In the COVID-19 world, digital transformation is essential for business continuity and resilience. While modernizing cloud content management is a critical step in this transformation, new Forrester research reveals that most content today is still stored on-premises.
OpenText recently commissioned a study with Forrester Consulting to explore the use of the cloud for content storage, management, and collaboration. Based on responses from 208 decision-makers in enterprise content management (ECM) at companies in North America and EMEA, 76% say improving content management is significantly important to accelerating their digital businesses. Yet 57% of content is still stored on-prem.
The good news is that organizations can take a hybrid approach and still reap the rewards of cloud content management, says Forrester.
Why organizations delay moving content to the cloud
Our work environment drastically changed in 2020. The convenience of having employees and company information in one place disappeared, forcing organizations to rely on remote-work technologies to keep business moving.
There was already an impending need for digital transformation, especially in organizations that were lagging. In our increasingly digital world, it takes user- and enterprise-friendly tools to enable effective and agile collaboration between both internal and external stakeholders.
The Forrester study clearly shows that decision-makers recognize the need to move towards cloud content management, but many organizations stall this critical migration due to cost, complexity, and security concerns.
These hesitations, while relevant, can be overcome. Rather than shutting down any notion of moving their content to the cloud, organizations should shift their focus to how they’ll do it, not why they should.
Benefits of cloud-based enterprise content management
Delaying a move to the cloud not only limits an organization’s ability to achieve agility goals, it can put an enterprise behind its competitors. In fact, 64% of organizations storing all content on-premises acknowledge that they’re at a competitive disadvantage.
That’s because organizations that opt for a cloud-based approach see considerably greater benefits to customer experience (72% vs 25%), security (70% vs. 16%), and usability (64% vs. 16%) than their on-prem peers.
How to move to the cloud at your own pace
So, if at least some cloud content management is required to maintain market share and accelerate digital transformation objectives, how can organizations adapt if they have concerns about migration and security?
Forrester suggests taking a phased approach to managing content in the cloud by adopting cloud delivery models, such as:
- Vendor managed services
- Software-as-a-service
- Deployment in common public cloud infrastructures
These delivery models allow organizations to store their content on current, innovative platforms that offer greater flexibility and agility when they need to scale. But, according to Forrester, they also appease common cloud hesitations:
Organizations that adopt a hybrid approach have far more flexibility, faster sales and service cycles, and better collaboration and customer satisfaction without sacrificing security, compliance, or usability.
Download the study
Cloud content management may seem like an inevitability after the changes we’ve experienced in 2020, but the path isn’t always simple or straightforward. By taking a hybrid approach to the cloud, organizations can take big or small steps – depending on their comfort level – and still be headed in the right direction.
Download “Hybrid Cloud Enables Agile Content Management and Collaboration” for additional insights and recommendations for evolving your cloud content management strategy.
