Dynamics 365 & Teams Integration: Microsoft's Latest Updates

Enhanced Integration Between Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Teams

As remote work becomes increasingly prevalent and the challenges of managing distributed teams are better understood, users are seeking more streamlined integration between their various software tools. This desire aims to minimize the number of clicks needed to complete essential tasks.

During the Ignite Conference, Microsoft unveiled a closer connection between its Dynamics 365 business suite and its collaboration platform, Teams, specifically to address this need.

Reducing Context Switching

Alysa Taylor, Corporate Vice President for Business Applications and Global Industry at Microsoft, emphasized that this native integration significantly reduces the need to switch between different applications.

“Our commitment lies in unifying the collaboration platform with the business process layer,” Taylor explained. “This empowers professionals – including salespeople, service representatives, and operations managers – with a single, cohesive platform for both collaboration and daily business operations.”

Applications Across Departments

This integration will be visible across multiple departments, including marketing, sales, and customer service.

For example, marketers can now create and manage webinars directly within Dynamics 365 Marketing tools, and then host them as streaming events in Teams, utilizing the Teams streaming functionality integrated into the Dynamics 365 interface.

Sales Navigator and Teams Connectivity

In a sales scenario, Taylor highlighted the ability for sales teams to monitor the career progression of their contacts using LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

Furthermore, specific sales records can be linked within Microsoft Teams without requiring users to exit Dynamics 365 Sales. This ensures that contact information and any updates occurring in Teams are automatically reflected within the Sales application.

Cross-Cloud Connectivity

For organizations utilizing a mix of software solutions, Microsoft offers cross-cloud connectors.

These connectors enable integration with other services, regardless of the specific tasks involved, provided a connector for the desired application is available.

Competitive Landscape

Salesforce, a major competitor to Microsoft in the business software market, acquired Slack for over $27 billion last year to achieve similar integration capabilities.

Taylor views this acquisition as a reactive measure to the integration Microsoft has already established and continues to develop.

“The Salesforce acquisition of Slack was necessary for them to achieve the level of collaboration we already offer,” Taylor stated. “We are significantly ahead, as they will lack these native integrations. We see this acquisition as a direct response to our work with Dynamics 365 and Teams.”

Market Share Considerations

It’s important to note that, according to 2019 Gartner data, Salesforce currently holds a considerably larger market share in the CRM space – exceeding 19% – compared to Microsoft’s under 3%.

While these figures may have shifted somewhat since then, a substantial change is unlikely.

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