Making sure that sensitive files get the right amount of attention and that their accuracy is guaranteed before they get published is no easy task. And from new packaging designs to global marketing campaigns, you can’t afford to get things wrong.
This is where the accountability of each stakeholder is extremely important, where every approval counts and every mistake is pricey. To make sure you don’t waste resources due to sloppy approval processes, it’s crucial to verify each approval with an electronic signature.
With our new verified approvals, all your important files will get the attention they deserve, and you’ll end up with better-quality projects. Plus, the process will be way less stressful – which is something we can all get onboard with!
So let’s look at what verified approvals are and what makes them so essential to your approval process.
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What are verified approvals?
Verified approvals make your review process more secure by requesting digitally-signed approval from stakeholders – perfect for companies in healthcare, finance, and other regulated industries.
In practice, verified approvals represent an extra step in your approval process that ensures that each stakeholder who approves specific content verifies it with a double authentication process.
This way, you can be extra confident that all your content is accurate, compliant, and ready for publishing.
The importance of verified approvals
The quality of projects is something that companies can’t afford to compromise on. For example, if you’re releasing an important marketing campaign, it’s vital to get all the facts straight and make sure that all your assets comply with regulations.
Without great attention to detail, your company can easily face legal issues or a PR nightmare. Not only can this harm your reputation, it could also result in big financial losses.
Reprinting brochures, posters, and packaging designs because of tiny mistakes is a huge waste of money that companies can scarcely afford in today’s economic climate.
By adding verified approvals into your approval process, your company will save time and money while making sure your work hits the right standards. As a result, verified approvals will become an essential part of your approval process.
Top three benefits of introducing electronic signatures into your approval process
There are numerous benefits of introducing verified approvals into your approval process.
Let’s look at the three biggest ones below:
1. Streamline your approval process
Filestage’s verified approvals help your team guide all projects from start to finish in one tool. This means that you can streamline your approval process from the ideation phase to getting final approvals from legal and regulatory departments without switching tools and creating confusion.
By reviewing all your file versions in Filestage, you can easily set up an extra step for verified approval. Your reviewers will then be asked to verify their approval with two-step authentication instead of just giving a green light in Filestage and afterwards switching to another tool to sign it.
Your overall review process will soon become much faster and more precise, and your files will be all set and ready for publishing once they complete the final review step within Filestage.
2. Improve accountability
Above all, verified approvals introduce more accountability for each reviewer. Until now, your reviewers could either request changes or approve files with a single click on an orange or a green button.
The ease of approving with a single click means a much faster approval process, but on the other hand, stakeholders can give their approvals without giving too much thought to their reviews. And who could blame them if there’s already a lot on their plate?
Yet, in important situations, giving the right amount of attention to reviewing content can make or break your campaign. This way, an extra step like a verified approval puts more pressure on reviewers to adequately review the content and verify their approval in time.
3. Guarantee compliance with regulations
Verified approvals help you guarantee compliance with relevant laws and regulations. As a result, all verified approvals in a two-step authentication process in Filestage will have the same legal status as the handwritten signatures.
This is guaranteed by creating a process that adheres to the legal and regulatory requirements set by relevant laws and standards regarding the use of electronic signatures to authenticate and validate documents.
Here’s a list of regulations that verified approval is compliant with:
- FDA 21
- CFR Part 11
- EU Annex 11
How to set up and use verified approvals in Filestage
Setting up verified approvals in Filestage is a breeze. Simply click on the cog on the review step you want to add it to, then switch on the verified approvals toggle.
And here’s how things will look for your stakeholders next time they approve a file:
- They’ll see a “Approve and sign” button in the top-right corner of the screen
- Once they clicks on the button, they’ll be asked to confirm their identity by entering their Filestage password
- And that’s it – signed and approved!
Last but not least, verified approvals will also appear in your file and review reports. So if you need to save these on your system in case of future auditing, you’ll have that extra layer of verification to know exactly who approved what.
Final thoughts
Verified approvals keep your overall approval process more organized, transparent, and reliable. If you’d like to see for yourself how verified approvals can help you enhance the quality of your approval process, make sure to start a free trial →
