eProcurement software is good at getting purchase orders out the door, but less good at handling what comes back. Most suppliers still send order confirmations as PDF attachments, and someone in purchasing has to compare each one with the PO line by line.

That matters more than it might seem. According to Ardent Partners (2025), procurement teams manage about 71% of company spend on average, and every extra dollar they bring under control saves 6% to 12% in the first contract period.

Below, we show you how to implement eProcurement step by step and how enterprise content management helps with the supplier documents that most projects forget about.

Key Takeaways

• eProcurement software digitizes buying from request to payment, so employees order faster and procurement gets clear spend data
• Order confirmations, delivery notes and invoices still arrive as PDFs and paper, which is where manual checking and missed deviations pile up
• Maverick spend and contracts that are hard to find usually trace back to documents that sit outside the system
• Most suppliers will keep sending PDFs for years, so document capture belongs in your plan from the start
• Starting with one business unit or spend category and expanding once it works keeps the project manageable

What is eProcurement?

eProcurement (electronic procurement) is the use of software to manage purchasing digitally, from sourcing suppliers to settling their invoices. It replaces paper forms and email approvals with structured workflows and approved catalogs, so you can enforce purchasing policy and see every order in one place.

By using digital tech to manage the various stages of the procurement process, for example in sourcing, tendering, supplier management and all the way up to contract management, you’re able to streamline the procurement process, reduce costs, increase efficiency, and improve transparency and accountability.

eProcurement systems are often used alongside or within an enterprise content management system.

ECM is an incredibly important component of digital transformation by modernizing business processes and improving the customer experience, and also the experiences of an entire organization.

To see what that changes in practice, it helps to compare it with the way many companies still buy today.

eProcurement vs. traditional procurement

In traditional procurement, requests, approvals and orders move through paper forms and email. eProcurement puts the same steps into one system, which makes the biggest difference in how much manual work is involved and how much you can see.

	Traditional procurement	eProcurement
Ordering	Paper forms, emails and phone calls	Approved catalogs in one system
Approvals	Signatures chased by email	Built into the workflow
Spend visibility	Spread across spreadsheets and inboxes	Visible in one place
Purchasing policy	Checked by hand, if at all	Applied automatically
Supplier documents	Paper and email attachments	Still arrive as PDFs and paper unless you plan for them

The last row is easy to miss. Suppliers send their documents back in their own formats whichever way you buy, and we'll come back to that. First, here's what you gain once the ordering side runs through one system.

Benefits of eProcurement

eProcurement changes how buying works for everyone involved, from the employees placing orders to the team negotiating with suppliers.

Employees get what they need faster

Ordering from approved catalogs takes a few clicks, and approvals happen in the system, so nobody has to chase signatures by email.

You negotiate with better data

When purchases run through one system, you can see how much you buy from each supplier and use that in your next negotiation.

Each order costs less to process

With fewer manual steps, your team spends less time on routine orders and more on the suppliers and categories that need attention.

Purchasing policy applies automatically

Spending limits and approval rules are built into the workflow, so they are followed every time without anyone checking by hand.

These benefits only hold up if the process keeps working after the order goes out, and that's where many companies run into trouble.

Challenges of eProcurement

The complexities of procurement processes are wide, with multiple systems and platforms across many even departments, the need for a centralized hub becomes apparent.

Multiple teams, multiple points of failure?

While purchasing teams naturally are likely to use eProcurement systems the most, finance teams may also use eProcurement systems to track budgets, and operations teams may use them to track inventory.

With multiple teams using eProcurement systems, there is the potential for data quality issues arising, and communication can become complex.

Security issues

eProcurement systems should integrate with existing systems so as to avoid potential data security issues, with potentially sensitive data being held, they need to be secure and prevent unauthorized access.

There can be security concerns around sharing data with third-party vendors, so choosing an eProcurement solution that is trusted and secure is paramount.

Buyers still check order confirmations line by line

When a supplier changes a delivery date or rounds a unit price, the change is buried in a PDF order confirmation that someone has to read and compare with the PO. With hundreds of orders a week, a few get missed and turn up later as an invoice dispute or a delivery that arrives too late for production.

Delivery notes and invoices live outside the system

Delivery notes often come in on paper at the warehouse, and invoices end up in a shared mailbox, so neither reaches your eProcurement software in a usable form. Your team matches them in spreadsheets and email threads, which means nobody has a complete view of an order until the books close at month end.

