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Business automation software automates repetitive and mundane tasks in a wide variety of business processes, including invoicing, marketing, customer service, data entry, customer communication, and workflow management.

Business automation software helps reduce manual errors and allows businesses to focus on more important tasks that require human intervention. In our review of the best business automation software, we analyzed the top-rated tools to help you find the best automation solution for your organization.

Microsoft Power Automate: Best for cloud automation HubSpot: Best for omni-channel marketing automation Brevo: Best for email marketing automation Zoho CRM: Best for lead management ActiveCampaign: Best for marketing automation Hootsuite: Best for social media management SS&C Blue Prism: Best for automating rules-based tasks Zapier: Best for integration automation Workato: Best for workflow automation

Power Automate is part of the Microsoft Power Platform, including Power BI for analytics, Power Apps for building custom applications, and Power Virtual Agents for creating AI chatbots. Together, these tools empower organizations to improve operational efficiency through automation.

Microsoft Power Automate received a perfect score of 5 out of 5 across 4 rating criteria (feature set, ease of use, support, and quality of feature set) thanks to its robust feature set, user-friendly interface, strong support resources, and high-quality functionality. On the cost side, I found the tool affordable for the features it offers the multiple pricing options mean you can choose a plan that fits your organizations budget.

Microsoft Power Automate enables users to automate tasks between various services and applications without the need for coding expertise. With Power Automate, users can create automated workflows to streamline repetitive tasks, trigger actions based on certain events, and integrate disparate systems and data sources. It offers a user-friendly interface that allows users to visually design their workflows using a wide range of pre-built connectors and templates.

HubSpot, a well-known name in business automation and marketing, offers a comprehensive platform that includes tools for CRM, marketing, sales, and customer service.

The platform earned an excellent overall score of 4.6 out of 5, reflects the quality of the automation functionality offered by both HubSpots Sales and Marketing Hubs across key criteria.

HubSpot allows businesses to create and manage marketing campaigns across multiple channels, including email, social media, and website. Users can automate various marketing tasks, personalize messages, track customer interactions, and analyze campaign performance all in one place. This integrated approach helps businesses deliver a cohesive and consistent experience to their customers across many different touch points.

HubSpot Marketing Hub

HubSpot Sales Hub

Though Brevo scores a low mark for cost, it makes up for this by earning a perfect mark across other ranking metrics such as features, ease of use, and customer satisfaction. Users consistently praise Brevo for its powerful capabilities and user-friendly interface. Brevos reliable performance and positive user feedback make it a top choice for those willing to invest in a quality product.

Brevo is a comprehensive marketing and CRM platform, offering various tools and features to help businesses grow and manage customer relationships. It includes modules for email marketing, marketing automation, SMS campaigns, chat, pipeline management, and more.

With Brevo, you can create automated email campaigns, segment your audience, personalize content, and track performance metrics to optimize your email marketing efforts. It offers drip campaigns, trigger-based emails, A/B testing, and more to help you engage with your customers and drive conversions.

Sales Platform

Marketing Platform

Conversations Platform

Zoho stands out for its business automation features. It excels in Salesforce automation, workflow automation, marketing automation, and process management.

Businesses of all sizes can use Zoho CRM to handle customer relationship management activities and improve their overall capability. Zoho CRM helps companies to manage their sales, marketing, and customer support processes. It allows businesses to track customer interactions, automate sales processes, and analyze data to make informed decisions.

Zoho CRM offers lead management, contact management, sales pipeline management, email marketing, and reports and analytics.

With a high score of 4.8 for the feature set, ActiveCampaign provides users with a wide range of capabilities to meet their marketing needs. The platform also earns a strong rating of 4.5 for ease of use, making it accessible to users of all levels of expertise. On the downside, the platform receives a lower score of 2.8 for cost, indicating that it may be a more expensive option for some businesses.

