The email you entered is already receiving Daily Bits Emails!
Get all the best deals that ITAZ Technologies Pvt. Ltd. has to offer right here on BitsDuJour. Click quick, these discounts don't last long, and we update daily! We have deals on SOHODOX, . If you Follow ITAZ Technologies Pvt. Ltd., you'll get emails when deals go live!
Visit the ITAZ Technologies Pvt. Ltd. website.
The latest news, straight from our vendors.
We have said it many times and we’ll say it again, “Startups already have too much to worry about, they shouldn’t have to worry about managing their documents”.
As someone managing or working at a startup, you already have a lot on your plate. One minute you are creating social media posts & the next you are designing a pitch to showcase during the investor meet. Hence, managing documents should be the absolute last thing in your daily schedule.
But as most of you already know, documents are very important for businesses. And improper management of documents can result in heavy losses for the company. So, the best thing a startup can do is employ a good document management system for managing their documents. A document management system or document management software (DMS) lets you perform all document management functions like scanning, classifying, storing, tracking, retrieving & protecting documents, under one roof. Document management systems use process automation to reduce document handling costs and improve efficiency & productivity. Here are a few more reasons why your startup should invest in a quality document management system.
5 reasons why startups should invest in a document management system
Central Repository
How many hours would you take to dress up if all your different clothing items were stored in different closets or rooms? That’s the same with documents. The primary reason why people take hours finding documents is because they are stored in a thousand different locations like internal drives, external drives, emails, Google docs & more. A document management system simplifies this problem by acting as a single universal repository of all business documents. Plus, document software like SOHODOX & Microsoft Suite also provides multi-format file support for document formats like doc, xls, pdf & more, allowing you to directly view Microsoft Office & Adobe files within the system. A central repository of documents doesn’t just reduce document retrieval time, it also reduces the chances of misfiling & losing documents.
More Features
A simple document editing or storing system will not have the kind of features that have become a mainstay in the current business world. Such features include private folders, Dropbox integration, email capture & more. Whereas, most document management systems provide these essential features within their basic subscription plan itself. Some other exclusive document management system features include full-text search, optical character recognition (OCR), document linking, tagging, etc.
Automation
Document management systems are designed to reduce your work. But how do they do that? Through process automation. Let’s say your job is to manually extract key data from incoming invoices like client name, amount, date, payment status, etc, and store it in an excel sheet for further review. A document management system with built-in Zone OCR automatically indexes every incoming document for this information and stores it in the indexing field, allowing you to access it anytime. Some other document processes that can be automated by document management systems include document imports, archival, disposal & more.
Secure Sharing
Being able to share documents only with the intended audience is a critical aspect of every business. This is called secure sharing. Secure sharing restricts information from falling into the wrong hands and protects against thefts & leaks. One way of securing information sharing is by having a user ID-based login. A user login process ensures every user logs in to their respective accounts and restricts them from accessing information meant for other accounts. Another way of protecting documents is by using private folders. Think of private folders as a vault. Only people with a key or access code can access a locked vault. Similarly, only people assigned access to private folders can access them, thereby protecting the information it contains from other users.
Tracking
Document tracking refers to tracking every activity undertaken on the document like when the document was created, accessed, edited, shared or deleted, and by whom. Document tracking is a critical component of compliance filings & audits. Most industry compliances like ISO 9001, HIPAA & GDPR require you to submit document activity to ensure their authenticity. Document activity is also mandatory to be presented during tax audits to show that the documents haven’t been edited or tampered with. In some cases, document activity also acts as evidence during conflict resolutions & payment delays.
Final Words
Document management systems improve business operations by reducing documentation delays and improving client satisfaction.
Investing, learning & getting used to a document management system can be time-consuming & tedious, but it is worth every minute you will save once you are able to use the software to its full potential. So, go online, research some good document management systems, subscribe to the one you think is best for your business and get digitizing.
The post Why Your Startup Needs a Document Management System first appeared on SOHODOX.
The annual global production of paper & cardboard is more than 400 million metric tons, with China & the United States accounting for more than 50% of the total consumption of paper & paper-based products.
A total of 386 hectares of forest was lost globally due to paper production between 2001 & 2019. This means we have practically destroyed more than 10% of the total tree cover since 2000. At the current rate, we will have cut down every rainforest before the year 2100.
50% of all business waste is made up of paper. An estimated 2700 litres of water is required to produce 1 tonne of paper and if the same amount of paper (1 tonne) is recycled or reused, it can save around 1400 litres of oil, 26,500 litres of water & 17 trees.
