The world has changed. For media companies, doing nothing is not an option. But with the right strategic choices, media companies can not only survive intact, but stronger and better prepared for the future than ever.
2020 has been a profoundly difficult year for businesses and if there’s one thing we’ve learned during this time, it’s that doing nothing is not an option. That’s easy to say, but what does it actually mean? We decided to unpack the ways that you can protect your media business against future disruption, and to get it to a place where it can flourish in spite of adversity, in our all new executive report: The Media & Entertainment Industry’s Need for Digital Transformation. For an idea of what to expect, a summary of key themes follows, but we encourage you to check out the full free report in its entirety here.
Expect the best. Prepare for the worst.
...Capitalize on what comes. - the late Zig Ziglar. These words could not be more applicable than they are today, as businesses in every sector have experienced “the worst.” Now is the time to capitalize.
Quite independently of 2020’s unusual circumstances, technology has been changing with increasing speed. Suddenly, video is being used in every business. As the use of video becomes more granular, and more essential as a means to communicate, market and entertain, the need to manage it grows at the same rate.
This type of change is unintuitive. Even experts sometimes miss exponential trends in their early stages. But missing an exponential trend can disrupt businesses.
Rapid change makes it harder to predict the future. The only way to confidently face a future like this is to invest in technology that will be valid in the widest possible range of eventualities. While this might sound vague or even impossible, there are four distinct steps you can take to mitigate future threats and even emerge on the other side in better shape.
Surviving change: four business imperatives
Our executive report breaks down the risks associated with digital transformation by looking at the four key pillars of risk, summarized below. To thrive, media organizations need to keep these top of mind when considering long term investments in infrastructure.
Avoid disrupted production
When the pandemic hit, businesses had to figure out how to function with a remote workforce. Some couldn’t at all. But many organizations were able to carry on almost uninterrupted thanks to the internet. For video professionals there were additional hurdles. It’s much easier to send spreadsheets and database results over a home broadband connection than gigantic high resolution video files.
For Trailer Park Group, having a remote, secure and collaborative solution in place during the pandemic allowed them to continue delivering outstanding work for their clients. When other businesses had to put their work on pause in order to get up and running remotely, Trailer Park Group was fully ready to go - and could pick up the additional work others couldn’t.
Mitigate risk to revenue
By not embracing transformative tools that will future-proof your business, you risk finding yourself in a situation where your employees are unable to produce enough content remotely to meet demands. There’s also the real possibility that your talent could leave for another employer if you don’t provide the right level of technology they need.
Modern video management tools (read Curator!) bring remote working and collaboration to creative professionals with no compromise and a gigantic increase in capability. Integrated closely with Adobe Premiere, Curator adds an intelligent search layer that can retrieve content from anywhere in the world within seconds, all without editors leaving the familiar environment of their favored editing system.
Business continuity
Business continuity is essentially a euphemism for “avoiding a disaster”. What it comes down to is reducing vulnerabilities. For modern media companies one of the biggest vulnerabilities is relying on a centralized infrastructure. Large, inflexible, sometimes monolithic, installations are the antithesis of what’s needed during a period of dramatic change and disruption.
However, with a cloud-based workflow, not only will your existing employees be able to work from home, you’ll be able to recruit talent from around the world, broadening your capabilities and allowing you to respond faster to opportunities.
In a joint report from PwC and Microsoft, their COVID-19 CFO Pulse Survey discovered that 80% of CFOs are implementing cost-containment measures to compensate for other losses brought on by the current economic situation. Cost awareness is at the top of their minds; specifically, they're looking at the cloud as a key driver for operational efficiencies. This means embracing new cloud-based collaboration tools that will enable growth, agility and flexibility, while leaving behind costly and archaic infrastructure.
Surviving and then flourishing in an uncertain future
While the pandemic is a textbook example of how exponential change takes people by surprise, it’s just one of many disruptive changes that have been approaching for some time, often in plain sight, but outside of the media industry’s awareness.
How do you prepare your business for these onslaughts so that you can survive and thrive?
The answer is to invest in flexibility, modularity, robustness and the cloud. Take the steps that prepare you to manage and embrace change, swiftly and without massive disruption. Expect the unexpected, and be ready to deal with whatever the future throws at you.
Intrigued? Here’s what comes next…
We are only getting started looking at the digital transformation businesses are undertaking in the current mass migration to remote workflows. Read our full executive report on The Media & Entertainment Industry’s Need for Digital Transformation here to find out more.
Want to learn more about how Curator might just be the right remote and collaborative solution your business needs? Book time directly with Gabrielle below to see how Curator can help you take control of your video assets and produce quality video content faster than ever! 👇👇👇
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