Many architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry firms first adopt AVAIL’s all-in-one content management solution to manage Revit families, but these firms manage an enormous amount of project information beyond Revit families—CAD details, standards documentation, manufacturer resources, Bluebeam tool sets, and more—across network drives, cloud platforms, intranets, and web sources. The real value of AVAIL appears when teams connect those scattered resources into a single, searchable ecosystem. Director of Customer Success Clay Watson describes how AVAIL can help AEC teams connect all project information with AVAIL, drawing lines across resources instead of scattered dots.
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The Problem: Content Chaos
Drawing Lines & Connecting Dots with AVAIL
Real-World Impact: How JLG & SCB Tie Things Together
Three Practical Steps to Expand the Value of AVAIL at Your Firm
At AVAIL so far, I have engaged in more than 200 customer calls, discussions, and meetings.
Across large firms, small firms, and everyone in between, one major takeaway from these interactions is the enormous challenge design technology and BIM management leaders face in managing an ever-expanding array of knowledge and information.
The scope of content management in the architectural, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry is staggering.
From Revit families and CAD blocks to Bluebeam tool sets, sustainability spreadsheets, code compliance websites, manufacturer cut sheets, internal standards, and intranet web pages—the list seems endless. While there is no shortage of information, managing it effectively is critical.
On top of the sheer amount of data, project information lives everywhere—network drives, SharePoint, cloud platforms, bookmarked web pages, and old project folders.
Teams know the content exists. They just don’t always know where the right version lives, what supports it, or how it connects to the rest of the project ecosystem. Under deadline pressure, people default to what’s easiest to find, even if it’s outdated.
That’s where inconsistency creeps in. That’s where rework starts.
From AVAIL’s point of view, the real issue isn’t the amount of information; it’s the lack of connection between the variety of necessary resources.
AVAIL was designed around a simple idea: don’t force firms to move everything into a new repository. Instead, create an access layer that connects what already exists. Building from this idea, AVAIL sits atop two primary concepts: it is both file-type-agnostic and file-location-agnostic.
AVAIL's all-in-one content management solution stretches across all disciplines, file types, and content locations so production teams can find everything they need, all in one place.
When I lead onboarding sessions, I always begin by emphasizing these fundamental concepts. Being file agnostic means that Revit files, DWGs, PDFs, Excel spreadsheets, images, videos—even URLs—can be indexed and searched within AVAIL. File location agnosticism means that these files can remain in their original locations, whether on-prem or in the cloud.
Serving as a single, streamlined content management solution for AEC firms, AVAIL centralizes access to all of a firm’s technical content for easy search and reuse.
The result isn’t just a library. It’s a centralized source of truth for all project information and data. Randall Stevens (AVAIL CEO and Founder) commonly uses the ‘draw lines, not dots’ metaphor when discussing this problem and AVAIL’s approach to solving it. Connecting information and workflows is at the heart of the AVAIL interface and drives much of our work as we build out new features like Related Content.
In November, we hosted a webinar with customers who are using AVAIL well beyond Revit families. What they shared reinforced something we see again and again: once information becomes connected, workflows change. Two customer stories stood out as great real-world examples of the benefits of using AVAIL’s Related Content feature to bridge the gap between disconnected project information.
JLG connects Revit families to outside and internal resources
At JLG Architects, what began as a content management initiative quickly expanded into something larger. Morgan Blum, BIM Manager at JLG, described how they began thinking differently about what belongs in AVAIL. They used a phrase—tying things together—which speaks to the heart of the issue. JLG didn’t just upload families. They began surfacing sustainability resources, internal standards, brand guidelines, and web-based references. More importantly, they used AVAIL to connect items that logically belong together using Related Content. Instead of users finding a single file, they find a cluster of information that supports a task.
Morgan explained how they approach project startup, “If we start up a project… I have four or five files that are like these that should all be part of your project right away when you start a project.” That small shift prevents a common AEC habit: digging through past project folders for “something similar.”
By centralizing and connecting the right resources, JLG reduced the likelihood of outdated standards creeping back into production.
AVAIL's Related Content feature makes it easy to connect Revit families to supporting content like schedules for anyone on the team to find later instead of having to dig into old project folders for "something similar."
SCB curates libraries for Revit, marketing, materials, models, and more
Peter Rybicki, Director of Design Technology at SCB, described how the firm’s use of AVAIL expanded over time. It began with Revit families and details. Then came entourage libraries. Then marketing photography. Then PBR materials. Then FBX model libraries.
For SCB, AVAIL became a structured visual catalog of production resources. Instead of downloading materials from manufacturer websites again and again, teams pull from curated libraries. Instead of searching through Windows Explorer previews, they navigate visually organized channels.
The evolution wasn’t overnight. It was iterative. Each step addressed the friction the firm was already experiencing.
For firms already using AVAIL primarily as a Revit library, the opportunity lies in expanding perspective.
1. Start by paying attention to the questions your teams ask every week. If people are repeatedly searching for a standard, a spreadsheet, or a code reference, that information belongs in AVAIL. Not buried in a network path. The goal should be to make it surfaced and searchable.
2. Next, think about relationships. Rarely does a file exist in isolation. A family might require a cut sheet. A detail might depend on a code reference. A template might link to a sustainability tracker. When those items are connected through Related Content, users discover context automatically.
3. Finally, don’t overlook web-based information. Manufacturer pages, code compliance sites, and intranet resources are part of your project information ecosystem. If they influence design decisions, they should be accessible alongside your production content.
URLs are easy to view in AVAIL, and teams can customize the preview image of a URL by scrolling to a specific screen and saving it by clicking the camera icon in the top right corner.
The goal isn’t to upload everything at once. It’s to reduce friction where it hurts most and build outward from there.
As firms scale their use of Related Content, managing those relationships efficiently becomes more important. That’s where an existing AVAIL admin feature—Tag IO—comes into play.
Tag IO allows administrators to export metadata from a Channel into a spreadsheet, make structured edits, and reimport it to apply changes in bulk. It’s already a powerful way to manage tags and descriptions at scale.
Soon, we’ll be extending that capability to make it easier to manage Related Content relationships at scale using the same structured workflow. For firms with growing libraries, that means less manual effort and more control over how information connects.
Be on the lookout for a webinar invite to explore new bulk Related Content capabilities.
The amount of project information and data is not going away anytime soon. As information continues to swirl from all directions, a sense of clarity and connection across this information will steer teams towards a higher level of efficiency.
When project information is centralized, searchable, and thoughtfully related, teams spend less time hunting and more time designing—and that’s a shift every firm can benefit from.
Founded in 2016 as a solution for architecture and engineering firms to find the information they need faster, AVAIL creates software for the global architectural, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry. AVAIL’s content management system (CMS) platform and Revit, AutoCAD, and Civil 3D application tools help designers and engineers take control of their intricate network of files in one visual, streamlined solution. AVAIL’s customers include industry leaders Gensler, Perkins&Will, IMEG, LEO A DALY, and Populous.
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