Organizations have traditionally used paper-based workflows to process information, resulting in the need for dozens of file cabinets and hundreds or thousands of folders for storing paper documents. Document capture and workflow solutions use scanners or MFPs to scan paper documents into electronic files that can be very easily searched, shared and modified—greatly simplifying ease of access and often tightening the security of the data those documents contain through encryption.

In addition to scanning paper documents, some document capture and routing solutions can also merge electronic files taken from various sources, such as e-mail, fax servers, or local or network drives, that are part of the same workflow into a single location where they can be more easily accessed. In addition to storing these files in a network folder, many document capture and routing solutions can also route the information contained in these documents directly into select back-end applications, such as content management systems. Tools called connectors enable a solution to provide this level of integration with particular third-party applications.