Demystifying Process Automation: A Comprehensive Guide

Process automation is a valuable tool for business owners, but it can feel a little intimidating at first. With all the information out there and the techie jargon scattered across every article, a lot of people get overwhelmed before they even really know what they’re looking at. Process automation can be the best way to increase efficiency and customer satisfaction by automating time-consuming and repetitive tasks. It avoids human errors, saves time normally spent on manual tasks, and clears mental space for business leaders so they can focus on other aspects of their business. And, with the rise of artificial intelligence and various options for robotic process automation, there are more ways to automate than ever.

Understanding Process Automation

First, let’s be clear about what we mean when we’re talking about process automation. Process automation is when you use software, AI or otherwise, to do repetitive tasks like sending meeting reminders, data entry, managing an email list, and other similar repetitive tasks. You let the computer handle the tedious and boring housekeeping tasks of running a business so you don’t have to deal with it. This makes your business more efficient, more affordable to run, and, let’s be honest, more fun to manage. 

Historically process automation has used robotic process automation, also called RPA bots or software robots. RPA bots carry out a list of simple tasks in a certain order when they run. A different, more advanced type of software called intelligent automation has grown in the past several years that integrates AI into RPA algorithms so that the program can make decisions and predictions based on the data it receives. Intelligent automation (IA) is popular in healthcare especially because the program can personalize patient care plans based on multiple factors. Most recently generative AI-based automations have entered the scene as we go through the digital transformation brought on by generative AI companies like Open AI. These systems can be used for problem-solving, product design, and a variety of other purposes by using data and simulations to create suggestions for users, and therefore automate more complex and creative tasks.

The Role of AI and Machine Learning in Process Automation

It can be a bit of a red flag to hear about generative AI learning to take over creative tasks, and fairly so. But when it comes to process automation and the context of our conversation, we aren’t talking about using AI to design a poster with a bunch of smiling kids and the wrong number of fingers or to write generic copy that kind of makes sense, though you can certainly use it to do those things. What we’re looking at is the use of AI to help creatively solve problems, analyze data and present it in a digestible way, spot and flag outliers in data, recognize patterns in things like sales, website traffic, and social media engagement, and more. 

A program that uses machine learning can notice at what amount of inventory you stop ordering more of a product and how frequently you make new orders, and use that data to automate supplies purchases. Ultimately AI and machine learning are playing an important role in improving process automation so it can cover more tasks, more efficiently, and more affordably with fewer errors and better decision-making abilities than ever before. That being said, your average small business owner won’t need to break out the big bucks to pay for the latest generative AI process automation tool. Most people can make business-changing improvements to their existing list of repeatable tasks using a classic RPA bot or intelligent automation if their needs are a little more complex.

The Impact of Process Automation

Driving Efficiency and Reducing Errors

We’ve already mentioned that process automation can improve efficiency by taking over time-consuming tasks and lowering errors, but good automation software can do more than that. Technology Magazine lists ten ways process automation benefits businesses, and the list includes more than you might think. 

First, it helps make your business more scalable and more adaptable. Most softwares won’t have much of a difference in handling 1 data set versus 100, which means whether it’s more customers, more products, or more employees, whatever data you have them managing will be scalable, giving you the freedom to pursue business growth without worrying about managing all the excess admin. 

Since you can handle all that data, your business will be able to adapt to new challenges and adventures as long as the software is designed to handle multiple types of data sets. Process automation also improves employee satisfaction since your employees won’t feel stuck to doing all the mundane busy work anymore. And, it can improve your customer experience too!

Improving Customer Experience

Process automation can seem like a very behind-the-scenes business practice that wouldn’t have much impact on your client experience, but you’d be surprised by how much simpler it can make some of the basic business-client interactions. First, automating things like a welcome email sequence for new email subscribers and sales confirmation emails means that your customers get regular and timely communications from you to stay up-to-date on your business. 

Second, it speeds up things like the communication between sales, production, and shipping or your internal systems so there is less time lag from a customer sale to the delivery of their order. Third, by improving your employee satisfaction, process automation gives your team more time to create improvements in the customer experience.

Practical Guide to Implementing Process Automation

Best Practices & Tools

There are a ton of process automation tools available on the market, to the point that you will never be starved of options. That being said, not all tools are created equal. A few programs we’d recommend are:

• ClickUp for project management and task delegation
• Airtable for database management 
• Zapier or Make for automations integrated across different softwares

If you want to begin process automation but aren’t sure what to do first, start by identifying your areas of need and repetitive tasks you can automate, then decide which ones are the highest priority to automate first, whether that’s by how much time they take, how often you make mistakes doing them, or just which task you truly loathe doing yourself. Assess if these processes make sense to automate before doing so. Are there any steps in the process that aren’t truly necessary? Once the process is clear, then find a software that’s compatible with your needs. Set up your automations, train your team on how it functions, and enjoy the freedom it offers you. Just remember to always have a backup plan for if something goes wrong and you have to keep doing things manually while you find a solution.

Final Thoughts

Business process automation is a crucially important tool for business owners to improve their efficiency and set their businesses up for success over time. It lets you grow and scale your business, save time and money, improve your customer experience and employee satisfaction, and reduce errors in your business. Don’t let overwhelm and fear hold you back from utilizing such a powerful tool to your advantage; a little research into RPA and IA systems can go a long way towards improving your work-life balance and business trajectory.

If you’re interested in process automation and optimizing your systems but aren’t sure where to start, check out our business audit for personalized help finding the perfect way to automate your processes.