Managing an application process can get complex very quickly. With multiple steps and systems, often involving various teams, it’s easy for work to slip through the cracks.
Mike Freeman, the owner of Man Over Machine, a Nashville-based web design and marketing firm, saw this happen when his aunt, Babs Freeman-Loftis, started a nonprofit in 2019 that relied on an application process.
The nonprofit One More Day on the Appalachian Trail offers financial assistance to people battling addiction who want to hike the Appalachian Trail as part of their recovery. His own cousin’s experience with drug addiction inspired the organization’s mission.
“My cousin, Nate Loftis, passed away a couple of years ago after battling an addiction to opioids," Mike said. "He had gone through rehab, and one of the things he found really helpful in his recovery was hiking on the trail. So, when he passed away, our family started this nonprofit in his memory to help others find an outlet in their recovery.”
One More Day hopes to double the number of scholarships it provides to hikers in 2024, but that would require a major increase in applications—and a corresponding increase in manual work. Managing applications requires administrative and organizational tasks that can easily consume their workdays.
To grow, One More Day needed a cost-effective and streamlined workflow to vet the ever-growing pile of applications. Luckily, Mike’s experience in automation and the release of Zapier products Tables and Interfaces, helped him build the kind of solution they desperately needed without any coding.
A 150-hour manual process of Google Sheets and printed applications
To get up and running, Babs cobbled together a hodge-podge of different tools to manage applications from prospective hikers. But the experience was clunky and time-consuming—both for applicants and for Babs.
“When my aunt Babs was first starting the organization, she had a couple of different spreadsheets and a Google Form, and everything was really disconnected. When I saw how she was running it, I knew there was a great opportunity to use Zapier,” said Mike.
Before Mike stepped in, his aunt manually tracked each application through the process. Following each application required far too many Google Sheets and far too much of her time.
Each stage of the process was disjointed and slow. The administrative work for just the application process took up much of his aunt’s focus—more than 150 hours per year—so there wasn’t enough time to spend on growing the nonprofit's reach. This status quo made it impossible to reach their goal of doubling the number of scholarships simply due to the hundreds of hours of tedious admin work required.
“Before using Zapier, my aunt was using Google Sheets, printing everything out, and handing applications to people in person. They would even have to meet in person or get on a phone call to vote on applications. Now, it’s all in one place and one system.”
Mike wanted to build an all-in-one system so it would be as simple as possible for his aunt to learn and maintain. The less upkeep, the better, and it would need to be nonprofit budget-friendly. They simply didn’t want to replace a complicated paper process with a complicated digital one.
Mike knew he could create a far better solution for the One More Day team. As a Zapier Early Access Program member, Mike had already tinkered with Zapier Interfaces and Tables and knew these products would allow him to build this custom process all in one place.
“One day, I was playing Legos with my son, and I realized that the feeling I have in my brain when I’m playing Legos with him is the same feeling that I get when I’m working in Zapier. I love connecting things and figuring out solutions.” Mike said.
In only about five hours, Mike built a system that could handle every stage of the application process and be completely managed without ever leaving Zapier. He was able to quickly get started by using the Applicant Tracker template.
Now, the streamlined application process follows these steps:
Capture new applications. The process kicks off when an applicant applies on the One More Day website via a Zapier Interfaces form embedded into the site.
Store applicant info and materials. When an applicant completes the form, a new row is automatically created for them in a table.
Share the application with the team. Another Zap takes the answers from the application and enters them into a Google Doc, making it easy for the team to read and reference.
Vote on the applications. When an applicant moves to the next review stage, the workflow sends an email to the judges with a unique link tracking each response and the judge's notes on that application.
Compile votes and notes. Each time a judge votes, their scores and notes are all saved within the table. With all of the info needed to make a decision in one spot, they can collaborate and discuss the applications virtually or on their own time with everyone’s notes easily on hand.
Track application progress. Using Interfaces, the team can track the progress of each application via a Kanban-style view and easily move each application from one step to the next.
Zapier allows Mike to separate public-facing info from sensitive data that needs to be password-protected. With Tables and Interfaces, he built two connected systems that interact with one another—when an application progresses beyond a certain stage, it automatically moves into the password-protected side of the system.
With help from the streamlined system, the team now takes as little as one week to vet an application. Previously, the process took nearly a month.
“This would have taken weeks of work to develop an application like this and it would have cost a ton of money. So, to be able to spin this up all in Zapier in five hours is life-changing,” said Mike.
Simplicity is what makes the new process so successful. Through Interfaces and Tables, Mike built an ecosystem for managing the application process without needing multiple products, forms, spreadsheets, or in-person meetings.
“If you have a little bit of time to build, there’s a lot of power in Zapier,” said Mike.
While he manages the Zaps, his aunt can manage the application process much more easily than she could before. And best of all, there’s no printing required. One More Day now has a simple, straightforward system that can scale as it grows.
With the dozens of reclaimed hours, One Day More can spend more time spreading the message of hope and recovery and less time managing documents.
