A helping hand on the paper to digital journey

When it comes to communications with business or consumer clients, digital channels can be fast, flexible and efficient. However, the transition to digital tools needs meticulous planning, especially as print still has a valuable place in the modern world.

Companies are at different points on the journey. Start-ups are mostly conceived as digital from the outset. More established companies may have digital strategies in place, but even the biggest global businesses may not have reached their digitalization targets – it is not as simple as flipping a switch, and does not happen overnight. For corporate structures and workflows it can be as big a change as it is for recipients familiar with print and mail.

CUSTOMER FIRST

At Victor Buck Services, all digitalization projects start with the ultimate recipient. We help to identify which groups may favor digital communications, using clients’ data, if available, to filter by age and other factors, and filling in knowledge gaps with surveys (sent by post, of course) of the customer base.

But basic digital data can be patchy at best. We often find that the email data many clients hold on their customers is non-existent or out-of-date; as few as 10% hold email information in their databases.

Surveys not only provide a deeper picture of which customers prefer digital communications and fill out basic data such as mobile phone numbers or current email addresses. They can also identify preferences, as recipients often prioritize digital for speed but still prefer physical delivery for certain documents, either for psychological reasons or simply because they may be required by other agencies in printed form.

They can also prompt recipients to register online with an email address to start the switch and offer a QR code – or link – to start the digital onboarding process – as well as confirmation emails to check identities.

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BUILDING PERSONALIZED CONTENT

In parallel with onboarding, internal working processes need modernizing, too. Print is often a longstanding and embedded communications medium, with specialist systems and technology. Digital is different and creating in-house platforms can be expensive and disruptive.

Again, at Victor Buck Services we offer a range of options to ease the process. We can take traditional print material and route it through to our digital platforms. We’ll take a pdf, or an actual physical template, and format and blend it with customer digital data. Our clients can themselves directly access a range of tools to combine original print content with up-to-date databases of customer emails and phone numbers, or use our online Docunify service to create digital documents from scratch.

SAFETY FIRST, ALWAYS

Naturally, we are fully GDPR compliant, with strict security measures in place for all our servers. For financial services clients, we are an authorized Financial Sector Professional entity, licensed by Luxembourg’s Financial Sector Supervisory Authority (CSSF) for outsourcing activities.

We’re also dedicated to ensuring that every digital communication gets to the right destination. We have a strict ‘maker and checker’ regime, ensuring that any change to a recipient’s data, such as an email address, must be validated by another staff member. We can also provide clients with final versions of digital documents for approval before they are dispatched.

Of course, not all digital documentation should be sent directly to a user’s phone or email address. Compliance audits must be kept confidential, and nobody should be sending tax-related documents such as Common Reporting Standard, FATCA or W8BEN forms for US nationals to an unsecured inbox.

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Our VDOX platform can provide a secure repository of documents including statements, invoices and contracts to which recipients can sign into securely using a self-chosen login or one-time password sent as a text message. The platform also hosts documents that are too large to send via email in order to take the load off our clients’ own servers.

If you would like to know more about how we can help your digital journey, we would love to hear from you.

All the tips for a successful digital transition are available in the file below.

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