Robert Weißbach
Technical Editor
Last updated on
14.8.24
Best Practice
Database Automation: Revolutionize Your Ninox Databases with Make
4
min
Table of contents
Create, delete, and update records. Upload and download files that are attached to records. List databases, tables, records, and files: These are just a few examples of tasks you can automate in Ninox, and they're just the tip of the Ninox automation iceberg.
What if you could automatically create documents from the information in your databases? Contracts, confidentiality agreements, letters of intent, letters of thanks, etc. How about automatic notifications when records that meet specific criteria appear in one of your databases? You could send notifications for regular events (such as a sum of values by time period) to rare but possible events that you don't want to miss.
But you might also want to automate the collection of data from every conceivable source: emails, social media platforms, digital forms, Facebook and Google ads, or other databases; you set the conditions and let the data flow by itself. This makes it clearer what “Ninox automation” means: It's about reclaiming time and resources by connecting Ninox to other applications and putting tasks on autopilot — and above all: all of the examples above can be easily achieved by using Make to connect Ninox to other applications.
What is Make?
Make was launched in February 2022 and is the leading visual platform that allows anyone to design, build, and automate everything—from tasks and workflows to applications and systems—without programming. When it comes to Ninox automation, there's nothing better than this pair.
Create 15 Ninox endpoints (also known as modules) to to automate database administration, connect Ninox to more than 1,000 applications and automate your journey to more meaningful work.
But as an old saying goes, it's always better to show something than to tell something, so let's take a look at three Ninox processes that you can automate in just a few minutes with Make.
Automatically save email content to a database
Adding new information to a database is the cornerstone of database management.
At the same time, it is a tedious task that requires many working hours when carried out manually, drives up costs and opens the door to avoidable errors in the charging process.
With Make, you can automate the loading of data and tailor it exactly to your needs. Let's say you want to maintain a database of email communications between you and your customers to optimize your customer service.
In its simplest form, this issue would require basic integration between your email client and a Ninox database:
Connect digital forms to Ninox
The same concept we saw above applies to digital forms as well. If you want to collect incoming form data into a Ninox database, a two-step integration between the digital form app of your choice and Ninox is enough:
Avoid duplicate records in your databases
As you probably know, the process of loading data isn't always linear and easy. Duplicate records, for example, can cause chaos, but Make can also take care of that.
Take the following template, which allows you to create new records in a Ninox database for Stripe payments.
Since no one wants duplicate records for repeat customers, Make searches the database for existing customers and creates the records accordingly.
If the customer does not exist in the database, a record is created with the new customer. If it exists, the data in the database is used to create the record and avoid duplication. This is how you kill two birds with one stone!
These are just three examples of what you can do with Make, but there's always more, and that's where your business needs come in.
Once you figure out which processes can be automated, Make will help you reach new heights in scalability, growth, and efficiency.
Say goodbye to data silos
Companies today have more data at their disposal than ever before. This includes internal data, but also publicly available data from online sources.
The ability to collect, process, and integrate data from various sources — internal departments, customers, partners, transactions, third-party apps — is one of the key challenges of our time.
That is exactly what makes tools like Ninox and Make so relevant: They are best-in-class products for managing and processing data. But above all, they make the task of data management affordable for all parties involved.
If you're passionate about data, Ninox and Make help you process tons of data and uncover all kinds of information and insights that would otherwise remain hidden.
And if you're not passionate about data, Ninox and Make will take the burden off your shoulders, improve your efficiency and reduce the chance of errors when managing data — that's no small feat either!
If you're curious about where to start, we recommend that you get started very simply: subscribe to Make and automate a simple data loading process for your Ninox databases.
Once you see the results, it's only a matter of time before you start building incredible things — or, as we like to say, work the way you want to.
