How Microsoft 365 Enterprise helps my business?
Unless you were born after 1990, you probably remember, like us, typing up documents or memos on clunky word processor programs and waiting (im)patiently for a rumbling printer to deliver your finished work. We’ve been avid users of IT for many years, and involved in IT support services for nearly two decades, and have been swept up in the tide of advancing technology throughout. However, although the programs, utilisation and methods of access and production have changed, the fundamental services that IT provides for communication and productivity have always been the same.
The undisputed leader in documentation and email production is Microsoft. The Office program has expanded in popularity constantly since inception and as it’s evolved, the many different versions have become harder to keep track of. Currently, Office 365 adds 50 thousand new small business customers a month, and has 60 million active users currently signed up, whilst Microsoft Office’s overall user count sits at 1.2 billion. So, why the introduction of Office Enterprise 365 and what is this latest and greatest offering from the IT giant all about?
Put simply, Enterprise 365 combines Office 365, Windows 10 for desktop and Enterprise Mobility and Security (EMS) into one single service, paid for in a consolidated monthly fee. This delivery model is hugely attractive to businesses. Its flexibility and simplicity eliminates the more complex, piece meal costing system previously required to access all of these services. Instead of having separate Office 365 and Windows OS agreements with different time period commitments attached, this new M365 SKU is given under a Cloud Service Provider (CSP) agreement. You pay a monthly price for the whole lot, and can retract it whenever you want, which means that the days of just losing any pre-paid licenses you hold in the event of selling or liquidating your business, or reducing employees, are over.
But where does enterprise’s superiority lie in terms of actual functionality, and what will you be actually getting?
Firstly, the email capabilities are extensive and come with AV. Mailboxes are extremely large. There is enough space to archive emails for permanent storage, instead of deleting them altogether. Also, unlike previous versions of 365 which limited your full history of emails to desktop access, your entire mailbox can be accessed from mobiles and tablets. Calendars and sharing for scheduling are included as well. Best of all, you’ll never have to patch another Exchange server again.
Then we come to Office, the most commonly used element of 365, after email. When Enterprise 365 is used in combination with OneDrive for Business, the Word, PowerPoint and Excel applications offer effective and efficient collaboration on live documents and sharing. Most usefully, the latest versions of each program are available online as well as having the option of being downloaded locally.
The collaborative benefits of Enterprise 365 are further enhanced with Skype for Business, Teams and Sharepoint. Skype for Business moves users from email to instant messaging, meaning quicker response times and fewer emails cramming your inbox. Calls between users are easy and toll free, and video calls are high quality and simple to facilitate. Video conferencing also, of course, eliminates swathes of travel and the associated time and monetary costs, and enables workers to convene quickly and easily when issues arise. Teams and Sharepoint centralise all files and information attached to a particular project, event, process or customer, and allow team members instant access to all of the information and interactions related to said project, etc. Though it may take a little time to set up and learn this new system properly, the ultimate payoff is vast for your business.
As far as security is concerned, Enterprise 365 is streets ahead of its predecessors. It offers additional layers of protection at user and desktop level, over and above the usual security standards implicit in Microsoft products. It quarantines attachments for safety review, and checks URL destinations to detect malicious intent, using things like Threat Protection, Data Loss Prevention, Bitlocker and ID and Access Management – this keeps users as safe as possible against cyber threats of any kind. Because your single monthly user fee encompasses all security measures as well as the applications and programs, you’re more likely to employ all of these security features and thus avoid problems with data loss, breach, ransom-ware and downtime.
Finally, Microsoft 365 Enterprise offers the ability to cut down your local overhead costs whilst simultaneously expanding your output. Because it works seamlessly alongside different 3rd party Cloud services, any requirement for customised applications delivered from the Cloud/Azure won’t be a problem.
As a Microsoft Gold Partner and Cloud Service Provider with ISO27001 accreditation, Correct Group can get you up and running and enjoying the benefits of Microsoft 365 Enterprise as soon as you decide to make the transition. The monthly fee for the 365 Enterprise service is £28 (at the time of writing) If you’re interested in switching to the new 365 system, or want some more information about migrating to a cloud hosted server, call us today and speak to one of our qualified IT support consultants or get in touch using the contact form here.
Both the E3 and E5 plans offer an intelligent solution that utilise Office 365, Windows 10 Enterprise, Enterprise Mobility + Security.
The feature set includes:
