You’re the marketing department, the accounts team, the customer service line, and the person who actually does the work. When you run a business on your own, every job that isn’t billable still lands on your desk. Replying to enquiries, chasing invoices, sending reminders, posting on social. None of it pays, and all of it has to happen.

Here’s the better news. Most of that repetitive admin can run itself. Research from Sage found small business owners effectively lose around a month of productive time every year to admin work, and a big chunk of that is the same handful of tasks repeating on a loop (Sage, 2025).

You don’t need to automate everything at once. You need the first five that give you the biggest time back for the least effort. Here they are, in the order I’d build them.

What do you actually need to get started?

Almost nothing. You need a free Make.com account and the logins for tools you already use, like Gmail, your booking calendar, or a Google Sheet. Make connects those apps and passes information between them, so a single new enquiry can trigger an email, a spreadsheet row, and a text message without you lifting a finger.

The free plan gives you 1,000 operations a month, which is plenty to test your first few scenarios. Paid plans start at around USD $9 a month, roughly NZ$15, if you outgrow it (Zapier, 2026). If you’re brand new to the tool, read our guide to what Make.com is and how it works first, then come back here.

1. Reply to every new enquiry within minutes

This is the one that pays for itself fastest. When someone fills in your contact form or sends a message, the clock starts. Reply in five minutes and you look switched on and available. Reply the next morning and they’ve often already booked someone else.

An instant auto-reply buys you breathing room. It confirms you got their message, sets expectations on when you’ll respond properly, and stops good leads going cold while you’re busy on a job.

How to build it

1. Create a free Make.com account and start a new scenario.
2. Add a trigger module that watches where your enquiries land, like your contact form, Gmail, or Instagram messages.
3. Add an email module that sends an instant reply thanking them and telling them when you’ll be in touch.
4. Drop in a Claude or ChatGPT module if you want the reply tailored to what they actually asked.
5. Turn the scenario on and set it to check for new enquiries every 15 minutes.
6. Send yourself a test enquiry and confirm the reply lands.

Once this clicks, you’ll see how the same logic powers bigger flows. It’s the exact foundation behind a full automated client onboarding sequence.

2. Capture every lead into a spreadsheet automatically

How many enquiries are scattered across your inbox, your DMs, and a notebook on the desk right now? When leads live in five places, they slip through the cracks, and you’ve no idea where your work is actually coming from.

Build a scenario that drops every new enquiry into one Google Sheet, with the date, name, contact details, and what they wanted. Add a step that pings you on your phone or in Slack so you never miss a hot one. Now you’ve got a simple CRM that builds itself, and a clear view of which marketing is paying off.

3. Send booking and appointment reminders automatically

No-shows are pure lost income. The slot is gone, the time is wasted, and you can’t get it back. For a solo operator, a couple of no-shows a week adds up fast over a year.

Set up an automation that reads your calendar and sends a friendly reminder by email or text the day before, then again a couple of hours out. People are busy and they forget. A reminder that costs you nothing to send protects bookings you’ve already won.

4. Chase unpaid invoices without the awkward conversation

Following up on money you’re owed is the job nobody enjoys. So it gets put off, and the invoice sits unpaid for weeks while you quietly stress about cash flow.

Hand it to a machine instead. Connect your invoicing tool or a tracking sheet to Make, and have it send a polite nudge three days after the due date, then a firmer one a week later. The reminders go out on schedule, the tone stays professional, and you’re not the one sending the uncomfortable email. You just get paid sooner.

5. Turn one piece of content into a week of posts

Showing up online matters, but writing fresh posts every day is a fast track to burnout when you’re the only one doing it. The fix isn’t more effort, it’s reusing what you already make.

Build a scenario where you drop in one blog post, video, or long caption, and a Claude or ChatGPT module spins it into several shorter posts for different platforms. Save those into a sheet or push them straight to a scheduler. One good idea becomes a week of content, and you’ve stopped staring at a blank screen every morning.

Which one should you build first?

If I had to pick one to start with this week, it’d be the instant enquiry reply. It’s the simplest to set up, it touches money directly, and the moment you see a lead get a reply while you’re out on a job, automation stops being an abstract idea and starts being a thing you trust.

Don’t try to build all five in one sitting. Get one working, let it run for a few days, and notice the admin that quietly stops landing on you. Then build the next. Once you’re comfortable, you can layer on smarter flows like automated cold outreach with Claude AI and Make.com. The goal isn’t a clever robot. It’s getting your evenings back.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to know how to code to use Make.com?
No. Make is a no-code tool, so you build automations by dragging modules onto a canvas and connecting them. If you can follow a recipe, you can build your first scenario. The hardest part is usually deciding what to automate, not the building itself.

How much does it cost to get started?
Nothing to begin with. The free Make.com plan includes 1,000 operations a month, which easily covers a few automations while you learn. Most solo operators only move to a paid plan, starting around NZ$15 a month, once automation is clearly saving them time.

What’s the easiest automation to build first?
An instant reply to new enquiries. It uses one trigger and one action, it’s hard to get wrong, and the payoff is immediate because you stop losing leads to slow responses. It’s the best confidence builder of the five.

Is it safe to connect my email and accounts?
Yes, within reason. Make uses secure, official connections to apps like Gmail and Google Sheets, and you can disconnect any of them at any time. Start with low-risk tools, test with your own data first, and only expand once you trust how a scenario behaves.

How long does it take to set one up?
Your first automation usually takes an afternoon, mostly spent learning where things live. After that, similar scenarios take 20 to 30 minutes. The time you invest once keeps paying you back every week the automation runs.

What if I use New Zealand tools that aren’t on the list?
Make connects to thousands of apps, and most popular tools are supported. If yours isn’t, you can often still connect it using email triggers, webhooks, or a Google Sheet as the middle layer. There’s nearly always a workaround.

Related guides: What is Make.com and why everyone’s talking about it · How to automate your Etsy shop with Make.com · The NZ business owner’s AI starter guide

Ready to get your time back?

You don’t have to figure all of this out alone, or spend your weekends watching tutorials. We build done-for-you automation systems for solo operators and small teams across New Zealand, so the admin runs itself while you do the work that actually pays.

See how our automation services can take the busywork off your plate.