• A secure, centralised repository that can capture and store different types of information – paper documents, office documents, other electronic documents, emails, discussions, calendars – and present them together in a single view.

• Rapid retrieval of documents when required with minimal effort, and access to documents by outside parties in order to collaborate across the web.

• Access to the same document by multiple people at the same time, but allowing for version control of documents and ensuring that everyone is always working off the same version.

• Back up the corporate content repository as part of a disaster recovery plan.

• Security controls that ensure that people only see the documents they are meant to see and only perform the actions on those items that they are meant to – as well as providing an audit trail of events.

• Integration points with Line of Business (LOB) systems.

• A mechanism for routing documents around the organisation without choking the email system, and automatically notifying people when new documents are available or changes have been made.

Content Management solutions are rich in such capabilities. They manage documents and other unstructured information across their complete lifecycle from creation through to destruction. Integration with Relationship Management systems provides a solution that can manage both structured record information about a relationship (names, addresses, contacts, events) and unstructured documents (emails, word files, spreadsheets, discussions) so that a complete record of all elements of a relationship can be securely stored and retrieved.