Process automation with n8n

Fewer manual steps: automation for small businesses

Friday afternoon, and this month's invoices are still sitting in the inbox as PDFs. Someone has to download them, rename them, file them. That can be set up once – and after that it takes care of itself.

Which work eats up the same time every week?

It's rarely the big tasks. It's the small ones that come back every week.

The paid invoice that gets exported from the software, renamed and dragged into the right folder. The quote whose figures you retype from an email into a template. The appointment confirmation that goes out late in the evening because it got lost during the day. And at the end of the month, the same number three times, in three different windows.

Each single step takes two minutes. Together they add up to hours – every month, reliably.

You know these steps. You know they don't earn anything. And you still do them, because nobody else will. The hours keep running as long as nothing changes.

What does process automation for small businesses mean?

Process automation for small businesses means: recurring manual steps are described once and then carried out by a program – without anyone having to remember them.

Picture a quiet colleague. She can only do one thing: repeat exactly the steps you showed her once. In return she forgets nothing, never calls in sick and keeps working at three in the morning.

We build these steps in a tool called n8n that runs on our own server. You never see it and you don't have to install anything.

What you do notice is something else: the file is already where you look for it. The email has gone out. The spreadsheet is up to date.

Automating tasks doesn't mean technology takes over your business. It means it takes two minutes off your hands – a few dozen times a month.

What workflow automation looks like day to day

Invoice filing that sorts itself

Before: At the end of the month every paid invoice was downloaded from the invoicing software one by one. Each file was renamed so it could be found later, then moved into the matching cloud folder. An afternoon, every month.

Today it happens the moment payment comes in. The invoice is fetched automatically, named by invoice number and customer name and filed in the right folder.

What changes day to day: Nobody has to remember it. Whoever is looking for an invoice finds it – without asking whether it has been filed yet. And the monthly close no longer starts with an afternoon of filing.

Project documentation that happens along the way

Before: Work reports for clients ended up as PDFs in the downloads folder. At best they got sorted at some point. Most of the time they were missing exactly when a client asked.

Today a short note is enough – the workflow does the rest. The report moves into cloud storage, a card appears automatically in the right project on the project board, with the PDF attached.

What changes day to day: The documentation is created while you work instead of being missing at year end. When someone asks about the status of a project, the answer is already prepared. Once this filing runs by itself, you quickly spot the next manual step that can go.

Which tasks can be automated?

File, rename and sort invoices into the right folder
Move quote details from an enquiry straight into your template
Send appointment confirmations and reminders at the right time
Add contact form enquiries to your customer list
Pull figures from several programs into one spreadsheet
Attach work reports and photos to the right project
Send review requests once a job is finished
Create reminders for recurring tasks and deadlines

Which step comes back every week at your place? Usually it's the one you just thought of first.

How does the setup work?

1

A conversation about your day

We talk about what happens the same way every week at your place – not about technology. The conversation is free of obligation and you need no prior knowledge.

2

A proposal with effort and price

You get it in writing: what will be automated, how long it takes and what it costs. Only when that works for you do we go ahead.

3

Setup and a test run together

We build the workflow and run it as a trial together with you. You see with real cases that the result is right before it goes live.

4

Handover, then it just runs

We briefly show you what happens in the background and who to reach with questions. After that you don't have to do anything.

One fixed contact person, no hotline, no ticket number.

Why does the automation run on our own server?

Because your data then doesn't travel through third-party services. We run n8n self-hosted on our own server – invoices, customer names and addresses stay there and are not passed on to a US provider like Zapier or Make.

The second difference is the price. Those services bill per executed step. If your workflow runs more often, the bill goes up – without anything about the work having changed. With us the bill doesn't grow with the number of runs: if a workflow runs ten times as often, it doesn't cost ten times as much.

Those providers aren't bad. But for a small business working with customer data, our own server is the calmer solution.

What does process automation cost?

Billing is not per executed step. Whether a workflow runs ten or a thousand times a month makes no difference to the invoice. There are still running costs – those for the server. They are small and known in advance.

Setup

from €890 one-off

Fixed price. What your case costs is stated in the quote before we start – not as an hourly estimate afterwards.

Server costs

from €5 / month

Always covered by the client, depending on project size and task volume.

Optional care

from €59 / month

Server, system maintenance, monitoring of the workflows and small adjustments. Voluntary, cancellable at any time.

So you know before we start what to expect: a fixed price for the setup and a small monthly amount for running it. No billing that grows with usage.

Frequently asked questions about automation

The first step costs nothing

In three months, stop thinking about invoice filing. The file is already in the right folder, the report is with the project, and Friday afternoon is yours again.

Just tell us what happens the same way every week at your place. We'll look together at whether some of it can be taken off your hands – no obligation, no preparation needed.

Request a free consultation

Is automation worth it for a small business?

Yes, often especially so. What matters is not the number of employees but how often a task repeats. A workflow that saves twenty minutes every week pays off even in a two-person business – usually within a few months.

Do I need any technical skills?

No. Automation without coding means exactly that: you describe what is done by hand today, we set it up. You don't need to learn new software or install anything. At handover we show you in a few minutes what runs in the background.

How long does the setup take?

A single, clearly described workflow is usually done quickly, including testing. It takes longer when several programs have to work together. The expected duration is stated in the quote before you agree – we never start open-ended.

What if my process changes later?

Then the workflow is adjusted. Small changes – a different folder, a new recipient, an additional field – are included in ongoing care. Larger rebuilds get their own quote. Automated workflows are not set in stone.

What happens if something goes wrong?

Every run is logged. If a workflow stops – for example because another program is unreachable – you can trace it in the log. An automatic email notification can be set up on request; it is not automatically part of every workflow. Monitoring is included in the optional care package: then we notice the failure and take care of it. Without care, checking is up to you.

Will I be dependent on you afterwards?

No. The workflows we set up belong to you and can be handed over at any time, so another provider or your own server can keep running them. The workflows can be exported and passed on in full; only the credentials for the connected programs have to be entered again by the new operator – that is a security feature, not an obstacle. You also get a written description of what happens. Anyone who wants to switch should be able to do so without negotiation.

What about my data and the GDPR?

Your data sits on a server we run ourselves – not with a US service. Only the data a given workflow actually needs is processed. A data processing agreement is available on request. We name the server location and provider in the quote.