From Copy-Paste Hell to One-Click Workflows: Identifying High-ROI Automation

"I need to automate everything." No, you don't. Automating a bad process just makes it fail faster. Automating a process you only do once a year is a waste of capital.

The secret to high-ROI automation isn't knowing how to code-it's knowing what to code.

Test Before You Build

Before writing any code, run your task through this three-question filter.

The 3 Rules of High ROI

1. Frequency x Friction > Complexity

Calculate the "Annoyance Score": Ah = Hours per week spent. Fr = Frequency (Daily = 5, Weekly = 1). Sc = Score (Ah * Fr).

• Score < 5: Don't automate.
• Score 5-20: Build a Zapier automation.
• Score > 20: Build custom software (Apps Script).

2. The "Structured Input" Rule

Automation requires structured data.

• Bad: "Email me when a client feels angry." (Subjective)
• Good: "Email me when a client replies with the word 'Refund'." (Objective)

If you can't write the rule on a napkin, you can't code it.

3. The "Human Loop" Fallacy

Don't try to remove humans entirely. Low ROI: Building an AI bot to answer every customer question (Cost: $10k, Accuracy: 80%). High ROI: Building a script to route the question to the right department instantly (Cost: $500, Accuracy: 100%).

Case Study: The $50k Spreadsheet

A real estate client of mine had a Transaction Coordinator spending 20 hours/week manually creating calendar invites for inspections.

• Cost of Human: $25/hr * 20 hrs * 52 weeks = $26,000/year.
• Cost of Solution: One Apps Script (50 lines of code).
• Build Time: 3 hours.
• ROI: 8,600% in Year 1.

Where to Start?

Look for "The Bridge Tasks." These are tasks where you act as a bridge between two systems that don't talk.

• Moving data from Email to Trello.
• Moving data from Stripe to Sheets.
• Moving files from Inbox to Drive.

These are your gold mine.