Your workday feels like a whirlwind, right? One minute, you’re crafting an email, and then you’re jumping to Microsoft Teams. Then, you need to switch gears and update a customer record in your CRM system. Finally, with a flurry of activity, you update the team board on Asana to keep everyone on the same page.
This app hopping can be frustrating. However, there’s a solution! Automation tools can help you connect your favourite apps and automate repetitive tasks. This means less time switching between screens and more time getting things done.
Now, when you decide to explore no-code automation tools, you are likely to run into two popular options: Zapier and Make. Both are powerful tools, but which one is the better fit for you?
In this article, we’ll break down the key differences between Zapier and Make. We are not here to declare winners; we are here to guide you through each tool and help you answer the burning question: What does my business need- Zapier or Make?
What is a Workflow Automation Platform?
Let’s get started with the basic definition.
A workflow automation platform is basically a digital assistant for your work tasks. Imagine you have a set of instructions for a repetitive process, like adding new leads to your business. A workflow automation platform lets you turn those instructions into an automated flow.
Here’s how it works. You connect your favourite apps, like your CRM and email marketing tool. Then, you set up a rule, like “whenever a new lead comes in,” and an action, like “automatically add them to my email list.” Boom! The platform takes care of that repetitive task, freeing you up to focus on the bigger picture.
The Necessity for Workflow Automation in Modern Businesses
A study by InformationWeek revealed that 58% of organizations report their IT teams spend over five hours each week – that’s basically six-and-a-half work weeks annually – fulfilling repetitive tasks.
This is where workflow automation comes in. It streamlines these mundane processes, saving you tons of time and reducing errors that can creep in.
How can it help?
Workflow automation can be of great help as it tackles those mundane tasks, freeing you up to:
- Boost your productivity: By automating repetitive tasks, you free up valuable time to focus on more strategic work, like growing your business or developing new ideas.
- Reduce errors: Manual data entry is a big culprit for mistakes. Automation eliminates human error, keeping your processes consistent and reliable.
- Improve customer experience: Faster response times and smooth workflows mean happy customers. Automation helps you stay on top of things and keep your customers informed, creating a frictionless buying experience.
- Empower your team: When your team isn’t bogged down by repetitive tasks, they’re free to shine. Automation boosts morale and lets your employees focus on their strengths and tackle more strategic projects.
For example, An online store automates the process of sending order confirmations and shipping notifications. This saves them time and ensures customers are always kept in the loop, resulting in a smoother buying experience.
Workflow automation isn’t magic, but it might feel that way for your productivity and efficiency.
Leading Workflow Automation Platforms
Zapier and Make (formerly known as Integromat) are two of the leading platforms in this domain. Each offers unique features and capabilities, catering to various business needs and user skill levels. Let’s start by understanding Zapier.
Understanding Zapier
Zapier is a popular automation tool that helps you connect two or more apps like TimelinesAI, Asana, Slack, Zoho, Mailchimp and thousands more.
Zapier is renowned for its user-friendly interface, making it an excellent choice for beginners. Forget hiring a developer! Zapier uses a user-friendly, point-and-click interface. Anyone can build automations (called Zaps) without any coding knowledge.
How does Zapier Work?
Zaps are made up of two parts: triggers and actions.
Triggers: You define the event that starts your automation in the first app. This could be anything from receiving a new email to adding a new lead in your CRM.
Actions: You choose what happens on the other app in response to the trigger. This could be creating a new task, sending an email, or adding a contact to a list.
Zap it Up: Zapier monitors the trigger app. Whenever the trigger event occurs, Zapier automatically performs the action in the other app.
For example, you can set up a Zap that automatically adds a new customer from your Shopify store as a subscriber to your Mailchimp. Or you can set up a Zap to automatically add new WhatsApp contacts to TimelinesAI whenever someone messages your business number for the first time.
Bonus Tip: Zaps can be as simple or complex as you need them to be. If you’re new to automation, start with basic templates to save time on repetitive tasks.
As you get more comfortable, you can experiment with filters and conditional logic to build more advanced workflows.
Now, let’s see what Make brings to the table!
Understanding Make
Similar to Zapier, Make is a tool that helps you connect various apps you use and automate repetitive tasks between them. It allows you to visually create complex workflows between various apps and services.
It’s designed for users who need more control and customization over their automated tasks, offering a more granular approach than Zapier.
How Does Make Work?
