No code automations

Personal experiences with no code automations, API's and webhooks. How to string together modular application to create a complete and dynamic website.

No code automations
Bit of automation. 

You can buy or rent a website with everything on it as a whole system, but you can also manage it yourself in modules and then hook it together. And that hooking together requires automations because you have to transfer the data and such by hand between them, and that is of course not very scalable and slows down the processes requested by the customer.

An example

I want to hold a live webinar via Zoom and automate the payment, registration and invitation. To do this, I have created a landing page with an order button.

Landing page
Landing page

This is followed by a payment process that asks for the customer's name and email address. After payment, the data goes to my accounting program for the official VAT invoice and the customer is credited in the CRM system and then added as an invitee to a Zoom meeting. The customer receives an invitation from this.

So a landing page in Leadpages, a payment process via Plug&Pay, financial administration in MoneyBird, relation management in Hubspot and invitation via Zoom.

Zapier

To hook all of this together, we use Zapier. That's a no-code solution that, through webbooks, APIs, filters and the like, and it allows us to connect these stand-alone programs and share the data. An API is access to the program, a webhook is the signal that goes out and offers the data to a different server. Here is the flow, in a Zap, that I described above:

Automation flow in Zapier
Automation flow in Zapier

E-mail sequence

This is where I will link to ConvertKit later. We use this program for marketing and sending programmatic e-mails. These are messages that include conditions such as time or actions and from which the customer can also unsubscribe. Those emails are related to the purchased product and also to possibly other interesting products or events of our company (graymail).

The e-mail sequence is easily added to the list of automation by extending the existing Zap.

Adding ConvertKit email sequence in Zapier. Note that many fields are prepopulated.
Adding ConvertKit email sequence in Zapier. Note that many fields are prepopulated.

Is no-code automation easier?

I would say yes, but it does have a learning curve and is not always easy to test. I also think scalability is limited, but time will tell. What it mainly offers us is creativity and a certain freedom when coming up with new products and especially campaigns. It also makes it easier to iterate. To see whether a campaign works or not and then adjust it.

But a process also does break more quickly, you depend more on others, and then you have to open all kinds of drawers and boxes in Zapier of which you no longer have any idea. That is sometimes more laborious than writing, managing and documenting code, but it might be a lack of experience. So I will be playing around with no code and low code and keep you updated.

Also, I will be on the lookout for agencies to whom you can outsource certain requests and explore to see if no code automations are scalable.

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