Although paper production is going down in countries like the United States, it is swiftly moving up in countries like China, with China accounting for 117 million metric tonnes in 2020. It is estimated that the global demand for paper is expected to double before 2030.
1. Saves office space
Office space is expensive & limited. Ask anyone that always cribs about having to share a cubicle with someone else because there aren’t any more left or someone who has to listen to their colleagues all day because they sit within an earshot distance from each other. Going paperless helps you remove the unwanted filing cabinets, drawers & stationary units, which could mean an extra seat for a few more people at the office.
2. Eases document organization & search
Who here hasn’t cursed their luck for being tasked to find a missing document? Managing, organizing & finding paper documents is always going to be difficult. On the other hand, digital documents have something called tags & keywords, which simplify the organization & search process. You can simply enter a tag or keyword in the search bar & voila, your document appears. Moreover, specialized tools for digital document management like SOHODOX allow you to replicate & automate your entire document management process with features such as full-text search, document tags, multi-format compatibility & more.
3. Reduces costs
If everything you read above still didn’t motivate you to give up paper documents, let us tell you how paper is emptying your pockets. Every lost or misfiled document can cost you anywhere between $120 – $220. A traditional four-drawer filing cabinet which uses just 9 sq. ft. of space costs you about $1500 each year. Every 12 filing cabinets need an additional employee to help maintain & organize the documents inside them. Indirect paper-based costs like printers, cartridges, shredders, copiers, stationery, folders, clips, etc add up to almost $400,000 every year for an average company.
4. Boosts data security
Data security is one of the primary reasons to move away from paper. Imagine this, you give your file of paper documents to an employee. You want to allow him to read the documents but you don’t want him to be able to print them. This will only be possible if you take away his smartphone & lock him inside your office as long as he has the documents. On the contrary, a digital document management system will allow you to control document printing & sharing privileges, sometimes literally with a single click.
5. Improves information accessibility
Isn’t it tedious to have to go to the office just to get a signature on a physical document? Well, that’s the drawback of using paper documents. Paper documents can only be accessed, shared, stored & signed physically, in person. But digital documents can be accessed from anywhere, at any time. Most digital document management systems have a web interface as well as a mobile app. So the only thing stopping you from being able to access documents is a faulty internet connection & the lack of a smartphone.
6. Speeds up approvals
Paper documents can literally take ages to get approved. Want proof? Just go down to your local municipal or state government office and see the dirt on some of the piles of documents they have stored. This is usually because paper documents need to travel from one desk to another & another & another, till they reach the final signatory. Even if one of the approvers in the pipeline fails to do their job, the approval gets delayed & the document either just lies there or gets tossed aside. Digital document management systems create a systematic process for document approvals. Users can easily identify which users are in the approval pipeline and they can also share necessary documents & communicate with them about pending approvals via the system or email.
SOHODOX is a simple & easy-to-use document management system that lets you convert all your written documents into digital documents within seconds. SOHODOX’s features & interface are specifically designed for single users & small businesses. SOHODOX helps you organize your documents into identifiable groups, which ensures faster document search. SOHODOX also lets you link multiple documents, create private folders, integrate & share files via Dropbox, capture emails & more.
Experience the happiness of a paperless office with SOHODOX at just $9/month, or download our 14-day free trial today.
The post Facts About Paper That Will Make You Switch to a Paperless Office first appeared on SOHODOX.
When was the last time there wasn’t a single stray document lying about at your workplace? Probably the day you moved in, right? Document piles, stuffed folders & unorganized filing cabinets are a part of our everyday work life, especially for small businesses. Because most small businesses still communicate using written documents. From receiving documents for services sought to creating documents for services rendered, an average small business handles more than a hundred documents every day. These documents need to be carefully segregated into identifiable groups & stored in appropriate folders or filing cabinets for easier retrieval. These processes are both time-consuming and error-prone.
Most of the above document processes like document creation, organization & storage can easily be improved with the help of digital filing systems. Digital filing systems allow you to store & organize files via digital mediums like computers & smartphones. Digital filing systems have plenty of benefits that outweigh the traditional paper-based filing systems still incorporated by most small businesses. Let’s look at some of the benefits of digital filing system to small businesses.
How To Organize Office Paperwork In 6 Easy Steps
The most lucrative benefit of a digital filing system is that it eliminates unnecessary paper-based costs like stationery expenses, the cost of physical storage units, document handling costs, the cost of damages & misplacements, etc. Digital filing systems like SOHODOX start from $9/month, which are comparatively low cost & easily upgradable to suit growing business needs.
