Is your association looking for innovative technology to improve staff processes? If so, you’re not alone. According to research conducted by IDC, employees wasted 44% of their workday on unsuccessful data-related activities.
Automation is the key to reducing the burden of manual tasks. Leveraging Salesforce Flows in your association management software (AMS) will save staff time that can be directed toward higher–value work. Read on to learn about Salesforce Flows and discover what processes your association can automate.
How to leverage Salesforce Flows at your association
Your organization can use Salesforce Flows in your AMS to automate crucial staff processes. Here are the benefits of adopting this innovative technology at your association:
- Point-and-click technology. With Salesforce Flows you can build complex automation with point-and-click actions, rather than code. Salesforce Flows are also easy to use, and it’s simple to adapt and maintain your automation as your needs change.
- ROI. If you’re looking for a return on your technology investment, choose Salesforce Flows—it reduces staff time on manual processes and increases overall productivity. And because Salesforce Flows is a clicks-not-code solution, your cost of ownership will remain low, ensuring your ROI.
- Save staff time. As your employees automate processes with Salesforce Flows, it streamlines manual and repetitive tasks, ultimately freeing staff to work on higher-value work like improving the member experience.
What are the types of processes your association can automate?
Now that you understand how Salesforce Flows work, it’s time to learn about what processes your organization can automate. Here are some examples of processes your staff can easily streamline:
- Email communications. Create a welcome campaign that’s automatically triggered when a new member joins. The campaign can familiarize the new member with your organization and encourage the new member to take advantage of the benefits offered by your association.
- Membership renewals. Community Brands research found that 9% of lapsed members simply forgot to renew. A powerful way to address this issue is to offer an option to automatically renew a membership, with the fee charged to the member’s credit card.
- Member recommendations. Much like the familiar Amazon shopping experience, you can recommend new product purchases based on past behaviors and “what other members like you purchased.” This modern e-commerce functionality has the added benefit of increasing your non-dues revenues.
- Member service. Using chatbots, automate aspects of member service, such as assisting with common questions, to provide immediate responses 24/7 and free up staff time. With chatbots intercepting and answering more straightforward questions, the more complex inquiries can be passed to a live agent, who can take time to assist the member and ensure an exceptional experience.
- Tax processing. When it comes to providing a superior member experience, your first thought might not be “tax processing.” However, by automating accounting processes you take human error out of the equation and save staff time, letting employees focus on serving members.
“Our previous systems required us to pay someone who understood the systems to set up process automations with custom code,” said Jake Adler, Chief Technology Officer at the American Society for Surgery of the Hand (ASSH.) “With Nimble AMS, built on the Salesforce platform, we now have constant innovation with each seasonal release. This means we get to leverage things like automation, AI, and chatbots… Better yet? Because it is intuitive, the staff at ASSH are excited and empowered to find new ways to leverage the technology.”
How to get started with process automation at your association
Here are three key considerations to help you increase process automation at your organization:
- Process analysis. It’s difficult to know the degree of efficiency that automation can bring to your association without first understanding the extent of your business processes. Consider conducting a business process assessment to begin identifying opportunities for automation.
- Automation strategy. After completing the assessment, develop a strategy for automating specific processes to help create a great member journey and reduce repetitive processes.
- Consistency. Remember that process automation ensures things are done consistently without the need for staff to remember or intervene. Once a process is created, unless a need changes, there’s no need to revise the automation.