Maverick spend shows up only when the invoice arrives

If an invoice arrives without a matching PO, the purchase has already been made. And when invoices are handled outside your system, it can take weeks before you notice that someone bought off contract, by which point it's too late to move that spend to a preferred supplier.

Contracts take an afternoon to find

The master agreement with your negotiated prices might have been signed two years ago and saved somewhere on a team drive. When an auditor or a new category manager asks for it, finding it can take an afternoon, and it's hard to hold suppliers to contract prices if your team can't quickly pull up the contract.

If a few of these sound familiar, the steps below show how to set up eProcurement together with ECM so those gaps are covered from the start.

How ECM can enhance eProcurement

eProcurement software manages the buying, and enterprise content management (ECM) manages the documents that come with it. These eight steps show how the two work together, from the first process map to day-to-day use.

Step 1: Map your procure-to-pay process, documents included

Follow one real order from the first request to payment and note who handles it. Also write down every document that comes in, like order confirmations and delivery notes, and where each one ends up. This map shows you where ECM will make the biggest difference.

Step 2: Choose your eProcurement software and decide what ECM covers

Pick software that makes it easy for employees to buy from approved suppliers at contract prices. Then agree what stays in that system and what ECM takes over, which is mainly the documents suppliers send outside the portal.

Step 3: Capture supplier documents in one place

Set up one intake for supplier documents from every channel. Intelligent document processing (IDP) reads each one, recognizes what it is and pulls out the data your team needs, so nobody has to retype it from a PDF.

Step 4: Sort and route documents automatically

Once a document is captured, ECM files it by type and workflows send it to the right person for review and approval. Your buyers no longer have to sort through a mailbox to find what needs their attention.

Step 5: Connect eProcurement, your ERP and ECM

Link the three systems so every order has one complete record, with each document kept together with the order it belongs to. Ask vendors which integrations are ready to use for your ERP, whether that's SAP, Oracle or Microsoft Dynamics 365, and which need extra project work.

Step 6: Bring contracts and older records into the same repository

Store your supplier agreements in ECM, where contract management keeps them easy to find and alerts you before notice periods run out. If older records still sit in a legacy archive, this is a good moment to move them over.

Step 7: Archive documents and apply retention rules

You'll need to keep procurement documents for years for tax and audit purposes. Decide how long each type has to be kept, and let ECM apply those retention rules automatically so documents stay complete and can be found when an auditor asks.

Step 8: Roll out, bring people on board and expand

Start with one business unit or spend category where buying is frequent and repeatable. Make ordering quicker than the old workaround, give your main suppliers a portal or EDI connection and accept everyone else's documents in the formats they already send. Once it works, bring procurement automation to the rest of the company step by step.

Many of these steps rely on ECM, so here's a quick look at what it adds to an eProcurement setup.

What ECM brings to eProcurement

eProcurement software handles the buying, and ECM covers the document side that it leaves open. Together they give you:

• One complete record for every order, with all supplier documents kept together with it
• Less retyping, because the data is read from supplier documents automatically
• Faster reviews and approvals, because each document goes straight to the right person
• Contracts and negotiated prices that are easy to find
• Easier compliance, because retention rules are applied automatically
• Older records from legacy archives in one place, where they're easy to search

The ECM side of these steps, from capturing documents to archiving them, can run on a single platform, and that's what Doxis is built for.

eProcurement only pays off fully when the documents around it are under control as well. Start with one business unit, connect your systems and capture supplier documents from day one, and you'll have a setup that grows with you.

Your eProcurement software takes care of the buying, and Doxis takes care of the documents that come with it. Supplier documents reach your team with the data already captured, whichever ERP you run, so buyers only need to check and approve them. Each document is then archived together with its transaction.

Document capture is one part of the Doxis Intelligent Content Automation platform. The same platform covers contract management with automatic deadline monitoring and gives you one compliant archive for procurement records that are currently spread across several systems.

With Doxis, you get:

• AI-based data extraction from supplier documents in any format and from any channel
• One intake for email, paper and portal documents, with automatic document classification
• Workflow automation: route documents to the right person for review and approval
• Contract management with central storage and notice-period alerts
• Robust security and compliance system: all documents are stored in a central location and access is controlled
• Audit-proof archiving with retention rules applied per document type
• Document management, process automation and IDP on one platform, connected to your ERP through open interfaces

Doxis is a Leader in the Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Document Management 2026. In a Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study, manufacturer SEW-EURODRIVE achieved a 336% ROI with Doxis and recovered its investment in under six months. If you'd like to see how Doxis would fit into your eProcurement setup, request a free demo below.

Frequently asked questions about eProcurement