ActiveCampaign offers email marketing, CRM, and automated messaging tools to help businesses create personalized experiences for their customers. It allows businesses to create targeted campaigns, automate repetitive tasks, and track customer interactions.

The platform supports email marketing, SMS, social media advertising, and more, allowing businesses to engage with their audience on multiple channels and touch points. It also provides detailed analytics and reporting features that help businesses track campaign performance, understand customer behavior, and make data-backed decisions to optimize their marketing activities.

Marketing: Email & Marketing Automation

Sales: CRM & Sales Engagement

Bundles: Marketing Automation + Sales CRM

Businesses and social media professionals commonly use Hootsuite to streamline their social media marketing efforts and maintain a consistent online presence. Hootsuite allows users to manage and schedule posts across various social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube.

It also provides features for monitoring social media activity, engaging with followers, and analyzing social media performance through data and analytics. Aside from allowing users to create and schedule posts in advance, it also shows the best time to post suggestions based on data analysis, tracks engagement metrics such as likes, comments, and shares, and provides insights to help optimize social media strategies.

One of Hootsuites standout features is its stellar support (5), providing users with the assistance they need to maximize the platforms capabilities. This high rating underscores the companys commitment to customer satisfaction and ensuring users have the guidance and resources to succeed in their social media marketing efforts.

SS&C Blue Prism earned a moderate score for features and quality of features, a perfect score for ease of use and support, and a poor score for costs, as it lacks pricing visibility. The lack of pricing transparency makes it challenging for potential users to assess the softwares value proposition against their financial resources.

SS&C Blue Prism provides intelligent and robotic process automation (RPA) software solutions. Their tool enables organizations to automate repetitive, rule-based tasks to increase efficiency, productivity, and accuracy. Blue Prisms RPA technology uses software robots to mimic human actions, interacting with applications, systems, and data to perform different tasks. This helps organizations reduce errors and free employees to focus on higher-value work.

A 30-day free trial is available. For your actual pricing, contact the company for a custom quote.

Zapier is a web automation tool that allows users to easily connect different apps and automate workflows without any coding knowledge. It works by creating Zaps, automated workflows connecting two or more apps to automate tasks. Zapier supports thousands of apps and services, making it a versatile tool for streamlining processes and increasing productivity.

Businesses of all sizes can benefit from using Zapier as a business automation tool due to its extensive integration and automation capabilities, allowing for seamless connectivity between different apps and systems.

While Zapier excels in ease of use and support, it falls slightly short in the quality of its feature set, with a score of 2.5 out of 5. This is due to limitations in AI capabilities and assistance in CRM management.

Note that the actual amount you will pay depends on the number of tasks you need to perform monthly.

Workato is an enterprise automation platform that allows organizations to automate workflows and integrate data across various applications. It allows businesses to connect their apps, automate workflows, and optimize business processes. Workato offers over 1,200 pre-built connectors to popular business applications such as Salesforce, Slack, and ServiceNow, allowing for straightforward integration and automation of tasks.

The platform scores high marks in feature set and quality, thanks to its extensive connectors and functionalities, which cater to a wide range of business processes. However, Workato falls short on cost, with a score of 0. The platform lacks pricing transparency and may not be the most cost-effective solution for organizations with limited budgets.

Workato can accelerate various organizational functions, including IT operations, marketing, HR, finance, sales, and more, by automating tasks such as ticket escalation, threat detection and resolution, compliance management, lead management, payroll and benefits processing, sales forecasting, and integration processes.

Contact the company for a custom quote.

When choosing the best business automation software, carefully consider your specific needs. Assess your current business processes and identify areas that could benefit from automation. Look for software that offers features and functionalities that align with these needs, such as workflow automation, task management, data integration, and reporting capabilities.

Our review analyzed various software that fit the needs of different user categories to help you determine the best option for your business. Key factors to consider are ease of use, affordability, feature set, and customer support. Opt for intuitive and user-friendly software, as this will encourage adoption and maximize the benefits of automation. Evaluate the pricing structure to ensure it aligns with your budget and offers good value for the features provided.

