The Automation Advantage: Working Smarter Not Harder

0:00 The topics and opinions expressed in the following show are solely those of the hosts and their guests and not those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services, or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability explicit or implies shall be extended to W four CY Radio or it's employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W FOURCY Radio. Welcome to Powerful Business Strategies, where you will find out that everything you have ever learned about growing your business is wrong. Finally, a show where you'll learn the right way to grow your business by learning business and financial strategies that your competition isn't doing. And now here's your host.

0:47 President of NeXTSTEP CFO Michael Barbarita, and joining Michael for today's show as an executive moderator is Chooky Obia. Welcome to Powerful Business Strategies. My name is Michael Baberda, President of Next Step CFO, and next Step CFO is a fractional CFO and strategic implementation firm and our vision is to ensure overwhelmed business owners achieve the time, freedom, and consistent profits to build a legacy and the life they desire. Our mission is dedicated to guiding small business owners to leveraging their time, exploding their profits and building a meaningful legacy, and to show powerful business strategies, and our book of the same name is a step toward accomplishing that vision and mission. And just to also point out that Chucky and I are both affiliated with a number of different organizations. Chuckie currently serves as the managing director of business development for Better Price, a global business focused law firm. In addition to that, Chucky and I collaborate to moderate business roundtables around the country and around the world and document those insights as out of our book, Powerful Business Strategies. But please note that the views expressed on this show are personal views based on our own successful experiences and our moderator for the show today, Chucky Obio, will be joining us a little later on. But you know what amazes me is that every morning, thousands of

2:19 entrepreneurs like you wake up, step into their businesses and make magic happen. You are the dreamers and the risk takers, the ones who saw something missing in the world and said, you know what I can fix that. Maybe today wasn't perfect, maybe you hit some roadblocks, maybe you're wondering if it's all worth it. Well, I'm here to tell you that you're not just running a business. You're building a legacy. Every challenge you overcome, every problem you solve, every customer you help, that's your mark on the world. So get ready because in the next forty minutes, I'm going to share concepts on how to go about automating systems in your business and so let's make some magic happen. But before I do, also, I think I already mentioned it that Chucky will be joining us a little later on.

3:09 But did you know that most businesses waste forty percent of their productive time on tasks that could be automated. Think about that. Nearly half of your workday is spent doing things that a simple system, an automated system could handle. But here's what's fascinating. The most successful companies aren't the ones with the biggest technology budgets to be able to put these systems in place. They're the ones who understand the science of practical automation and over the next forty minutes. I'm going to share some specific strategies that have helped businesses reduce their workload by fifty percent or more using what I call smart automation system I'm sorry, SMOT systems automation, and I'll show you exactly how one business went from working seventy hours a week, actually one business owner to a forty hour week while increasing their profits by eighty five percent using automation tools that cost less than one hundred dollars a month. And I'm going to reveal what I call the automation Advantage formula, a systematic way to identify and automate the right processes without getting overwhelmed by technology.

4:31 By the way, and the best part, once you understand this formula, you can apply it to any part of your business. So grab a pen and paper, because I'm about to share with you some strategies that will completely change how you think about running your business. And if you're driving, don't worry about it. You can catch the episode again on our podcast located at Powerful Business Strategies dot com. So if you're just joining us, we're talking about practical automation and I promise to show you exactly how to do it. And you know, a couple of shows ago, we talked about something we have been talking about actually a few few times, and the pneumonic is called aid CO AI D c O And when you need something done, think of a CO. Think of AI d c O, and the A stands for automate, look to automate the task. And that's what we're going to talk about today. For example, I for innovate, find a way to create the task, to complete the task, and a creative way to complete the task. D for delegate, delegate the task to an employee or C for cancel or eliminate the task if it's unimportant. And finally, oh to outsource the task to a subcontractor. You know, if you combine focusing on the seven step Pathway to Profit formula then we talked about in an earlier show, and

6:02 you go back to listen to it in conjunction with aid CO, you will finally get your time back. But in the meantime, let me tell you about Bob, who runs a successful contracting business, and like most contractors, he was drowning in estimates. He was drowning in follow ups that he had to make and scheduling he was working seventy hours a week just to keep up. And then he implemented this thing he called the essential Automation Stack. And the first thing he did, and by the way, this is so critical. This is if you don't do this, a lot of your automation attempts will fail. He first did what he called a time drain audit, and for one week, Bob locklogged every single task that he did in a Google spreadsheet. And here's what he does discovered.

