How and with what to deploy the project for production?

Question

Software Deployment

Hello everyone and thank you for your attention to my question.
We have a virtual machine with Windows Server, on which a test environment with a developed application, a database is deployed. The developers have a local application, but the database is used alone from the test environment (yes, we understand that this is bad, but we tolerate it, and this is not the issue).
To unfold all this goodness, a huge manual is written for sale with a description of what and where. It seems to be good, so as not to forget, but after all, the transfer of the project / improvements, in general, is not automated and this is hell. Because everything is done by hand, there is a high probability of error and there is no way to transfer quickly from test to prod.
Actually, how to make a quick transfer of all the good that we have to prod at minimal cost? With using what? Is it necessary to use virtual machines? If we make some kind of image, can we use it not in a virtual environment? How to automate this (clicked the button, preparation, transfer, deploy, done)? How to make it so that it could be transferred in parts (application server, integration services, database)?
I want solutions not at the level of individual tasks, but a complex solution.
Thank you.