We evaluated the best business automation software based on the following criteria:

We allocated 30% of the evaluation criteria to the available features of the software. We looked at the range of automation features offered by each software. Software with a comprehensive set of features scored higher in this category.

We consider the software user-friendly and intuitive for both beginners and advanced users. Software with a simple and easy-to-navigate interface received higher scores in this category.

20% of the evaluation criteria was allocated to the pricing structure of the software. This includes the overall affordability, transparency of pricing, and value for money.

We examined the quality of customer support services provided by the software vendors, including response times, resource availability, and user reviews.

10% of our evaluation criteria was allocated to the overall quality and innovation of the feature set. This includes advanced capabilities such as CRM integration, AI implementation, and predictive analytics.

A business automation tool is software that helps automate various business processes and tasks. These tools can automate repetitive tasks, manage workflows, improve efficiency, and reduce human errors in business operations.

Standard features of business automation tools include workflow automation, task automation, document management, data integration, reporting and analytics, scheduling and reminders, collaboration tools, CRM integration, and customizable templates for various business processes.

By leveraging automation tools effectively, businesses can free up valuable time and resources, allowing employees to focus on strategic and high-value tasks. The key to success is identifying the best software that aligns with your business objectives and workflow processes and making sure that your chosen solution can scale with time.

Whether automating sales and marketing processes, managing customer relationships, or optimizing supply chain operations, investing in the right business automation software can be a game-changer for organizations looking to drive growth.

For a full portrait of the AI vendors serving a wide array of business needs, read our in-depth guide:150+ Top AI Companies

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9 Best Business Automation Software in 2024 - eWeek

Concerns that the Chinese government could access sensitive user data through the short-form video app TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, have prompted the U.S. government to pass legislation banning the social media platform unless it is sold to a government-approved buyer.

President Biden on Wednesday signed into law legislation that gives ByteDance up to a year to divest from TikTok after the U.S. Senate approved it on Tuesday night.

Heres why the pressure has been ratcheted up on TikTok.

Lawmakers and regulators in the West have increasingly expressed concern that TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, may put sensitive user data, like location information, into the hands of the Chinese government. They have pointed to laws that allow the Chinese government to secretly demand data from Chinese companies and citizens for intelligence-gathering operations.

They are also worried that China could use TikToks content recommendations to fuel misinformation, a concern that has escalated in the United States during the Israel-Hamas war and the presidential election. Critics say that TikTok has fueled the spread of antisemitism.

TikTok has long denied such allegations and has tried to distance itself from ByteDance, which is considered to be one of the worlds most highly valued start-ups.

Yes, India did in 2020, costing ByteDance one of its biggest markets. The government there cracked down on hundreds of Chinese-owned apps, claiming in part that they were secretly transmitting users data to foreign servers.

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Why the U.S. Is Forcing TikTok to Be Sold or Banned - The New York Times

One afternoon last month, Chad Nedohin, a part-time pastor and die-hard supporter of Donald J. Trump, put on a pirate costume, set up his microphone and recited a prayer.

Mr. Nedohin was opening his latest livestream on the right-wing video site Rumble, where he has about 1,400 followers who share a devotion to Trump Media & Technology Group, the former presidents social media company.

Faith comes from hearing that is, hearing the good news about Christ, said Mr. Nedohin, 40, his face framed by fake dreadlocks under a pirate-style hat.

Mr. Nedohin and his viewers were waiting for the results of a merger vote that would determine whether Mr. Trumps company could start selling stock on Wall Street. Soon the news about Trump Media arrived via an audio feed: It was going public.

Mr. Nedohin raised his arms in celebration. A few minutes later, he cut to a video of a rocket blasting into the sky, with Mr. Trump photoshopped onto it. We are holding Trump stocks, he declared. We are now financial investors in him.

