// Integrations
Custom API integration services that connect the systems you already run
When your portal, back office, database and reports don’t share data, your people become the integration: re-keying orders, running exports, reconciling spreadsheets. Our custom API integration services connect those systems through REST APIs, SQL Server and the reporting tools you already use, and you talk directly to the U.S.-based engineers who build them.
// Sound familiar?
Signs your systems need connecting
These workarounds appear when two systems hold the same information and only people move it between them.
“We type the same order into two systems.”
Every re-key costs time, invites typos and lets the systems drift apart. An integration moves the record once, applying the rules your team applies by hand.
How to stop double entry →“Someone exports a CSV every night and imports it somewhere else.”
It works until the person who runs it is out or a vendor renames a column. A scheduled, logged sync doesn’t depend on anyone remembering.
Price the manual work →“There’s a spreadsheet in the middle holding it all together.”
The bridge between your systems is also the weak point: no permissions, no history, and one person who understands the formulas.
Replacing the spreadsheet →“Nobody trusts the numbers in the report.”
A dashboard only shows what’s underneath it. The fix starts below the report: one system of record per field and tables designed for reporting.
Example: a report-ready schema →// What we connect
What our API integration services connect
Our API and database integration services start from the systems you’re keeping. For everything else we build and maintain, see all services.
Portals to back-office systems
A customer, contractor or vendor portal is only as good as the records behind it. We connect sign-ups, orders, documents and status to your office systems.
Customer & vendor portals →Apps to databases
Web and phone apps that write validated records straight into SQL Server, instead of a sheet someone retypes after the shift.
Your systems to product APIs
When a product you pay for publishes a REST API, we use it to push and pull orders, jobs, customers and files, on a schedule or as records change.
Accounting and CRM, through their APIs
Invoices, customers and job status move between your software and the accounting and CRM tools you already use, through the vendors’ APIs.
Reporting tools to clean data
Tableau and your other reporting tools read from views built for reporting, so a dashboard refresh doesn’t slow the app your team works in.
AI checks on connected data
A practical AI check can flag a missing field or an entry that breaks your rules, and a person makes the call. Read how to add AI to existing software or see AI integration.
// Choosing an approach
Connector, iPaaS or custom API integration?
Start with the simplest thing that will hold. If a built-in connector, a Zapier-style tool or an integration platform (iPaaS) supports both systems, and the rule is “when this happens here, create that there,” use it. It’s quicker to set up and your team can see what it does.
Custom integration earns its upkeep when you hit one of these walls:
- One side has no API: only a database, file exports or a screen people type into
- The rules depend on several fields at once: customer type, location, job status, approver
- Volume outgrows per-task pricing (how Zapier counts tasks), or a vendor’s rate limits need careful pacing
- An older database is the system of record and has to stay that way
- You need retries, duplicate protection and a log of what moved and when
We’ll tell you if a connector is enough
If an off-the-shelf connector will do the job, we’ll say so on the first call. Custom code is worth building and maintaining only where the simpler option breaks.
Ask which fits your systems →// SQL Server & Tableau
SQL Server application development and Tableau reporting
For Chelten House, a fourth-generation food manufacturer (sauces, dressings, condiments), we built a custom application where operators record production performance, product traceability and equipment downtime, planned vs unplanned, with causes and durations. Its data is stored in SQL Server and supports their Tableau reporting.
Tableau can query SQL Server live or work from an extract, a saved copy refreshed in full or with only new rows (Tableau’s documentation on extracts). For Tableau reporting integration, we design a production data model and views Tableau can read either way, and an extract keeps heavy dashboards from competing with the app. Your analysts keep owning the dashboards; our job is the data underneath them.
Report-ready data comes from decisions made in the application itself, as our downtime database schema guide shows table by table, with a T-SQL script you can request. In any build, we look for:
- Pick lists and codes where people would otherwise type free text
- Times and durations stored one consistent way across shifts
- Reporting views kept separate from the tables the app writes to
Manufacturing · Data collection
Production, traceability and downtime data from the plant floor
A custom application where Chelten House operators record production performance, product traceability and equipment downtime (planned vs unplanned, with causes and durations), stored in SQL Server to support their Tableau reporting.
// Legacy system integration
Connecting older systems without replacing them
With legacy system integration, a system that still does its job doesn’t have to be replaced before it can share data. Four ways in, from least to most involved; an engineer looks at the system first and recommends the safest.
Least involved
Read-only feeds
A read-only copy or set of database views feeds reports and new apps. Nothing new writes to the old system, which keeps its risk low.
A small API in front of an old database
A thin, authenticated REST API gives portals and phone apps the records they need, with your rules applied and no direct database connection.