7:00 And if you miss this critical step, you're in real trouble in terms of implementing any of these strategies related to automation. But what Bob discovered is that he was spending fifteen hours writing estimates, spending twelve hours on follow up calls, spending eight hours on scheduling, spending ten hours on invoice processing, and six hours on basic customer questions. Now here's how he went about actually automating this this process. First, for estimates and scheduling, he set up what is called jot form. It's an automation process for estimates and for estimate requests. He integrated calidly for appointments, and he connected both of those to active campaigns. Now when someone requested an estimate form, collected all the project details, automatically calendly showed only available time slots, and active campaigns sent in confirmation emails and reminders. Now for customer communication, he implemented active campaigns. For email automation, he set up a service called mini Chat for Facebook messages and he used Zapier

8:30 to connect to everything. The system automatically set estimate follow ups, provided project updates, requested reviews after completion, and handled basic customer questions. And for project management, he implemented Trello for job tracking and it's my understanding that's a free service, by the way, at least what he needed it for. He connected it to Slack for team communication, and he added the mobile punch app for time tracking and when a job is booked, Trello automatically creates a project board as signs task to team members, then's notifications through Slack and tracks time and materials. And for financial processing, he obviously set up quick books online. He added Square for payments and he connected them all through zaper and when a job is complete, the invoice generates automatically, the payment link goes to the customer. The books update in real time and follow ups happen automatically. So with just a few inexpensive systems, Bob was able to take administrative time from fifty hours to twelve per week and total cost of the automation was one hundred sixty eight dollars a month.

10:02 His return on investment was over five hundred percent when you consider the value of his time. And let me show you another example that proves that this works in any industry. So Sarah runs a real estate agency and she implemented this exact automation stack. So for lead capturing and nurturing, she used Mailchimp for email excuse me, she used mailchim for email marketing, Facebook lead ads connected to Zapier, and active campaigns for follow up sequences. For property management, she used a tool called property base for listings, showing time for scheduling and DocuSign for contracts. And for client communication she used a tool called bomb Bomb video emails, text expander for quick responses and Calendly for appointments. Her time spent on routine tasks dropped from thirty hours to eight hours a week, and her conversion rate increased by forty percent because nothing fell through the cracks. Now, let me show you something even more powerful about automation tools that most business owners completely miss. So a medical practice that was struggling with patients, scheduling and follow ups. Here's

11:35 exactly what they implemented. So for scheduling they use a tool called next Health. This is for patient bookings. And what next Health did is it was on online scheduling portal, a text message reminders, two way text confirmation, insurance verification, and wait list management. But here's the key. They integrated it with Mailchimp for email communications, Rings Central for phone systems, and Zapier to connect to everything. And so the system now automatically sends appointment reminders via text three days before, email prep instructions, two days before, requests confirmations, twenty four hours before, alert staff of cancelations and contacts witless patients when slots open up. And for patient records and communication, they use doctor a tool called doctor Chrono, and that provided them a way to automate digital intake forms, lab result discovery, prescription management, patient portal access, and automated billing.

12:54 And the results is they were able to reduce no shows by eighty percent and they saved twenty five hours per week in staff time. But here's what's really interesting. Patient satisfaction scores increased because communication was consistent and professional and they didn't miss anything. The total monthly technology cost that I went through there was about five hundred dollars a month, but they saved there were three thousand in staff time and increased revenue by fifteen thousand a month through better scheduling efficiency versus when a human was do it would do it. So before we continue the rest of this discussion on automation, we're going to take a ninety second break. Hey, their business owners, let me ask you something. Are you tied of blending in with your competitors?

13:45 Frustrated with slow growth and slim margins? Well, I've got news for you. Everything you've ever learned about growing your business is wrong. But don't worry. I'm here to let you in on a secret weapon. Your position of market mines. It's what sets you apart, makes you irreplaceable, and has customers lining up at your door. My name is Michael Babarrita from Next Step CFO. I know what you're thinking. Sounds great, Michael, But how do I find my position of market dominance? Well? That's exactly why we've created our game changing impleitation program called Next Step to Market Dominance. In just ninety days, we'll guide you step by step to a position of market dominance by uncovering your unique strengths that competitors can't touch. By crafting a message that resonates deeply with your ideal customer, by building a strategy that turns you into the go to expert in your field.

