This blog post summarizes my interview with Kate Ersly from Resource/Ammirati. Kate is Senior Manager, Omni-Channel at Resource/Ammirati. Her focus is on helping clients drive sales through ecommerce channels.
Kate has been using Visual SKUs Digital Asset Management software for a year and a half to manage and send thousands of product images, on behalf of their fortune 500 global manufacturer client, to 25 of the world’s largest retailers including Walmart, Amazon, Target, Home Depot, and Lowes. Resource/Ammirati is a marketing agency formed in 2014 by the integration of digital marketing agency Resource and New York advertising firm Ammirati. They have over 400 associates spanning three offices. They focus on building open brands and ‘everywhere commerce’ for clients like Birchbox, DSW, Nestlé, Newell Rubbermaid, North American Breweries, P&G, Pirate’s Booty, Sherwin-Williams, White Castle and Victoria’s Secret. Check out their website here for more information. In this interview I ask Kate the following questions:
Here is my interview with Kate.
Companies consider a Digital Asset Management system for all kinds of reasons – managing digital assets is inefficient and costly, sales are being lost due to delays getting digital assets into the marketplace, low customer satisfaction due to poor quality or non-existent digital assets, etc. What challenges were you experiencing that motivated you to consider a DAM solution?
Kate: One of our clients, a global manufacturer with over 50,000 active products spanning a large number of brands, was having difficulty acquiring, managing, and distributing product images to their retailer community which included Walmart, Amazon, Target, Home Depot, and Lowe. Our client knew they were losing sales because their retailers did not have quality images of all the products they sell. They needed to acquire consistent high-quality images of their products and send these images to their retailers. They approached Resource/Ammirati to see if we could help. The first thing I did was review the state of their current image library. I found outdated images and many products with no images at all. Next, I looked at the image specifications of all their retailers – file name, image size, file type, delivery method, data to be sent with the images, etc. I learned that every retailer had unique image requirements.
It seems like you were faced with a significant task – thousands of products without images, many retailers needing images, and every retailer having different requirements. At what point did you consider a DAM solution?
Kate: When I looked at all the tasks involved in meeting our client’s goals I could see that this project was huge. I estimated that I would need a team of 10 people to effectively manage the images, format them to meet the retailer’s specs, and report on products that have images, products that are missing images, retailers that have images, and retailers that are missing images. I was not in a position to hire 10 people and I knew that a manual approach was not the way to go. To be successful I would need software tools, preferably a digital asset management solution.
When you began your search for a DAM system what features were on your ‘must-have’ list?
Kate: To successfully execute on this project I needed the software to satisfy 6 broad requirements.
1. Efficient asset management. I wanted a system that was easy to use yet powerful enough to accomplish all the project tasks without having to hire a team. In fact, I really wanted a system that empowered me to be a one-person team.
2. Organization and search. I wanted to be able to organize digital assets by brand and be able to search for specific assets or groups of assets based on very specific search criteria i.e. all images that are less than X pixels high and Y pixels wide, all products for brand X that are missing a top view.
3. Image formatting and delivery. I felt that formatting and sending thousands of images to over 25 retailers that have specific formatting requirements and that sell a sub-set of our client’s products would be complex and time-consuming. I wanted the system to at least partially automate this process. I also knew that the retailers would be sending me one-off requests for images and I wanted to be able to respond to these requests quickly.
4. Image metadata management. Each retailer requires image related data to be sent with their images. And all retailers want this data formatted in a very specific way. Creating these data files would be complicated, time-consuming, and prone to human error. Ideally I wanted the data files to be created automatically by the software and sent with the images.
5. Reporting. As the person responsible for tracking project progress, I wanted to be able to generate reports to share with my management team and our client. These reports would need to detail how many images, by brand, were acquired within a specific time period, how many images were sent to which retailers, and which products are missing images. I wanted to be able to send the ‘missing images report’ to our product photography partner so they can begin the image acquisition process.
6. Automation. I knew that managing thousands of images and formatting and sending them to retailers would be an extremely error prone activity. Sending the wrong images with inaccurate data to the wrong retailers would impact our client’s business and could result in lost sales, higher product returns, and decreased customer satisfaction. I needed the software to reduce human error through automation. The fewer manual processes the better.
I assume you looked at several systems before making your final decision. Why did you select Visual SKUs DAM?
Kate: In the end I choose Visual SKUs DAM for two main reasons; 1) it had all the functionality I was looking for, and 2) it represented the best overall value. The repository feature would allow me to organize assets by brand. The search function looked powerful and flexible, I could create baskets and collections of assets based on my searches and share these assets internally or with retailers.
The customer profile feature would allow me to create a detailed profile for each retailer. I could define the exact product mix they sell, how they require their images formatted and sent, and how they need their image data file formatted. I could also schedule these deliveries to each retailer. I felt that this would make the format and sending process straightforward, it would save time, and it would help reduce human error.
The reporting feature would allow me to produce detailed production reports that track my progress. I could also create reports listing products that are missing images so I can guide my product photography production team. Overall I felt Visual SKUs DAM was the best fit on a functionality and cost basis.
It’s been over a year and a half since you implemented Visual SKUs DAM, can you describe how Resource/Ammirati is using the system today?
Kate: Visual SKUs DAM plays an integral role in every process involved in managing and distributing digital assets on behalf of our client. Here are some examples of how I use Visual SKUs DAM daily:
Since using Visual SKUs DAM, how many assets do you now have in the system and what is the asset mix? How do you see this growing and changing in the future?
Kate: We have built the digital asset library to over 15,000 images and to date we have formatted and sent over 40,000 images to the retailers. Because of retailer demand we have focused exclusively on product images. Over the coming few years I could see the number of images acquired and managed in the DAM system growing 3 or 4 times. Once all priority products have images we will be moving to PDFs and other digital assets.
Obviously, for a global manufacturer selling through major retailers, having product images in the market as quickly as possible is critical. How have you used Visual SKUs DAM to ensure that your client’s product images are in the hands of retailers quickly?
Kate: At Resource/Ammirati we focus on helping our clients grow their ecommerce sales. Product images and higher ecommerce sales go hand in hand. For this reason I find the function for formatting and sending images to retailers one of the most important.
With Visual SKUs DAM, once the customer profiles, substitutions for naming the assets, and the data manifests are set up, it is extremely easy to format and send product images and image data to retailers. A few clicks and the system does the rest. And because the format and distribution process is automated human error is almost completely eliminated. There is no risk of formatting or naming the images incorrectly, the system does this for you.
There is no risk of sending inaccurate data to the retailers, the system takes care of this as well. And there is no risk of sending a retailer images for a product they don’t sell or not sending images for products they do sell – the system knows which products each retailer sells and sends images accordingly.
Are you happy with your decision to go with Visual SKUs DAM and has it produced the results you expected?
Kate: I am extremely happy with Visual SKUs DAM. Here are few notable results:
It is interesting learning about your experience with DAM software and how it has helped you provide complex services to your clients. Do you have any closing thoughts that you would like to share?
Kate: Well just to reiterate what I have said several times – Visual SKUs DAM has been an excellent tool for Resource/Ammirati. There is no way I could have achieved what I did over the past year and a half without this tool, it has made me incredibly productive, it has allowed Resource/Ammirati to provide an excellent service to our client, and there is more we can do with the tool when providing services to our current and future clients. Working with Visual SKUs has been a pleasure, I look forward to a great working relationship in the coming years.
By Patrick Weilmerier | Amplify
In many industries manufacturers are responsible for supplying their customers with the product information needed to sell these products. This product information includes digital assets – images, videos, audio files, data sheets, marketing brochures, etc.
