The breakdown of communication can be damaging in many circumstances but in business it could be catastrophic. Making sure your data, your processes, and your communication is linked up – and, more importantly, talking the same message throughout your business is something many of the most successful companies focus on.
In our high tech and digital world much of your communications and systems will be online in the cloud. As useful as that is, it’s not without its own problems.
Many of the businesses we talk to and work with have some great systems and processes… But they’re not talking to each other.
One of the greatest benefits of these online and digital systems is being able to link them up and get them communicating. The benefits are huge, for you, your business and your customers.
The single input of data saves time, money, and problems
It’s fair to say that we spend a lot of time tapping, swiping, and typing on our devices. In many cases, getting the taps and types (data entry) correct is important. But we’re only human and mistakes happen.
Inputting information twice into separate systems? You’re doubling your chances of including mistakes.
Linking up your systems so that they share the data in the digital form reduces errors in your data. Why risk it? If you’re putting data into one system and it needs to be in another too (maybe client facing systems or platforms) then link them up!
Remove validation errors caused by re-keying wherever you can. Never re-key data if you don’t need to.
Give the job to your customer…
Adding in data such as addresses, emails, phone numbers, and more complicated data like descriptions and orders can be time consuming but also gives more room for error. Why not hand over the job to your customers who should know this information pretty well?!
Now obviously you won’t want to give your customers access to your entire system so a customer facing system linked to your other systems is another way to join up the communications and save you time and helps you to stay on the right side of the data entry errors.
Get your customers and clients to input own their own data and keep it up-to-date and correct.
You can only handle one version of the truth!
Having only one version of your data and information can help you stay compliant, keep up-to-date, eradicate errors, and save money and time. Having two versions is painful and can be the route to larger problems in your business.
Which system do you work with? Which version is correct? Which version does that team work on? How do you know which information is the best to use?
Working on one joined up system gives you one place and one set of data to work with and on and could save you more than the odd embarrassing mistake.
Visibility of same data across a business
Let’s say, for example, that you have a customer you really love and you want to reward them. Let’s imagine you have 100 customers you love and you want to send them something in the post.
It’s coming up to Christmas and you decide that hampers are a really great way to add some feel good vibe to your customer base.
Where do you go for the data? Your accounts system? Your CRM? Your email database? How about all of them? Is the information the same?
Linking up your systems would mean that no matter where your team decide to look for the data, they get the same information.
Small business using off-the-shelf systems?
If you’re running a start-up or small business then you might not be ready for bespoke and complex systems made for you, so you’re probably using some off-the-shelf systems. How do you link those?
Have you tried something like Zapier? Zapier is an online cloud system that marries up many of the well-known systems like Xero, Mailchimp, and others, to help your data and systems work together and save you hours and hours of time.
Why not try Zapier to share your data between applications? It could save you time, money, and important resources! If you need help setting it up, just ask us.
Time for custom software?
If you’re more of an established business then a bespoke option might be better for you. Working with your historic faithful systems, our team can create a bespoke system to help it all work together. That might mean building a platform from scratch or creating some intelligent software to enable your business to communicate across all the systems.
Build the processes to enable sharing in your business, across platform, and across processes.
Empower software APIs
Most cloud software has an API (Application Programming Interface). APIs allow clearly defined methods of communication to be shared among various components. An API is a way of allowing an existing system to speak to a new system and it’s really quite exciting for your business.
Most of your cloud-based systems have an API and can allow connectivity and exchange of information between your other systems. Imagine how powerful that could be.
Better digital adoption drives productivity and efficiencies
It’s a simple fact that companies who join up their communication and systems benefit from more productivity and efficiency. With more speed, accuracy, and the ability to grow and build new systems from existing ones, the decision to join up your systems into one big machine could be game-changing.
If you need help getting your business systems and processes talking to each then please contact us at iOStudios. We make business-changing software.
