What content strategy and technology will leading brands use in 2025?

The state of digital content

Industry insights

Automate your digital asset sharing with brand portals

by Casey Schmidt  |  April 27, 2020

3 min. read
A digital door open wide.

A brand portal provides access to your company’s digital content internally and externally. Portals boost efficiency and promote healthy relationships with potential customers and current clients. If you’re not sure how a brand portal works or how it boosts companies, this guide will steer you in the right direction. Here’s a closer look at how they work, starting with a breakdown of what they are exactly.

What is a brand portal?

A brand portal is a complete digital storage center for digital assets. Portals allow companies to share important digital content with fellow team members or outside parties. They also offer secure sharing of valuable company guidelines and assets such as manuals, images and brochures.

A long space-like tunnel bridge.
Brand portals give access to a company’s digital assets.

Here’s an example to help you better visualize brand portals. It’s Halloween night and kids are ringing doorbells looking for candy – these kids are like company externals, such as journalists or students. The candy they want is like digital assets. If the homeowner answers the door each time the bell rings, they are behaving like a company without brand portals. However, if they place candy in a big bowl outside the front door with a sign that says ‘take one’, they’ve created a brand portal. Every outside source has access to what they need and the company isn’t obligated to find assets for anyone.

Here are some unique ways a brand portal helps companies:

Share faster with externals

As your company grows, it adds valuable digital content to a company image library. This content is useful to externals wishing to use it for a story, research or reference. The process of delivering these company assets to externals is overhauled with a brand portal, which allows access to authorized individuals. Once implemented, the clients can retrieve this content without any extra steps.

People working together using cloud devices.
Externals like journalists can access your logos quickly with portals.

Not only does a brand portal increase the retrieval time for externals, it also decreases the amount of effort teams have to put into coordinating asset deliveries. This builds the company in multiple ways because externals can return for future access with ease. Furthermore, members of the company optimize their workdays through the use of portals.

Optimize internal brand processes

Brand portals boost internal brand processes by minimizing excess access to the content library. For example, if the finance department uses brand assets for documents they send out, they don’t want all the branding content. Instead, they simply need a few digital pieces. A brand portal solves this by giving them specific, limited access so they only get the content they need.

Digital rooms in neon lighting.
Internal departments locate assets quickly through portals.

Brand portals give administrators the ability to oversee shared files within the portal. This ensures all brand material is being given out correctly and to the right people. The efficiency this creates optimizes not only brand asset management but also the entire day-to-day operations.

Increase accessibility

Brand portals need to be accessible for all access channels, especially mobile. The chances are high that externals are going to access brand portals using mobile devices. Ensure your brand company portal is versatile enough to fulfill its purpose without frustrations for externals. This requires, in particular, extensive mobile-accessible brand portals.

A phone expanding digitally.
Brand portals should be accessible through mobile devices.

Mobile-friendly portals diversify not only the access points but also the externals seeking information through a multitude of devices. The portal should not only function on mobile devices, it should also be optimized aesthetically for mobile devices. The chances of continued portal use depend on the ability to make a functional, visually-pleasing portal that is mobile-available.

As your brand portal opens up content to externals, adjust it accordingly to handle every possible usage outcome. Make sure the process of retrieving digital content from your company is secure, efficient and convenient.