5 good tips on how to sign contracts smarter
Digital signing has made our lives very convenient and sped up business processes. However, it's still very time-consuming to prepare and sign contracts. Contracts are created one by one and manually, signatures are collected in time-consuming email correspondence and finally important documents disappear in the mailbox.
What if it could be done differently? What if preparing dozens of contracts was only a matter of minutes and everything was error-free? Wouldn't it make sense if the signed documents went into the right folder by themselves? Would this mean that certain people would no longer be needed? Or rather, that we could concentrate on the issues that really appeal to and interest us?
Here we share 5 useful tips on how you can sign contracts smarter and reduce the tedious manual work that often comes with formalising and signing contracts.
1. Choose a suitable platform for signing the contract
Having your own signing platform makes working with documents much easier and faster. It also provides a good overview of all the company's contracts, as all contracts are located in a specific place that can be accessed by all relevant people in the company. The signing platform also offers the possibility to connect document-related actions with your company's tools and automate the signing process.
The main problem is getting started, learning something new and giving up old habits. If you choose a good platform and implement it in your company, you'll save valuable free time. For example, here's a good story about how Horeca Service, a company with a large client base, started to manage its contracts more effectively.
We know very well how difficult it's to change processes that have been in place for years. That's why we explained in more detail why it's good to choose your own platform for signing contracts and what that entails.
2. Use a contract template with dynamic fields
At Agrello, we've created a way to reduce the time it takes to create contracts. Since most people use Microsoft Word to work with documents, we've developed a solution for this tool. The trick is that it's enough to create just one template for a contract, which can then be used again and again (for example, an employment contract or a confidentiality agreement).
The contract template should contain dynamic fields that must be changed in the contract for each worker. If you use such a template, you don't have to duplicate the same file, fill in separate fields, save, email for signature or archive in separate folders. Contract templates with dynamic fields help you to create contracts faster, avoid mistakes when filling in the contract fields, send the contract to the parties for signature with just one click and receive a notification when all parties have signed.
3. Automatically move contracts into folders
Do you want the contract to be automatically moved to the folder you specify after you've signed it with all parties? You don't have to keep track of when the contract was signed, you don't have to look for it in your mailbox, download it to a separate folder and you don't have to worry that you might forget to move the contract to a specific folder and the contract gets lost.
If you connect the Agrello platform to a Google Drive or Dropbox folder, for example, contracts with a certain status will automatically be moved to the folders you specify. You can also set up notifications in Slack to notify you or your team when contracts have been signed. If you want the desired status to appear after the contract is signed, for example, in the Pipedrive sales channel, you can easily create this connection as well.
4. Automate contract preparation
Sometimes there are situations where it's necessary to quickly create dozens or hundreds of documents to be signed on the same template. Be it the renewal of internal work rules, changes to customer contracts or the signing of subscription contracts.
Let's make an example: How would it be possible to get updated work rules signed more quickly by everyone in the company? First, you need to create a contract template with dynamic fields and an Excel spreadsheet with all employee data, in which the data of each employee is entered (name, profession, contact information, personal identification number, etc.). In order to then be able to automatically create signature-ready work rules from the employee data, a connection must be established between Agrello and Zapier. Now it doesn't matter how many employees are on the list, whether dozens or hundreds, the contracts are created automatically and quickly in Agrello.
This type of permanent connection has already been used by several companies to save time when creating documents. We've written more about one example here: How you can use Agrello to sign contracts with investors faster.
5. Manage and organise contracts in one place
After the document is signed, there's the question of storage. Often this is done in a cloud service or on a hard drive, but sometimes the documents get lost in the depths of the postbox and it's difficult to find them later. On the Agrello platform you can shop signed documents worry-free, they're always available to you. You can also organise documents in folders and share them with your team.
Try it yourself
If this story has sparked new thoughts in you and your company is interested in using the signature platform and needs help setting up and implementing workflows, then why not choose Agrello as your partner?
