Widen Launches DAM Software Integration With ConceptShare to Bring Customers Advanced Creative Markup and Review Tools

MADISON, WI--(Marketwire - Dec 12, 2012) -  Widen Enterprises has taken a major step to help users of its digital asset management (DAM) software, Media Collective, enhance their marketing workflows. The company has integrated ConceptShare, a web-based creative review and collaboration application, into the DAM offering.

"Bringing ConceptShare into the Media Collective mix is going to add tremendous value for our DAM customers. The people at ConceptShare know what they're doing and create a great product," said Widen CEO Matthew Gonnering.

"We're just as excited about working with their people. We've had lots of opportunity to exchange with them -- from hosting Nish Patel at the Widen User Summit to some friendly Movember mustache competition -- and we know they're also a great cultural fit. That matters as much as anything for Widen users, who benefit from the personal touch we're known for."

Widen digital asset management software is used by creative and marketing communications professionals in a wide variety of industries -- from higher education to apparel to hospitality to government and everything in between. What they all have in common is that they're dealing with ever-growing media libraries and digital media workflows. ConceptShare, with its highly intuitive markup and review tools, will be an invaluable resource for Widen customers, who will be able to send assets directly from one platform to the other.

Thanks in large part to the fact that it also offers premedia services, Widen Enterprises is known for its expertise in all areas of the digital asset lifecycle, starting at creation. This integration with ConceptShare strengthens the organization's position as a provider of solutions that support workflows throughout that entire process.

"We know people are excited about having access to these new tools. Our customers have come to put a lot of trust in us, so we're glad to now be bringing these review capabilities to the table, as they'll enable users to make Widen solutions a part of even more of their creative processes," said Lanita Haag, Widen's director of project services.

How does it work? Users of the integration can send any asset to ConceptShare from Widen Media Collective's asset details page. Once the asset is placed in a ConceptShare workspace, reviewers can use any number of annotation tools to mark up and make suggested edits to the asset. They can also initiate a review of the asset with a group of people. Once the review process is complete the asset's status is updated to reflect that, Widen pulls it right back to Media Collective.

"In a short period of time ConceptShare and Widen have built a collaborative partnership based on common values and a shared understanding that enterprise marketing, creative and production teams want to be able to work effortlessly across multiple best-of-breed applications that touch an asset during its lifecycle from concept to final asset to re-use," said Nish Patel, CEO of ConceptShare. "The integration between ConceptShare's Creative Operations Management (COM) platform and Widen's DAM system will allow our shared customers to achieve significant marketing asset production and time-to-market productivity benefits through the synchronization of information, metadata, activities and events across their work in progress and asset management workflows."

In future Widen Media Collective releases, Widen will make enhancements to the integration with ConceptShare.

About Widen Enterprises, Inc.

Based in Madison, Wisconsin, Widen has honed its more than 60 years of experience in premedia services and color management specifically for assisting customers with building brand equity and supporting consistent brand representation across print and Web communications. Through its inventive suite of Web-based digital asset management applications, Widen software services provide marketing networks with real-time, Web-based access to clients' digital asset libraries, subsequently eliminating manual search and file preparation time, costs related to replacing images and videos that cannot be located, and added costs for hardware, software and upgrades. For more information, visit: http://www.widen.com.