SOPA Images and LightRocket: How This Photo Agency Benefits from Digital Asset Management
DAM software and photo agencies: natural partnership
It's been seven years since SOPA Images came to LightRocket with a plan to start a photo agency using our digital asset management system.
The synergy was evident. Both co-founders of LightRocket Enterprise, myself Yvan Cohen and Peter Charlesworth, were experienced photojournalists. LightRocket's very first incarnation as a business, just over two decades ago, was as a digital photo agency, called OnAsia.
Managing picture archives, contributors and download access is integral to LightRocket's identity, history and corporate DNA.
When SOPA Images' founders, Hong Kong citizen Geovien So and French national Guillaume Payen, contacted LightRocket, they were already aware of our partnership with Getty Images - one of the world's most powerful platforms for licensing photography. A partnership that further highlighted our credentials in the editorial sector.
Our detailed understanding of editorial workflows and our first-hand knowledge of the world of photography, are two important traits that make the LightRocket digital asset management platform stand out from the competition.
LightRocket has over a million images on Getty
LightRocket is fortunate to have forged such a close partnership with Getty Images. Our editing teams are entrusted with the task of reviewing, selecting and verifying editorial content that is passed directly from LightRocket to the Getty sales platform.
The flow from LightRocket to sales-ready content on Getty's platform is completely seamless - thanks to a suite of bespoke features developed by our team. These integrated tools allow LightRocket to automatically validate and dispatch content to Getty. Every single image is hand-checked by LightRocket's editors before being placed into an electronic dispatch queue that is connected directly to Getty's own picture management platform.
With a million images already available on LightRocket's Getty collection, the company's editors continue to check and publish hundreds of images on Getty every single day. It's a labour of love for our editors who are committed to ensuring only the best content is pushed out to publications around the world.
For Sopa Images, the combination of LightRocket's efficient and comprehensive editorial media management tools, and the opportunity to distribute content directly to Getty, were powerful factors that impacted their decision to work with us.
SOPA Images manages more than a million images on LightRocket
Scalability and cost are also important factors for any agency choosing a digital asset management platform.
Reflecting our flexible approach to pricing, LightRocket immediately offered SOPA Images a start-up package, calibrated to remove financial concerns from the fledgling agency's decision-making process.
LightRocket's flexible start-up fees for new agencies means a risk-free opportunity to work with a world-class media management system. This allows new picture agencies to distribute content on one of the world's most powerful media sales platforms while benefitting from the support, consultancy, and upgrades that LightRocket offers its clients.
Seven years after approaching LightRocket, SOPA Images' initial tentative venture into LightRocket's digital universe has clearly paid off. Today, SOPA Images is managing more than a million images on its LightRocket Enterprise platform and has over a thousand contributing members.
At the end of the day, we want our clients to get great value from our platform, we understand that for any potential client, taking the plunge with a DAM software system involves a certain degree of risk. By offering attractive introductory rates, we aim to reduce that risk, and stress, for new agencies like SOPA Images.
Peter Charlesworth
Co-founder, LightRocket
A perfect digital asset management system for photo agencies
If one surveys the market landscape for digital asset management systems, it quickly becomes obvious that most of LightRocket's competitors are geared towards brand management and servicing the corporate sphere.
LightRocket's unique editorial roots and our team's singular focus on innovation, are undoubtedly what set us apart from the competition.
For picture agencies like SOPA Images, features like LightRocket's contributor dashboard (which allows editors to track the flow of incoming content), our laser-accurate search tools, ranking options for filtering content, and unique features like our dual description fields (which allow general descriptions to be added to batches of images), make LightRocket Enterprise an easy choice.
At LightRocket Enterprise we're always evolving
One of the greatest concerns for any client investing in a DAM software system, is the question of how future-proof the service and system will be.
At LightRocket, we take the idea of Software as a Service (SAAS) very literally. We develop and provide software to our clients but see each new client as the beginning of an ongoing, long-term relationship.
Our team understands that if we are to win the trust and loyalty of our clients (like SOPA Images who have been with LightRocket for almost a decade) then, collaboration, feedback and upgrades must remain integral to our business practices and ethos.
Support and upgrades are built into the modest monthly fee paid by SOPA Images. Regular upgrades ensure their platform is future-proofed. Upgrades include both new functionality but also a raft of invisible upgrades that aim to ensure LightRocket's technology remains cutting edge and performance benchmarks are always being tweaked and enhanced.
With a commitment to growth, editorial integrity and innovation, the future for SOPA Images and LightRocket Enterprise looks bright.