Office 365 Makes It Easy To IT-Enable the Processes You Need to Grow Your Business.

There’s no better solution for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) today than Microsoft Office 365.

Why?  Because instead of simply packaging the popular applications you use (like Excel, Word, PowerPoint and more) Microsoft has taken the extra step to integrate these tools, along with others. This provides your business the capabilities a larger-sized business enjoys.

Office 365 is a secure, integrated, accessible and flexible cloud-based solution. You can access the applications you need from your smartphones, tablet, laptop, or desktop, wherever you are.

Worry Less

With Office 365 you don’t have to rely on your servers, worry about data loss, or your email going down. It offers:

• Mobile Device Management to protect your organization’s information when people use their mobile devices. You can use it to set device security policies and access rules to wipe mobile devices if they’re lost or stolen. Your data will always be secure and in your control.
• Data Loss Prevention so you can comply with business standards and industry regulations by protecting sensitive information and preventing its inadvertent disclosure. You’ll have all the compliance features you need, all in one place.
• Rights Management Services so you can always see who’s accessing your information. Plus, you’ll have 24/7 real-time support for critical issues.

Work Easier

Office 365 allows you to work the way you want to, where you want to, by accessing applications like Word, Excel, PowerPoint and more from your phone, laptop or tablet, with:

• On-the-Go Access to files, emails and conferencing.
• A consistent, familiar and synced experience across all your devices.
• 1TB of online storage.

Work Together

Office 365 enables virtual collaboration where you can set permissions so specific colleagues or customers can access your documents and files as you wish.  Having everything on the cloud makes it easy to share information with whoever you want, where you want.  It makes working together smooth, secure and productive.

• Create and edit documents in real time with colleagues.
• Create groupings for projects, and work with teams and customers via sharing sites, videos and private social networking.
• Collaborate across all your platforms and devices.
• Host or join multi-location meetings with any device.

With Office 365 you’ll have access to Microsoft’s basic cloud solutions like:

• Word with easy reading and writing on any device.
• Excel to create order, organize data and share insights.
• PowerPoint to make your point with clarity and style.
• Outlook so you can stay productive and connected.
• OneNote to access all your notes on all your devices.
• Publisher, so you can create something that helps you stand out.

With Office 365 you’ll have high-end features with the functionality you’d expect in more expensive stand-alone programs that larger-sized businesses use.  This allows you to create exceptional flyers, business documents, presentations and more.

Exchange Online

This is Microsoft’s backend email server. You’ll have access to Exchange Online with 50GB of mailbox storage per user.  You can manage your business communications across all your devices, and share easily and securely.

OneDrive for Business

Put all your documents and files in the cloud, in one place for enhanced efficiency and productivity. You’ll have access to all your work from one secure, reliable place, with 1TB of cloud storage per user.

Skype for Business

This is a video/web-conferencing program that you may already be familiar with. Microsoft has incorporated Skype into Office 365 so you have access to messaging, audio and video calls, and online meetings, all from this one application.

SharePoint Online

SharePoint is a content management system that works seamlessly with the other applications in Office 365. You can add permissions for your colleagues, employees, vendors, suppliers to selectively share ideas and work.

Yammer

This well-known texting application is now part of the Office 365 solution. Yammer allows you to create team chat rooms, allows you to send texts back and forth more easily, send private messages with your team, share information, and organize around projects. Yammer can be incorporated into your other Office 365 applications as well.

Groups

To enhance the work experience, Microsoft incorporated this team-share site into Office 365. It allows you to manage projects and collaborate effectively with your team members using a shared inbox, calendar, document library site, and Yammer feeds.  Unlike SharePoint, you don’t have to individually assign permissions because the group will have pre-set permissions.

Office 365 Video

Now you can capture, share and discover videos from any device using Microsoft’s cloud. No more sending large video files that take forever to download. You simply stream or edit them from the cloud.

Cross-platform experiences

Microsoft customized platforms across devices to enhance functionality. The result is a familiar, consistent experience across devices that makes on-the-go document creation, review and collaboration easy.

Office for Mac

Some people just can’t do without their Apple computers. So, Microsoft developed Office for Mac that has a similar look and feel as Office on Windows. Plus, it seamlessly integrates with Office 365.

