Overview
Business Area:
National Geographic Society (NGS) – Image Research Team
Largest nonprofit scientific and educational organization for scientists to advance and diffuse geographic knowledge using science, exploration, education, and storytelling to illuminate and protect the wonder of the world.
Project Overview:
The NGS Image Research Team serves as the central intake point for asset and image-related requests, including images, files, layouts, cover designs, archive retrievals, and print-ready assets. Requests are submitted for review and based on the selected category, are routed to the Asset Management Team for fulfillment.
The current process involves a significant number of manual activities and lacks standardized workflow, resulting in inefficiencies, limited visibility, and longer turnaround times. Implementing an automated request intake, routing, approval, and tracking process would improve operational efficiency, accountability, and fulfillment speed.
The NGS Image Research Team remains solely responsible for obtaining all required usage rights, permissions, and clearances for requested content, as well as covering any associated clearance fees and costs related to the use of that content.
Challenges
- Managing data collection for multiple business teams through a single public form.
- Routing submissions to the correct Airtable base based on Category and Subcategory.
- Maintaining near real-time synchronization across multiple Airtable bases.
- Eliminate manual data entry and duplicate processing.
- Ensuring each team accesses only the records relevant to their operations.
- Maintaining data consistency across interconnected Airtable environments.
Our Solution
- Developed a dedicated Airtable base to serve as the centralized public form.
- Configured the form for secure public access, enabling external users to submit requests.
- Implemented Live Sync to synchronize submissions with multiple destination Airtable bases.
- Used Category and Subcategory fields to intelligently route records to the appropriate base.
- Built Airtable Automations to automatically distribute synchronized records into the required operational tables.
- Delivered a fully automated, scalable workflow that minimizes manual intervention and supports future expansion.
Key Benefits
- Single, centralized entry point for all data submissions.
- Automated routing of records to the appropriate business teams.
- Near real-time synchronization across multiple Airtable bases.
- Reduced manual effort and elimination of duplicate data entry.
- Improved data accuracy, consistency, and reliability.
- Scalable architecture that supports additional teams, categories, and workflows.
- Faster request processing and enhanced operational efficiency.
- Simplified maintenance through centralized data collection and automated distribution.
Application Link: NGS Incoming Requests
Submission Form Link: Assets & General Request Form
Workflow Architecture:
Submission Form:
Interface – List View (All Photo Request)
Interface – List View (All Video Request)
Automations: Create and Update in respective bases
NatGeo Video Request Tracking Data view:
Date Synchronization from NGS Incoming request base only with Video requests – live sync
Image Collection Request Tracking Data view:
Date Synchronization from NGS Incoming request base only with image requests – live sync
