Data digitization: definition, stages and benefits for the company

What is data digitization? It's the first process in a company's digital transformation. Your company uses scanning software to extract and capture data, then sends it automatically to your business applications for direct use. This data is also classified and stored according to your own rules in an EDM (electronic document management) solution for structured archiving of your files.

The main benefit: improved information processing and real-time accessibility. The main challenge: staying ahead in an increasingly digital, fast-paced market. To improve quality, the French government itself is digitizing public services.

appvizer takes you through the basics of electronic data capture:

See all software Electronic Data Capture

Understanding data digitization

What is document digitization? While individuals can scan a document or an image and reuse it as is, it is in the interest of professionals to consider document digitization from a data perspective. Here's how.

Document scanning: definition

The digitization of a document using specialized software refers to :

• the action of copying and converting an entire document from paper to a digitized file format that can be used on a computer or on the Internet;
• the action of capturing data from a document, whether in paper or digital format, extracting it according to your own rules and sending it to third-party applications on the Internet or on your own computer for further processing;
• the action of recognizing and classifying digitized documents according to one's own storage criteria in an online document database for conservation and legal archiving.

Note: most of the time, digitized information is text and images. In some sectors, digitized data can be sound, audio or video, moving images with audio.

The diagram below explains how document digitization works and how the data is used:

Dematerialization: definition

Dematerialization refers to the digitization of processes and working methods within a company. In other words, employees no longer (or less and less) handle paper, but use software and the Internet to process data more efficiently.

Here are some concrete examples of successful dematerialization in the workplace:

• employees use digital documents from which they can extract part of the data to carry out a specific task ;
• a content management system centralizes all the company's digital documents in an orderly fashion, so that each business line can easily find the documents it needs;
• each business expert exploits the documents or part of the data by importing the information into a software program to perform his or her tasks;
• the processing and use of information and documents is streamlined;
• employees improve their workflows, save time and are more efficient;
• company-wide productivity increases;
• the company also saves physical storage space, formerly dedicated to archiving paper documents.

Data capture and extraction at the heart of digitalization

The digitization of documents enables the dematerialization of processes and the acceleration of information processing. The relationship with data has completely changed the established order: data is captured, extracted, sent to the software of choice and exploited in real time.

Document digitization and data capture enable dematerialization, but they are not the only components.

Automated digitization now makes it possible to :

• restore data quality identically, eliminating errors caused by manual input,
• exploit data as never before, and improve internal and external exchanges.

The 5 steps to document scanning

To explain the 5 steps to document scanning, let's use the ^{IRISPowerscanTM 10} scanning and data capture software as an example in the following video:

Let's take a closer look at the 5 steps involved in document scanning:

Step 1: Scan documents and import data

The software scans and imports documents from all kinds of sources: paper format, import from documents stored in the Cloud, from email, various scanners or multifunction devices.

The solution recognizes and processes all file types (JPEG, TIFF, DOC, PDF, PNG, BMP, etc.) and all document types (invoices, ID cards, driving licenses, orders, delivery notes, contracts, etc.).

Step 2: Pre-processing and classification

The solution makes the document more legible thanks to more than 20 image enhancement techniques (dewaxing, removal of black edges, autorotation, etc.).

It then automatically classifies the document according to your own rules and criteria, thanks to integrated technologies such as character recognition, barcode recognition, OCR zone recognition,....

The software also uses automatic recognition of standard documents (RAD) to classify CVs, passports, invoices, delivery notes, etc.

Step 3: Intelligent data indexing

The tool recognizes search fields and zones, data type and regular expressions such as a company name, invoice number, IBAN number, SIRET number or logo.

It detects the data to be indexed and extracted.

Step 4: Verification and ambiguity management

The software automatically checks matches and detects anomalies by requesting their verification.

If an error is detected, the manager can be immediately alerted by e-mail, so that he or she can rectify the situation immediately or at a later date.

Step 5: Export to business applications

The scanning and data extraction software allows you to export the document in the format of your choice (PDF, hyper-compressed PDF, TIFF, JPG, DOCX, XLSX, ....), and send it to your archiving or document management solution (Google Drive, Therefore, Dropbox, Dokmee, SharePoint, etc.).

Relevant data from a supplier invoice, for example, can also be sent automatically to accounting or ERP software to automate or pre-assign entries, or to other business software for further processing.

Advantage of digital data: the complete picture

Using scanning software such as ^{IRISPowerscanTM} 10, Kofax Capture or CaptureOnTouch Pro to capture data from a variety of documents offers many advantages to companies in all sectors.

The first advantage of digital data for companies is the dematerialization of invoices:

• You avoid having to encode each invoice manually: the process is automated. The scanning software recognizes and extracts the relevant information itself.
• As a result, you record each invoice in your accounting system right from the data capture stage. The information is processed and added to the accounting entries according to the rules you have established.
• You then export the invoice in PDF format, for example, for archiving, a format enriched with metadata that will enable you to retrieve the document should you need it.
• This saves you 50% in processing costs, and gives you more time for management.

Here's an example of invoice scanning with Kofax Capture (mobile version) in the image below: the data is automatically recognized and extracted.

The following table details the various benefits of digital data, depending on your sector of activity:

See all software Electronic Data Capture

Conclusion: 5 reasons to buy scanning software

Companies use scanning software for 5 main reasons:

1. They automate administrative tasks and save time.
2. They avoid errors caused by manual data entry.
3. They can continue working while the solution is running in the background (depending on the software).
4. They can use the data in their business applications.
5. Archive and retrieve documents easily.