Ricoh Company Ltd. : Improving document processes can help sales and product development organizations capitalize on new business opportunities, says Ricoh
10/23/2012| 09:01am US/Eastern
Improving document processes can help sales and product development organizations capitalize on new business opportunities, says Ricoh
Research shows potential of improved processes to enhance organizational collaboration and speed time to market
TOKYO, Oct. 23, 2012 - Ricoh Company, Ltd. today announced that improving document and information processes can significantly help organizations seize new business opportunities such as: faster time to market with new offerings, rapidly addressing customer needs, reacting more quickly to changing market dynamics and winning competitive business. These findings are supported and summarized in a recent IDC white paper sponsored by Ricoh1.
1 IDC White Paper sponsored by Ricoh, "Organizational Blind Spot: The Role of Document-Driven Business Processes in Driving Top-Line Growth," September 2012
A product of Ricoh's new Process Imperative initiative to promote improved document and information management, the IDC global study surveyed 1,516 document-driven business process owners and information workers.
New business opportunities defined
According to the study, document processes are important to an organization's revenue but can have a bigger impact on time to market. Ninety-one (91) percent of respondents said that optimizing customer-facing processes would help speed time to market - on average by 13 percent. Improved processes enable teams closest to customers - such as sales and marketing - to quickly and accurately convey opportunities they have identified to design and development teams responsible for new product or service creation. The ability to supply information to the right people, at the right time and in the right format can easily make the difference between being a leader or a laggard - and success or failure of a new business initiative.
The research also found improving processes can help sales and product-development organizations create new market opportunities. Study respondents said fixing document processes would help their organization more rapidly address customer needs (78 percent); respond more quickly to market changes (65 percent); and improve their competitive stance (63 percent). Improved processes can also help cement customers' loyalty to an organization and decrease the chances that they will defect to a competitor, according to the study. Companies with outstanding document processes can capitalize on the vulnerabilities of their competitors' inferior customer service.
"The benefits of optimizing business processes are real, and they are profound," said Sergio Kato, Deputy General Manager, Ricoh Global Marketing Group/Services Business Center. "Improving business processes is one of those very rare initiatives that can reduce costs, drive new business opportunities, speed time to market and most importantly potentially increase revenue. The investment is usually modest compared to the return, which can be substantial."
Ricoh has mastered a process for continual process improvement over decades of work with thousands of Managed Document Services clients. Concludes Kato, "Change is difficult, but following best practices and leveraging years of document management experience can make it easier. Equally important is sustaining the change and continually improving on it."
For more research findings and resources on how improved processes can help businesses improve revenue and manage risk, please visit this site.
About Ricoh MDS
Ricoh is uniquely equipped to assist its customers execute a comprehensive strategy for document process improvement that helps reduce costs and potentially increase revenue through its Managed Document Services approach. Its proven methodology (Understand, Improve, Transform, Govern and Optimize) helps Ricoh pinpoint an organization's key processes and then align them with services that will help customers achieve measurable and sustainable business outcomes. The knowledge Ricoh has gained through its thousands of implementations has also provided insight into the top business concerns that are most prevalent in today's corporate environments including: cost control, environmental sustainability, information security and governance, business process efficiency, organizational change management, information worker (iWorker) productivity, information optimization and strategic infrastructure. This valuable insight helps accelerate the first step in the process - Understand - so customers can begin the Improve phase more quickly and start realizing the resulting benefits as soon as possible.
About the Process Imperative
Ricoh's Process Imperative is an ongoing initiative to promote understanding of new document and information processing paradigms that help enterprises leverage the collective wisdom embodied in their organizations. This initiative will fund research and provide resources, like those found on this site, which combine Ricoh's document and information process expertise with that of industry visionaries, our partners and our customers. The insights gained through this work help businesses transform their business processes to improve productivity and drive out cost by delivering the right information, at the right time, in the right form.
October 23, 2012
Ricoh Company, Ltd.
Information in the news releases is true and accurate at the time of publication.
Manufacture, sales, price and specifications of products may be subject to change.
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