14:39 Now this isn't theory. These are battle tests strategies that have helped businesses like you as double, triple and quadruple their revenue. Don't let another quarter go by struggling to standout. It's time to dominate your market. Period. Go to NEXTSTEPCFO dot net forward slash contact. Fill out the form and the message section. Put the word dominate or call us at seven eight one three two six three A two two. That's next step CFO dot net forward slash contact or call us at seven eight one three two six three A two two. Michael, how are you, jokie? How are you? How you doing every wall?

15:22 It's really energizing to join you for the second segment. Excellent, excellent, Well, thank you for coming and uh Welcome back everyone. If you're just joining us, we're talking about practical automation tools, and I'm gonna show you exactly how to automate your customer experience. So let me introduce to you the Customer Experience Automation stack. This is the exact set of tools used by an HVAC company that automated their customer service while reducing their workload by sixty percent. And here's through Yeah, and here's what they implemented. Michael likes. So let's get Yeah, we're gonna we're gonna leave. The audience in suspense a little bit on that, yeah, because they're really excited to get into the detail of that insight.

16:05 But a quick question for you. So we are getting some nice. Comments from listeners, business owners really coast to coast that are listening. So here's a. Question specific to automation, Michael, how do you advise business owners to first map out their process? So there's some folks that are saying, well, how do I automate when I don't know or at least I don't have the best appreciation of my process. So what do you say to that? Yeah, Well, step one is to write out the existing process. Nice if you It's just like earlier in the show, I talked about how a business owner themselves have to log their activity for one week. Same thing here, except this time.

16:50 What we're doing is we're logging the actual process as it is today and see where some of these tools that we're talking about to they can fit in and automate that process. And so it some of these tools that we're talking about, I'm repeating like calendly and utilizing that or Zapier, uh utilizing that, Active Campaigns utilizing that. So a lot of a lot of these tools are some of these tools are industry specific, Like I think I mentioned that there was a tool for the real estate industry, but uh, and and you can look at your individual industry and see what tools are available. But you'll be shocked at the minimum cost that it is to automate something that just saves an inordinate leverages time tremendously and saves an inordinate amount of time exactly.

17:48 And Michael, just to pick up on that point, right, So you mentioned the a code technique, right, which they so if that if that's the season, right, so automation is a season, would you say the preseason is mapping out. Your process before you get to the automation. Yeah, you have, Oh, you have to do that, because what will happen is if you don't map out the existing process, you'll pick the wrong tools for automation and you'll be and you'll complicate the process instead of enhancing it. Great point, Michael, you out, very helpful. Thank you. Okay, So back to this HVAC company that automated their customer service while reducing their workload by sixty percent, and what they implemented, first of all, for customer communications, they implemented a tool called Service Titan. And what Service Titan did is an automated dispatch. It provided GPS tracking, digital invoicing, customer notifications and photo documentation. And those customer notifications was when they could when they were going to arrive. And then they use a tool called Podium for text message updates for reviewing requests from customers, payment processing, customer chatting, and team messaging. And then he connected these with active campaigns so they would be automated follow up sequences of email, maintenance reminders, seasonal promotions, customer surveys, and birthday greetings. So

19:20 he was able to utilize active campaigns on an automated basis send happy birthday greetings. And here's exactly how the automation worked. When a customer called ring Central would root them to the right person, Service Titan would create the service ticket, the technician gets dispatched automatically. Customer receives texts text with the text photo and estimated time of arrival, and then a GPS tracking sends arrival alerts. So the GPS tracking gets sent to the customers so that they can track when when the tech will be there. Interesting during yeah, during service, actually during the actual mechanics of the work, the tech uses certain type Service Titan mobile app to document the problem with photos, create digital estimates, get approval signatures, process payments and schedule the follow up maintenance.

20:23 And then after the service, the Podium app automatically requests reviews from customers. Active campaign sends out of satisfaction survey. Service Titan schedules the maintenance reminders and QuickBooks updates automatically through integration of all these tools. So the results was that the customer satisfaction jump from seventy two percent to ninety four percent and the team saved twenty five hours a week with a total technology cost of just under five hundred dollars per month, but revenue also increased by four thousand monthly because of the better efficiency. And just think about this too, the scheduling efficiency. When you're scheduling more officially, you're able to take on more jobs in the case of HRAC company. So now let me share an example using the same tools as time in a different industry. Trying to I'm trying to show and demonstrate how all these different industries there are tools available for them to use to be able to automate. So this is a dental practice and what they did they for front office automation. They used a tool called Curve Dental.

