Let’s face it: technology isn’t stopping for anyone. It can be almost humiliating when a young person shows us a better way to do something on phones or computers. Efficiency is never more important than when it comes to our businesses. If there are new and simpler ways to do things, they need to know about it! Precious time can be saved, and more space to be freed up for earning money. Let’s look at six examples of automation right now that can provide an immediate benefit to any business.

1. Apps Related to Sales

Some smartphone apps for company accounts are able to connect to the larger accounting software used in the workplace. In a similar way, the technicians at CirrusInsight.com say there are sales management apps that connect to such software as Salesforce. They can display the company/customer communications in order, and display sales productivity information. Such automated software can check the leads and responses, and record every step of the customer journey from ‘the cradle to the grave’.

2. Social Media Scheduling

These days businesses frequently post regular quality content on social media sites such as Facebook. This is helpful for the readers, builds customer loyalty, and can lead directly to sales. Employees regularly create content, and it can be time-consuming. There will be certain times the posts will be most read, so it’s not just a case of posting as soon as they have been written.  

Such apps as Hootsuite or Buffer can be immensely helpful here. People can schedule each post to automatically appear on social media at the best possible time. Businesses frequently have a presence on several social media platforms at a time, and many of these apps can manage them all.

3. Online Calendars

In the ‘old days’ someone rang up a business for a visit or an appointment. When calendars move online, the public becomes empowered to make their own bookings.

People can choose to access the company website at any time. The business will only display the available time slots. The public simply enters their details into the calendar system, and the booking is complete. They will then receive an automated booking confirmation.

4. Chatbot

When a chatbot is in place on a business website, the page visitor may be able to find their own answers 24/7. People are invited to ask a question, and will automatically be given a number of topics to choose from. This can be narrowed down further to such things as business opening times. A pre-produced FAQ page will then appear, providing the weekly opening times. In this particular instance, the visitor will be pleased they have received a virtually immediate answer.

The inquirer will have been spared making a phone call, and potentially being held in a queue. In turn, the business will have saved money on paying a call center employee to be available.

5. Grammar and Plagiarism Checkers

In times past a person would write their memo or document, and then read and re-read. The problem is, the more we view a document the less likely we will be to spot the mistakes. If we pass documentation to a colleague to check, this will now be taking up their time as well.

Fortunately, MS Word underlines possible issues with grammar or spelling. There are also grammar checkers available online, such as Grammarly. They will quickly identify any such issues. Whilst they are not 100% foolproof, they drastically reduce the likelihood of people reading mistakes and questioning how professional the business is.

Plagiarism checkers are also available online. Like the spell checkers, many of them are free. Usually, people can paste a document of up to 1,000 words into a box. The wording will then be compared to thousands of other sites, and within minutes any issues will be displayed.

6. Email Responders

If potential customers do not quickly receive a reply to their email, they may take their business elsewhere. The problem is that it’s very disruptive for employees to drop everything each time a new inquiry is received.

Fortunately, automatic email responders can save the day. They can be sent instantly and contain either a small or detailed amount of information. When they are content-rich and look highly personalized, the recipient will be delighted. The company employee will then be able to check all the emails at a time that suits them.

These are just a few of the ways businesses can appear more prompt and professional. Automated software can be used to delight the customer and also save precious work time. When such things are in place, the business will be freed up to grow and to prosper.

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