Understanding the Three Types of ECM

Get this. Not long ago, the Pennsylvania Treasury Department was spending $9 per check to process 300,000 monthly Social Security supplemental checks, each paying out a mere $27.40. Do the math and you’ll discover this particular program was costing the state $2.7 million a month or $8.1 million a quarter. Ouch.

Something had to be done, and the Treasury Department knew it. So it started searching for a business solution.

Chances are that’s why you’re visiting Hyland today. You know you have a problem – either specific to your department or enterprise-wide – and you know you need a solution. But you just don’t know what it is, or how to implement it, or what this crazy product OnBase is and what it can do for you.

That’s okay, you’re not alone. The Treasury Department didn’t know either, at first.

But they figured it out. And guess what? By implementing Hyland’s document management and workflow business solutions, the department dropped its processing cost from $9 to $1.50, realizing an 83 percent savings of $8 million a quarter, and a return on investment in less than one business day.

Nice, huh? Yeah, we think so, too.

But enough about the Pennsylvania Treasury Department. Let’s talk about you and your business problem.

Are you losing critical documents, have little to no visibility into your everyday business processes, or can’t easily find information when you need it? Then a content management solution can help. But which one?

Cutting Through the ECM Clutter

First things first. As we said in our introduction, enterprise content management (ECM) is a relatively generic term. It means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Throughout your ECM journey, you will encounter several ECM vendors – all using the same terms and claiming to do the same thing.

The truth is, no one can do it all. Most do well in one – maybe two – ECM classes. So it’s extremely important to know what style of content management will best solve your problem before you send out request for proposals.

You will also hear a lot of companies talk about ECM as a solution. So quick lesson: If your problem is not enterprise-wide, that’s OK. Great ECM software companies will offer you a scalable solution; one that solves your immediate need and can be applied to other issues  – and other departments – when you choose to address them.

Get Started By Understanding the Three Types of ECM

We can break down ECM into three types: web content management, collaborative content management and transactional content management. Figuring out where your company’s ECM needs fit is possibly the biggest step to finding both the right solution and the right vendor.

• Web Content Management: If your company maintains a large, content rich website or suite of sites focused on brand consistency and personalized content for each public -facing presence, this is your solution. You’ll want to invest in software that allows consistent control of website look and feel (brand, wire frames, navigation), while giving several content producers the ability to dynamically create and publish content (articles, photo galleries and so forth).
• Collaborative Content Management: Maybe you work in a pharmaceutical company or financial services organization that requires several people work on the same document in various iterations and those folks are miles – or even oceans – apart. This solution allows for an entire team to work off the same master document, tracking changes, saving minor drafts and embedding files.
• Transactional Content Management: You’ve got a lot of physical documents – insurance claims, medical records, government forms, payroll, student admissions – and you need a more efficient way to maintain and access those documents. And with a solution like Hyland Software's OnBase, it becomes even more powerful, as workflow solutions automate repeatable business processes and seamless integration with established core applications means ramping up users almost immediately.

Got it? Great. Now let’s talk about why you need an ECM business solution.