21:46 And what Curve Dental did is it did patient scheduling, insurance verification, treatment planning, digital charting, and billing management. Then they use a tool called weave w eave where they were able to utilize two way texting, miss call texts, AP, pointer reminders, review management, and team chatting. Then they used a tool called local med. This was for online scheduling, insurance integration, treatment matching, and availability management along with a patient portal. Their patient retention increased by forty five percent and their staff said, twenty hours a week on administrative task. Yeah.

22:39 And what ended up happening is their referrals doubled because the automation made patients feel more cared for. Got left. You might think the automation would be something that would make the patients feel less cared for, but in fact it turned out to be that they were more cared for, or at least they felt that way. Mhm. And let me show you what a restaurant did UH to improve the customer experience and how they automated it. And they used They transformed their entire operation using what they call the smart service stack. And here's what they implemented. For reservations and seating. They used open table, which is a common app included online reservations, table management, guest profiles, waitless control SMS notifications. They integrated that with a tool called Devin Rooms, which enhanced customer relationship management, automated the marketing, automated general marketing for the of the of the of the of the of the restaurant, and then special Occasion tracking v i P guest alerts so you could sign up for VP. You know, you'd have to pay a little bit more, but you have to you can sign up for VIP guest alerts and then preference logging and for order management, they used a tool called toast pos

24:12 and in that tool was digital ordering, kitchen displays, a kitchen display system, inventory tracking, labor management, and real time reporting, and it was all connected to a tool called margin Edge which had recipe costing. This was kind of a back office tool had recipe costing, inventory control, vendor price tracking, purchase ordering, and waste management. And the system automatically sends reservation confirmations, alert staff about allergies and preferences, so customer allergies like glactose intolerance and differences you know they might want to add, had certain sides to their to their order and attract tracks table turnover, managed the pension timing and monitors food costs and this was all automated and the results were that the table turnover improved by thirty percent, food costs decreased by four percent, and labor costs dropped by eight percent because everything was more efficient, and their reviews improved because service became more consistent, and the perception was it was more personalized even though it was automated then and their total technology cost was about eight hundred a month, but they increased profit by five thousand a

25:43 month through betterficient efficiency and increased table turns. So before we continue to the next segment and continue our discussion, we'd like to take this ninety second break. Business owners, let me ask you something. Are you tied of blending in with your competitors, frustrated with slow growth and slim margins. Well, I've got news for you. Everything you've ever learned about growing your business is wrong. But don't worry. I'm here to let you in on a secret weapon, your position of market dominance. It's what sets you apart, makes you irreplaceable, and has customers lining up at your door. My name is Michael Babarrita from Next Step CFO. I know what you're thinking. Sounds great, Michael, But how do I find my position of market dominance? Well, that's exactly why we've created our game changing implementation program called Next Step to Market Dominance. In just ninety days, we'll guide you step by step to a position of market dominance by uncovering your unique strengths that competitors can't touch. By crafting a message that resonates deeply with your ideal customer by building a strategy that turns you into the go to expert in your field. Now this isn't their These are battle tests and strategies that have helped businesses like you as double, triple and quadruple their revenue. Don't let another quarter go by struggling to standout. It's time to dominate your market. Period.

27:14 Go to NEXTSTEPCFO dot net forward slash contact. Fill out the form and in the message section put the word dominate or call us at seven eight one three two six three A two two. That's next STEPCFO dot net forward slash contact or call us at seven eight one three two six three A two two. So welcome back to powerful business strategies. And if you're just joining us, we're talking about practical automation tools. And now I want to show you what I call the profit automation stack. This is the exact tools that directly increases your bottom line. And so let me tell you about a guy named Mike who runs a successful manufacturing company and he implemented this specific automation suite brilliant.

