Visual assets—photography, illustrations, infographics and videos—are considered by most senior marketing executives as central to how brands are communicated. However, a new study from the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council, “From Content to Creativity: The Role of Visual Media in Impactful Brand Storytelling,” found that brands are failing to fully leverage this content for effective customer engagement. Only 27 percent of executives have the ability to aggregate, organize and manage these assets across marketing and non-marketing teams—including those outside of the organization.

Of the visual assets the CMO Council studied, video is set to most dramatically increase in importance in the near future, according to 79 percent of senior marketers. Usage of infographics (60 percent), photographs (50 percent) and illustrations (41 percent) will also increase. Yet the study also revealed that internal silos, disconnected content development strategies and other marketing priorities have prevented visual assets from being fully leveraged across the organization.

“Marketers have been remiss in approaching the visual asset dialogue as part of the strategic customer experience and engagement dialogue,” says Liz Miller, senior vice president of marketing for the CMO Council. “Perhaps because visual assets have long been the domain of creative or agency resources, the conversation around maximizing value across the organization has fallen off of the priority list. But as customers continue to react in meaningful ways to visual media, marketing cannot afford to stand idly by and not include visuals in the content ROI agenda.”

Andrew Fingerman, CEO of PhotoShelter, which conducted the study in partnership with the CMO Council, adds, “Companies will continue making massive investments in the production and procurement of visual media assets because of the obvious and powerful impact on audience engagement and customer experience. Yet as the study shows, hiding these assets away in team silos is destroying the greater organization’s potential return on content investments. As more content is captured and created, companies will need to rebalance their focus with a greater emphasis on strategies behind digital asset management, including centralization, storage and accessibility.”

The full strategic white paper is available for download here.