Advantages of integrating IFTTT services with your digital products

If you work on a product or service and want to put customer experience on the next level and highlight your products in the marketplace; then you should integrate them with IFTTT.

If you do not know what it is, then you should know that IFTTT (IF This Then That) is the world's leading connectivity platform that enables you to connect apps and devices (which are services) in order to trigger automations that involve those apps and devices.

That's why we have integrated our IoT product DotHub with this valuable tool, which enables our users to integrate our product with smart home devices, such as Amazon Alexa and Google Home.

How IFTTT works?

The main idea of this software platform was to enable your apps and devices to work together, so they can do specific actions they can't do on their own. But how?

IFTTT was named after a simple programming statement that says: If this happens, then that will happen and it perfectly explains how this tool works. It all starts with creating "a recipe", which is composed of several parts explained and visualized below:

• A recipe - consideration of what you want to do following this statement.
• An Applet - after you considered your recipe, you have to create a proper and running recipe, automation that occurs when you connect two apps or devices (services).

Each Applet has two components:

• A trigger - sets off your Applet.
• An action - the result of the set trigger.

But, there is one more additional component that Applet can have:

• A query - a question which user might want to ask when a trigger fires (only when you have multiple events to trigger an action).

• A recipe - I want the gate to open when I say a simple phrase.
• An Applet - activating the gate when I say a simple phrase.
• A trigger - when creating a trigger, you have to choose a trigger service. We used Google Assistant and our trigger was "Say a simple phrase", which fires when someone says "Ok Google, open the gate".
• An action - when creating an action, you have to choose an action service. We used DotHub and our action was "activating the gate".

Why should your product be interoperable?

A digital world becomes more and more connected and possibilities for integration are increasing every day. It would be unimaginable to live without digital connectivity, and it is essential for anyone who wants to place their product in today's market. As the connectivity opportunities grow, so do consumers' expectations. Consumers are expecting to have the ability to connect their services and devices and also to easily share their data, and that all can be possible thanks to digital connectivity.

Every successful business decides to integrate its products with another platform, but why? Here are some valid reasons for that:

• collaboration and cooperation bring businesses many opportunities to collaborate with other leading brands
• collaboration can enhance businesses' credibility and increase their brand loyalty
• their product will be more recognized by customers and it will not be just another product "in the sea"
• integration keeps consumers more engaged and they are more likely to stick with the product's brand and to promote that brand to others
• by integrating products into consumers' lives, consumers' expectations and desires are being satisfied
• the product performance is increasing with the service integration
• opportunity to fill possible gaps that their product may contain, but without changing their roadmap or adding costs.

That's why you should also connect your product with many other products, but first, you have to explore your use case, define your exposure strategy and finally choose the way of building integration.

Building an integration in-house vs IFTTT platform

You've decided to connect your products with other services and products, but there is one more major decision that you have to make: choose the way of building integration. Many people choose in-house builds, but without having considered their disadvantages.

The main disadvantages of in-house builds are:

• Expensive maintenance - your budget has to be high enough to cover expenses for API maintenance, engineering resources and project management costs.
• Maintaining your API is hard - API is constantly changing and you have to keep it updated, which requires a lot of time and additional costs.
• Maintaining multiple integrations is quite challenging - you have to edit and improve each API.

What IFTTT platform brings you?

• reduced costs
• It saves your time - it requires only one integration to connect with numerous services and products.
• No need to worry about maintaining all of your integrations - one integration allows you to maintain all of your integrations, which results in reaching a wider audience and a wider range of products and services.
• Possibility to build relationships with a developer community - it can accelerate your product innovation roadmap. Having a collaboration with an active developer company provides you insights into the future product innovations that your customers want.

How to integrate IFTTT services with your products?

When you realized that using a connectivity platform is a more suitable and sustainable option for integration, the final step is to integrate your products (mobile apps, IoT devices, websites, blogs, etc.) with IFTTT services.

First, you have to create your service and set it up on the platform, and this is something we can help with. After we finish that part, we have to submit your service for review. Then, we have to create connections, which allow you to power the next level of integration between your service and another service with a single connection. Connections allow you to set up actions, triggers and queries that other services can interact with. Finally, you have to publish your connections, so that users, developers and others can integrate with your products, but it's only available for approved paid organizations.

Final thoughts

Connectivity is the future, and the proof of it is a more than thousand connected devices. As digital connectivity spreads more and more, customers have higher expectations and their experiences are becoming more important. That's why you should use a connectivity platform, which is the most cost-effective option for building custom integrations. Everything works better together and with the IFTTT platform, you will bring a wider range of possibilities to your customers. We did it, so should you!