7 Small Business Automation Tools To Save Time And Increase Profit

The digital era has transformed the world in many ways, and automation is a vital part of this revolution. Every organisation deals with complex and repetitive processes and operational tasks that consume a lot of time, energy and money. However, with the advent of technology-driven automation tools, it has become possible to streamline tasks and enhance productivity while saving your precious time and efforts.

If you are planning to purchase a business for sale in the United States, then you must think about acquiring these tools to make your job easier. Small businesses can leverage such systems to improve their margins. Also, a small set-up is always struggling with lack of resources and talented people.

Thus automation tools come handy in such scenarios and reduce the load being borne by the multi-tasking entrepreneur. Here is a list of seven automation tools that are beneficial for small businesses.

1. Calendly

Client meetings, team meetings, vendor meetings, supplier meetings and some more last-minute engagements and conference calls - the schedule of the day is filled with a plethora of meet and greets. Usually, it becomes impossible to keep track of follow-up discussions and conventions. Often you have to employ an assistant to take care of these appointments.

However, with Calendly you can fix meetings and appointments without wasting time on sending umpteen chain mails to people enquiring about their availability and participation. The easy to use automation tool allows you to send an email invitation with an embedded link about your availability preferences.

The recipients of the mail can select a convenient time which gets added to your calendar. Thus you are saved from making phone calls and waiting for mail responses to arrange meetings and schedule your day.

2. IFTTT

Short for ‘If This, Then That’, IFTTT allows you to connect all the apps and devices to each other so that repetitive tasks are minimised. For instance, if you upload a company blog, it will automatically get posted on all the synced social media profiles. This free tool starts working immediately as soon as the trigger action takes place.

It can be utilised to create to-do lists, send notifications for responding to important emails on priority and importing stats into spreadsheets for simplifying reporting. Additionally, the applets in IFTTT help you to save every social media post in a spreadsheet, save Gmail attachments in Google Drive and backup your iOS contacts.

A similar tool called Zapier is also available in the market, but it is a paid tool, unlike the free to use IFTTT.

3. ActiveCampaign

The multi-faceted automation tool helps you to mechanise email marketing, marketing automation, sales plus customer relationship management and messaging. With attributes like automated follow-ups, personalised emails for customer actions and enhanced calls to action, this is a must-have software that helps you to communicate with consumers in a tailored manner.

ActiveCampaign is the best-designed format for small as well as big enterprises and is quite affordable when compared to other similar software available in the market. You can systematise the data acquired from customers and start sending automated and customised emails to leads which persuade them to take action.

4. Xero

When you get recommendations about successfully buying a business and managing it, you must often hear the word Xero software. The popular cloud-based accounting software is utilised by bookkeepers for the financial management of businesses. It has a variety of automated features which make accounting a less tedious and cumbersome task.

With business growth, the need for organising the books and managing the cash-flow becomes imperative. Xero takes care of it and various other aspects of accounting such as creating invoices, creating purchase orders, scheduling payments, cash flow management, real-time financing reporting, collaborating with teams spread across time zones, generating a backup of all the valuable data, and eliminates all chances of human error. It saves a lot of time and amplifies efficiency.

5. Google Ads

Advertising is the best way to reach your potential customers and influence them to make a purchase. Since the entire population is hooked to their mobile phones and desktops in the current era, it makes sense to catch your audience on the screen where they spend most of their time. This is the reason why Google Ads works wonders in generating sales and its automated features make it an ideal advertising tool which saves time.

You can pick an automated bidding strategy to change the budget, bids, ad status which means you can set up automated rules in Google Ads and use Google Ads scripts to organise the ads data using JavaScript. Also, you can schedule the ads so that they are viewed by the customers when they are most likely to browse the site.

6. Hootsuite Or Buffer

Besides advertising online, you need to make your business visible on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, etc. as it is the new way to stay connected with your audience. However, with so many social networks on the block, it can become challenging to keep track of the posts and upload them at the most opportune moment so that it is viewed and shared extensively.

Hootsuite or Buffer both help in automating the social media marketing efforts by scheduling posts for all the networks and getting them posted automatically according to the pre-defined time slots. They also give you insightful reports on how well the posts are received by the target audience so that you can work on improving the messaging and making it more immersive and engaging.

7. Grammarly

Content is the king in this digital world where everything is being done online ranging from advertising to communicating with your team members. Every organisation is churning out dozens of content pieces every day such as blogs, articles, social media posts, threads on discussion forums, direct emails, infographics, etc.

It is human to make errors when you are typing, but it portrays a bad image in front of the recipient of the message including your clients, employees, vendors, stakeholders, and potential customers. This is where Grammarly comes to the rescue of business owners as it provides spelling and grammar check for all the content produced digitally.

Conclusion

There are myriad automation tools which can be employed by small businesses to reduce manual labour and save time. If you are looking for business opportunities in the United States, then you must ensure that you are equipped with all these essential tools to make your business thrive with increased efficiency.