Order arrives in the webshop. You type the data into your accounting package. You then create an invoice in yet another system and manually email the customer a confirmation. Recognizable? Then you're not alone: and you'll probably spend more time than you think.
How much does manual retyping really cost?
Do the math. Five minutes of typing per order, twenty orders per day: that's over an hour and a half per day, more than eight hours per week. And then we don't even count the smaller streams: requests from the website that you copy into your CRM, hours from the planning that you transfer to the invoice, addresses that you correct here and forget there.
Time isn't even the biggest problem. The mistakes are worse. An incorrect amount, a typo in an email address, an order that is left behind: every error takes time to correct and can cost you a customer. Retyping is work that a computer can do 100 percent error-free: and a human simply cannot.
How do those links work?
There are roughly three ways to get systems talking to each other. You don't have to master the technology, but it helps to recognize the terms when talking to a supplier.
API links
Most modern software has an API: a system of agreements with which programs exchange data with each other. A direct API connection is custom development between two systems: for example, your webshop that automatically sends orders to your accounting. Robust, fast and precisely tailored to your process.
Webhooks
A webhook is a signal that a system gives as soon as something happens: "there has been a new payment", "this form has been completed". Other software picks up that signal and immediately does something with it. Webhooks ensure that links work immediately instead of once an hour or a day.
iPaaS (connecting platforms)
Platforms such as Make, Zapier or Power Automate are ready-made intermediate stations with thousands of standard connections. Ideal for quick starts and for simple flows. With a lot of volume or complex logic, they become slow or expensive, and then custom development is often cheaper and more reliable.
Three practical examples
Webshop → accounting
Every order automatically becomes a sales booking, including the correct VAT code and payment status. The stock is updated and the customer immediately receives an order confirmation. At the end of the week you only check whether everything has been booked properly.
Form → CRM
A request on your website immediately lands as a lead in your CRM, with the source, subject and a task for follow-up. No separate emails that you have to enter later: and no request that you overlook.
Planning → invoice
A completed job in the planning automatically becomes a draft invoice: correct rate, correct hours, correct customer data. You check and send. Invoices are sent out faster, and what is invoiced faster is also paid faster.
Practical tip: Keep track of how often you retype data from one system to another for a week. Make a note of which systems, which data and how many minutes it takes. At the end of the week you can see at a glance which connection earns back the most time.
Where do you start?
Not with the technique, but with the pain. Choose the route that takes the most time or produces the most annoying errors: that is almost always either the route to accounting or the route from request to follow-up. One connection that works well provides immediate peace of mind and measurable time savings. A pragmatic approach:
- First measure a week. Use the tip above and determine which retyping stream is the most expensive based on numbers, not on feeling.
- Check your software. Almost every modern package has an API or webhooks; Older software can be more difficult, but even then there is often a way via exports, e-mail or custom development.
- Determine the data direction. Which data is leading where, and which direction does the information flow? This clarity prevents duplicate and conflicting data later.
- Automate one connection at a time. Let that one run stable for a month before tackling the next one. This way it remains clear and you immediately notice if something goes wrong.
Also calculate in advance what a connection may cost. If he saves you five hours a week, an investment of several hundred to thousands of euros is often recouped within a few months. If the payback period starts to take years, then manual work is, to be honest, fine for the time being.
Want to get started yourself?
Do you want to know which connection in your company pays for itself the fastest? Take contact us — in a free 30-minute consultation we will go through your processes and you will receive a concrete plan with a fixed price.