Effectively managing digital asset expiration dates is crucial in the financial services industry. Failing to do so can lead to severe consequences, such as regulatory fines, reputational damage, and customer dissatisfaction, as outlined in the FCA's Banking:Conduct of Business sourcebook (BCOBS).
Without a financial services-specific Digital Asset Management solution, institutions are left relying on manual processes and human effort to track expiration dates. It becomes a risky game of "who's got the spreadsheet?" and "did anyone update that file?", exposing them to significant risk of using outdated compliance assets.
Generic DAM systems, while helpful for basic asset management, often lack the industry-specific features and workflows necessary to meet the stringent requirements of the financial sector. Relying on these systems puts you at the mercy of human error, with outdated compliance assets lurking in the shadows, ready to cause serious trouble.
Financial promotions like advertisements, social media posts, and email campaigns are particularly challenging, as they are subject to strict oversight and approval processes under BCOBS rules.
Our Asset Expiration Management Solution
bethebrand provides a comprehensive solution to manage the expiration dates of digital assets effectively. Our DAM system is designed specifically for the financial services industry, ensuring that you have the tools and features necessary to maintain compliance and streamline your asset management processes.
Here's an overview of how our system addresses asset expiration challenges:
- Who owns what? We track asset ownership, approvers, version numbers and all the important dates.
- Utilise a date field in the asset metadata to define use by/expiry/next review dates.
- Use the Asset Lifecycle widget on the user's dashboard for easy monitoring.
- Generate reports for specific assets or all assets, ensuring oversight and accountability.
Automated Alerts and Notifications
- Set a Red-Amber-Green (RAG) status for each asset, which changes colour as the asset approaches expiration. For example:
- Red: 30 days or less
- Amber: 31-59 days
- Green: 60+ days
Want to adjust these standard settings? No problem. Organisations can customise the thresholds based on their needs.
- Asset life cycles can be set by content type, with different expiry rules for different types of content such as financial promotions.
- Requesting an extension rather than a full re-approval can streamline the process, with compliance still reviewing it. Marking assets as one-time use ensures they expire properly without creating unnecessary tasks.
- Weekly reports of expired/red assets can be emailed to senior management teams to demonstrate oversight.
- Send automatic emails for actions, such as removing out-of-compliance content.
Workflow and Compliance Management
- Check-out and versioning made easy - assets approaching expiry can be checked out into workflows to create a new version.
- If a new version is not required, an expiry date extension request can be made, with an audit trail of the decision.
- Automatically archive single-use assets.
Workflow Automation
The system configuration can be set up so that certain “trigger events” automatically generate a workflow. For example:
- Print Asset Archival: If a print asset is archived, a “stock destruction” workflow is auto-generated to ensure that printed stock of that asset is destroyed.
- Web Asset Update: If a web asset is updated (e.g., a new version is checked into the Asset Store), an “update CMS system” workflow can be auto-generated to ensure that websites using that asset are updated accordingly.
- Expiry Date Approach: If an asset is categorised under specific conditions (e.g., “Product = A or B” and “Audience = X or Y”) and the expiry date gets to Z days, a workflow is auto-generated to start the asset update.
In all instances, the workflow auto-adds the Asset Owner as the deliverable owner and if appropriate auto-checks out the asset into the workflow.
Integrated Systems and API
- Integrated systems utilising the asset will learn of its status change via the API.
- Where assets are accessed via links, the out-of-compliance asset will no longer be available for download.
Image Rights and Lockdown
- Actively manage image rights to ensure compliance.
- Expired items are automatically locked down and can't be downloaded, shared, or printed. Items no longer required can be archived or retained in the solution.
Take control of your Asset Expiration Management
Don't let outdated assets put your organisation at risk. Contact Sales Director Ross Jenner, ross@be-thebrand.com, to learn how bethebrand's solution can help you master marketing asset expiration.