Ask anyone who has wasted hours trying to organize paper documents and they will tell you why digital documents are better. Digital documents can easily be categorized into different groups based on their type & content, and instantly moved to their appropriate folders & subfolders. For example, a paper invoice from ABC Ltd. for the month of October, 2022 needs to be stored in the folder name ABC Ltd, under the subsection invoices, chronologically arranged as per the month & year. This process is quite tedious. But the same invoice in a digital format can easily be stored in a folder named ABC Ltd, subfolder invoices, subfolder 2022 & subfolder October.
Better organization & keywords make it easier to locate digital documents. Keywords are important information in the document’s content like client name, date, amount, payment status, serial number, etc that act as search criteria to find the exact document a user is looking for. Most digital filing system provide the option of using multiple search criteria to narrow the search results even further.
Manage Freelance Work Better With Document Management Software
Digital filing systems are more secure than your traditional document editing app. Digital filings systems provide additional security features like individual login credentials that limit unauthorized user activity and private folders that allow you to restrict access to sensitive documents & information. Digital documents are also more secure because they leave a digital trail that can be recovered anytime.
As mentioned earlier, digital documents leave a digital trail that allows you to track document activity like when & by whom a document is accessed, edited, shared or deleted. Document tracking also ensures the legitimacy of documents which is essential during audits. For example, a digital filing system will show that the documents you are submitting for audit haven’t been tampered with, in case it is required by the auditor.
It is mandatory for companies to store select documents for required periods of time. For example bank statements like mortgage documents, student loan documents, etc need to be kept for a period of 3-7 years depending on the country you are residing in. It is also imperative that businesses protect employee documents like health insurance information & medic history from thefts and leaks. Digital filing systems ensure companies comply with all the mandatory guidelines as per industry & international standards.
More and more customers are switching to digital modes of documentation & communication. Digital filing system help you replace traditional paper-based document processes with digital processes which are easier & more comfortable for customers. Digitization also helps improve existing business processes and helps reach more customers via new sources like social media marketing, email marketing, blogs & more.
How can a Document Management System Benefit your Small Business?
The post Benefits of Small Business Digital Filing System first appeared on SOHODOX.
Organizing office paperwork means arranging documents in a systematic way to make it easier to find them when required. There is no concrete way of organizing paperwork. Some people label their filing cabinets or drawers, some use color-coded tags & some people prefer to move away from both the previously mentioned time-consuming processes and go completely digital. So yes, if you are still using paper documents, you are costing your business both time & money. The first & foremost thing you need to do to organize office paperwork is deciding to go digital. But how does one go about the digitization process? In this article, we will list down everything you need to do to digitize & organize office papers.
Collect every business document you have in your office, home, storage unit, etc. Bring all the documents together to make it easier to categorize them. Get your team involved & ask everybody to create their individual document piles.
Note: If the paper documents are already organized, please don’t take them out of their organizational structure & double your work.
The most important step in paperwork organization is categorizing the documents. Categorize the documents based on their content & type. For example, invoices will be categorized as finance documents & employee records will be categorized as HR documents.
You can bifurcate the categories even further by creating document-based groups like tax records, insurance records, PF records & more. Categorizing also helps figure out which documents are necessary & which aren’t.
The cleaning process you had been dreading is finally upon you – discarding unwanted documents. You will discover plenty of old & unwanted documents while cleaning out the office drawers like employee records of people who have left the company, old invoices, old project reports, etc. Discarding such unwanted documents makes the digitization process a lot easier & less time-consuming
Note: Make sure you don’t discard any bank statements that might be required for an audit. Read How long should you keep bank statements for more details.
What Is A Virtual Filing Cabinet And Why Do You Need It?
Going digital means scanning all your paper documents & converting them to digital documents. There are plenty of apps that let you scan & convert paper documents into digital files, some even for free. The real concern is the number of documents.
Scanning & uploading a few hundred documents shouldn’t take too much out of your day, but when the number of documents goes into thousands or hundreds of thousands it becomes problematic. You can divide the work between your team, but it will still be a huge waste of time & resources. If you have the funds, a better solution would be to outsource this process. There are companies that specialize in helping businesses go digital, for a reasonable fee of course.
