Here’s everything you need to know about integrations, plus a look at how integrations on Unqork’s no-code platform can help optimize your enterprise.
Across every industry, there’s more market competition than ever before. Staying relevant and differentiating yourself from competitors can seem daunting, and it’s tempting to try to provide every service a user could possibly want all on your own. However, there’s a smarter (and easier!) way to go. Collaborating with other enterprises that will help you provide end-users with extraordinary services is key to giving your users more of what they want, which in turn pushes you far ahead of the competition.
Integrations are vital to building connections that foster growth, inspire innovation, and drive value. They can also help optimize your internal processes. Here’s everything you need to know about integrations and how they can help improve your business.
What are Integrations?
Today’s enterprises must engage with a large and varied set of digital services in order to work efficiently, meet customer demands, and stay competitive. Unfortunately, these services often don’t come as a package deal.
For example, an enterprise might use a CRM service to collect and organize customer information, an issue-tracking service to handle service requests, and a non-relational database to handle important analytics. All these tools are important, but it would be time-consuming and inefficient to toggle back and forth between these unique systems all day. Not to mention, you must ensure any and all changes made on these individual platforms are accurately reflected across your entire IT environment.
In 2018, Gartner predicted that 50% of the enterprise IT team’s time and money would be spent on implementing digital integrations in 2020—and that was before we knew COVID-19 would drive up demand for digital services.
Integrations bring together different platforms and services, where each service typically addresses a particular use-case, to form a unified system. Integrations are made possible thanks to application programming interfaces (APIs). APIs are tiny bits of code that allow different software platforms to communicate with each other and define how creators request information from one application OS to another. APIs increase security since the software platforms involved only share necessary information, simplify integrations by merging new and existing architecture, and much more. By connecting different services together using APIs, integrations help facilitate the seamless flow of information and coordination of various processes.
Why Integrations are Essential
In 2018, Gartner predicted that 50% of the enterprise IT team’s time and money would be spent on implementing digital integrations in 2020—and that was before we knew COVID-19 would drive up demand for digital services. Now, over a year into the pandemic, the need to connect different digital services together is more urgent than ever. Here are three key ways integrations can help take your enterprise to the next level.
1. Expand your product ecosystem
As we established earlier, it’s nearly impossible for a single enterprise to provide absolutely everything a customer needs in today’s digital landscape. To remain competitive, enterprises must collaborate with other businesses to bring important products and platforms into their ecosystem. Integrations form seamless connections between these services so your users can access everything they need to complete their customer journey without leaving your application.
2. Increase internal operational efficiency
Using integrations to connect third-party services and applications to your own platform increases system functionality and boosts the efficiency of internal operations. For example, the Unqork platform integrates with DocuSign, SignNow, and Adobe Sign, three popular services that make it easy for members of your enterprise to manage electronic agreements, track e-signature completion, securely store signed documents, and more.
By integrating with any of these tools, you don’t have to worry about documents getting lost in the shuffle or projects coming to a standstill because a team member forgot to sign off on an important form. Once repetitive tasks and business processes have been taken care of by a trusted, enterprise-grade third-party service, you can shift your focus back to driving value.
Watch our brief demo to see how easy it is to set-up integrations using Unqork.
3. Accommodate legacy systems
In the midst of a digital transformation, you may not be able to completely move away from legacy systems and start fresh immediately. Integrations that connect old systems to modern systems are an excellent way to keep services running smoothly as you continue your digitization efforts.
Solving Integration Implementation Challenges with Unqork
For many enterprises, managing integrations is easier said than done. If you’re using a code-based or low-code platform, you’ll likely run into issues with integration. Integrations with code are notoriously complicated since engineers must constantly ensure new integrations are compatible with legacy systems while managing the ever-growing code base. If your legacy code can’t accommodate integrations, you’ll end up with an application that only works in a vacuum and doesn’t expand your product capabilities. Low-code allows you to complete modern integrations using visual configuration, but you’ll still have to use code for your most complex data transformations.
On the Unqork platform, building connections between services couldn’t be easier. We help facilitate easy integrations between services in a fully visual environment perfectly suited for your enterprise’s needs. You can seamlessly integrate modern systems with legacy technologies without any scripting and easily configure APIs using plug-in components to offer increased functionality. Also, you can easily move data into BI platforms like Tableau, Excel, and Qlik. Stay competitive in today’s rapidly changing market is all about making the right connections, and with Unqork, they’re right at your fingertips.
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