Top 5 Email Management Benefits
For the individual user, email management usually refers to the process of moving messages from the inbox to the appropriate archive folder. If a mistake is made in that filing, it generally isn't a big deal. However, for business entities, managing email effectively can have a significant impact on their bottom line. Read on for five of the top email management benefits.
1. Increased Productivity
Take just one issue that email management addresses: spam. According to the National Technology Readiness Survey, an annual survey conducted by Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business and Rockbridge Association, the economic impact from time wasted deleting spam was estimated to be $21.6 billion in 2004. According to Iron Port, an email management vendor, there were roughly 86 billion spam messages per day in the month of November 2006, up from 5 billion per day in June of 2006. Considering the huge economic impact in 2004 of a relatively smaller amount of spam, having an effective spam solution in place can greatly increase your business's productivity. And handling spam is only one part of what email management systems do.
2. Decreased Cost of Compliance
Recent corporate scandals have triggered a new wave of legislation aimed at increasing the transparency of business practices. While that has been helpful for the public's conscience and to regulatory bodies, for most businesses, it has been a nightmare. Increased demands for document retention have led to soaring storage costs from cobbled-together solutions. A good email management system can decrease the cost of compliance by simplifying and streamlining that entire process.
3. Decreased Cost of Litigation
Many companies believe that they have covered all of their bases when they create email management systems that grab every inbound and outbound email, but that is only half the story. When the dreaded subpoena arrives asking for an email exchange from three years ago, having a storage system that is easily searchable can save countless employee hours and general frustration.
4. Decreased Exposure to Security Threats
Viruses delivered via email can expose important company assets, from intellectual property to customer information. The financial losses from even a single such breach can be staggering: the estimated cost of a highly publicized data theft incident at the Department of Veteran's Affairs was, according to VA Secretary Jim Nicholson, "way north of $100 million." While most businesses might not have that size of liability, losing customer data or company secrets is never a helpful thing.
5. Speedy Recovery in Disaster Situations
Having every megabyte of data stored on backup servers is an important starting point for post-disaster recovery, but having a well-defined archiving system for email can help a business get back up and running much more quickly after a disaster occurs. Essentially, knowing where data came from (and thus, where it should be restored to), can be the difference between a calm recovery and a frantic one.
