Before diving deep into the sea of digital asset management systems, let me ask you a question, what is a digital asset? Well, the digital asset is just like any other media viz video, document, or photo.
But then, why a different terminology? The reason is digital assets come with a ‘right to use’ policy. In other words, digital assets are digital media files that contain a right to use them.
The use of digital assets is increasing exponentially, the reason being we live in a digital age where content creation and content sharing are the trend.
Now that we understand digital assets and know that they’re growing exponentially, a question must have popped up in our minds. How do companies manage such a huge accretion of these assets? Well, that’s where the DAM comes into play.
Digital Asset Management (DAM) offers an effective system that provides for storing, sharing, and organizing digital content in a central location.
In short, the DAM is a complete solution for content sharing and storage demand of an enterprise.
Let’s see the Top 7 free Digital Asset Management Software
Adobe Experience Manager
Adobe Experience Manager is one of the most popular tools for digital asset management. It’s mostly used by IT people and marketers for designing, maintaining, and customizing different types of websites.
Features:
- Capable of storing huge amounts of digital content.
- Inbuilt integration with various platforms like Email Marketing, e-commerce marketing for promoting brands, etc.
- Creates and manages the social media community.
Pros:
- Sharing of digital content across various channels digitally & translation for multi-devices.
- Capable of tag managers, non-technical admins, and digital asset managers.
- Easily searchable with metadata.
- Easy creation and upload of files and folders in AEM
Cons:
- Needs more automation for maintenance like purging, re-indexing, etc.
- Knowledge of Java is required.
- Sometimes, it’s too buggy.
- Awful design of OOB-related components.
HyperCMS
HyperCMS is used for the management of both digital assets and content. It’s mainly used for the content depository. Being an open-source CMS, it’s used to store and maintain digital assets.
Features:
- Can be accessed anywhere.
- Support for mobile phones and tablets as well
- One can create content once and publish it anytime, anywhere, on the cloud.
Pros:
- Fast and reliable.
- Easy integration with social media
- Support for mobile phones and tablets
- Large files can be sent without spamming the client’s mailbox
Cons:
- Reduces the flexibility of websites
- Takes time to update
- Training is required for using the tool
OpenText MediaBin
OpenText is not only an on-premise but also a cloud-based solution. It helps in the accomplishment of digital assets more proficiently. Decreases repetition, inefficiency, and invalid assets that don’t meet the values of the brand.
Features:
- Centralized repository
- Self-service access
- Asset searching
- Content analysis
- Automatic extraction of key concepts
- Speech-to-text conversion
Reprtoir
Reprtoir is an online suite that helps music publishers and record labels centralize their content, manage their rights, and assist creative and administrative teams in their day-to-day tasks.
Features:
- Managing and sharing playlists with your contacts.
- Manage contracts and royalty splits.
- Management of tracks and albums
The software is free of cost.
ResourceSpace
ResourceSpace is an open-source DAM system. Trusted by 250,000 users globally across organizations like Coca-Cola, Toyota, Google, and Autotrader.
Providing 24/7, multilingual, unlimited user, mobile & web-enabled access to help marketing professionals get the most from their digital assets. Though it is an open-source tool, you’d need to pay for support.
Features:
- Asset categorization
- Customizable branding
- Available as a mobile app
Pros:
- Clean and highly customizable interface
- Plug-in support
Cons:
- Slightly difficult to navigate through
- Doesn’t offer more advanced features, like image/video editing, the graphical workflow engine
Pimcore
Pimcore DAM, again an open-source DAM system, offers a single and centralized platform to enterprises. It consolidates, manages, and shares digital assets.
Features:
- Incorporates a powerful central repository
- Boasts a multi-tab interface
- Configurable metadata management technology
- Audio content
- Customizable templates
- Image Editor
- SEO management
Pros:
- A flexible and extendable framework
- Easy for developers to add customized features
Cons:
- Requires various customizations
Phraseanet
It is an open-source DAM software. You can view, share, archive, and publish an unlimited number of media files, like videos, images, audio, documents, etc., from any standard web browser.
Features:
- Asset categorization
- Workflow management
- Metadata management
- Asset sharing
Pro:
- Intuitive interface
Cons:
- Not available as a mobile app
- No customizable branding
- No file conversion
Besides the top 7 free DAM software mentioned, one can also avail of some other top-rated DAM software. The catch here is that they’ll be paid.
Top 5 paid DAM systems
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Adobe Experience Manager Assets
In Adobe’s DAM users can manage all the content and assets through a single platform. Streamlining collaborative processes allows marketers to work together more efficiently. Equipped with AI capabilities and data-driven insights, it can easily identify the content that is achieving a higher ROI.
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Bynder
Bynder uses AWS services which enable scalability and performance. Bynder offers on-demand publishing features that give access to a smart template tool to users.
This access helps in creating branded materials such as advertisements, business cards, and banners.
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Canto
Canto offers a gallery-style interface and also allows you to preview visual content. Users can run numerous reports to examine the performance of the content. Also, using the admin dashboard is a piece of cake.
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Cloudinary
Armed with AI capabilities, Cloudinary’s DAM assists you in tagging assets. Setting the automatic tagging feature by color, object, and facial recognition really works well.
Manipulation of assets stored here can be done in real time.
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CELUM
CELUM’s DAM comes with full integration and can be easily connected to other systems. This DAM solution offers a platform for searching, uploading, sharing, and managing files.
The work-in-progress feature enables automation and tracking the process becomes an easy job via its task management feature.
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