Automation Magic đȘ
Remember the movie Fantasia and the story of The Sorcererâs Apprentice? Mickey was sick of the menial work he was responsible for and decided to use a little magic to automate his simple task of hauling water.
What started out as a brilliant time saverâŠ
âŠquickly became a nightmare.
The same thing can happen to any of us when weâre using workflow automations in our businesses. What begins as a simple, automated onboarding drip sequence, can quickly spiral into a series of âI apologize for the confusionâ emails.
And, unless youâre a sorcerer yourself, it takes time that most business owners donât have to clean up the mess (and your reputation) from a rogue automation.
Side note: A common view held by many is that automationâs purpose is to make our work easier, and Iâve witnessed that perspective to be unhelpful and a source of frustration. A more helpful perspective is to view automationâs purpose as one that improves the accuracy and efficiency of our work.
So how can we still reap the benefits of workflow automations, while protecting our client experience?
Build in âapprovalâ steps, which will pause your automation.
These are different from a âwaitâ step, where the automation delays taking the next step in the workflow. What âapprovalâ steps provide is a literal stop to the automation until you take an action.
This gives you an opportunity to personalize the message youâre sending, add in specific project details/links/files, or just make sure you have control over when it does or doesnât send.
Client interactions are never exactly the same, and the content you deliver to them should reflect that. Adding âapprovalâ steps to your automations enables you to accomplish that without having to re-create the wheel every time.