The importance of process automation through software
Manually entering data, sending emails, dragging documents into the right folders, or processing orders — manual tasks like this Eat a lot of time. Due to their dull work, they are also not particularly popular and are often postponed.
Software that automates such processes solves this node. Programs or entire platforms take over your routine activities step by step — and increasingly without human intervention.
Why is that so valuable?
Automated processes are usually faster, more consistent and more reliable than manual processes. When employees are relieved of these routine tasks, they have more time for tasks that require their expertise much more urgently.
As a company grows, automation can be an important lever. Scale processes more easily and you avoid routines growing over your team and you.
What does automation through software bring to a company?
Automation has a positive effect on virtually all areas of business. This gives employees more mental space to monitor the processes instead of having to carry them out themselves.
- time: Automated processes save you and your team valuable hours that you can spend elsewhere.
- costs: Less manual work often means less personnel costs or even more time for value-adding activities.
- Failure: People make mistakes (especially when working monotonously) — software, on the other hand, always performs the same steps without errors, provided it is programmed correctly. As a result, the error rate decreases and quality increases.
- Productivity: When your team isn't constantly tied to routine tasks, they can focus more on customers, products, and innovation.
Staff: It is motivating when you free yourself from repetitive tasks and can dedicate yourself to more exciting projects. Automation therefore also contributes to team satisfaction.
Examples of automated processes
There are countless ways to automate business processes. We'll give you a few examples here. Since every company works and works differently, the examples serve you more as sources of ideas and not as fixed constructs:
- Automated invoicing: As soon as an order is received, an invoice is automatically generated and sent to the customer. Your team doesn't have to go through every invoice individually.
- Email marketing: New prospects automatically receive a series of welcome emails. Based on their behavior (clicks, downloads), a system can send further personalized emails.
- Lead qualification in sales: Visitor data from the website is automatically collected and evaluated. The system recognizes which visitors are more likely to buy and passes these leads directly on to the sales department.
- Human resource management: From the application process to onboarding new employees to training administration, a lot can be automated. This ensures that all necessary steps are always completed and documented.
- Data analysis and reporting: Instead of rolling through Excel spreadsheets every week, an automated process can create and send reports — including all relevant key figures.
Current state of automation options
Companies are usually very interested in automating as many internal processes as possible with software. Pressure from rising wage and energy costs is a strong driving force here.
Since demand is high, so is supply. The market is dominated by:
- Low-code/no-code platforms: Processes can be automated on these platforms with little or no programming knowledge. With graphical interfaces, you can click together workflows without writing code yourself. This makes automation accessible to a wide range of users.
- Artificial intelligence: AI models can not only take on repetitive tasks, but also abbreviate tasks that would take much longer by hand. This enables tasks such as identifying patterns in data, creating forecasts or automatically answering inquiries (such as chatbots).
- Robotic Process Automation (RPA): Software bots are used here to observe and imitate screen activity. For example, if you have to make the same inputs over and over again in different systems, an RPA bot can recognize exactly that and then adopt it. This is particularly useful when using old systems that are difficult to integrate.
Platform ecosystems: Providers such as Microsoft or Google offer numerous automation features on their platforms.
Tips: Identify and avoid automation issues
Not every process can be effectively automated. Some tasks are too complex or are constantly changing. You should consider whether the time and financial commitment is justified by the resulting automation.
Always think of your team when making your efforts. Employees may be concerned that they will be “replaced” by automation. It is therefore important to work together on how automation makes work easier for your team and not jeopardize jobs at the same time.
Before a process is automated by software, you should look at the process itself. Is it already running in ideal tracks? If not, improve it first. It applies to Principle: Optimize first, automate later!
Keep in mind the Automation always includes data protection. As soon as you put data into external software, it should always be clear how this data is handled. Anyone who automates must deal very carefully with topics such as access rights, encryption and compliance. Automatic data exchange between applications in particular requires careful action.
What software tools for automation are there?
To completely represent the market would go beyond the scope here — if it is even possible at all. That's why you'll find well-known and frequently used tools here:
- Zapier and Make: Popular for connecting various web applications via graphical workflows, e.g. automatically copying new leads from a CRM to a newsletter system.
- Microsoft Power Automate: Part of the Microsoft ecosystem that allows you to build workflows within Office 365 and other Microsoft services.
- UiPath, Automation Anywhere, Blue Prism: Common RPA tools for larger companies that want to automate more complex processes.
Workato: Another integration platform that specializes in companies and offers deep interfaces.
Tip: Not all processes in every company can be automated with standard software. It can be easier to use custom software. This ensures that the tool is perfectly tailored to your processes — without compromises.
Automation through individual software from Axisbits
At Axisbits, we see every day that automation pays off. They are the companies that lead the competition, that have first questioned their processes, then digitized them and then automated them. But this is not always possible with the software that is already available on the market.
As a full-service agency with many years of experience in developing custom software, Axisbits covers all areas that are decisive for your successful automation project — from concept to launch and fine-tuning of processes. Here are two examples, in our portfolio Do you find more:
- that Chalet Matterhornblick makes itself independent of major platforms and automates its customers' booking processes.
- Regal Wings Inc. maps processes in individual CRM software and now works leaner and more efficiently.
If you already have an automation idea on the table and need advice on how to implement it, get in touch with us. We'll show you exactly how we approach your project.
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