Make operates on a visually intuitive interface where you create “Scenarios” to automate your processes. Here’s how you can use the power of Make:
Scenarios Instead of Zaps: Make uses “scenarios” instead of Zaps. Scenarios function similarly to Zaps, with triggers and actions, but they offer more flexibility and customization.
Visually Appealing Interface: Make’s interface uses a visual drag-and-drop Scenario Editor to build scenarios, making it easy to understand the workflow.
It allows you to create multi-directional workflows. This means you can set up multiple triggers and actions to occur based on different conditions.
Conditional Logic: Make allows for powerful conditional logic within scenarios. This means you can create more intricate workflows with decision points based on specific conditions.
Deep Customization: Make provides detailed control over data manipulation and integration. You can format data, use built-in functions, and even connect to APIs directly for a tailored automation experience.
Now, let’s compare these automation giants.
Make VS Zapier
Alright, we’ve peeled back the curtain and revealed the inner workings of both Zapier and Make. Now, we’re going to put these two platforms head-to-head.
Remember, there are no true winners here – the best platform depends on your specific needs!
Make VS Zapier: Integrations
When it comes to connecting your favourite apps, both Make and Zapier offer a robust selection, but with some key differences.
When it comes to the number of integrations, Zapier takes the crown, boasting over 5,000 compared to Make’s 1,200+. This means Zapier might have that one specific tool you need.
It is also constantly evolving, adding new integrations all the time. You can find these under the “Recently Launched” and “Coming Soon” options.
However, don’t get caught up in a numbers game. You will find most of the major players you need on Make as well. Both platforms cover the major players like Gmail, Slack, and popular CRMs.
Even if both platforms connect to your chosen app, how they connect can differ:
Here’s why:
Depth of Functionality: Even with the same app, Make and Zapier might offer different levels of access. Imagine you want to automate tasks in your project management tool. Zapier might just let you move tasks around, while Make might allow you to create new tasks with specific details or update existing ones with additional information.
Triggers & Actions: Triggers are what kick off your automation. Make might offer more triggers for a specific app, letting your automation react to a wider range of events within it.
Similarly, one platform might have more actions you can perform compared to the other.
Here’s how to decide:
- Check their app stores: Both Make and Zapier have searchable lists of all the apps they connect with. Take a look and see if the ones you use most are on either platform.
- Focus on what you need to do: If both platforms connect to your essential apps, think about the kind of automation you want to build. Which platform offers the features you need to make it work?
Make VS Zapier: Setting Up Workflows
Imagine you’re building a workflow – like a recipe for getting things done. Both Make and Zapier help you create these automations, but they take slightly different approaches. Let’s see which one fits your cooking style!
Make
Scenarios and Modules: Imagine building your workflow like a flowchart. In Make, you create “scenarios” that act like the main blueprint. Each step is a module, like a draggable bubble you connect on a canvas. This lets you see the entire process at a glance, which is helpful for complex workflows with many steps.
Plus, the interface is super sleek and visually appealing!
Router Tool: What if things get a little more complicated? Say you want to send different welcome emails based on the client’s location. Here’s where Make’s Router comes in.
This nifty tool lets you create multiple paths within your scenario, each with its own conditions. Data from previous steps determines which path gets followed, making it a breeze to handle even intricate decision-making.
Zapier
Zaps and Paths: Zapier’s workflows are called “Zaps.” Each Zap consists of a trigger and one or more actions. For branching logic, Zapier introduced “Paths,” which are conditional workflows within a Zap. A path allows the Zap to take different actions based on specific conditions set by the user.
Limitations on Paths: There’s a catch with Zapier Paths – you can only use up to three per Zap, and they have to be the final step. This can be restrictive for more intricate workflows, although you can get creative with webhooks (a more technical option) to break those limitations.
Here’s how to decide:
Make’s visual interface and powerful Router tool make it a great choice for complex workflows with branching logic. Zapier, with its familiar trigger-action setup and Paths for basic branching, is a good option for simpler automations.
Make VS Zapier: Ease of Use and Interface
Building automations shouldn’t feel like homework! The right platform can make it fun and efficient. Let’s see which one matches your workflow style.
Getting Started: No-Code Champs
Zapier is famous for being beginner-friendly. It walks you through creating “Zaps” (automations) with clear instructions, one step at a time.
Make, on the other hand, takes a more visual approach. You drag and drop app icons and connect them to show how data flows between them. This is great for complex workflows, but it might take a bit longer to learn the ropes if you’re new to automation.
Pre-Built Solutions
Zapier has tons of pre-made Zaps for common tasks. Need to automatically add new Gmail contacts to your CRM? Zapier probably has a ready-made solution waiting for you. These pre-built Zaps are a fantastic way to jump right in without building everything from scratch.
