and automation are not only a pattern — they’re remodeling how corporations function.
In a earlier article, I shared a number of case research of AI Brokers supporting the sustainability roadmaps of small, medium and huge corporations.
That is a part of a 4-month exploration of how agentic AI can drive enterprise digital transformations.
All of it started after I found no-code instruments like n8n, which let you design and automate highly effective workflows with just some clicks.
My co-founder summed up the chance completely:
“We want a technique to deploy easy and environment friendly options to scale our supply of analytics and automation.”
So we set to work.
We constructed case research and prototypes to indicate how these AI brokers will help clients speed up digital transformation.
In the present day, AI brokers for workflow Automation signify over 60% of our income.
On this article, I need to share the within story of our explorative journey and the way we turned this chance right into a enterprise so you’ll be able to study to copy our method.
Removed from buzzwords and clickbait articles, we are going to take a realistic method to explaining how these instruments can convey added worth to companies with out promoting desires.
In brief, we are going to cowl
- What sorts of examples and case research we shared to draw clients
- The issues prospects delivered to us (and the way we hearken to their wants)
- How can we promote these options (ROI arguments and enterprise affect)
When you’ve been questioning the right way to flip automation and AI brokers right into a worthwhile service, this text is an effective inspiration to start out investigating.
How Case Research Introduced Clients to Our Door
Studying by doing
After I need to study a brand new device, I create case research.
When OpenAI launched its first GPT API, I began exploring LangChain with a case study shared in this blog.
It’s my favorite method to flip curiosity into hands-on experience.
Subsequently, my weblog accommodates over 70 case research masking analytics for provide chain optimisation, logistics price discount, and sustainability.
So after I found AI-powered workflow automation with n8n, I replicated this confirmed course of:
- Be taught the fundamentals of the device
- Decide an instance of an operational or enterprise drawback from the a number of tasks I performed up to now.
- Construct a prototype and measure its affect
- Publish a case examine
My n8n creator profile turned a playground to attach enterprise and operational issues with real-world options.
This method sharpened my abilities and have become a lift to draw clients on the lookout for sensible options to their issues.
Learn how to choose your first case examine?
I began by specializing in the most vital ache factors I had seen throughout my 9+ years in logistics — throughout 3PLs, FMCG corporations, and luxurious manufacturers.
What guide processes have been draining productiveness and limiting capability?
One instance that got here to thoughts was from the distribution operations of a trend firm in China.
The pallets, shipped from Europe, have been delivered by a truck within the morning.
Sadly, we weren’t linked to the provider by way of Electronic Data Interchange (EDI).
We needed to depend on electronic mail exchanges to know what we might obtain.
This meant warehouse admins needed to:
- Evaluation the emails coming from the client’s logistics staff.
- Manually enter order particulars into the system (PO quantity, supply date, SKU ID, portions)
What are the ache factors right here?
It is a bottleneck for the reception course of.
Certainly, if the orders will not be keyed into the system, inbound groups can’t obtain the pallets.
However extra importantly, this guide course of impacts the productiveness of admin groups that spend time on duties that don’t present added worth.
Subsequently, I used this instance to construct my first n8n automation.
It’s a easy workflow linked to Gmail that routinely analyses all of the emails associated to inbound orders.
A GPT-powered AI node analyses the content material of the e-mail to extract the order data.
The output is saved in a spreadsheet able to be loaded into the system by a script.
For extra details about this workflow, verify the whole tutorial right here
What occurred after I revealed this workflow?
The Issues Purchasers Introduced — and How We Solved Them
After publishing, prospects from totally different industries and nations started searching for assist with related issues.
That is answering a standard drawback: the dearth of interconnectivity between programs.
Earlier than, corporations would depend on guide work to bridge the gaps.
Now, we will deploy AI brokers to automate these bridges.
A furnishings firm within the Netherlands contacted us.
Part of their worth chain (small suppliers) wasn’t linked by way of EDI.
Subsequently, they relied on guide processes to ship and obtain orders.
After a number of interviews with their IT staff, we realized:
- The programs might generate EDI messages
- However they couldn’t obtain or course of incoming messages
Subsequently, now we have proposed a workaround
- The sender would generate the EDI message and ship it by way of electronic mail
- An n8n workflow would accumulate the e-mail, parse the content material and save the outputs.
Now we have now eliminated a major ache level for the client by “partially” automating the method.
On this instance, AI brokers present an awesome added worth: adapting the device to the format of the EDI message.
This makes the device extra strong and adaptable to the totally different programs their suppliers are utilizing.
For extra data on implementing this answer (with the template obtainable), verify this tutorial.
This answer has a number of benefits:
- It’s cheaper and simpler to deploy than correctly connecting the furnishings firm to every provider.
- This improves the info high quality and permits the corporate to allocate these information enter groups to customer support.
This was our first victory and proof that we will assist companies with easy options.
For the next tasks, we developed a course of to qualify clients and standardised the options design.
- Outline the issue confronted by the client
→ We have to manually enter orders obtained from suppliers. - Discover the basis trigger
→ Absence of Digital Knowledge Interchange (EDI) connections - Design an answer
→ AI-powered workflow automation to parse EDI messages.
However, how can we promote these options?
I’ll share our technique for promoting these automation options within the subsequent part.
How We Promote These Options
After constructing and testing these automation prototypes, the following problem was clear: How can we place and promote these options to purchasers?
