Key takeaways
- Manual process causes delays: When documents sit in inboxes for days due to manual follow-ups, an automated workflow with scheduled delivery and reminders can cut that time down to hours.
- Disconnection between platforms wastes time: If your team creates documents in one tool and signs them in another, you lose time. With an automated signing process, you eliminate those steps.
- Tracking signatures manually is a burden: A spreadsheet may work for low volumes, but with 30+ agreements per month, it becomes hard to track. After automation, you can see the progress happen automatically.
- Scaling manual signing leads to issues: As agreement volume rises, so does the time spent on routing, tracking, and archiving. You can handle all three at once with automation.
Here is how document signing usually works: Your team finishes a contract, downloads it from your system, opens a separate signing platform, uploads the document, places signature fields, types in the recipient's email addresses, sets the routing priority (who signs first, second, etc.), and then finally sends it out. That’s 10 to 15 minutes spent on each document. When you do this 40 times a month, you’ve just wasted over six hours on steps that could be automated.
Billwerk+, a subscription management company in Copenhagen, faced the same issue. They were spending about 15 minutes per contract just on manual tasks before the document was ready for signing. The time was not lost during the signing process, but on the processes before signing happened.
To solve this, it is important to get a clear picture of the entire digital signature process, how it starts, the steps involved, where things tend to slow down, and how it all connects. This guide walks you through exactly what a digital signature workflow is and how you can optimize it.
What is a digital signature workflow
A digital signature workflow is simply the process that a document goes through from the moment it’s created to when it’s signed.
Let’s break it down step by step:
- Starting point: It all begins when a document is ready to be signed. This could be a contract, an agreement, or any document that requires approval.
- Routing to signers: The document is sent to the right people, in the right order. For example, maybe a contract first needs to go to the manager for approval, then to the legal team, and finally to the CEO. The workflow ensures each person signs at the right time.
- The signing event: Once the document reaches the right person, they sign it electronically. This is done through a digital signature tool like DocuSign or Adobe Sign.
- Final destination: After the document is signed, it’s automatically saved to a specified location. This could be a cloud storage service (like Google Drive), attached to a CRM record (like Salesforce), or sent directly to someone’s email inbox.
Here’s an example:
Let’s say you’re a manager who needs a contract signed by three people: your supervisor, legal, and then the CEO.
A manager uploads a contract and sets the order for signing. The supervisor signs first, then legal, and finally the CEO. Once the CEO signs, the document is saved to the company’s cloud and sent to everyone who needs a copy.
Now, it’s important to understand the difference between the two terms:
- Digital signature: This is a more secure type of signature that uses encryption to verify the signer’s identity and make sure the document hasn't been tampered with after signing.
- Electronic signature: This is a broader term that includes any electronic way to sign something, like typing your name or clicking "I accept" on a form.
In short, a digital signature workflow is the efficient, automated process that ensures a document gets signed correctly, in the right order, and stored where it needs to go.
Configure once, run every agreement on autopilot
A digital signature workflow runs on its own once it is set up. The setup has 5 parts. They are:
- Trigger source
- Routing type
- Field-level visibility
- Identity verification method
- Audit trail depth
Trigger source:
Workflows can be triggered manually (a button click), automatically (when a CRM deal hits a certain stage), or through a form submission that both generates and queues the document in one step.
The trigger you choose will affect how much manual effort is required at the start. Platforms like Docupilot allow CRM events, Zapier triggers, or webhooks to kick off document generation and signing from the same action.
Routing type:
Sequential routing (e.g., manager → legal → CEO) ensures signers follow a specific order, which is important for approval chains. Parallel routing sends the document to all signers at once, allowing them to sign in any order. Use sequential for approvals with legal or procedural significance and parallel for mutual agreements.
Docupilot's built-in eSignature module supports both routing types, and the configuration is applied per template.
Field-level visibility:
Some workflows give all signers access to the full document, while others restrict each signer to only the fields assigned to them. This is important when some parties should not see sensitive information, like internal pricing on a customer-facing contract.
Identity verification method:
Email verification confirms the signer controls the email address. Access codes, delivered via SMS or another channel, require an additional step. Multi-factor authentication combines multiple methods to add an extra layer of security for high-stakes agreements.
