SFIR Consulting uses Zoho Creator to digitize its accounting operations with an AI-infused custom application

SFIR Consulting is an accounting firm based in Toronto, Canada that specializes in cloud-based bookkeeping, ERP implementations, consultancy, and corporate tax services. Recognizing that most businesses prefer to avoid complex accounting tasks, their team of expert accountants provides year-round support, offering solutions that help clients overcome common challenges like managing tax deadlines, ensuring accurate financial reporting, and automating repetitive tasks to manage their finances more efficiently.

The challenges

Before using Zoho Creator, the company relied on a variety of tools like Monday.com for task management, Excel for handling data, and Dropbox for file storage. However, many of their workflows still depended on manual methods, including pen and paper, to manage tasks and track operational improvements. This approach led to challenges like:

• Data entry and validation: Collecting client information from various documents required significant manual effort, often leading to errors that slowed down the process. They also needed a way to check for missing or incorrect data to ensure accuracy.
• CRM integration: Maintaining up-to-date client records and ensuring smooth interaction between the CRM and other tools in their tech stack was essential to avoid data inconsistencies.
• Income calculation: The company needed an automated system that could accurately compute business income based on client-provided data, eliminating the risks of manual errors.
• Interconnected data management: Efficiently handling related data and enabling filtered views posed a challenge, making it difficult to retrieve and manage specific sets of information.

These issues prompted SFIR Consulting to seek a customized solution that could leverage AI and advanced validation techniques to streamline their client onboarding, improve data accuracy, and seamlessly integrate with their CRM system. For this, they partnered with Amazing Business Results (ABR), a Premium Zoho Partner.

The solution

ABR collaborated closely with SFIR Consulting to map out their workflows and integration needs. After a thorough assessment, they recommended Zoho Creator as the core platform for developing a custom application. The app was designed with dedicated modules for different stakeholders, enabling efficient process management and workflow automation, including:

Client management

This module allows sales or account managers to capture client details, including personal information, account specifics, and requirements, in a structured way. It covers both the pre- and post-enrollment processes.

Product and services portal

After enrollment, this lists various products and services for clients to choose from. For instance, when a client shares their income details, the company can offer tailored investment or savings options to meet their needs.

Operations management

This module oversees internal operations, tracking the daily activities of sales and account managers. It also ensures that clients are assigned to the appropriate personnel during onboarding.

• AI Modeler: The application uses optical character recognition (OCR) to automatically extract and populate fields with data like names, dates of birth, ID numbers, and addresses from client documents. The AI model was also trained to handle various document formats, ensuring high accuracy.
• Ready-to-use integrations: They connected their Zoho Creator app with Zoho CRM, allowing real-time synchronization of client records and ensuring that all data was consistently up to date across platforms.
• Workflows/triggers: ABR set up a preconfigured workflow that auto-calculates business income from financial user inputs. The system also validates data in real time and sends alerts for missing or incorrect entries. This ensures the accuracy and integrity of all financial data.
• Lookup of data: By utilizing lookups and dynamic filters, the system enables streamlined management of interconnected datasets. This allows for easier filtering, retrieval, and analysis of specific data points.

Benefits and ROI

By adopting Zoho Creator, SFIR Consulting was able to streamline and automate its data management and processing workflows, resulting in estimated savings of $30-33 CAD per user, per month, largely due to eliminating the need for multiple tools. Additionally, the firm saw a significant 12% improvement in operational efficiency, particularly by reducing the time spent on tasks across different systems.

Looking forward

The company is planning to expand the application and its capabilities even further. One key area of focus is leveraging Zoho Creator to develop internal tools for risk analysis and testing, which will help assess customer risk based on economic trends. This new function will play a critical role as they continue to grow, ensuring that their processes evolve alongside Creator.