But if you are willing to take on this task by yourself, we’d recommend checking out our document management system SOHODOX. SOHODOX lets you scan & convert hundreds of documents within minutes. Plus, it also provides excellent organizational features like document types & tags that help you categorize documents with ease. You can try SOHODOX for free with our 14-day free trial.
Once you have converted all the necessary documents into digital files & uploaded them to a system, it’s time to create an organizational structure. What do we mean by organizational structure? Organizational structure is structuring your folders & sub folders more efficiently to reduce file search time. An effective organizational structure can also be replicated for future documents, thereby reducing work.
Example of an organizational structure in SOHODOX Document Management System:
5 Benefits of having the World’s Best Document Management Software for a Small Business
The final & probably the easiest part of organizing paperwork is setting disposal or expiry dates for the documents. Expiry date allows you to reduce the clutter in your system by removing old unwanted documents. You can simply set a date on which documents expire or are no longer needed, find expired documents with the help of the search feature & delete those documents from the system.
Once you have taken care of the above steps, all you need to do is to repeat the process for all new documents. Ask your clients & vendors to switch to digital modes of communication and you will never have to organize your documents again.
The post How To Organize Office Paperwork In 6 Easy Steps first appeared on SOHODOX.
People often think freelancing is ‘easy work’, and in some parts, it is. Freelancers don’t have to slog their way to the office every day & they certainly don’t have to organize their lives around the traditional nine-to-five work hours. But there are certain aspects of freelancing that even the most staunch supporters find problematic, and one of them is having to manage their paperwork.
At an office, most of your document management needs are taken care of by your employer. There is a separate person or team for every incoming document like accounting, sales, management, etc. But when you are handling your documents you have to manage documents on your own. You are responsible for downloading, scanning, organizing, storing & tracking your documents. And repeating this same process countless times a day for multiple clients can be taxing.
All these document management hassles can be easily eliminated with document management software (DMS). You might say “I already have a google drive. Why do I need anything else?”. The answer: Because document management software is much more than just simple storage drives.
Document management software lets you edit, store & share multiple file formats, so you don’t have to open a thousand different tabs. It also lets you edit PDF files. Most other apps (including google drive) do not allow PDF edits. DMS also automatically extracts metadata keywords from every document, which makes document searches a lot easier.
Document management software also provides other essential documentation features like login credentials, private folders, virtual printing, text-based search, drag & drop file transfers, annotations and more, which are not provided by most other document editing & storage apps.
Creates a central repository of all documents
Document management software lets you store, edit & share all your documents via the same platform. It also supports preview of multiple file formats like doc, pdf, xls, jpeg, etc which eliminates the need to subscribe to multiple service providers like Microsoft Office, Adobe, etc. A single digital repository of all the documents results in easier access, faster document turnaround times & lower misplacements.
Locates documents much faster
Document management software has a built-in optical character recognition (OCR) feature that extracts metadata from select areas on a document. Metadata is important words or phrases in the document’s text like client name, date, amount, address & more. Metadata act as keywords which can be entered as search criteria to locate documents faster.
Users can also enter multiple keywords to narrow their search results or use multi-language search for documents in foreign languages (other than English). Most document management software offer search support in widely spoken languages like Spanish, Hindi, Portuguese, German & more.
Increases security & restricts unauthorized access
One of the reasons why document management software are better than other documentation apps is their better security features. Security features range from document encryption to event logs to two-factor authentication to access control & more, depending on the document management software’ feature list & pricing.
Simple document management software like SOHODOX, one of the more popular platforms among single users & freelancers, provide security features like private folders & individual user credentials that allow users to control access to their documents.
Improves client coordination
What would you say is the biggest benefit of being a freelancer? Multiple clients. Working for multiple clients generates multiple sources of income. But it also generates multiple trails of paperwork. Categorizing each document based on the client, project & document type can result in reduced billable hours & productivity.
Document management software lets you create multiple folders & stacks, which can then be shared with any client by giving them access. Clients will only be able to view the documents that have been shared with them.
5 Easy Ideas To Improve Your Work Life Balance
Easily upgrades with increasing needs
Document management software provides regular software updates which improve the security & functioning of the system. Plus you can easily add more storage at the click of a button, usually at rates lower than most other documentation apps.
“Document management software has helped organise my work a lot better” – Cruz Salas, Writer.
“Thanks to full-text search I no longer have to waste hours searching for documents” – Elliot Higgins, Paralegal.
“I love how I can link all the different patient documents with each other” – Molly Proctor, Dentist.
The post Manage Freelance Work Better With Document Management Software first appeared on SOHODOX.