Look and Feel: Clean vs. Customized
Zapier keeps things clean and simple. The interface is straightforward, and everything you need is easy to find. It’s like a well-organized workspace – uncluttered and efficient. But the downside? You can’t personalize your setup much.
Make offers more customization. You can tweak how information flows between apps in your visual workflow, and the interface itself has more details. Think of it like a painter’s palette – you have a wider range of colors to create your automation masterpiece.
Make VS Zapier: Testing Issues and Error Handling
We all make mistakes. As they say, to err is human. Testing and error handling are key features in any automation platform because they help you catch and fix issues quickly. Here’s a breakdown of how Zapier and Make handle these situations.
Zapier allows you to add a special “error handling step” to any part of your Zap. If something goes wrong in the previous step, this error handler takes over and lets you define what happens next. This way, your entire automation doesn’t grind to a halt if one part hits a snag.
As Make is a visual tool, you can watch your automation (scenario) run in real time and see data processing as it happens. If there’s an error, a big red exclamation mark pops up right next to the failing module, pointing you right to the problem. No more guessing or detective work – just fix it and move on!
So, when it comes to error handling, it’s a bit of a give-and-take:
Zapier offers more control: You get dedicated error-handling steps for specific actions, allowing you to fine-tune how errors are addressed at each point in your automation.
Make offers better visual clarity: You can see your entire workflow run in real-time, with errors flagged instantly for easy identification.
Now, let’s talk about the real bottom line: how much do Zapier and Make set you back? We know money doesn’t grow on trees, so we’ll break down each platform’s pricing to ensure you’re getting the most bang for your buck.
Zapier vs Make: Pricing
Here’s a breakdown of their pricing:
Zapier Pricing
Zapier offers a variety of pricing plans to suit different needs, with a free plan available to get you started. Here’s a breakdown of their pricing structure if you choose 2,000 tasks per month:
Zapier charges based on the number of tasks your automations use each month. Tasks are basically the actions your Zaps (automations) perform. So, the more complex your Zaps, the more tasks they’ll use, and that will determine your monthly bill.
For example, a Zap that adds a new lead to your CRM and sends a welcome email would use two tasks (one for adding the lead and one for sending the email).
Make Pricing
Make.com offers a tiered pricing structure with plans for individuals and teams, catering to various automation needs. Here’s a breakdown of their pricing structure for up to 10,000 ops/month:
Make charges per operation, which is basically each time your automation runs a task.
Free Plans
Both platforms offer free plans but with key differences.
Zapier limits you to 100 tasks per month and only lets you build single-step automations (meaning they can only trigger one action in another app). This makes it tough to build anything complex without upgrading.
Plus, some cool features like auto-replay are locked behind a paywall starting at $49/month.
Make’s free plan is way more generous. They give you 1,000 operations, similar to Zapier’s tasks, and you can build multi-step automations. This means you can create more powerful workflows without spending a dime.
Value for Money: Zapier vs Make
Zapier might be significantly pricier than Make, but cost isn’t the only factor. Let’s see how they compare in terms of value.
- Zapier is great if you use common apps and have simple workflows. However, their free plan is limited, and complex automations can get expensive fast, especially if you need features like auto-replay.
- Make is ideal if you’re on a budget. Their free plan is really good, and the operation-based pricing plan offers a better cost-benefit ratio for handling large volumes of tasks.
Both platforms offer free trials, so take advantage of them! See which one feels more comfortable for you and your needs. This will help you pick the perfect tool to automate your work and free up your time for more important things.
Make VS Zapier: Delayed Functions
Both Make and Zapier offer ways to introduce pauses between steps in your workflow. This lets you control the timing of actions. For instance, delaying a welcome email for a day or two after signup creates a smoother experience for new users.
Zapier’s “Delay by Zapier” is more versatile. It lets you delay for a specific duration (hours, days) or until a specific time (like noon tomorrow). You can even ensure a minimum time between steps. This is useful for tasks that take some processing.
Make’s “Sleep Module” is simpler to use but limited. It can only delay for a maximum of 5 minutes (300 seconds). If you need longer delays, you’ll need to explore alternative methods.
So, What’s the Verdict?
So this is a quick visual glance of the differences:
Conclusion
Both Zapier and Make are great automation tools. So when you are busy thinking whether you should go with Zapier or Make, just consider your needs and try out their free plans to see which platform best suits you. Happy choosing!
