At DEFX, we specialize in workflow automation and digital process optimization. When Responsible Whatr, a leading sustainable beverage brand, approached us with a problem — manually creating invoices from their Zoho Books sales orders — we stepped in with an efficient, scalable automation using n8n, Zoho’s APIs, and Google Sheets.

Responsible Whatr’s operations team was spending hours each week converting sales orders into invoices in Zoho Books. With hundreds of orders being processed monthly, this manual effort introduced several challenges:

To build a fully automated workflow that:

To streamline invoice generation for Responsible Whatr, we built a robust automation workflow using n8n, integrated with Google Sheets and Zoho Books. The process begins with a scheduled or manual trigger that pulls sales order reference numbers from a Google Sheet — the team’s central tracking point. Each reference number is used to fetch the corresponding sales order ID from Zoho. If the ID is found, the automation continues; if not, the issue is logged back in the sheet to keep things transparent.

For each valid sales order, the workflow retrieves complete order details via Zoho’s API, including line items, customer data, and the salesperson involved. A Code node dynamically constructs the required invoice payload using this data. This JSON is then submitted to Zoho Books' create-invoice endpoint. The final status — whether successful with an invoice ID or failed with an error message — is instantly written back to the same Google Sheet, keeping all stakeholders informed without manual effort.

After implementing the automation, the benefits were immediate and measurable:

This automation not only helped Responsible Whatr scale their operations without increasing overhead, it also:

With the power of n8n and Zoho’s robust APIs, DEFX helped Responsible Whatr turn a repetitive accounting task into a hands-off automated flow.

We're continuing to work with Responsible Whatr to automate more areas of their operations, from inventory management to payment tracking.

Want to build something similar? Reach out to DEFX for custom automation that grows with your business.

Stay tuned for more case studies where DEFX transforms workflows with automation!