A modern business is always evolving and looking for ways to improve its operations. The way your internal processes work often reflects on communication with customers and service quality. If you seek to grow and expand, you can't rely on traditional business and document archiving methods.
One of the biggest challenges in digitizing your business is replacing physical document management and storage. When you archive important information in a physical place, you risk losing or damaging data, human errors, and need to invest more in storage space and human resources. Physical storage space must meet all security standards such as a fire alarm system, access control, locks, etc. And let's not forget about all that paper waste.
But the great news is that an electronic archive can help you solve all these problems. Yes, there's a way to archive documents and contracts safely, with just a few clicks of a button.
What's E-archive?
E-archive is an electronic archiving system designed to store and secure documents and customer information in a digital environment.
Let's take the healthcare sector for example. Your clinic got a new patient, and for you to provide proper treatment, you have to collect information about that person's health and conditions, obtain their consent, and other agreements.
Manually, this process would take a lot of time, but digital storage allows you to securely archive their information and access it whenever you need it. Unlike physical archiving space, you can access your document with only a key phrase or main details.
But that's just a few benefits of an electronic system. Let's see how it can benefit your business more.
10 E-archive benefits for your business
1. Data security
The digital archive provides exceptional levels of security. First, you can activate two-factor authentication to ensure secure access for authorized users. Second, a digital system allows role-based log-in, meaning that each employee or authorized party can have different access rights. Trace logs show user activity and log-ins. And third, when it comes to data transfer, you can use encryption technology to secure private information during transfer.
2. Sustainable business practices
Sustainable business development isn't only a nice phrase to add to your business description. Sustainability is an integral part of a modern company that seeks to attract customers and investments.
The most important part about sustainability is that even baby steps matter. And the great way to start is by adopting paperless practices. E-archive is your go-to tool for ditching paper and embracing eco-friendly operations. Just by replacing paper with a digital archive for your document storage and control, you can save tons of paper and adopt restorative practices.
3. Avoid human errors
We all are humans and humans make mistakes. They can even make them on a digital archive, but the chances of that happening are much lower. This is because the system takes over archiving and presenting the information. Also, e-archive limits storing mistakes such as damaging or losing documents due to human error.
4. Faster information processing
You can forget about a long and tiresome search going through piles of documents in physical storage space.
A digital archiving system collects and keeps all your data for as long as you need it. Therefore, no matter how old the information is, you can find it just by writing down a key phrase or date when the document was saved.
5. Automated document disposal
According to GDPR requirements, after the customer contract expires, the company must destroy all their information to protect customers' privacy. It can get complicated dealing with paper documents because you physically have to shred piles of paper and ensure that nothing slips your watch.
E-archive allows deleting information with one click of a button without wasting your time or putting customer data at risk. The system automatically deletes outdated information based on the GDPR requirements without leaving a trace.
6. GDPR compliance
When dealing with paper documents, you risk violating GDPR requirements. For instance, your customer puts their email in the wrong way, or you can't identify the correct spelling, and by accident send an email to the wrong person. This way, you might risk a fine or even a lawsuit. Or, if the information is incorrect, you simply lose further communication opportunities with the customer.
A digital archive is fully GDPR-compliant, which eases managing customer data, deleting expired accounts, and ensuring effortless communication with clients. Also, a digital system gives you the advantage of better readability, and it automatically notifies a customer if some piece of information is missing.
7. Saved costs on storage space and human resources
Handling sensitive customer information is meticulous work. You have to ensure security, storage space, and find people who could manage the archive, audit data, and make sure everything is intact. That costs a lot of additional expenses, and when the business is growing and the number of documents multiples each day, the job becomes more and more challenging.
Electronic archive saves you from trouble and extra expenses because the digital environment can store an unlimited amount of files without the need for more employees or additional physical space. Every authorized employee can access data and manage it on the go.
8. Accurate business statistics
When you use pen and paper, how do you track your company's progress? Do you count all the contracts signed or try to guess? None of that sounds like an effective way to measure your business growth.
Electronic document archive, on the other hand, gives you a full overview of your business activity. You can see what time you had the most customers and signed contracts, and compare this data based on the time of the day, week, or month. You can also choose the UNIT activity option, which allows seeing data from a specific city or location.
9. Protection from physical damage
Storing physical paper documents makes them susceptible to water, temperature changes, and other damage. When you archive records in a digital environment, you don't need to worry that something will happen to those files. Unlike a physical archive, a digital archive can be updated with the latest security software and other technologies that work in boosting your data safety. As all data is stored on the cloud, the information will remain intact even if you damage one of the devices.
10. Fast data audit
Most businesses commit to regular data audits to ensure that every piece of information is secure and in place. With manual archiving tools, this task can become challenging as the paper is more prone to damage and deterioration, not to mention time wasted checking all the files.
E-archive can be customized to your business processes to perform data audits whenever you plan on doing them. A digital system processes data faster, doesn't miss any detail, and notifies you if something is, in fact, missing.
Sign on Tab electronic document archive
Sign on Tab is a multifunctional tool designed for a business that seeks to be among industry-leading companies. We offer a digitally captured signature feature and E-archive to store and protect your customers' information.
Our archiving solution meets all the functionality listed above and can give your business a push towards digitalization and sustainable practices. But see it for yourself! Visit our case studies to learn more about how Sign on Tab can benefit your company.