City of Kawartha Lakes Learn how the City of Kawartha Lakes uses MediaValet to support brand management and streamline city wide communications. Who is The City of Kawartha Lakes? The City of Kawartha Lakes (Kawartha Lakes), is Ontario’s second largest single-tier municipality and home to some of the most vibrant downtowns, abundant green spaces and diverse opportunities in the province.It is a year-round home to 80,000 residents. Over the Summer season, Kawartha Lakes welcomes over a million tourists. Location: Kawartha Lakes, ON Industry: Government Company size: Mid-Market Joined MediaValet: 2021 Features: Partner access & brand consistency The Challenges Cheri Davidson and her team faced challenges in scaling their digital presence to serve the community and growing tourism sector.Despite its idyllic setting and burgeoning population, Kawartha Lakes faced hurdles in streamlining communications across its 1200 staff and variety of external vendors and media partners. The Results Since turning to MediaValet for their digital asset management needs, Kawartha Lakes has accomplished: More effective program promotions A cohesive brand image for the Kawartha Lakes Enhanced media engagement Cheri Davidson Manager of Communications, Advertising, and Marketing, The City of Kawartha Lakes The Challenge Disjointed Digital Asset Management Cheri Davidson, the Manager of Communications, Advertising, and Marketing, explained Kawartha Lakes’s initial struggles; with a staff of approximately 1,200 and a myriad of communication needs, securely managing their growing library of photo and video assets was proving to be an uphill battle. There was a reliance on fragmented systems for asset storage and access. Sharing assets through email attachments or file sharing was also proving inefficient. Our reliance on SharePoint and email for file sharing was both inefficient for internal staff and our external partners.” They needed a system that could offer a centralized hub to store and manage digital assets and facilitate easier access for various departments as well as a new, more secure method for distributing their assets externally. It was time to find a unified platform that could do all of these things, so Kawartha Lakes turned to MediaValet. Not only was there an incredible improvement in asset management and distribution, but their MediaValet DAM helped them achieve so much more! The Use Case Streamlining City-Wide Communications Now, the team at Kawartha Lakes is using MediaValet as a central component of their marketing tech stack. By centralizing and improving access to their digital assets, it’s enabled them to scale their marketing efforts on par with the rate Kawartha Lakes is expanding. The DAM serves their marketing and communication needs, but the team at Kawartha Lakes has also leaned into the efficiencies and benefits of using Branded Portals. Customized Branded Portals for Diverse Needs Recognizing the diverse needs of its audience, Kawartha Lakes has deployed multiple, specialized Branded Portals, each designed to cater to the unique requirements of different stakeholders. For instance: Partner Resource Portal: For external partners, including contractors, vendors, and regional agencies, this dedicated portal provides access to essential branding guidelines, project briefs, and collaborative tools. It ensures that all external communications and representations of The Kawartha Lakes are consistent and aligned with its brand identity. Media Portal: For timely access to media assets, partners can login to download exactly the version and size needed for their media outlet. Community Services Portal: Aquatics and recreation staff are empowered to access the training, marketing and operational files they need, when they need them, knowing the latest versions are always current. The use of these Portals has seen two major improvements in how the team at The Kawartha Lakes utilize their assets and manage their teams. Transforming Municipal Communications The Kawartha Lakes’s innovative use of Branded Portals, underpinned by MediaValet’s security and asset management capabilities, has transformed its approach to communication. What was once a challenge of managing files across multiple users has now become a streamlined, secure, and effective strategy that not only enhances internal operations but also enriches the work Kawartha Lakes does with its various partners. Through Branded Portals, Kawartha Lakes can facilitate effective distribution of information and resources, enhancing their communication abilities within the organization and streamlining their external communications methods. In fact, the DAM is being used as a transformative tool for enhancing operational efficiency and partner connection in Kawartha Lakes’s municipal communications. Improving Promotional and Branding Initiatives: The team uses MediaValet’s Branded Portals to enable easy access to up-to-date logos and brand guidelines across teams and stakeholders, ensuring consistent communications. They use Portals to house operational templates for seasonal staff, and Portals with specific branding guidelines to ensure both efficiency in the distribution of and consistency across their branding materials. Our promotional campaigns have become more impactful and resonant with our target audiences.” With easier access to promotional materials and community information, Kawartha Lakes is continuously enhancing its engagement efforts, promoting events, services, and initiatives to more effectively market Kawartha Lakes as a desirable location to live and work. It’s really become a way of working for our core users across departments…and has become a way that we can start, continue, and finish a project with third-party vendors.” The Key Features Achieve Versatile Asset Management Kawartha Lakes’s innovative application of MediaValet’s features, particularly branded portals, exemplifies the DAM’s versatility. But they’re using so many more features to build a digital presence. User Groups and Permissions To facilitate collaboration with external users like photographers and videographers, Kawartha Lakes implements user groups with specific permissions (an unlimited feature within MediaValet). This allows for controlled access based on user roles, enabling external contributors to upload and manage content within predefined guidelines. This has led to optimized external collaborations and asset management. By setting up user groups, The Kawartha Lakes’s contribution process is streamlined for external partners, ensuring that all digital assets are uploaded, tagged, and managed according to the Kawartha Lakes’s standards, enhancing the quality and consistency of their digital library. Security Features Kawartha Lakes leverages MediaValet’s top-tier security features to ensure safe and secure distribution of digital assets both internally and to the public. This includes the secure sharing of promotional materials, community information, and sensitive operational documents. The MediaValetDAM helps to safeguard sensitive information and resources. It ensures that digital assets are protected against unauthorized access, supporting Kawartha Lakes’ commitment to maintaining high standards of data security and privacy. The Results True Alignment Kawartha Lakes’ journey with MediaValet highlights how digital transformation can streamline operations and maintain brand consistency. Their MediaValet DAM has transformed municipal communication and marketing strategies by: Streamlined Operations: Since implementing MediaValet, workflow efficiency across Kawartha Lakes departments has improved significantly, reducing the time spent on searching for and sharing files. Increased Engagement: MediaValet has helped to enhance access to promotional materials and community information allowing for more effective promotion of events, services, and initiatives. Adaptive Brand Management: The MediaValet DAM has facilitated controlled distribution of branding materials enabling the team to present a cohesive Kawartha Lakes image, supporting economic development and tourism. Cheri Davidson remarked on the profound impact of MediaValet, stating, MediaValet has become integral to our way of working, enabling us to initiate, execute, and conclude projects with a level of efficiency and collaboration that was previously unattainable. It’s fundamentally changed how we manage our brand, marking a new era in our digital strategy.”
