In business process automation, staying ahead with efficient tools and techniques is paramount for productivity and workflow optimization. Make.com offers a wide range of automation templates that can simplify complex processes and make your life easier.
In this blog post, we’ll explore how to find, set up and customize some templates to fit your specific needs. Plus, I’ll introduce three updates of the guided set-up feature of Make automation templates that are game-changers for users.
When you log-in to your Make account, you can find the templates section on the left-hand side of the menu bar.
Here, you can find a library of pre-build scenarios that can cater to different automation needs. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced user, these templates can serve as an excellent starting point for your automations.
To find templates relevant to your business or to the tools you are using, use the Search by Apps or Name search bar.
For example, if you have a Shopify storage, typing “Shopify” into the search bar will filter out templates specifically designed for Shopify integrations.
This makes it very easy to find scenarios that will fit your business operations.
Once you find a template that will suit your needs, setting it up is very straightforward. You have two options in setting up the selected template:
1. Start guided setup
2. Create new scenario from template
The Start guided setup walks you through each step which makes it ideal for those new to automation. For those with experience, Create a new scenario from template allows for flexibility and customization.
The examples presented in this blog will use the Start guided setup. Let me start by showing the three updates in this type of setup.
1. Modular Editing
Unlike before, you don’t have to go in a certain order to modify modules. Now you can modify any module at any point giving you more control over the configuration of your scenario.
2. Status Indicator
The module icons, represented by bubbles at the top, lets you know of the status of each step at a glance - whether if it’s not started (gray), in progress or something is missing (yellow) or completed (green).
3. Direct Execution through Side Panel
After setting up your template, you can immediately run your scenario, schedule it or edit further directly from the side panel.
This template allows you to sync new products between Shopify and WooCommerce, including all pictures.
To start using this template, click on the start guided setup to guide you with the individual steps to set up the scenario.
Follow the prompts to connect your Shopify account and configure the template settings.
The module icons at the upper right of the modules will turn green as you complete each set-up.
A yellow module icon means that it is in progress or you need to input additional information.
Set up the images needed in the aggregator to complete the set up of the scenario.
Once done, click continue and you should have a green check in the module icon.
You can also modify the scenario to suit your needs. You don’t have to set up the full scenario, you can exit the guide anytime by clicking the skip guided setup button and this will take you to the actual scenario editor.
We don’t use WooCommerce so we unlink the connection. WooCommerce can be replaced by another platform.
Running the scenario for testing purposes will give you the following output:
You can use this template when you need to generate random strings for security purposes, testing or simulating data.
Let’s set up this template.
Clicking the Run you scenario will run and test your scenario immediately. This is the expected output of the scenario above:
You can customize the length and character set to fit your needs.
The "Get RSS Feed Updates in a Single Email" template simplifies this by sending you a summarized email containing all posts from your selected RSS feeds that include specific keywords.
The Google Sheet that contains the URL of the RSS feeds we want to monitor looks likes the sheet below. The keyword of interest is also included in the sheet.
As you run the scenario, it searches through all the RSS feeds and checks for specific keywords. If a keyword is found, it creates an HTML string and aggregates it into a table format, which is then sent to your email.
However, we encountered an error when running the scenario as is.
Examining the output of each module in the scenario, we observed some discrepancies, such as receiving multiple results when you expected only one, or encountering empty results. To prevent sending out empty emails, we can optimize this template further.
Here, we added a filter that checks if there is actual text in the RSS item and only continues the scenario if text exists. This ensures that empty emails are not sent out.
Additionally, we also added an error handler to manage scenarios where the RSS feed link is outdated or not working properly.
When using error handlers, we also need to enable the Allow storing of incomplete executions.
This helps in tracking, identifying and addressing any issues that arise during the scenario's run.
The modified scenario looks like this:
Running the scenario again, we can see that it only passes the filter once because the other time it was empty and therefore, it did not send an email.
We can also check that the scenario failed twice, probably because the RSS feed link is old and did not work properly. No email was sent out for this as well.
Only one email was sent out for the successful run with the following content:
Automation templates on Make.com are a powerful resource for anyone looking to streamline their digital tasks. By understanding how to find, set up, and customize these templates, you can unlock new levels of productivity and efficiency in your work.
I encourage you to explore the huge library of templates, search for the tools you are using, and experiment with different scenarios that will benefit your needs.
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