Delve

Get to know your colleagues and help them get to know you. Create a profile and put documents, videos, blogs, anything you want to share about yourself with others. You can search across your organization for information and insights derived from individual user behavior, relationships to content, topics and one another.

BI for everyone

BI (Business Intelligence) in Office 365 allows you to collect, filter and organize your company’s data in a way that helps you get information, spot trends, and focus on what matters. You can share this data with your employees and colleagues to help you make better decisions for your organization.

Trust Center

This is a customer-focused area with a dashboard where you can access tools, online support, controls to help with archiving data, and more that allows you to access data that previously only tech people could. For example, you can archive emails for all your employees for 5 years by simply clicking a few boxes. It incorporates the highest level of security, privacy, and compliance, required for businesses today.

Compliance Center

This tool is included the Trust Center. It allows you the control to store and archive data to meet your legal, regulatory and organizational requirements from one place. Plus, it integrates with all of Office 365’s features, including Exchange and SharePoint.

eDiscovery

Within the Compliance Center, eDiscovery allows you to easily search for documents using specific queries. This is much easier than going file by file to find particular documents. You can find, protect and transfer content from one central point.

Rights Management Services

This improves the security of your data with advanced encryption using RMS (Risk Management Solutions). Whether it’s your spreadsheet, financial information or other documents, you can protect them with a password, or set permissions allowing access for selected individuals.

Data Loss Prevention

Block the transmission of your organization’s sensitive information. When credit card numbers or sensitive account numbers, etc., are keyed into an email or document, a pop up warns the user that they are attempting to send sensitive information. It relays your security policy, or can even block the transmission of this information automatically.

Encryption

You can encrypt not only documents but also emails so only select individuals can open them.

What makes Office 365 so great is that all these applications can be integrated. For example, you can post an Excel spreadsheet in a PowerPoint slide, and by linking them together, make changes on the slide that are reflected in the Excel document

Office 365 Benefits All Types of Businesses  

Microsoft Office 365 is a valuable solution for businesses in any industry, including those in:

• Financial Services—BI power gives you greater insight into your business performance, provides enhanced layers of security and an enriched customer experience.
• Healthcare has a lot to gain from Office 365 when it comes to collaboration and PHI security. Patient reports can be posted online in the cloud to provide a better experience for employees and patients.  Plus, you’ll have the peace of mind knowing they are stored and transmitted securely to help you meet HIPAA compliance regulations.
• Retail—With everything in one place, employees can access inventory, documentation, HR, all from their tablet, laptop or smartphone. This reduces costs and increases efficiencies.
• Manufacturing—Office 365 can be used across different devices so your foreman can send real-time information from a tablet or other mobile device to the home office or clients. This allows for better reporting and decision making.
• Hospitality—You can collaborate and have a share point all in one place for your restaurants, hotels and other services, in a consistent real-time way.
• Law Offices—Capture data when talking to a client and share it in real time with employees. Plus, you can save this data securely to the cloud so you can go home and finish working on a case if needed.  Documents, emails, etc., can all be archived as long as needed. And with enhanced security, Office 365 helps you meet your legal compliance requirements.
• Contractors—Manage your resources, logistics, budgets, calendars, and invite people into your groups to organize and complete projects in a timely, cost-effective way.

Want to give Microsoft Office 365 a try?  Contact the Microsoft Experts at CTECH.  We serve businesses in Southern Alberta and the Calgary Metro Area including Cochrane, Airdrie and High River. Call us at (403) 457-1478 or send an email to info@ctechgroup.net.

Written by Carl Fransen

posted on January 30, 2018

Carl Fransen

My passion is to make my mark on the world in a positive and lasting way. I want to set an example for my son that his father can compete with integrity in today’s world, be very successful, and leave the world a better place for him.

Combining my technical/business-based education with a long career steadily progressing up the corporate ladder, I decided to build a company that held true to my values. So, I founded and designed the next generation of IT support firm: CTECH Consulting Group Inc. We are a completely automated, cloud-based IT company designed to compete against any other IT firm without the overhead. We promote a lifestyle to all our staff where they can work anywhere, at any time, access any information on any device that is relevant to their job, and collaborate with anyone they want to.