ELMA365 vs. Square 9 Softworks

I would recommend ELMA365 to all small to medium-sized businesses who want to automate their processes and therefore increase transparency and manageability.

Square 9 Softworks is great in data management and flow. For us, they've done an excellent job with the Health Screening Tools, Cloud Storage/Management and Online Applications. It seems to be a very diverse product. I think because of that, you can talk with Square 9 Softworks about what you are envisioning to see if they are capable of it. I would not do that with many other products - they just don't have that flex.

Incentivized

• It is a great deal in terms of price-quality ratio. We have the option to promptly create applications without detailed formalization of requirements.
• With Typescript scenarios, the system is rather flexible and provides tools to implement complicated business logic.
• They have very client-oriented support. Every time we face a problem they are ready to help.
• Easy to start using the system for both analysts and users.

• Fast Manual indexing with what we consider the best in point-n-click OCR indexing.
• Webserver that incorporates Full-Text Content Searching, Workflow Queues, Full Document Management and Live document Signing on any mobile device or location.
• Fast workflow designers for rapid implementation
• Broad range of capture and information processing tools, easy to configure
• Loaded with essential security options
• Low price, and about 10X more powerful than MS SharePoint right out of the box.
• Multi-database support for a very low price with disaster recovery licensing, this is very rare in the industry.

• no request is missed
• you can see the approval status at any moment
• you only need your browser in order to work

• Some of the administrative/security configuration with Windows Active Directory can be tricky when managed by separate corporate IT personnel (alignment in strategy)
• User adoption with any new process can be challenging, but overall user friendly menus
• As Database sizes grow (200,000+ records) paging through records can be cumbersome, probably need to migrate to an archive process to offload some of the data.

Incentivized

We absolutely can't imagine not continuing software maintenance as there are always new additions that improve the system not to mention the excellent tech support when issues are encountered. Response times for troubleshooting are very quick and usually, my issue is resolved in less than an hour after connecting with support.

Incentivized

Super simple software to operate and configure. Very granular permissions and controls. Browser based setup with everything and very intuitive visual workflow building makes it easy to set things up. Troubleshooting document workflow issues is also made easy via the batch manager when you can track each document as it moves through the workflow.

Incentivized

Square-9 can get this product out to you in almost the same hour your order it. We got ours very fast.

With the PDF projected viewer, the document retrieval-to-display can drag for a second more than some systems, and the capture workflow if you overload a server array can also drag, but those are the only two issues we've ever seen with this product, and they are not serious issues at all.

The support we received from Square 9 Softworks was exceptional. From deployment to implementation, we always felt supported. The team we worked with had patience and exceptional response time. They were amazing to work with, I always felt supported. No matter how simple or complex my question was they always delivered.

Incentivized

It would have been higher, but the training is a bit muted for the lesser qualified office equipment vendors who signed up as partners to sell and support it. The more experienced ECM vendors and customer end-users will find the training very good, but a bit slow.

I think the implementation could have gone a little smoother than it did. Now that I know how to use the software, I could do it myself. I feel that as an organization, we could have been a little better prepared. If the consultant was more aware of what we were looking for, they could have assisted in setting up some workflows for us as per the contract. But because we were not prepared, the initial implementation process was a little painful. That said, adding a document management system to ANY business kinda means everyone has to re-think the way they do their work which can be difficult for some staff.

Incentivized

They have a free trial. Took 5 minutes for me to set up my own pages in the system. So if you are considering it, give it a try and see if it works for you.

A similar product I have used was Time Matters. For a Law Firm, I think Time Matters is more useful as it keeps track of everything for a client, including billing. However, since I now work for a legal department of a corporation, SmartSearch is definitley more useful. It is not possible to seperate the documents we have internally in neat client files. We have various miscellaneous documents for many different services and customers or vendors. SmartSearch allows us to organize in broad categories that make sense to internal employees using it and to make sure security is set on specific documents. Time Matters would not have been sufficient for our managers to have access to, since it uploads all documents to the file - some of which are confidential.

The scale-ability is quite good actually, but you need competent sales/support folks providing it to you, so the scale is set right for the demands of your system use. Some resellers are not good at doing this, some are fantastic. If you are scaled correctly at first implementation, you'll be very happy with this system.

• Time for processing sick leave has been reduced from 1 week to 2 days
• All the employees communicate quickly with each other online

• OCR capabilities allow users to quickly and accurately index files without data errors from manually keying in data
• Administrators can update users access through active directory without ever opening Square 9 and without generating accounts in yet another system
• Users can find files needed without ever leaving their desk

Incentivized