If you’ve ever wasted time searching for a file, struggled with outdated document versions, or worried about compliance risks, you’re not alone. Many businesses unknowingly spend thousands of dollars every year managing paper or trying to manage disorganized digital files without a strategy. If this sounds familiar, it might be time to invest in a document management system (DMS).
Here are 10 telltale signs your business is ready for a smarter approach to managing documents and how the right platform can help.
1. You Waste Time Looking for Files
If your team spends more time searching for documents than using them, you may be due for an upgrade. Employees spend nearly 30% of their time searching for documents in disorganized folders, shared drives, and email threads, stalling productivity and risking your deadlines.
A DMS solution like Paperwise offers centralized, searchable storage so documents are always where you need them, when you need them. Our platform is complete with metadata tags, full-text indexing, and saved searches, so your data is just a keyword away.
2. Approvals Take Too Long
Are invoices, contracts, or reports stalled in someone’s inbox waiting for review? Paper-based or ad hoc email approvals can slow critical procedures like invoice processing or contract sign-off.
Paperwise’s DMS platform provides automated workflow routing, ensuring documents move efficiently through approvals with built-in notifications and escalations. This acceleration speeds up your business’s cash flow and project launches while reducing employee frustration.
3. You Rely Heavily on Paper
Are you still printing forms to sign and scan? Filing contracts in a cabinet? Paper might feel familiar, but it’s inefficient, error-prone, and difficult to scale. A single misplaced document can stall your hiring, billing, or compliance processes for days.
With an enterprise-grade DMS like Paperwise, digital document workflows replace outdated paper processes with secure, trackable eForms and approvals. Companies that invest in a digital mailroom can see up to 80% in efficiency enhancements, and 41% of organizations that use eForms see a reduction in proposal errors.
4. Audits Give You Headaches
Industries like healthcare, finance, and manufacturing face increasing regulations that require strict documentation protocols. If you scramble to compile documents every time an audit comes around, you’re likely relying on fragmented or manual systems.
A compliance-focused DMS like Paperwise helps maintain compliance with audit trails, retention schedules, e-signatures, and secure storage, producing audit-ready reports in minutes and protecting your business from fines and reputational damage.
5. You’re Struggling With Version Control
When multiple team members download, edit, and re-upload copies of the same document, mistakes and rework are inevitable. If team members are working from outdated or incorrect versions, overwrites, conflicting changes, and lost comments become inevitable. In fact, 83% of employees say version control slows their work and leads to rework.
Modern DMS platforms ensure everyone accesses the latest version with clear version history, change tracking, and document controls. Using Paperwise, your business and its employees can easily compare documents side-by-side or revert to prior drafts, eliminating guesswork and protecting your project’s integrity.
6. Remote Work has Complicated Access
92% of remote workers report using their personal mobile devices for work. This complicates document access and may result in files being shared over email or unsecured networks. If only in-office staff can retrieve important documents, your hybrid or remote employees are at a disadvantage.
Cloud-based DMS solutions grant secure, mobile-friendly access from any device. With Paperwise, role-based permissions keep data safe while empowering field workers, contractors, and home-based employees to
7. You’re Duplicating Work Across Teams
When sales, finance, and operations each store documents differently, collaboration breaks down and delays multiply. And with multiple departments re-entering the same data, your company may face added delays and conflicting reports.
A centralized DMS like Paperwise integrates with ERP or CRM systems to synchronize information. Cross-department workflows ensure all document updates flow throughout the organization, keeping everyone on the same page. This automation accelerates decision-making, eliminates duplicate effort, and cuts the administrative overhead of reconciling mismatched records.
8. Storage Costs are Adding Up
Paper storage typically costs around 2.8 times more than digital storage, not to mention the productivity loss of lost or misfiled documents. Filing cabinets cut into your office’s real estate and can quickly become disorganized, while off-site vaults and archiving services are costly, and retrieval fees add up.
By digitizing documents, organizations eliminate these expenses and can reclaim office space for revenue-generating purposes. Cloud-hosted DMS solutions like Paperwise reduce capital expenses, replacing hardware and facility costs with scalable subscription models.
9. You’re Entering Data Manually
Downloading, renaming, and sorting files or entering data by hand is tedious and can waste valuable time and productivity. Moreover, studies show that 1% of all keystrokes are likely incorrect, adding up over thousands of entries and affecting your margin of error.
Paperwise’s intelligent capture and automated indexing extract data directly from invoices, forms, or scanned documents and push it into workflows or backend systems. This automation not only saves time but also improves accuracy and frees staff to focus on strategic work.
10. You Aren’t Leveraging Analytics
Your documents contain valuable insights, such as approval bottlenecks, process delays, and collaboration patterns. But if they’re not searchable, indexed, or connected, you can’t use that data strategically. In fact, organizations that adopt real-time data analytics can see a 70% increase in their operational efficiency.
A scalable DMS like Paperwise provides dashboards and reports that surface these metrics, helping you optimize workflows and allocate resources where they are most needed. By turning raw document data into actionable insights, your business can make smarter decisions and continuously refine your operations.
Ready to Transform your Document Workflows?
Don’t let disorganized files and manual processes hold you back. Whether you’re looking to save time, reduce risk, or improve team collaboration, an intuitive document management solution can streamline your business processes and help you gain peace of mind.
Schedule a demo or book a strategy call today to see how Paperwise’s secure, scalable, and customizable DMS can save you hours, cut costs, and keep your business compliant.
