Actuate I Business Overview
Print to Web
Making the Shift to Online Customer Communications
Organizations that send out high-volume customer
communications such as monthly statements, bills,
and invoices are moving away from expensive printed
documents toward lower-cost, web-based electronic
formats.
While cost savings is a powerful incentive to make this
change, it is certainly not the only reason. Indeed, as more
and more customers expect anywhere, anytime online
access to their data, organizations must satisfy these
expectations to maintain high levels of customer satisfaction
and keep pace with competitors.
To successfully achieve this paradigm shift in customer
communications, organizations must implement
technology solutions that can rapidly transform print
streams, PDFs, other document types, and data into
appropriate electronic formats for online channels such as
secure web portals, mobile devices, and email.
Actuate offers a wide range of print-to-web enterprise solutions designed to help large organizations and their customers make
a smooth transition from paper to online communications.
How It Works
The print-to-web transformation process begins when a software application parses incoming print streams, documents, and
data into an internal (intermediate) format. While the information is in this format, organizations can perform various operations
on it, such as adding, replacing, redacting or extracting data; inserting targeted messages; and including images (e.g., company
logos).
When parsing is complete and the information is ready to be released, the software application transforms the internal format
into an appropriate output format for:
•• Documents (e.g., PDF)
•• Desktop or mobile web pages, or mobile apps (e.g., HTML, XML)
•• Assistive technologies such as screen readers (e.g., Accessible PDF)
PDF format, in particular, is good for creating a “system of record”—of monthly account statements, for example—because it is
not easily changeable. Web formats are good for viewing transactions online.
Actuate I Business Overview
After transforming the information into an output format for consumption, many organizations add value by giving their customers
the ability to perform interactive visualizations, reporting, or analytics on that content that they can use to gain further insight into
their data.
Benefits to the Customer
Given a choice between paper-based and electronic communications, the ever-growing number of customers who prefer to manage
their affairs online via mobile devices and personal computers will obviously choose the convenience of anywhere, anytime web
access, resulting in a vastly improved customer experience.
Instead of having to manage and retain hardcopies, they can simply use their preferred device to log in and gain immediate access
to all of their data—no fuss, no clutter. Having information in electronic format also allows customers to visualize content in unique
ways that make sense to them, using either the online tools provided by the organization or their own software applications. With the
insights they derive from their analyses, customers have an opportunity to make better budgeting and buying decisions.
Finally, customers can send electronic data to third parties more cheaply and easily than paper documents. For example,
during the busy tax season, they can use a smartphone to instantly transmit electronic tax forms to an accountant without having to
photocopy documents, buy stamps and envelopes, and go out to mail a package.
Benefits to the Organization
Organizations can profit from print-to-web solutions in several ways. For starters, they can achieve dramatic cost savings on
paper, ink, stamps, envelopes, postage, and printing equipment and supplies. Plus, by providing anywhere, anytime online access
to customer data, organizations can simultaneously improve the customer experience, remain competitive in their industry, and
attract and retain customers.
Of course, with customers regularly logging in to a secure web portal, using a mobile app, or receiving email communications,
organizations have more upsell/cross-sell opportunities and increased brand exposure. Organizations can also gain valuable
customer insights from their archive of historical content, by converting it to data and using analytics software to predict behavior,
identify trends, drive dashboards, and much more.
In short, organizations have a lot of incentive to get their customers online and off paper.
What Sets Actuate Apart
Although several other vendors advertise low-cost point solutions, none can match the extensibility, performance, and long-term cost
effectiveness of Actuate’s enterprise print-to-web solutions.
Instead of locking organizations into a fixed product with limited options, Actuate takes a more flexible approach by offering an
extensive à-la-carte menu of features. In this way, we make it possible for all types of organizations to precisely align a print-to-web
solution with their current business requirements and then, down the road, add additional modules to accommodate future growth.
We offer:
•• “Big Picture” Understanding
Actuate’s depth of experience with enterprise customer communications management (CCM) is unrivaled. We know how content,
transformation, composition and document generation, visualization, reporting, analytics, and all the other pieces of the print-toweb puzzle fit together in a complex, fast-paced, online ecosystem.
•• Flexible, High-Fidelity Transformation Tools
Actuate’s print-to-web solutions aren’t tied to a single input or output format. Input formats include AFP, Line Data, PCL, Metacode,
PDF, TIFF, and many more. Web-based output formats include PDF, accessible PDF, XML, HTML, and others.
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Actuate I Business Overview
•• Multichannel Capability
By providing multiple output formats and programming interfaces, Actuate enables organizations to deliver customer
communications across all online channels—including web, mobile, and email—and computing devices (e.g., smartphone, tablet,
laptop, and desktop).
•• Accessible Output for Visually Impaired Customers
Actuate offers the only solution on the market for automatically producing high-volume enterprise communications in WCAG 2.0
compliance level AA Accessible PDF format.
•• Superior Performance
Like our entire CCM suite, Actuate’s print-to-web solutions deliver robust, enterprise-grade performance that leaves competitors
lagging behind.
Competitor’s
Software
Actuate Difference
.012 seconds
.373 seconds
31 times faster
30.60%
14.07%
2.2 times more
.222 seconds
.815 seconds
3.7 times faster
38.27%
17.92%
2.1 times more
25.296 seconds
(.42 minutes)
710.541 seconds
(11.84 minutes)
28 times faster
35.91%
22.79%
1.6 times more
1.0
Average Conversion Time (Seconds)
Actuate
Line Data (Insurance Claim)
Average
Conversion Time
CPU Usage
AFP (Explanation of Benefits)
Average
Conversion Time
CPU Usage
Line Data (Large Claim)
Average
Conversion Time
CPU Usage
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
Actuate – Line
Data to PDF
(Claim)
Actuate – AFP to
PDF (EOB)
Document transformation performance testing results, details available on request
Competitor’s
System Line
Data to PDF
(Claim)
Competitor’s
System – AFP to
PDF (EOB)
•• Excellent System Integration
Actuate has a suite of products that not only talk to each other but also to popular, third-party business systems, so organizations
don’t need to have an Actuate “stack” to benefit from our high-performance print-to-web solutions.
•• Comprehensive Visualization and Reporting
Actuate’s solutions make rich interactive visualizations fast and easy by accepting data from multiple sources, producing multiple
output formats, providing informative dashboards, and giving customers the tools they need to aggregate, sort, filter, chart,
compare, sum, and rank their data.
•• Fast, User-Friendly Analytics
Actuate’s BIRT Analytics can help customers (and organizations) get more out of their data. For example, with our powerful, easyto-use analytics tools, customers can predict future spending and develop budgets based on their account history.
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