28:04 So yeah, yeah, we're to keep them in suspense before we jump into that. It's interesting that you save all the best examples for people named Mike and Michael. How about that? I know, how do you like that the smartest people in the world and named Mike? I love it? Well, I don't know that. You go to some great insights here on these automation principles. You know, we've talked about mapping your existing process. We've talked about looking for technology solutions within your industry and making sure that they could sort of drive efficiencies that way. One of the questions, and this is from listeners, really coast to coast, this idea of cross industry applications.

28:47 So you've touched on a number of different types of industries. Now here's a question. These automation principles would apply both to products as well as the services. Correct, Yes, yes, Like you know, I'm about to talk about a manufacturing company who manufactures products. So it definitely applies, no question. It applies to both, you know, it applies to anything to It applies to distribution. Uh, it applies to retail manufacturing service organizations. And at the near the end of this segment or at the end of this particular segment, I am going to try to summarize for everyone what steps they should take if they're looking to automate.

29:34 So yeah, we'll definitely get to that. But as I said, Mike runs a successful manufacturing company and he implemented this specific auto automation suite. So for the production management he did what he used a tool called fish Bowl Manufacturing, and what that did is it tracked inventory, It provided production scheduling, it provided material requirements planning sometimes called MRP, order management, and quality control. And he connected that system to a tool called sensor Tracks. And what sensor Tracks did is it did real time machine monitoring of the of the machine's use of production, production analysis, quality tracking, downtime analysis, and maintenance alerts. And for the supply chain component of his business, he used a tool called Trade GetUp.

30:46 And what that did is it automated the purchasing, the supplier management. This is more of an inventory receipt type of program, reorder points, price track and multi warehouse management. And this was all integrated with QuickBooks for automated invoicing, cost tracking, financial reporting, payroll processing, and vendor payments. And here's how the automation worked in practice. So when inventory hits a reorder point, the trade Gecko app automatically generates a purchase order, compares supplier prices, sends orders to approved vendors, updates accounting in QuickBooks, and tracks shipping status. For production, that sensor tracks app monitors machines in real time, alerts maintenance before breakdowns, so when things are starting to go slower, it alerts maintenance, tracts production speeds. That's how it knows to notify maintenance if those production speeds start to reduce.

31:56 Monitor quality metrics, reports efficiency data and predicts maintenance needs. And then fish Fowl automatically schedules production runs, allocates materials, updates the inventory, tracks labor costs, and calculates actual versus standard cost for variance reporting. And the results were that inventory costs dropped by forty percent, production efficiency increased by thirty five percent, and profit margins gruba twenty five percent. And the total technology investment was about twelve hundred dollars per month, but they saved over fifteen grand monthly in reduced waste and improved efficiency. So once again that A and A co. This is what this show is about.

32:51 It's automating your processes and understand naming some tools that are out there for some of the business owners. Obviously not everybody, but I mean, and some of the tools are as generic as quick books. Some of the tools are as generic as Zapier. Some of the tools are as generic as active campaigns. It's really interesting. And Michael, let's pause, gonna say just a couple of questions exactly to your point. About the different tools that you're naming. So one of the questions that's come up is should the business owner demo the solution the tool before they implement it, and if so, how would you advise a business owner to approach that sort of demo exercise.

33:33 Well, I one thing I wouldn't do is buy all the tools at once. Ah. Interesting, Yeah, I would. I would buy them one at a time to test them. Uh. That way, Uh, you know, you've got one process automated before you integrate the second process. It's very proctical. Now the sale, the salespeople will tell yourself the different of course, you know. Yeah, but but because you know, if you can negotiate demos of which uh you know, the trial periods, it's really cool, then you'll be in better stead. And then i'd be I would recommend to you know, to get them all at once. You're able to at that point because you know, you're you're demoing everything and you're you're not paying for it, or at least you're not committed to pay for it exactly. That would be a great that would be a great negotiation tool. But if barring that, because some of them don't do that, barring that, I would try one tool at a time, get that working, then go work on the next.

