits. Personalization was born from a drive to better connect with end customers, to create long-term trust and lasting relationships with products. For businesses, embracing personalization can increase total customer lifetime value, help customers actually put your products to use, and allow your organization to offer more relevant services.

Barriers to personalization

Despite these clear benefits, a 2015 VentureBeat study still rings true. It found that 80% of companies fail to implement personalization effectively. We believe the only thing standing in their way is … themselves.

One common barrier to personalization is brands simply not wanting to change longstanding processes and try a new approach. Moreover, the larger an organization, the more people work in silos. Workflows are slowed by bureaucratic processes, meaning teams don’t share data effectively and collaboration is obstructed. This prevents many from implementing personalization. Additionally, workers are often scared that introducing these technologies will change their jobs, or even wipe them out completely.


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The importance of digital asset management

These barriers, while understandable, must be overcome by forward-thinking businesses. At the heart of an exceptional, personal customer experience is a brand’s assets. The quantity of assets demanded by today’s personalized digital interactions has grown exponentially and diversified to include images, video, documentation and more.

To create exceptional online experiences and personalize at scale, businesses must dynamically manage millions of assets at any time, on demand. This means organizations are being forced to rethink how they manage their assets — and are looking to new technologies for future-proof assets solutions.

Businesses need an approach to asset management that empowers them to react dynamically in an increasingly volatile digital environment. That’s where a digital asset management (DAM) system comes in. According to an Adobe Systems blog post, “IDC research shows that organizations realize an average increase in revenue of 24% from their investments in a DAM system with personalization capabilities.”

When approaching personalization, an outdated DAM system will stall success, slow progress and disrupt workflows. Beyond that, a holistic strategy and state-of-the-art technological foundation for content creation, management and distribution is essential. Indeed, when businesses prepare with a framework for more seamless asset management, the rewards speak for themselves: organizations that leverage an intelligent DAM solution see an average three-year ROI of 366%, according to IDC via that Adobe blog.

While implementing a DAM solution may require some uncomfortable moments and internal resistance, businesses that fail to do so will find themselves unable to provide the personalized experience demanded by today’s customer.

Adapted from Netcentric’s “A Guide to Digital Asset Management: Unlocking Personalization.” To learn more, visit the Digital Business section of our website, or contact us.