How many workdays have been filled completing manual, repetitive, time-consuming business processes, like sending reminders, scheduling meetings, or completing the steps of an approval? These tasks are necessary, but they often require time and energy that employees could otherwise spend on driving the business forward. With advancements in technology and the power of automation, these processes can be done—often from start to finish—automatically, freeing up time in your day for all the other important things you do for your company.

Effective marketing strategies and tactics are designed to cultivate enough interest to make sure each sales-focused interaction has a stable foundation. Creating lead scoring models in Dynamics 365 Marketing autogenerates a score to indicate each contact or account’s likelihood of closing a deal based on interactions with websites, emails, events, and more. Scoring leads allows users to focus on the most quality prospects by cutting through cluttered sales pipelines and highlighting each lead’s progress towards becoming sales ready.

After a decade of investing in improvements, Microsoft has announced that pricing changes will be made for enterprise and commercial subscriptions of Microsoft 365 packages. Smaller price increases have been made over the years, but this announcement marks the first “substantive” pricing increase in the 10 years that these products have been on the market. The pricing changes will reflect the value of added features, functionalities, and elevated standards of quality—especially as so many new features and product upgrades have been made in the last year and a half alone.

From the ancient masters of rhetoric themselves, we are told that logos, or logic, is an effective way to persuade an audience. And all of recorded history is a testament to the power of storytelling, a most innate human attribute, to influence people’s actions. Therefore, being able to tell a story with logic, with data, must be an effective way to understand the world and act within it according to our goals.

This is the foundation to which Microsoft’s Power BI application is based. Tell a compelling story through the visualizations of data, and that story can help inform decisions that will benefit businesses.

New real-time marketing features in Dynamics 365 Marketing provide users with tools to engage customers in the moments that matter using a variety of customizable dimensions like branching paths and triggers. Insights can be harnessed by AI capabilities to automatically generate recommendations for actions when it comes to content, channels, and analytics.

Segments (marketing lists) and integrations also allow organizations to seamlessly leverage customer profile information to ensure each customer engagement utilizes the full range of tools available for an overall personalized experience.

A happy customer is one who is listened to, their needs met. A resilient and successful business is one who fosters happy, loyal customers. Where these Venn Diagrams meet is an efficient and easy way to ask for and give feedback. Standard, generic feedback won’t give the nuanced insights to help a company serve its clients and grow; yet asking for specific, detailed feedback usually calls for time-consuming manual labor, developing a myriad of surveys for common situations and experiences.

The goal behind digital transformation is to help organizations adapt and remain resilient against competitive pressure, changing customer needs, and even global crises. Companies who are flexible, with growth-mindsets and the urge to stay relevant with ever-new technologies, are the companies who successfully shift via digital transformation.

Digital is the future, and it is also the present, so there is no better time to consider how your business can move toward full digital transformation. This blog discusses seven key ways businesses can leverage the power of Dynamics 365 business applications to drive their digital transformation.

Dynamics 365 Customer Service helps organizations offer end-to-end customer support services across multiple channels to meet customer needs, wherever they may be. The app tracks customer issues through cases, manages performance and productivity in the workspace dashboard, tracks customer requests across channels, and provides customers with assisted and self-service through a variety of scenarios.

With the upcoming 2021 Release Wave 2 updates, the app will see overall enhancements to AI insights, embedded analytics, collaboration tools, and bolstered case management abilities.

When onboarding a new employee, the ability to quickly and efficiently provide permissions is paramount to that new employee settling in and jumping into the flow of work. Just as, if not more, important is taking access or abilities away if a position has shifted or an individual no longer works for the company to prevent over access and abuse of it.

Dynamics 365 applications have a variety of pre-built and editable security roles admin can assign to groups of employees, streamlining and enhancing security across the organization.

Good digital strategy has the potential to transform business operations by driving revenue, building broad brand awareness, uncovering new and untapped audiences, boosting online engagement, and increasing customer retention and loyalty.

Email marketing is a powerful tool that shouldn't be tossed to the side. Emails grant the ability to tailor the exact information going out to recipients, customize visual elements, track analytics, and require minimal effort for a sound return on investment.

These simple tactics can be used to make sure every email packs a punch to get the most out of marketing efforts.