34:43 And the next one, and then last question just uh, you know, in this sort of phase of the show, again based on feedback from business owners, this idea of calculating ROY. So, in all the examples that you've discussed, Michael, you've had an ROY calculate. Does the business owner as part of the trial period maybe or maybe as they sort of onboard their team on a new solution, how should they think of approaching the ROI return and investment calculation? Well, number one, they should understand what their standard labor cost is, you know, in other words, to average labor costs. I shouldn't say good, but average labor costs. So if they know what that is and they're able, they should be able to track and their employees can give them feedback of how much time savings that they've had as a result of this. Now some of that and the efficiency savings. You know, what happens is is that once these systems are implemented, you need to kind of have you know, weekly meet staff meetings to be able to understand what are the problems with the implementation, to understand where the benefits do you see the benefits are the what are Sometimes there's downside. You know, there's certain employees that will say, you know this, this pot is taking me longer. Well, that has to be that has to be straightened out obviously. So, Uh, it's it's it's never any I'll say this, it's never. I don't care what

36:15 systems you're implementing, what automation you're implementing. It's never fun the first couple of weeks. Never, yeah, never, it's it's it's really hard on the business to implement these things. You know. Uh, sometimes it pays to come in a little earlier when on these implement days and have the staff come in and pay the overtime and all that, because uh, it will get them. Uh they'll look they'll be slower the first the first couple of weeks, there's no question about it, because they're getting used to the systematic pot of the automation. But over time, there's nothing like it, and you're going to bite the bullet. And you know, anytime I have recommended systems like this to clients, I definitely get cursed on the first three or four weeks, There's no question about it. When after that they see the benefit. And in curms of taculating calculating ROI, you have to consider all the time savings. You have to consider the opportunity cost the opportunity benefits. Actually, because what did you do with that extra time? Did you turn over more volume In the case of the restaurant, the case of the restaurant, that's exactly what happened, they turned over more volume. In the case of the manufacturing company, they ended up producing more in a shorter period of time.

37:47 So these all these benefits have to be calculated in terms of determining return on investment. I wish that formula was simple, but this things like opportunity costs. That makes it a little bit more subjective. Correct. Yeah, I very helpful context Michael, thank you. So let me show you another example using simpler tools for a smaller business. So here's what a retail store did so. For inventory, they used shopify pos It had sales tracking, inventory management, customer profiles, staff performance and that sales staff performance and multilocation control. And it connected to a tool called switch Labs which was automated reordering, demand forecasting, channel management, purchase order verification, or i should say automation, purchase order automation, and vendor management. For marketing, they plugged in a tool called Klavio. I've never been able to pronounce that. My couple of my clients have their tool, and of course I can't pronounce it right, but it's klav I yo. And it automated the email campaigns customers.

39:05 It provided customer segmentation between different groups of customers. It also identified where there was abandoned carts, product recommendations and purchase analysis. And so let me show you something also about some more profit automation tools. For a landscaping company that completely automated their operation using the Field Service Office Automation stack. And here's exactly what they implemented. So for job management, they used a tool called jobber. By the way, Klientoman just started using loves it. He integrated with company Cam, another tool that was integrated into jobber and Company Camp was able to by the way job job Tracker a jobber o't sorry. Jober provided root optimization, GPS tracking, digital quotes, scheduling, and time tracking. It also doestimates, also does estinates, by the way, I know that from personal experience, and it was integrated with company cam, which was before and after photos of the of the UH of the job, which is unbelievable, project documentation, team communication and client updates along with quality control. And for equipment management, they use a tool called manager Plus which was maintenance scheduling, equipment tracking,

40:38 cost monitoring, service history, and parts inventory. And then that was all connected to a tool called fleet Shop, which is a GPS system for real time vehicle tracking, fuel monitoring, driver behavior, route optimization, and service verification. Once again he had the total technology cost was about five hundred dollars, but they saved about three thousand dollars in operational costs and increased revenue by eight thousand dollars through better efficiency. And most importantly, all these tools paid for themselves in the first month through fuel savings alone. And so let me so let me explain exactly. At the beginning of the show, I talked about smart automation systems and Automation Advance and the Automation Advantage formula. And these are frameworks, like I said I talked about at the top of the show that make all these tools work together effectively.

41:41 So what I mean by SMOT system automation that has four key components. The components are trigger points and I'll go through those action sequences, checkpoints, and completion loops. So the trigger points AREFIC events that's stock and an automated process. For example, this is what I was talking about earlier and identifying your current system. You know, a new leads fill, a new lead fills out a form, a customer books and appointment, inventory hits reorder levels, a project miles, reaches a milestone, and a payment becomes due. These are all trigger points and specific events. That's STOT an automation process.

