10 Essential Integrations That Are Significantly Cheaper and More Powerful on Make.com
In today’s fast-paced business world, efficiency isn’t just a buzzword; it’s a critical determinant of survival and growth. Fragmented software systems, manual data transfers, and expensive custom integrations often plague businesses, particularly those scaling rapidly. Companies spend countless hours and exorbitant sums trying to get their essential tools to “talk” to each other, leading to data silos, errors, and an overwhelming drain on valuable human capital. The promise of an integrated tech stack often comes with a hefty price tag, making robust automation seem like an exclusive luxury. However, this no longer has to be the case. Make.com (formerly Integromat) has emerged as a game-changer, democratizing complex system integrations and offering a significantly more cost-effective and flexible alternative to traditional iPaaS solutions or bespoke development. It’s not just about connecting apps; it’s about building sophisticated, resilient workflows that save you time, reduce operational costs, and free up your high-value employees to focus on what truly matters. We’ve seen firsthand how businesses, especially in HR and recruiting, can leverage Make.com to achieve enterprise-level automation without the enterprise-level budget. This article explores ten critical integrations that become not just possible, but significantly cheaper and more efficient when built on Make.com.
1. CRM and Applicant Tracking System (ATS) Synchronization
Integrating your CRM with your ATS is fundamental for any recruiting firm or internal HR team managing candidate pipelines and client relationships. Without it, you face constant data reentry, missed communication, and a disjointed view of your interactions. Traditional custom integrations or enterprise-level iPaaS solutions can charge per record, per sync, or per hour of development, quickly escalating costs into the tens of thousands annually. Make.com, however, offers an entirely different model. Its module-based pricing and visual builder drastically reduce development time and ongoing operational costs. You can set up scenarios to automatically transfer new leads from your CRM (e.g., Keap, HubSpot, Salesforce) into your ATS (e.g., Greenhouse, Lever, Bullhorn) as new job requisitions or candidate profiles. Conversely, candidate status updates from the ATS can flow back into the CRM, keeping account managers informed. This bidirectional sync ensures a “single source of truth,” eliminating the need for manual updates and reducing errors. For instance, we’ve helped clients automate the creation of a new candidate record in their ATS every time a specific form is submitted via their CRM, complete with resume parsing and initial screening data, all for a fraction of the cost of other solutions. The cost savings come from Make.com’s efficient operational pricing, where complex multi-step scenarios consume fewer “operations” than direct API calls might incur on other platforms, coupled with the rapid deployment possible with its low-code interface.
2. Automated Document Generation and Management
Generating offer letters, employment contracts, NDAs, or client proposals is a frequent, time-consuming task in HR, recruiting, and sales. Manually populating templates with candidate or client-specific data is prone to error and takes valuable time away from strategic work. Tools like PandaDoc, DocuSign, or Conga provide solutions, but integrating them seamlessly with your CRM, HRIS, or ATS can be expensive. Make.com excels here by acting as the central orchestrator. It can pull data from various sources—your ATS for candidate details, your HRIS for employment terms, or your CRM for client information—and dynamically populate a document template in a platform like Google Docs, Microsoft Word (via OneDrive/SharePoint), or even directly into PandaDoc or DocuSign, then trigger the sending for signature. The cost efficiency stems from Make.com’s ability to handle complex data mapping and conditional logic without needing a developer. You pay for the operations, not for custom code every time your document structure changes. For example, an offer letter automation can fetch salary details, start dates, and role descriptions from an HR system, inject them into a template, convert it to PDF, and then upload it to a secure cloud storage, all before sending it for e-signature, significantly cheaper than a dedicated document automation platform’s integration capabilities.
3. HRIS and Payroll System Integration
The chasm between HR Information Systems (HRIS) and payroll platforms is a notorious source of manual work and potential errors. New hires, terminations, salary changes, and benefits updates often require dual entry, leading to discrepancies and compliance risks. While some HRIS and payroll providers offer native integrations, they are often basic, expensive, or limited in scope. Make.com provides a flexible and significantly cheaper alternative to build robust, custom connections. It can monitor your HRIS (e.g., BambooHR, ADP, Workday) for changes in employee status, salary, or benefits enrollment, and then automatically push those updates to your payroll system (e.g., Gusto, QuickBooks Payroll, ADP). This eliminates manual data entry, reduces human error, and ensures timely and accurate payroll processing. The cost saving comes from bypassing costly premium integration tiers from HRIS or payroll providers and building exactly what you need with Make.com’s extensive module library. Its visual interface allows for complex conditional logic, such as only updating payroll for active employees or after a specific approval step, all without needing to hire a full-time integration specialist.
