5 Reasons Why Your Business Should Use E-Signature Software
The e-signature software market is expanding at an impressive rate. Valued at $1.2 billion back in 2018, the digital signature software market is predicted to grow by as much as $5.5 billion by the end of 2023 according to a 2019 forecast by MarketsandMarkets. That’s a stunning Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 36.7%!
The convenience of replacing paper-based processes with digital ones is chief among the different drivers of digital signature adoption for many industries. Paperless business processes have proven to be more efficient and cost-effective. Adopting and implementing a paperless approach in the workplace is also friendly to the environment as it minimizes office waste and reduces a company’s carbon footprint.
This is just the beginning…
Here are some of the factors that drive the adoption and utilization of e-signature software solutions and other digital signature services, and how they’ll benefit many businesses, including yours:
1. Save Time
The most obvious benefit of an e-signature service is accelerating the turnaround time of your business-related documents. It eliminates the need for you or your staff to prepare a draft, print, scan, and submit documents for approval and signature.
You won’t have to lose momentum waiting for a client to sign a contract and send it back to you. Electronic signature software lets process your documents and have them signed within minutes.
2. Add More Flexibility and Mobility to Your Team
Reliance on mobile devices in the business world is becoming commonplace, and using a mobile-based electronic signature app will help boost team efficiency and overall productivity.
While conventional PDF readers keep signatures in a local storage hub, mobile e-signature tools allow you to store, retrieve, access, and use signatures via cloud-based storage. These signatures are accessible anywhere, and on any device, meaning you can even sign and process documents when you’re out of the office.
Signatures being stored on the cloud also provides another blanket of security as you and other users will be required to sign in to access them, preventing unauthorized access.
3. Create Custom Workflows
You can focus more on more-urgent priorities, like closing deals, with the time you’ll save integrating electronic document signing software to your workflow.
You can refine your document-related processes by creating specific templates for different contracts or forms and reusing them in different situations. It eliminates the need to create different versions of documents from the ground up.
Digital signature solutions can automate tasks to streamline your workflow, especially for documents that are prepared and used on a regular basis.
Some documents mandate that signatures are recorded in a specific order from multiple signees. An eSign service will support this by letting you customize the order in which it collects recipients’ signatures, ensuring that your workflow is followed to a tee.
4. Enhance Document Security
Security for your documents is paramount. E-signature solutions help protect your company’s documents by storing each iteration and all saving all edits made via digital audit trails. Each electronic signature is protected by a tamper-evident seal. You are instantly alerted whenever changes are made to the document after it is signed.
As opposed to PDF readers, the best electronic signature software provides password verification options to its users, requiring signers to validate their identities via email or SMS. In some instances, access to the documents can be granted after signers are provided with a link and enter the corresponding code. This helps prevent unauthorized users from accessing confidential documents.
E-signature platforms automatically log all events, changes, and users with a timestamp, so you don’t have to dig deep to create a digital paper trail. When you need to look at who prepared the document, signed it, and when, you can access the document’s log and retrieve the information you want. If you want to boost transparency, you may also consider having or integrating it with the best version control software systems.
5. Reduce Operational Costs
Paper-based processes can be costly. U.S. companies lost $8 billion as paper waste in 2015, and 82% of businesses are still using paper and spending billions for their acquisition, utilization, storage, and disposal, according to Corp! Magazine.
The average office employee in the United States uses over 10,000 sheets of paper annually. That is roughly two cases of paper per office worker. Considering the average price per case of standard copy paper is around $40, then the company spends $80 per employee on paper.
Research conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers also revealed that companies spend an average of $20 on document filing; finding misplaced documents costs $120; and reproducing one can set a business back by $220.
Paper seems inexpensive, but when taking into account costs associated with processing, managing, and storing documents, it represents a huge piece of your operational budget. And if you factor in printers, folders, toners, ink, staples, filing cabinets, shipping, disposal, and other document-related costs, you quickly see the impact on the bottom line.
Your company is able to cut down costs with digital signature software by eliminating many paper-based processes from your operations.
Planning Ahead for Your Business & its Clients
Keeping pace with the evolving workplace requires that an increased emphasis be placed on accomplishing tasks faster while remaining cost efficient. Adopting digital-age solutions that replace paper-heavy and time-consuming processes, like getting contracts signed, is an easy first step that will not only save you and your team time, but also benefit your clients.
Kdan Mobile’s DottedSign is an easy-to-implement eSign service that will boost your team’s productivity without negatively affecting your bottom line. The service is available for a free trial, and includes special pricing for anyone interested in purchasing multiple accounts — just contact our sales team!
Originally published at Kdan Mobile Blog.