42:29 So can get your thinking right. You know, the somebody has to fill out the lead form, the customer, the customer books and a point that all can get automated. But those are these are the trigger points action sequences. So each trigger initiates a series of automated actions using specific tools. Calendly schedules, the appointment active campaign sends the confirmation's APR, updates the CRM, quick books, generates an invoice, slack motifies the team. So there's the trigger points and then the action sequences for each of the trigger points. Then there's the checkpoint. These add verification points where the system either continues the automation flags for human review, triggers alternate sequences, updates relevant databases, and generates status reports. And then these completion loops. This is the fourth phase. These ensuring nothing falls through the cracks by confirming all these steps are completed, updating all connected systems, notifying relevant team members, documenting the process, and starting follow up sequences. So that system right. This helps the business owner understand how to go about the automation. It's called smart systems automation. Then there's this other tool called automation, the automation advantage formula,

44:05 and this is how you decide how to automate. From the first place, the time impact multiplied times frequency times an error rate gives you an automation priority score. So for each task, you rate on a scale of one to five. Time impact how long did the process take on a manual basis two frequency how often does it happen, three, error rate, how often mistakes occur, and the highest score indicates your first automation target. So, for example, your appointment scheduling, your time impact was four on a scale of one to five, your frequency was five, and your error rate was three. That equals six state, So appointment scheduling, that's pretty high score. So appointment scheduling would be one of the first things that you automate, and so this formula helped you identify where automation will have the biggest immediate impact on your business. Schookey, I think it's time for compliments.

45:20 Great really energized by the business complements segment today. So we have four business owners coast to coast that we want to spotlight. The first is Zach Ping with Icon Roofing. Zachpin created Icon Roofing after working for other roofing contractors in the Metro Phoenix area for ten years, so a decade of experience, and then he leveraged that and realized that there's just a better way to serve customers looking for roofing company services, particularly to have those services be professional. So he developed the Icon Way, which is a customer centric way to repair and replace roofs and it ensures every project includes four principles competitive pricing, quality materials, a satisfaction guarantee and warranties on materials and craftsmanship. So you can check out more at icon roofing az dot com.

46:26 Please note that. They are a g AF Master Elite Certified roof and contractor. The next business owners Spotlight is Mark Rodgers with Frame Destination. They are a leading online custom picture frame supply an accessories retail manufacturer, so it's an end to end commitment to your picture frame. Needs and part of what they do, it's kind of interested in Michael Market Team. They help photographers, painters and graphic designers get their printed images framed to really showcase their talents. You can check out more at frame Destination dot com. The next business owner is Alena Zerpa. She's a founder and CEO of a t Z social agency and Michael. They are in a mission right they aren't a mission to weave together compelling narratives for businesses and brands and then establish not just customers, but to establish customers for life with an authentic online experience. So you sort of create this online family as it relates to your customers and your clients and Alena and team can.

47:44 Help with that. And then the last business owners of Spotlight in today's segment is Eric Zapata with HTx Junkoholics. They are a small business junk yard removal company based in Texas. And here's what customers love about Eric and team that they can reach out to Erican team for safety and efficiency in completing projects in a fast paced way. And again, look, junk removal is hard work, right and Eric and team approach that work with a service mindset and they are locally owned and fully insured. Those are the compliments for this weeek Michael back to you. Excellent, Thank you, Chicky, appreciate that. Just want to review again that automated advantage formula before we leave. Yes, once again, it's how you decide what to automate first. So you have time impact, times frequency times error rate and that equals your automation priority score. So this is the determination of what you automate first. And so for each task for time impact, frequency and error rate, it's a one to five scale where for example, on time impact one means you do it very fast, where five means it's exceeding.

49:04 It's it's exceedingly slow. So that and then frequency how often it happens. If it doesn't happen that very often, it's a one. But if it happens a lot, then you give it a five. So once again, when you multiply out those three scores, the higher score represents whay you automate first. And so to get a copy of the book Powerful Business Strategies, simply go to our website www dot NeXTSTEP CFO dot net. It's totally complementary and until next Monday at noon Eastern time for Chicky Obio. My name is Michael Barbarita, and remember, don't keep doing what your competition is doing.

49:51 You have been listening to Powerful Business Strategies finding out that everything you ever learned about growing your business is wrong. Tune in next week and every week at noon Eastern time on W four c Y Radio with your host, Michael Barbarita of Next Step CFO and moderator Chugy Obio