4. Lead Scoring and Routing Automation
Effective lead management is crucial for sales and recruiting, but manually scoring leads and routing them to the right team member is time-consuming and inefficient. Many CRMs offer basic lead scoring, but integrating external data sources (e.g., website activity, email engagement, firmographic data from tools like Clearbit) to enrich scores and then route based on complex rules can be prohibitively expensive with other solutions. Make.com excels at this for a fraction of the cost. It can pull data from multiple sources—a new form submission, a LinkedIn ad interaction, a website visit tracked by Google Analytics, or a data enrichment tool—combine it, apply custom scoring logic, and then automatically update your CRM or assign the lead to the appropriate sales rep or recruiter. For instance, a lead from a specific industry and company size, indicating high potential, could be immediately assigned to a senior recruiter, while a lower-scoring lead enters a nurture sequence. Make.com’s affordability comes from its ability to process a high volume of operations at a lower cost per operation, and its visual builder allows for quick iteration on lead scoring rules without developer intervention, ensuring your sales and recruiting teams are always working on the hottest prospects.
5. Automated Data Backup and Archiving
Data is the lifeblood of any business, and robust backup and archiving strategies are non-negotiable for compliance, disaster recovery, and operational continuity. However, many SaaS applications, especially CRMs like Keap or HighLevel, don’t offer comprehensive, granular backup solutions out-of-the-box that are easily accessible or restorable without significant manual effort or expensive add-ons. Building custom scripts for regular data dumps can be costly and requires technical expertise. Make.com provides a significantly cheaper and more reliable method for automated data backup and archiving. It can connect to virtually any SaaS application with an API (or a pre-built module) and schedule regular exports of your critical data—customer records, pipeline stages, communication logs, etc.—to secure cloud storage like Google Drive, Dropbox, Amazon S3, or even a database like Google Sheets or Airtable for easy access and audit trails. We’ve implemented systems that regularly pull all contact records and their associated notes from Keap, converting them into structured files and archiving them daily, offering peace of mind at a fraction of the cost of dedicated backup services that often lack flexibility. This ensures you always own and control your data, mitigating risks associated with vendor lock-in or service interruptions.
6. Social Media Management and Content Distribution
Managing a company’s social media presence across multiple platforms and ensuring consistent content distribution can be a full-time job. Tools exist for scheduling, but the integration between content creation, approval workflows, and posting across diverse platforms (LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) can become complex and expensive. Make.com offers a highly cost-effective solution for automating parts of your social media strategy. It can monitor a specific folder for new content, an RSS feed for blog posts, or even a shared Google Sheet for scheduled updates. Once new content is detected, Make.com can automatically format it and post it to multiple social media channels, schedule it, or even pass it to an approval system. For example, a new blog post published on your website can trigger a Make.com scenario that extracts the title, URL, and a snippet, then creates tailored posts for LinkedIn and Twitter, all within minutes. The cost advantage is clear: instead of paying for expensive, all-in-one social media management platforms that may not offer the granular control you need, Make.com allows you to custom-build your automation workflows, leveraging individual platform APIs for direct posting, thus optimizing your expenditure on social media tools.
7. Automated Internal Communications and Notifications
Keeping teams informed and engaged, especially in remote or hybrid environments, is vital. However, manually sending out updates, reminders, or celebratory messages across various internal communication channels (Slack, Microsoft Teams, email) is a repetitive task that distracts from core responsibilities. Many platforms offer basic integrations, but custom, conditional notifications based on specific events can be costly to set up. Make.com provides a much cheaper way to orchestrate intelligent internal communications. It can monitor project management tools (e.g., Asana, Trello, Monday.com) for task completions, CRMs for new lead assignments, or HRIS for employee anniversaries, and then automatically send customized notifications to the relevant team members or channels. For instance, when a critical sales deal closes in your CRM, Make.com can instantly post a congratulatory message in a Slack channel, notify the finance department via email, and update a performance dashboard. This dynamic, event-driven communication keeps everyone in the loop without human intervention. Make.com’s cost-effectiveness lies in its ability to connect disparate systems and apply complex logic for notification triggers, all within a single, affordable platform, replacing the need for multiple, expensive point-to-point integrations.