Building on the existing SQL Server database
New apps read and write the database your current system already uses. First we map every report, scheduled job and app that depends on it.
Most involved
Phased modernization
Replace one screen or workflow at a time while the old system keeps running. See legacy application modernization and Classic ASP migration.
// Monitoring & upkeep
API integrations that fail loudly, not silently
The dangerous integration isn’t the one that crashes. It’s the one that quietly stops syncing on a Tuesday, unnoticed until a customer asks about an order that never shipped. We build failure handling in from the start:
- Every run logged: what moved, what was skipped and why
- An alert to a named person when a sync fails or doesn’t run
- Retries with back-off when an API is down or answers “429 Too Many Requests” (RFC 6585)
- A unique key per record, so a retry doesn’t create a second order
- Token refresh, so an expired access token doesn’t stop the sync overnight (OAuth 2.0, RFC 6749)
- A queue for records that need a person’s decision
Who maintains it after launch
Vendors change their APIs, add required fields and retire old versions. The engineers who build your integration can keep maintaining it as vendors and your process change.
Maintenance & support →// Process
How an integration project runs
Data integration moves records between databases or files; API integration connects applications through the interfaces they publish; system integration makes them work as one process. In each case, the project runs in four steps.
Step 1
Inventory the systems
Every system involved, how data gets in and out of each today (API, database, exports or retyping) and who relies on it. Hidden spreadsheets surface here.
Step 2
Decide who owns each field
For each customer, order, job or status field, one system is the source of truth. Deciding that first prevents two systems from overwriting each other’s changes.
Step 3
Build and test on staging
We’d build against test accounts or a staging copy and run realistic data through it, duplicates, missing fields and vendor outages included, before anything reaches production.
Step 4
Monitor and maintain
Logs and alerts cover every run. When a vendor updates its API or your process changes, the integration changes with it.
They take the time to truly understand the use case and business need and suggest solutions tailored to our specific needs. Solutions often exceed expectations as to final design and functionality. They are always quick to respond to issues that require urgency and frequently offer help outside the scope of current projects.
Scot Carson
Chief Experience Officer, Amusement Advantage
// Proof
Selected work, including the API behind our own product
Just A Menu is our own product: a restaurant edits its menu once and it publishes to QR menus, TV menu boards, print, websites and an API. Running it means answering the same questions this page covers.
Our own platform · Restaurants
A platform we designed, built and still run
Just A Menu keeps QR menus, TV menu boards, print, websites and an API in sync from one dashboard, plus the JAM Player hardware.
Hosting · Maintenance
A national careers website, hosted and maintained
We host and maintain the careers website for a national retail chain. The client is confidential, so we don’t name it.
// Credentials
The basics, before you ask.
Since 2018
Building and supporting software
Orlando, FL
100% U.S.-based team, clients nationwide
SAP Ariba
Registered supplier
NDAs welcome
Happy to sign before you share details
Top Web Design Companies
DesignRush
// FAQ
API and database integration FAQ
Should we use Zapier or a custom integration?
Use a connector tool when both systems support it and the rules are simple. Custom integration earns its place when there’s no API, the logic is complex, volumes are high or an older database is involved. Our guide to eliminating double data entry walks through the decision.
Can you integrate with an older system that has no API?
Often, yes: by reading from its database, adding a small API in front of it, or using exports it already produces. An engineer looks at the system first and recommends the safest route.
Can you build on our existing SQL Server database without breaking current reports?
Yes, that’s a common starting point. We map what already reads the database (reports, scheduled jobs, other apps) before changing anything, and we’d test changes on a staging copy before they reach production.
How will we know if an integration breaks?
Integrations should log every run and alert someone when a sync fails or doesn’t run. We build that in from the start rather than bolting it on later.
What drives integration cost?
How many systems, how much data and how often it moves, whether APIs exist, data cleanup, and monitoring and upkeep afterward. Your first call is with an engineer who can scope it, and the automation ROI calculator sizes the manual work you’d replace.
// Keep exploring
More on connecting your systems and data
Free tool
Automation ROI calculator
Free automation ROI calculator: price your manual processes, re-keying and spreadsheet work with your own numbers, then see payback and break-even.
Use the free tool →Guide
Eliminate double data entry
How to eliminate double data entry between systems: map every re-key, pick a system of record, then choose a connector or a custom integration.
Read more →Service
Internal tools & automation
Custom internal tools and workflow automation built around your process: admin panels, approvals, trackers and dashboards that connect to the systems you run.
Read more →// Bring us in
Tell us about the software your business runs on.
A new build, a system that’s hard to use, a stuck project or a prototype that needs to go live. An engineer, not a salesperson, will get back to you.
202-88-MAGIC · or email info@effortlesspresence.com