Audit trail depth:
The platform records every action (including timestamps, IP addresses, devices used, and authentication methods), creating a legal record that makes the signed document defensible under laws like ESIGN and UETA. Deeper audit trails are crucial for high-value or regulated agreements.
Each of these choices is made once per document type, and every subsequent agreement follows the same configuration automatically.
With Docupilot, the configuration also covers what happens after the final signature, through auto-delivery integrations to Google Drive, Dropbox, Amazon S3, OneDrive, or directly into a CRM record.
3 signs your team is ready for an automated signing workflow
A digital signature workflow applies to any document that needs a signature. It depends on how many documents your team handles each month.
Here are three signs your team may be ready for automation:
Your contracts sit in inboxes for days
The signing process takes at most minutes to complete. The delay occurs during the process of sending the document to the signer. Someone on your team finishes the contract, emails it to the first signer, waits for confirmation, then sends it to the next person, and follows up if needed.
An automated workflow with scheduled delivery and reminders should be used here.
Once the document is ready, it should be automatically sent to the signer. Reminders should be set to go out at 24-hour and 48-hour intervals to ensure the signer doesn't forget.
This speeds up the process, as the document reaches the signer right away, and follow-ups are handled automatically without anyone needing to chase it.
Source: https://help.docupilot.app/deliveries/esignature
You generate documents in one tool and sign in another
Your team already has an eSignature platform, but the handoff between drafting the document and sending it for signing still runs by hand. That is where the 10 to 15 minute gap from the intro shows up.
A connected signing process links the drafting tool directly to the signing step, so the document moves from creation to the signer's inbox without a manual step in between. Docupilot generates the document from a populated template and sends it for signing without any downloads or uploads.
You track signature status in a spreadsheet
When you're handling a few agreements, tracking signatures in a spreadsheet might work. But when your team processes 30 or more agreements a month, it becomes a problem.
Common problems include: People forget to update the spreadsheet, or two team members might send the same document to the same person. Signed copies may sit in someone's inbox for days before being filed.
A better solution is an automated workflow with a live tracking dashboard. Each document shows its current status (whether it’s sent, viewed, signed, or declined).
4 key areas where manual signing fails at scale
How Docupilot Connects Document Generation to Signed Agreements
The process before signing (downloading, uploading, configuring, and sending documents) can quickly become time-consuming. When handling 20 or 30 agreements a month, these steps add up.
Docupilot automates the entire process. A trigger generates the document, routes it to the right people in order, and automatically saves it to the appropriate storage or CRM once signed. The eSignature module supports both sequential and parallel signing, automatic reminders, bulk signing, and live tracking.
Once set up, every agreement follows the same automated path, with no manual steps involved.
Start a free Docupilot trial and walk one of your highest-volume document types through the whole process. Full access to eSignature routing and all integrations is available from day one.
FAQs
How Much Does It Cost to Implement a Digital Signature Workflow?
Costs depend on the platform and document volume, plus whether eSignature is built in or charged separately. Per-envelope pricing typically ranges from $0.75 to $3.00 depending on usage. Most platforms offer free trials to test the signing workflow before committing.
Can a Digital Signature Workflow Run on Mobile Devices?
Most signing platforms offer a mobile-optimized browser experience that lets signers review and sign documents from any smartphone or tablet. The signing step works on mobile for recipients. Workflow configuration and template setup are typically managed from desktop.
What Is the Difference Between a Digital Signature Workflow and a Document Approval Workflow?
An approval workflow routes a document for internal review before it goes out. A digital signature workflow routes the document to signers for legally binding signatures and captures identity verification alongside audit trail data. Signed copies archive automatically.
Does Docupilot Support Digital Signature Workflows With Third-Party Signing Platforms?
Yes. Docupilot integrates with DocuSign, SignNow, HelloSign, Eversign, and Yousign for teams with existing signing tools. It also offers a built-in eSignature module supporting sequential and parallel signing, automatic reminders, bulk signing from CSV, and a real-time tracking dashboard.
Do Digital Signature Workflows Meet Compliance Requirements in Healthcare?
Digital signature workflows that capture audit trails with timestamps, IP addresses, device data, and signer identity verification meet requirements under ESIGN and UETA. For healthcare, the signing platform must also be HIPAA compliant to handle protected health information.
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