Editor's note: When I was searching for someone to write about taxonomies and digital asset management (DAM), Sara and Jeremy came highly recommended from friends in the industry. Their chapter is adapted from a wide-ranging conversation between them and covers all the bases for anyone who needs to plan and manage DAM taxonomies. Unlike taxonomies for predominantly text-based content, DAM taxonomies also have to account for the attributes of images, videos and other multimedia assets, which may be part of a complex lifecycle from commissioning through to rights management, usage and potentially reuse too.

When you think about strategy for taxonomy and DAM, what stakeholders do you have in mind?

Jeremy Bright: Well, I think there's general users, business users, platform owners, administrators, etc. So, thinking of end-users, the people who actually need to access the content, business users, the people providing the content, and then platform owners and even dev. I think that each of them has a role in what this all looks like. And they’re different pieces of the story.

Where is the right place to start?

Sara James: Let's start with the ecosystem. I think, when we’re talking about the DAM itself, there's always a question of where it sits within the ecosystem and whether or not it can be standalone technology or whether or not it has to connect and share its data, share its metadata and share its taxonomy. Plus, whether it has to play nicely with other pieces of technology and data or whether or not it can go solo. There are many things to consider, including what you are trying to accomplish and what success looks like. For example, are you doing e-commerce, in-store, packaging, etc.? Are you doing something that involves a lot of other moving pieces? Usually, it's better to think about DAM and its taxonomy and metadata as it sits within the full ecosystem. If you’re doing a lot of FMCPG (fast-moving consumer product goods) work or pharma work, where else does this fit within your ecosystem? DAM is rarely able to stand alone; it usually has to be a part of something else – your content management system (CMS), your product information management (PIM) system. Once you start thinking about the other places your metadata has to exist and interact, then master data has to be a consideration.