Engaging a customer at the opportune times is a tricky, time-consuming business; yet, this is a necessary act for many businesses to build and retain a loyal and satisfied customer base. Gathering touchpoint data, analyzing customer actions, anticipating customer desires, and sending proper emails or other communication at the right moment—what if all this effort and toil could happen automatically based on the customer’s actions? Fortunately, automation for a broad range of purposes, even across several Microsoft applications, can be easily established.

This blog will demonstrate just one example of Microsoft applications—such as Dynamics 365 Marketing, Microsoft Bookings, and Power Automate—interacting seamlessly to provide optimal, efficient business solutions for you, and a cohesive, satisfying end-to-end experience for your customers.

The majority of ransomware attacks begin with phishing emails. Malware (malicious software) is hidden in an attachment, like an invoice or a report. As soon as the attachment is opened, the ransomware spreads through the device, locking files, systems, or networks and leaving behind a ransom note. Even the most minor attacks can set an organization back with lost time due to disrupted operations—not to mention the risk of compromised proprietary information, financial loss, and even the hit the organization’s reputation may take as a result.

Event management is a complex feat from start to finish, but it doesn’t have to be difficult. Event planning and management tools within Dynamics 365 Marketing help guide users through every step of the process from preliminary budgeting, registration, session planning, webinar broadcasting, post-event analytics, and beyond. Users can utilize two helpful features within the event work area to manage event sponsors and vendors.

Dynamics 365 Sales makes sales-focused CRM easy, and organizations can expect even better features with updates that refresh the user experience and maximize efficiency. More AI capabilities will allow sellers to work smarter and prioritize the most gainful activities while keeping track of critical information for each lead.

Microsoft will begin rolling out a robust update to the Dynamics 365 suite later this year, and Dynamics 365 Sales in particular will see quite a few improvements. The improvements were created based on customer feedback, so users can look forward to a highly optimized app experience.

Businesses and employees have needed to embrace a “new normal” workplace reality, and it’s crucial that remote, asynchronous, and hybrid work options can keep up with expectations. One thing has been clear – innovation and growth mindsets are key factors in successfully getting things done together, even while working apart.

Microsoft Teams provides an all-in-one collaboration solution for environments returning in-person, embracing remote work, and everything in between. The best features of the Microsoft Teams desktop app have been optimized into a mobile app for iOS and Android, letting users talk with anyone, anywhere — without missing out on the capabilities of the desktop version.

Digital marketing strategies became more crucial than ever this past year, especially when many businesses realized an effective digital presence was a key factor in maintaining successful operations. Dynamics 365 Marketing takes the guesswork out of campaigns and makes it easy to put together polished digital marketing content while managing it all in one cohesive interface. Check out some of the key functionalities of Dynamics 365 Marketing that allow for a high degree of customization to branded marketing content.

It’s time. Time to come together again, in-person, and bask in the connections and momentum that comes from being together and learning together. Community Summit North America 2021 will be held in Houston, Texas from October 12-15, and you’re invited. Summit organizers encourage you to come with questions, and you will leave with answers.

If Summit is new to you, or if it’s been a while since your organization has attended, here are the reasons why you should consider attending and how to make the most of Summit NA when you’re there.

We’ve already published a blog featuring the 2021 Release Wave 2 key updates for all Dynamics 365 applications, and now it’s time to shift attention to Dynamics 365 Business Central, which has a full list of enhancements to dive into. Microsoft boasts better built-in tours, integrations with Teams, and a host of other new capabilities and features that will roll out to Business Central in the second wave of 2021. Here is a list of the highlights Release Wave 2 has to offer within Business Central.

Plans were recently published for the Microsoft Dynamics 365 2021 Release Wave 2, slated for release this fall. This update will feature hundreds of enhancements and improved functionalities, including robust integrations with Microsoft 365 products. These significant new capabilities will strengthen the features made available by Release Wave 1, which was rolled out earlier this year.

Accessibility should be the standard, not the exception. Fortunately, that is the direction culture is shifting. Microsoft 365 products are designed with accessible and inclusive features that work with any individual to better create, interact with, understand, and retain content. Documents, presentations, meetings, and emails can be better—more accessible, inclusive, easier to create, intuitive, interactive, successful. Here are seven accessibility and inclusivity tools and the Microsoft 365 applications they can be used within.