Why the Marketing Department is Your New In-House Newsroom

Historically, the marketing department has always been tasked with making brochures and roll ups, and organizing events, in order to best support the sales department in reaching the company sales goals.

In the last 20 years, the role has changed dramatically, and now marketing teams are tasked with creating, organizing, and sharing content in various formats across many platforms. This presents marketing departments and companies with a serious challenge.

When I worked in the Microsoft marketing department back in 1999, we were producing fact sheets and product feature brochures by the thousands. E-mail marketing and newsletters were important elements of communicating with the customer, along with banner ads and websites.

The Marketing World Has Changed

In today’s marketing world it is not only about supporting sales, it is about reaching out and touching customers with a message that’s tailored to their needs. It must provide value for their business and appeal to their wish to buy from a trusted brand. Customers aren't in a fixed role anymore, they go from worker to consumer and back again. The message from businesses trying to reach out with their products needs to reflect that.
In the fast-moving digital world, the marketing department has evolved from only creating long-term print marketing materials, to a pro-active, social media-conscious, lead-generating, inbound marketing-driven, full-on editorial ecosystem. In other words: the role of the marketing department is now closer to that of a newspaper editorial team - it’s your company’s internal media publisher. The head of marketing is now the new editor in chief, with loads of digital assets being published to different channels, across platforms and Content Management Systems (CMS).

High Demand for Relevant Content

There is great demand for creating relevant content for each industry or buyer persona, and graphics need to be quickly and efficiently made available in the CMS. The company logo needs to be uploaded and replaced in many places at the same time, without missing a single channel. Because most marketing departments work with external agencies, PR agents, and/or journalists, there is a constant need to share digital content quickly and safely.

Are You Taking a Big Risk?

Just as a newspaper uses a Digital Asset Management system (DAM) to keep control of every digital asset they get, own, and use - so should your marketing department. There are so many pictures, videos, logos, presentations, documents and podcasts, that if you choose to not store it all in a DAM, you may be taking a serious risk. You need to ensure that everyone in your company has access to images that are approved for use, with the appropriate licenses, and that they all comply with GDPR. Then there's the practical aspect: the need to share content across departments and with external partners, and to ensure you have the right version of the right logo, right now.