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How Pastor Chad Nedohin Helped Turn Trump Media Into a Meme Stock - The New York Times

Washington Almost a year after the American Psychological Association issued a landmark health advisory on social media use in adolescence, technology companies and policymakers still have made few meaningful changes, forcing society to continue to search for ways to maximize the benefits of these platforms while protecting youth from their harms.

Social media platforms know that the answer is to structurally correct harmful design features and functions. Most children and adolescents lack the experience, judgment and self-control to manage their behaviors on these platforms, which is why we see over 50% reporting at least one symptom of clinical dependency on social media today, said Mitch Prinstein, PhD, APAs chief science officer. Age restrictions alone are not the answer, since kids find ways around them. And putting the responsibility solely on parents is not fair either. The developers must address the dangers inherent in these platforms and make their products safe for youth.

APA has issued a new report as a follow-up to its 2023 health advisory focusing on social media design features and functions built into these platforms that are inherently unsafe for youth. The new report points to the psychological threats these features and functions introduce and the developmental vulnerabilities they exploit.

Policies will not protect youth unless technology companies are required to reduce the risks embedded within the platforms themselves, the report says. As policymakers at every level assess their approach to this complex issue, it is important to note the limitations of frequently proposed policies, which are often misreported and fall far short of comprehensive safety solutions that will achieve meaningful change.

APA calls for comprehensive design improvements to social media platforms to inform safety standards for at least four reasons:

Addressing the role of parents, it says: More robust and easy-to-use parental controls would help some younger age groups, but as a sole strategy, this approach ignores the complexities of adolescent development, the importance of childhood autonomy and privacy, and disparities in time or resources available for monitoring across communities.

Delegating responsibility to parents, to app stores or to youth themselves does not address the vulnerabilities and harms built into the platforms, said Mary Ann McCabe, PhD, co-chair of the expert panel that put together the 2023 health advisory. That responsibility sits with the creators and purveyors of these technologiesthe platform developers themselves.

Originally posted here:
APA report calls on social media companies to take responsibility to protect youth - APA Psychology News

AirChat, a social media app that was launched Friday (April 12), became the 23rd most popular in the U.S. on Apples App Store Monday (April 15).

The app has seen thousands of downloads as well as online requests for access to it, because AirChat is currently offered on an invite-only basis, ReutersreportedMonday.

AirChat is centered on voice, with messages being delivered through voice notes and simultaneous transcriptions of those notes, according to the report.

The apps design is similar to that of other social media apps in that users can post, scroll through feeds and message other users privately, the report said.

However, it features voice notes that play automatically and can be paused, per the report.

AirChat was founded by venture capitalistNaval Ravikantand former Tinder product chiefBrian Norgard, according to the report.

It aims to differentiate itself from other social media apps by using voice, the report said.

Ravikant posted on the platform, Humans are all meant to get along with other humans, it just requires the natural voice, per the report.

PYMNTS Intelligence has found thatvoiceis the next interface set to revolutionize consumers lives.

Connected devices are rapidly entering a modern hands-free, voice-driven era, as next-generation advances are made in voice recognition technology and increasingly being brought to market across a wide variety of conversational commerce use cases, according to How Consumers Want to Live in the Voice Economy.

The report also found that 58% of consumers would use voice because it is easier and more convenient and 54% because it is faster than typing or using a touchscreen.

In another recent deployment of voice technology,Volkswagensaid in January that it integratedOpenAIs artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, ChatGPT, into the automakers IDAvoice assistant.

With this integration, Volkswagen customers can access an expanding AI database and have researched content read out to them while driving.

Voice assistantshave also made significant strides in areas such as smart home integration, educational settings and business applications. With advancements in AI paving the way, voice assistants will be able to complete increasingly complex tasks.

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AirChat Uses Voice Technology to Stand Out in Social Media Market - PYMNTS.com