8. Expense Report and Receipt Automation
Processing expense reports is a notorious drain on administrative resources, often involving manual data entry, receipt matching, and multi-step approval processes. While dedicated expense management software exists, integrating it deeply with accounting systems and ensuring receipts are properly categorized and stored can incur significant integration costs. Make.com offers a highly efficient and significantly cheaper alternative. It can monitor a designated email inbox or cloud storage folder for new receipts. Using its OCR capabilities or integration with tools like Kofax, it can extract key information—vendor, amount, date—and then automatically create an expense entry in an accounting system (e.g., QuickBooks, Xero) or a spreadsheet for review. It can also route these entries for approval based on predefined rules (e.g., expenses over $500 go to a manager, under $500 are auto-approved). The cost savings are monumental: reduced manual entry errors, faster reimbursement cycles, and fewer hours spent by administrative staff on mundane tasks. Make.com’s flexibility to integrate with various receipt capture methods and accounting platforms, without requiring custom code for each connection, makes it an incredibly powerful and affordable solution compared to rigid, all-in-one systems.
9. Project Management and Task Synchronization
Teams often use different project management tools (PMs) or need to synchronize tasks across internal PMs and client-facing ones. Maintaining consistency and avoiding duplicate efforts in a multi-tool environment can be incredibly complex and expensive if relying on manual updates or high-tier enterprise connectors. Make.com simplifies and cheapens this critical integration. It can create scenarios to automatically synchronize tasks, milestones, and status updates between various project management platforms like Asana, Monday.com, Jira, Trello, or even Google Tasks. For example, when a new client project is initiated in your CRM, Make.com can automatically create a corresponding project in Asana with predefined tasks and assignees. As tasks are completed in Asana, their status can be updated in a shared client-facing spreadsheet or another PM tool. This bidirectional synchronization ensures that all stakeholders have the most up-to-date information, regardless of their preferred tool. The cost benefit stems from Make.com’s vast library of pre-built modules for popular PM tools, allowing for rapid deployment of complex syncs without custom API development, minimizing both setup and ongoing operational costs compared to dedicated project integration services.
10. Website Form Submissions to CRM/HRIS/ATS
Every website generates leads, inquiries, and applications through various forms. The manual process of collecting this data, categorizing it, and then entering it into the relevant system (CRM for leads, HRIS/ATS for job applicants, support system for inquiries) is a huge time sink and a major bottleneck. While many form builders offer basic integrations, complex conditional routing or multi-system updates often require premium plans or custom coding. Make.com offers a profoundly cheaper and more flexible solution for form automation. It can instantly capture submissions from popular form builders (e.g., Typeform, Jotform, Google Forms, WordPress forms) and then, based on the content of the submission, route the data to the correct system. For example, a job application form could automatically create a candidate profile in your ATS, send a confirmation email to the applicant, and notify the hiring manager on Slack. A sales inquiry form could create a new lead in your CRM, tag them appropriately, and assign them to a sales representative. This eliminates manual data entry, speeds up response times, and ensures no lead or applicant falls through the cracks. Make.com’s affordability here is paramount, as it provides a single, low-cost platform to manage all your inbound data flows, replacing potentially dozens of expensive, individual form integrations and custom development.
Integrating your essential business systems doesn’t have to break the bank or require a team of developers. Make.com empowers businesses to build sophisticated, cross-application workflows that drive efficiency, reduce human error, and save significant operational costs. From HR and recruiting to sales and general operations, the ability to connect disparate tools seamlessly and affordably transforms how businesses operate. We’ve seen our clients save upwards of 25% of their day by strategically implementing these types of automations, allowing their high-value employees to focus on strategic initiatives rather than mundane data entry. By leveraging the power and cost-effectiveness of Make.com, you can achieve enterprise-grade automation and integration, regardless of your budget, and truly unlock your team’s potential.
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