How to Make Your Life Easier With Microsoft 365 - Automation Tools From Microsoft 365

Novica Gijevski
9 min readFeb 5, 2021

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Microsoft 365, or Office 365, is a subscription-based service available anywhere in the world. This means that instead of purchasing a full copy of the package for a one-time, upfront fee, users instead pay a monthly fee to access the service at an optional level.

With the Office 365 subscription-based model, users always have access to the latest version as the platform is updated at Microsoft’s end. As usual, home users need to purchase a new copy of the newest version to use the new features.

Office 365 is also built as a cloud application; although working versions of its applications are available with specific plans, it is designed to be used on the Internet. All applications, data, and services generated by Office 365 are hosted on Microsoft servers.

Users do not have to install software or maintain any additional hardware. Office 365 comes with cloud storage and email hosting, so users can host their files over the Internet and access them whenever they need to, from any device that connects to the Internet.

Because it is cloud-based, Office 365 also comes with several features not available in the previous sustained versions.

Great automation tools can help anyone in an organization be more productive, communicate more efficiently, and accomplish more.

The Office 365 package performs essential tasks such as finding information, sharing knowledge, communicating with colleagues, processing data, and planning and organizing faster and more comfortably. It also helps you reduce time spent on administrative tasks while leaving business activities more time to create, innovate, i.e., to move the business forward.

Using a cloud-hosted productivity package can also have a positive effect on a company’s bottom line. Not only are subscription-based services usually more cost-effective and flexible if business circumstances change, but Office 365 also does not require hardware investments. The entire infrastructure is handled at the end of Microsoft, reducing the need for IT expertise to manage the package and potentially reduce the cost of in-house IT services.

How Safe Is Microsoft 365?

Everyone has a corporate email, right? Likewise, most of us in the corporate world rely on our calendars, spreadsheets, and word processing documents to complete our jobs. These tools make organizations all over the United States and around the world buzz.

But the corporate workforce has become global. People work from everywhere on all kinds of devices. We no longer sit in booths with the desk in front of us. As the working processes have evolved, so has the basic productivity toolkit we all use. Email tools have not only become more mobile, but they have also had to become more collaborative.

Many businesses have switched to email functionality in the cloud, and in many of those cases, it is through Microsoft Office 365.

By expanding their views and horizons, business owners get overwhelmed with processes and working techniques that should be noted in a safe place — that safe place is Microsoft 365.

Anyway, how many of us have encountered unpleasant issues? Most of us, right?

Those unpleasant issues mainly come from unprotected data and files, which are of enormous cruciality to your business operations.

Many companies started to realize these unwanted issues along with the solutions provided. So, the most important thing to do to your data is to keep it safe and secure. Backups are the best way to do it. Microsoft does offer backup for Office 365, but their backup option is not what you suppose it to be.

It is very limited and basic, i.e., ineffective for professional work.

Why Backup Office 365?

Microsoft 365 is an ever-growing platform. New apps are added every year, so it’s good to know what backup solution fits you best. The backbone of Microsoft 365 is SharePoint and Exchange (even OneDrive are just personal SharePoint sites, actually). For example, apps like List are basically a SharePoint list with another look and feel.

Bear in mind that Microsoft is only responsible for keeping the cloud services available while you are accountable for protecting your critical data hosted on those services.

Third-party Office 365 backup is the best way to protect yourself against accidental or malicious file deletion, other user errors, ransomware, and data corruption. These solutions store backups independently of Microsoft servers and allow granular recovery of Office 365 files, folders, and applications. They guarantee that you can quickly restore and meet Office 365 data retention requirements.

Moreover, not all Office 365 backup tools are equally established. In fact, most do not offer protection for the entire product package — for example, and many do not support Microsoft Teams. In addition to this, others may not provide granularly and return permits. So when choosing a backup solution for Office 365, make sure it meets your data protection needs.

The mammoth market has already ignited the idea of developing Office 365 backups for your needs, but not all are the same. In this case, I will present the best Office 365 backup. There is no better backup solution for Office 365 than Altaro Office 365 backup!

The fact that Microsoft doesn’t include native backup options is covered by Altaro Office 365 backup, which also restores your Office 365 data with ease. Their package includes backups, 24/7 light-speed support, unlimited storage, and access to a central management console.

Worry no more since your Office 365 backups are automatically stored to Altaro’s secure cloud backup. The hosted location is within the Microsoft Azure Infrastructure.

Difference Between Microsoft 365 and Office 365

You may have heard of Microsoft 365, introduced by Microsoft in mid-2017. Despite similar branding, Microsoft 365 is not confused with Microsoft Dynamics 365 or Office 365.

Office 365 is the suite of cloud-based productivity applications, while Microsoft 365 is the suite of services that includes Office 365 and other business tools as well. A single user can subscribe to Office 365 without subscribing to Microsoft 365 — but all Microsoft 365 users can also have access to Office 365.

Microsoft 365 was established to give business entities access to all the basic tools they need to complete their core IT infrastructure, secure their business, and get things done.

Along with Office 365, Microsoft 365 includes Windows 10 Enterprise and Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS), which means that subscribers get access to features such as email and calendar, file storage, data protection controls, cyber threat protection, controls for administration and deployment and 99.9% warranty during operation.

