Background Information - Poor Document Access
Recently,
BrightPlanet.com released the findings of their study on business document access; specifically, the huge waste of time we all spend in the business world (and I count myself as one of the prime time-wasters!) just looking for something. Businesses especially fall victim to this, in fact, according to the study "U.S. businesses are wasting $800 billion dollars per year due to poor document access and use by neglecting improvements right under their noses."
The System Is Outdated
If you have a business or work for a largish company, you've probably experienced this: trying to find a document or information that you know is there, but the system used to find this information is so archaic, you end up just re-creating the darn thing. That's where BrightPlanet's study comes in, because the amount of money that could possibly be saved by streamlining the retrieval process is considerable: "Research cited by the white paper shows that 25% of all these document expenditures can be markedly improved. For each of the nation's 1,000 largest firms, potential annual benefits are huge, approaching nearly $250 million per company."
Search Engine Optimization and Information Management
I believe that this problem, especially for large companies, falls firmly under the umbrella of search engine optimization. Why? Because if you are wasting time looking for something, you're not productive. If your customers are wasting time looking for something on your website, they are not productive. A clean, streamlined information retrieval process is just part and parcel of optimizing your site and your business. And with that, let's move on to the
interview.
