Before we explore the nitty-gritties of Bannersnack vs Rocketium, let us understand why you need such platforms at all. A brand’s visual identity has many roles to play. It needs to attract and retain users’ attention even as it becomes the brand personality that people admire. In effect, it is all about the customer experience — brands have to be on their A-game right from discovery. Besides, consumers would much rather consume quality over quantity. But how are marketers equipped to create permutations and combinations of messages so every segment of their database receives a worthy message?
On the execution level, the answer lies in creating variants — a number game that relies on creating at scale. There is a larger brand campaign positioning that is then hyper-localized or personalized to the needs of different buyers. But this seemingly simple strategy is rarely successful enough unless a brand has the resources to constantly create for individual segments. Is it going to be a luxury that only larger, consumer-facing brands resort to, while most others cite resource constraints as the barrier to missed opportunities?
Not in 2020 and after — when the pandemic furthered the (already speedy) adoption of digital platforms for all brands, old or new. Well, why rewrite prophecies that are already established —
“Marketers who use automation tools say time is the biggest barrier to advanced marketing while those who don’t automate say that budget is their biggest barrier.”- Openprise
So automation is no longer the choice you are making. The platform that you go with is the choice, perhaps. Today then, let us look at which one of the two would be the right choice for you –Bannersnack vs Rocketium.
For the uninitiated, both platforms give you the ability to generate creatives through data — typically in a form-based interface that modifies master templates to create variants. Also, the teams can collaborate, review, approve, and share files seamlessly.
Bannersnack vs Rocketium — Feature comparison
Template Creation – Lucidpress’s report found that Brand Consistency has proven to contribute to over 33% of a business’ revenue. This means that your automation solution must empower you to stay on-brand, every single time. The scale must not cost you brand consistency.
While both Bannersnack and Rocketium let you create templates so non-designers get to create on-brand assets, Rocketium takes the cake here. Not only does the platform give designers the canvas to create custom templates with valuable features such as one-click background removal, but it also services resource-starved teams with its expert creative services. Through this service (that is often part of the account setup and management process), brand-compliant custom templates can be built. For teams looking to import Adobe files, that is a hassle-free option as well.
Further, Rocketium gives you the flexibility to control the degree to which a template may be altered — so only designers can edit, while others change few areas (more on role-based access later). This effectively stops harmless, design-blind marketers from committing grave brand blunders. Suffice to say, with Rocketium’s template generating capabilities, you can rarely go off-brand! Since Rocketium gives you such flexibility with videos and GIFs as well, its ability to create are very comprehensive, spanning all formats. Bannersnack’s video capabilities are limited and it does not have Shutterstock integrations that help import , high quality stock footages, like Rocketium does.
Input and Output Flexibility- Since creating at scale is necessary, being able to generate multiple variants with minimal effort, is yet another criteria that must drive your decision. Both platforms let you generate creatives with form-based interfaces that help edit various master template to create different variants — with text variants, color differences, image changes, among others to suit different formats and sizes.
Rocketium goes the extra mile with spreadsheet input functionality – which means you can collate content across 100s of segments, and upload the file to create on-brand, appropriately sized variants within a minute! Besides, you can import images with just a URL too. With both platforms, you can generate output in different formats but with Rocketium, you can do more than just download the file. Regardless of your output format, integrate it with the channel of publication – social or internal, and with your library (more on asset libraries later).
Bannersnack has HTML 5 output format too among others, although the format has only seen limited uses in the larger context of creating at scale. It also provides Click Tag and AdTag capabilities.
Configurability– Automating an aspect of your creative workflow is never independent. The process has to integrate with your entire ecosystem, even as multiple people using the platform take to the change easily and begin to see value in the switch. Rocketium, built wholly for enterprises, intuitively gives you the ability to customize everything — the flow (ideation to publication), the tools you integrate with, the fields within your UI as well as the features available to each user. While role-based access to make edits and creatives or approve them is standard across the board, role-based permissions for different features, with feature-flag management via an ‘app store’ make a winning case for Rocketium. This means you can design the preferred dashboard for your users, thereby safeguarding information as well as minimizing the feature-clutter they need to deal with.
Bannersnack though highly configurable, does not give users this end-to-end control, given its is not as comprehensive.
Team Collaboration– The creative workflow involves collaborating effectively. Automation, then, owes you a solution that alleviates the pain felt in manual, time-intensive error-prone collaboration. In that regard, both platforms give you the freedom to involve different stakeholders and team members. Comments and chats, status updates, workspaces with multiple users are offered.
Rocketium lets you define workplace users to granularity spanning workspace-specific user roles. For example, an editor on one can only be a viewer on another. Besides, the platform can serve different purposes (or different teams in your enterprise) with its ability to integrate end-to-end, be it with ad platforms, social channels, asset libraries, or in-app publishing platforms. For solutions such as Slack, one-click integration is readily available.
Bannersnack’s team collaboration functions include features to add different users, different workspaces, labels and folders, dedicated approval mechanism as well as overall workflow management.
Digital Asset Management (DAM)- The State of Universal Content Management 2020 report conducted by London Research found that, “More than half (53%) of respondents (700 global brand marketers, business professionals and their agencies) say they waste too much time trying to find content assets. This has an impact on morale as nearly 9-in-10 marketers say marketing should be about the freedom to create and implement game-changing ideas, instead of getting bogged down in administrative tasks.”
In that context, a DAM library built into your automation solution is the best way to eliminate clutter and streamline asset discovery. More importantly, the right assets get utilized at the right time, ensuring you get best possible returns of having spent hours on the creation process. While creating at scale, not only does a library to store all your files becomes necessary, asset management features are just as crucial too.
This means version control, file tagging and sharing, as well as performance analytics, are crucial features. Rocketium’s DAM, in addition to these features, also provides easy integrations to other tools, making it an all-encompassing asset management platform for the enterprise’s complete creative operations. Bannersnack provides a library to manage your files.
Bannersnack vs Rocketium — Enterprise-readiness
Although both platforms are powerful, each serves slightly different niches.
Rocketium is an end-to-end platform for business teams looking to create at scale – spanning images, videos, GIFs, and more. Its granularity, completely customizable set of features and on-brand vision make it ideal for businesses that require both scaled creation as well as value-added benefits. Besides, if brand compliance is a non-negotiable for you, this is the best platform for you. Custom development of features, connectors, template creation with in-house services, a dedicated account manager, and exceptional support ensure that your whole organization creates and deploys creatives, from one unified platform.
Bannersnack offers multiple features for teams as well as individuals. For upstarts looking for a simple banner creator, when scale and customization are not critical, this may be the right choice. But remember, most organizations face a glass ceiling of sorts when their automation partner is not built for scale.
This is where the decision is really yours.
Over to you
ROI on creative automation is probably one of the most misunderstood areas even as it helps you make an informed decision. An automation solution unlocks new business opportunities for you, by letting you do more with fewer resources. While resource cost savings and faster time to market are driving factors, imagine how much more business you could unlock if each segment of your audience was reminded of your offering in the packaging that they most relate to.
In that regard, evaluate if — you are currently building at a scale that is viable enough, your scale is likely going to multiply and the growth trajectory the team is on is accelerated. You can then decide what best fits your requirements. Think of automation as a must-have that will be the spine supporting your operations in the coming years. Bannersnack vs Rocketium — the right partner for you, will then be a question that answers itself. And, congratulations on choosing to automate! Business2Community in its study revealed – “businesses that implement marketing automation experience an average of a 451% increase in qualified leads.” You will not be disappointed with your decision.
Nityashree Yadunath 