All services included in Microsoft 365 are available separately. However, many businesses may find it more convenient and cost-effective to opt for the Microsoft 365 package, especially if they are not existing Microsoft business customers.

Office 365 Work Routine

It is calculated that one out of five employees within a company (20 percent) use Office 365 cloud service. In practice, Office 365 has around 100 million active users, with a total of 1.5 billion Office 365 users.

Although you always have the latest version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Skype for Business and Access, Sharepoint, Publisher, OneDrive for Business, Enterprise clients list these reasons for moving to Office 365:

  • Anytime, Anywhere Access
  • Security
  • Reliability

So what comes with the day-to-day work?

Office 365 is developed to be a web-based productivity tool to support and help you collaborate and communicate securely on any device. Besides, content can be managed and shared between users.

Automation Tools From Microsoft 365 That Will Make Your Life Easier

Microsoft Flow

This tool allows the user to automate workflows, called Flows, across applications. You can use Flow to connect email alerts and instant messaging, synchronize files between applications. You can utilize Microsoft Flow to copy files from one service to another as well. For instance, if you fill out a form in SharePoint, you can use Flow to create a new lead in Dynamics365.

Microsoft Forms

Wanna find out what everyone wants on their pizza for Friday lunch? You can do this with Microsoft Forms. Microsoft Forms allows you to create surveys, polls, and quizzes and view the results as they appear. The good news is that it operates with up to 5,000 recipients. That’s a lot of food, i.e., that’s a lot of pizzas.

Microsoft MyAnalytics

Microsoft MyAnalytics shows you how you spend your working hours: everything, from how much time you spend on the email to whom you work the most, along with other scheduling pigs, like the many meetings you attend each week. The tool is divided into several parts: Your time, network, appointments, email, focus hours, hour by hour. Do you think you spend most of the day in meetings? Maybe you’re right.

Microsoft Planner

Is your team distributed throughout the whole world with many concurrent projects and deliveries to be delivered at the same time? Microsoft Planner can quickly move your current task management process into the digital era.

Planner provides users with a visual way to organize teams, which provides four essential functions: information center, flexible categorization, communication, and insight. Team users can create plans, compile and assign tasks, share files, interact with other team users, and receive progress updates.

Microsoft PowerApps

Build your own application with predefined templates provided by Microsoft. Better yet, you can connect that newly created application to other services, such as your CRM, SharePoint, Oracle Database, and more. You can share your PowerApps with an affiliate by simply entering their email address.

Microsoft StaffHub

This application allows workers and their managers to use a mobile device to manage schedules and stay in touch. Employees can use the tool to request free time, trade shifts, and communicate with co-workers. Messages can be sent to individual team members or the entire team.

Microsoft Delve

This handy data visualization tool incorporates social media elements with machine learning. Delve reveals content across four integrated Microsoft platforms — Exchange, OneDrive, SharePoint, and Yammer. But it does not just collect data points. Instead, it requires relevance to information, such as previous interactions and activities between users.

Office 365 Groups

Office 365 Groups provides a shared workspace for team members. Provides options for creating and saving documents, as well as shared email. Group administrators can add or remove group members.

Office 365 Video

This tool allows you to upload, share and play video messages.

Office 365 Video is an intranet web portal where individuals can post and view videos. It is a streaming video service available with SharePoint Online in Office 365. Office 365 Video displays each video’s thumbnail on the site; an individual selects a thumbnail to view a particular video.

Sway

Sway is a professional presentation tool that can replace PowerPoint at some point. It has a built-in design engine. This helps produce visually appealing reports and presentations, allowing you to drag and drop images, text, videos, and graphs into canvas-based form.

Power BI Pro

Power BI Pro is for those users who publish reports, share dashboards, collaborate with colleagues in the workplace, and engage in other related activities.

Microsoft Advanced eDiscovery

This tool allows you to be even more productive. The eDiscovery tool supports easy to search through Internet mailboxes, SharePoint Online, and OneDrive for single-page business pages. Ediscovery allows organizations to handle thousands of files and find relevant data quickly and efficiently.

In the latest update, Microsoft has added machine learning, predictive coding, and the ability to recognize “duplicate” files (plagiarized content), an email thread that identifies only new, unique email and export thread messages for review function. Export for preview allows you to export all data to a .CSV file, which retains all the document and metadata properties.

Conclusion

Workers today are performing their work from their respective homes, their offices, and their mobile devices. Teams are dispersed across cities, countries, and continents. Collaboration is key to productivity, and productivity tools enable modern knowledge workers to collaborate. By exploring some of the tools available in your Office 365 license, you open up opportunities for a true mobile, a collaboration platform.

By knowing all of the above, you can now easily take control over the suite and outperform the competition. Always have in mind that you need the right Office 365 backup so that you can prevent any damage to your whole system. Backing up Office 365 is crucial, and any serious business should consider getting one for themselves.

Also, keep in mind that the automation tools mentioned here in this post are only available within the Microsoft 365 suite. You only have to discover them and properly use them in order to grasp all the benefits of this enormous platform.

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Novica Gijevski
Novica Gijevski

Written by Novica Gijevski

Novica Gijevski delivers unmatched reliability and is a well-experienced professional for business with an indicated performance record.

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