Contemplating that the majority of our leads come from my content material (Towards Data Science, YouTube, n8n Creator Page), we developed three gross sales approaches tailored to the request of the prospect.
The thought is to adapt the gross sales pitch to clear enterprise outcomes and return on funding (ROI).
Method 1: Automate to Enhance Productiveness
That is the first concern of our clients.
They’re pressured to scale back prices by bettering the productiveness of their operators and admin groups.
Prospect: “A customer support admin can course of 6 orders per hour with our guide course of. What number of orders are you able to course of with AI?”
When now we have a buyer with a case associated to productiveness, we focus our questions on:
- Defining the present workflow, together with each step with an in depth description (information enter, outputs, programs used)
- Estimating the present productiveness (variety of actions per hour) and the workforce price ($/hour)
For example, an company specializing in ESG consulting approached us to assist them automate their sustainability regulation monitoring course of.
They ask their extremely expert (excessive hourly price) ESG analysts to assessment the European Parliament’s exercise experiences and choose these associated to sustainability.
Prospect: “We wish these analysts to concentrate on duties with increased added worth.”
We developed a workflow to fully automate this course of with an AI agent, offering a excessive return on funding.
ROI = Time Saved × Hourly Fee of Analysts
This straightforward calculation is essential to convincing the choice maker that it’s value investing assets and cash in implementing your automation.
To our prospect: “This answer will prevent XXX euros per thirty days, you’ll get better your funding by YYY months.”
For extra details about this workflow, verify the whole tutorial
For some prospects, the precedence is bringing extra enterprise; we will additionally use AI.
Method 2: Automate for Advertising & Promotion
In my startup, LogiGreen, we have been the primary customers of this type of workflow.
As a small construction, we don’t have the monetary means to recruit an entire Marketing and business.
How can we construct an automatic machine of content material distribution to extend our attain?
Subsequently, we depend on automation to advertise our enterprise — a good way to create or curate partaking content material.
The screenshot above comes from an electronic mail generated by our absolutely automated publication.
- Yow will discover hyperlinks to our web site within the header and footer.
- The distribution record consists of all our clients and prospects.
We use n8n with GPT-4o to automate this answer.
This straightforward workflow makes use of a classification agent to curate an inventory of articles associated to sustainability coming from a number of sources (EU information, specialised journals, social media).
The AI agent handles the editorial selections primarily based on the directions in its system immediate.
It is a superb method for us to create an internet group, keep high of thoughts with our clients, and share partaking content material.
To our prospects: “With this content material creation machine, you’ll be able to occupy the house, present worth and create an internet group centered round your enterprise.”
We at the moment are promoting this “content material creation machine” to our prospects!
For extra details about this “automated publication”, verify the video beneath
Some prospects that contacted us mentioned their high precedence isn’t just productiveness or advertising.
Method 3: Automate for High quality and Error Discount
They need to guarantee high quality and scale back errors, particularly in crucial reporting and compliance workflows.
For example, a rising variety of corporations have to adjust to the Company Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD)
This requires publishing ESG disclosures in machine-readable XHTML format, embedded with XBRL tags.
These experiences should meet strict formatting and compliance requirements to be accepted by regulators.
Prospect: “Now we have points with formatting our experiences accurately.”
To assist this prospect, we developed an n8n workflow that helps sustainability groups and ESG consultants routinely audit these experiences.
Their analysts should electronic mail a draft of the report back to a selected tackle.
The attachment is downloaded, and its content material is analysed to seek out lacking values and format errors.
The output of this audit is shipped to an AI agent that may clarify, in plain English, the errors discovered within the report.
We place this product as lowering errors to avoid wasting money and time.
Earlier than having this device, they relied on a third-party firm to verify their experiences.
By automating the audit course of, corporations can:
- Keep away from expensive reporting errors
- Cut back the chance of regulatory non-compliance
- Speed up turnaround time on experiences
- Unlock professional assets to concentrate on evaluation, not formatting.
The Return On Funding right here comes from minimising rework prices and delays whereas growing the reliability of reported information.
For extra particulars about this automation, verify this tutorial (together with the n8n template)
You’ll uncover that the core block of this audit device nonetheless makes use of deterministic code (for reliability).
Nevertheless, AI is bettering the consumer expertise by offering explanations in plain English.
To our prospects: “You don’t must be an XHTML professional to appropriate the report.”
We’re promoting this to our clients: AI gives superior analytics-as-a-service capabilities to any firm.
Conclusion
Over the previous few months, now we have reworked automation from a private exploration right into a promising enterprise supply.
By specializing in three key approaches — bettering productiveness, boosting advertising attain, and guaranteeing high quality — we helped corporations throughout industries resolve actual issues, save time and enhance their affect.
We don’t promote desires with AGI changing their complete provide chain departments.
The chance right here is big.
Companies search individuals who can bridge the hole between operational challenges and automation options.
When you’re interested in beginning your automation journey, I’ll present frequent updates on this weblog.
If you wish to implement these options for your enterprise, be happy to attach with me on LinkedIn.
About Me
Let’s join on Linkedin and Twitter; I’m a Supply Chain Engineer utilizing information analytics to enhance logistics operations and scale back prices.
For consulting or recommendation on analytics and sustainable provide chain transformation, be happy to contact me by way of Logigreen Consulting.
Samir Saci | Data Science & Productivity
A technical blog focusing on Data Science, Personal Productivity, Automation, Operations Research and Sustainable…samirsaci.com
