Microsoft 365 is a suite of productivity applications for individuals and businesses. This suite, previously known as Office 365, includes applications for document creation, cross-team collaboration, and data organization. Used individually or in combination, these modules are powerful additions to any business.

What Does Microsoft 365 Do?

Microsoft 365 is an ever-evolving suite of productivity applications that sync with other Microsoft solutions. If you’re using Dynamics 365 or Power BI, for example, you’ll be able to integrate those solutions with Microsoft 365 to save time and empower your team. Ultimately, Microsoft 365 helps your business achieve more with less time wasted.

You can purchase the entire Microsoft 365 for Business suite or pick the applications that fit your needs. 

Outlook

Outlook serves as a two-in-one email and calendar application, allowing you to send messages and schedule meetings. You can also save contacts in Outlook to view their calendars and quickly find an appointment time that works for everyone. And with bill payments, itineraries, and intelligent reminders embedded in the window, Outlook makes sure you have the full picture with every interaction and meeting.

Word

As the name implies, Word is a word processor that allows you to create and edit documents. You can use Word to draft reports and develop newsletters. Word also has conversion tools to turn your document into a webpage or translate and fact-check statements in real-time. Whether you’re drafting a quick one-pager for your team or putting together a customer report, Word can handle it all.

Excel

Excel is a flexible spreadsheet application for anyone trying to understand today’s data patterns in anticipation of tomorrow. You can fully customize a blank spreadsheet or use one of the many templates available, then create charts and graphs to understand trends. Using the Excel mobile app, you can even take photos of documents and input that data directly into your spreadsheet.

PowerPoint

If you’re presenting on this quarter’s financials or hosting a seminar at an industry conference, PowerPoint lets you create slideshows that will illustrate your points and keep your audience engaged. With countless templates to choose from, you can pick a design that matches your topic and input relevant text, images, charts, and links. PowerPoint has multimedia capabilities, too, so you can incorporate video, audio, and animations into your presentation. 

Teams

Teams is group chat software that serves as a quick internal alternative to emails. Instead of creating individual email chains for each interaction with your team, create a Teams chat that serves as a central hub for group conversations. You can also use teams to call or video chat with as many people as you wish. Plus, share documents, images, videos, and other important information to keep everyone in the loop.

Exchange

If Outlook doesn’t provide the depth you need, Exchange is a great add-on. Exchange brings the power of business intelligence to your inbox and calendar, registering events on the calendar from within your emails. You’ll also enjoy an automatically generated “focused” inbox for critical conversations. 

OneDrive

The cloud is perhaps one of the most crucial technological advancements in the digital age, allowing businesses to access data whenever they want and wherever they are. OneDrive brings all of your Microsoft 365 applications to the cloud, which keeps your data accessible and helps remote teams easily collaborate on projects.

SharePoint

SharePoint gives your business a unique intranet to serve as an information and project hub. Each team or department can have its own subpage to discuss and collaborate on tasks. SharePoint breaks down silos in your organization so that everyone understands how their daily responsibilities add up and contribute to something bigger.

What Types of Business Would Benefit from Microsoft 365?

Because of the broad capabilities of each module, Microsoft 365 can bring increased productivity and improved collaboration to any business in any industry. Of course, some organizations may find that a few modules aren’t necessary. For instance, companies that frequently use Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets may not need Word, PowerPoint, and Excel.

The true power of Microsoft 365 applications comes from synchronizations with Dynamics 365 and Power Platform applications. These seamless integrations unify your system, allowing you to access customer information from within Teams, connect Marketing and Sales contacts to emails in Outlook, or use Word to create standardized documents for your Customer Service and Project Operations applications.

If you’re a Microsoft shop, Microsoft 365 is worth the investment. By saving clicks, you’ll have more time to dedicate to value-adding activities, which gives your business room to grow and succeed.