Founded in 1824, registered charity RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution) saves lives at sea around the coasts of the UK and Ireland. Relying on staff, 1,500 lifeguards and 10,000 operational volunteers, the RNLI operates 238 lifeboat stations and provides a seasonal lifeguard service on 239 beaches. It relies on public donations to fund its vital work and is helped in that work by an army of volunteer fundraisers.

The RNLI needed to scale up its content creation and distribution activity to drive fundraising efforts, and began its search for a replacement DAM that would tick several boxes:

  • Empower RNLI to scale up its content production by allowing its employees to create engaging content more quickly and confidently
  • Help sustain and strengthen the brand reputation of RNLI
  • Facilitate a process to safeguard the use of its branded assets
  • Allow its users to access and utilize digital assets more easily
  • Enhance levels of user collaboration regarding content creation

Key challenges RNLI faced

The charity’s previous DAM harbored several problems for its users:

The RNLI has more than 134,000 digital assets. An outdated DAM meant there was no synergy between the files across the different storage methods — risking confusion about permission statuses and brand inconsistencies appearing across their content. 

It also only allowed RNLI employees to store photographic files, so other storage solutions like memory sticks would need to be used too. Day-to-day time would be lost due to ineffective searches and having to manually ‘match up’ different assets. 

These factors were slowing RNLI’s content creation process down and hampered its ability to scale up content production.

RNLI transformed its operations by upgrading to Bynder DAM

RNLI’s way of working has truly transformed since they replaced their outdated DAM with Bynder’s AI-powered DAM. Bynder’s ability to accurately categorize thousands of digital assets has helped the charity establish brand governance. This has proved critical when the charity relies so heavily on brand recognition and audience trust to fuel fundraising efforts.

Marketing has also been able to improve content governance and brand management thanks to Bynder features such as usage rights and user permissions. It means that if consent for a piece of content is suddenly revoked, users can quickly and easily block all related assets from use.

And, with all 134k digital assets now safe and secure in one place, the charity benefits from smoother workflows and shorter production times. Precious resources are conserved. Content stakeholders aren’t wasting time hunting through folders and memory sticks to find assets. They can now locate, upload, and distribute assets in a matter of seconds.

RNLI works extensively with external news organizations and broadcasters. It’s hard to imagine what we did before because Bynder has made it so much easier to be able to give the media and our supporters what they need, when they need it — and in a secure way.
Eleanor Driscoll,
Senior Production Specialist at RNLI

In fact, Bynder is referred to internally as ‘The Source’ because it has become the system of record for all of the charity’s digital assets — important when much of RNLI’s content is based on sensitive situations like rescues. 

How Bynder future-proofed RNLI's brand and content strategy

RNLI's adoption of Bynder actively supports the charity’s drive to sustain, protect, and grow its brand reputation—all of which are essential for attracting a steady stream of donations and building audience trust and advocacy.

It has allowed the RNLI to significantly scale up its content creation, install robust brand governance, improve its content distribution process, and manage large volumes of content production across multiple physical offices and bases.

It’s provided a 200-year-old organization with a modern, future-proofed way of working with content.  

Explore the benefits of an AI-powered DAM for your organization

Bynder’s composable and highly integrated DAM platform serves as the system of record for your digital content. Built on our enterprise-grade, scalable SaaS infrastructure, it offers ease of use, comprehensive capabilities, and flexible configurability for even the most demanding digital asset management needs. 

Register for a free demo, and see why Bynder is relied upon by over 4,000 global brands.

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