Understanding the needs of users is critical to success. It’s more than perfecting your pitch. It’s about timing and meeting a need. The issues at the forefront of user needs included:
- Audit compliance (Basel II, IFRS, SOX, Patriot Act, Bank Secrecy Act, Check 21)
- Legal disclosure (SEC 13A, Code of Federal Regulations (21,36))
- Privacy protection (Family Education Rights & Privacy Act (FERPA), HIPAA, Gramm-Leach-Bliley)
Much of the discussion at this year’s eCopy Paper Connection Forum focused on efficiency, cost, and compliance, which span all verticals. Three key management issues facing users include records/document management (auditability), privacy protection (confidentiality), and information availability (portability, legal disclosure).
With audits, users are held accountable to document the process, follow the process, and prove that the process was finished. Many of these business processes are augmented by paper-based procedures where ROI is usually determined by time-to-completion metrics.
Food for thought…
When tailoring your approach to the end user, keep this in mind:
- If improved efficiency is a major driver, then justifying the investment is a logical sales obstacle.
- If risk reduction and compliance are business drivers, then use this as a means to get executive sponsorship.
- Recognize that as buyers move to integrate capture with business systems, employee commitment will be an obstacle.
What does this mean to you? There are many opportunities for business growth and a connection with users:
- Solutions providers need to understand core business processes (order entry, service requests, benefits EOB).
- Less than half of business processes that could benefit from capture are currently using it.
- Use ROI sales tools: almost 50% of users believe that capture ROI surpasses traditional IT projects.
- Organizations are looking to better leverage MFP investments.
~ Janelle Julien, Associate Editor, AIIM E-Doc Magazine
