Why You Don’t Need Paper In Your Business

Have you heard about paperless offices and paperless businesses? If you’ve had your finger on the pulse of your industry, the environment, and business in general, it’s highly likely you’ll have heard about these thing, but have you thought about implementing the idea in your own business?

That’s where a lot of business owners become unstuck because although they roughly know what a paperless office is, they don’t know how to go about it or even why. Or, if they do know how and why, they still might be unsure simply because it feels as though paper is just such a necessary part of running a business. The good news is, it’s not, so if that’s what was holding you back, you can relax – and move forward. As for what forward means, let’s take a look at precisely why you don’t need paper in your business, and you might be surprised at the results. 

Why You Don’t Need Paper In Your Business
Photo by Steve Johnson

The Environmental Impact

One reason why you don’t need paper in your business is that, although it can be recycled and it’s a natural material, paper still isn’t great for the environment. Making paper takes a massive amount of natural resources, including water and trees, and it can even contribute to deforestation, which is clearly not something you want your business to be a part of. On top of that, paper production releases harmful pollutants into the air – why do you want your business associated with that kind of thing? 

The answer is you don’t, which means you don’t need paper in your business (or much of it, anyway) if it’s going to potentially tarnish your reputation. By switching over to digital alternatives, you can reduce your business’s impact on the environment, and that’s something customers are really going to like. 

There Are Other Options

As we said, switching over to digital versions of the paper products you currently use is a great idea, but what are those other options? Are there many of them you can make use of? Yes, there are – loads of them, in fact. 

One option that you probably already make a lot of use of is email, which is, of course, an alternative to traditional mail that needs not only paper and an envelope, but a stamp and transport to get it from place to place. With an email, you can get the same information where it needs to go quickly and securely without impacting the environment – and it costs less too. 

Digital signatures are another great thing to start using. If you have a lot of paperwork that needs to be signed by customers, clients, employees, partners, suppliers, and so on, you can stop sending out loads of documents and getting them signed by hand. Instead, you can use an e-signature system and save time and money – plus, it’s super secure. This is particularly great when you work in fields that need a lot of privacy, and electronic signature healthcare options are excellent. 

Cost Savings

As a business owner, would you rather spend money or save it? In general, the answer will probably have to be to save it – although spending money in business when you have to is important as well. 

If you want to save more money, you’ll need to know what you’re currently spending it on and reduce that spending where you can – paper would be a great place to start. Paper might seem as though it’s pretty inexpensive, but when you consider all the costs that come with it, which include storage, disposal, printing costs, ink cartridges, maintenance for the printers, and more, you’ll see how quickly it all adds up. 

When you go paperless, you’ll eliminate most of those costs right away, and even if you have to invest in some useful software, that’s still going to be cheaper in the long run than paper would be. Therefore, if you want to save money, you don’t need paper in your business. 

More Productivity

How is paper linked to productivity (or a lack of it) you might ask – and it’s a good question. Luckily, we’ve got an answer. When you use paper, you’re really slowing things up just because there are so many extra processes involved – printing, copying, filing, finding documents again once they have been filed, and on and on it goes… that’s going to lead to wasted time and inefficient working. 

Digital documents make things a lot easier to deal with and much more efficient as a result, and when you think of the electronic storage and retrieval systems you can use these days, it’s no wonder many people – business owners and employees alike – are able to get more done in less time. Why don’t you need paper in your business? Because it makes you less productive, that’s why. 

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About Dequiana Jackson

Dequiana Jackson, Founder of Inspired Marketing, Inc., helps overachieving women entrepreneurs conquer limiting beliefs and create marketing plans that grow their businesses. This includes one-on-one marketing plan development, digital product creation, web design and content marketing. Dequiana is the author of Know Your Business: How to Attract Ideal Clients & Sell More and runs the award-winning blog, Entrepreneur-Resources.net.

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