Blog Post

Microsoft 365 Copilot
9 MIN READ

Copilot Chat brings the power of AI to more Microsoft 365 users

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Angela_Byers
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Jan 22, 2025

Welcome back to Grow Your Business with Copilot, your ultimate guide for actionable insights on leveraging AI in small and medium-sized businesses. Over to the holidays I took time to reflect on the first year of Microsoft 365 Copilot for SMBs. What has impressed me most is how quickly so many organizations have used this new AI-powered assistant to rethink the ways they do business. Automating repetitive processes, inspiring creativity, boosting productivity, and enabling busy teams to focus on what really matters. 

Now, new options for accessing Copilot will help more businesses experience the transformative capabilities of AI. 

Introducing Copilot Chat 

Last week, we announced Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat, a new offering that adds agents to our free chat experience for Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Business Standard, and Business Premium subscribers.  Copilot Chat offers free, secure AI chat powered by GPT-4o, agents accessible right in the chat, and IT controls, including enterprise data protection and agent management. Without upfront commitment, businesses of all sizes can create and use agents to answer employee IT questions, be a research assistant, help new employees with onboarding, and more. 

 

Copilot Chat includes web-grounded chat, Agents, and Copilot Control System

Experience the full capabilities of Microsoft 365 Copilot 

While Copilot Chat is a flexible and powerful way for everyone in your business to experience how much more they can do with the help of AI, Microsoft 365 Copilot remains our best-in-class personal AI assistant for work. Summarizing long email threads in Outlook. Providing meeting recaps in Teams. Drafting proposals in Word. Surfacing data insights in Excel. Designing presentations in PowerPoint. You also benefit from unlimited web chat and agent usage. Copilot gives you the ability to save hours each week, letting you accomplish more and stay ahead of the competition. It’s not surprising that ROI for Copilot SMB customersis projected up to 353%.1 

New flexibility for Copilot agents 

Moving forward, every business will have a mix of Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot—our best-in-class offering—to run and grow their businesses.  See the table below for our product lineup and learn more about costs related to agent consumption. 

 

Capability comparison between Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot

Accelerate the value of Copilot in your business 

We recently introduced the Copilot Control System, a collection of admin capabilities designed to help you confidently adopt and accelerate the business value of Copilot and agents. 

Administrators can set data access and security policies as well as manage the agents their users create with the same tools and experiences they use in Microsoft 365 Copilot. And setting up metering for agents is easy and transparent, ensuring you always have control of and visibility into your organization’s AI investment. 

Copilot Chat is seamlessly integrated into the Copilot Control System. And like Microsoft 365 Copilot, Copilot Chat is covered by our enterprise data protection commitment, meaning that we protect the security and privacy of your data, and respect the controls and governance policies you have in place. 

Getting started with an agent 

Wondering what kind of agent you should create first? We’ve got you covered with a set of out-of-the-box agents that help anyone be more productive. For example, choose the Writing Coach for detailed feedback to make your communications stronger, the Idea Coach to help you brainstorm and organize ideas, or the Visual Creator to assist with creating image and videos. Once enabled by an admin, users can @mention these pre-built agents within Copilot Chat, or select them from the right-side pane  

Then, we have a set of agents that can be easily built using Agent Builder in Copilot Chat. Agents include Onboarding Buddy to assist new hires with onboarding processes and training, Research Assistant to review materials from company databases, Contract/Legal Review to automate review and analysis of legal documents.  

Once configured and shared, users with access can add the agent by selecting Get Copilot Agents in the right-side pane.  

Check out our newly updated Microsoft 365 Copilot Implementation Guide for Small and Medium Business. This resource is full of helpful recommendations related to technical readiness and user enablement. 

More ways to purchase Microsoft 365 Copilot 

Users can now self-purchase Copilot directly without the assistance of an admin. Microsoft 365 Business offers the convenience of self-purchasing Copilot when signed in at Microsoft365.com/Copilot, or simply send a license request to your admin for them to manage in the admin center. 

You also have the option to pay monthly instead of making a full annual payment upfront for increased flexibility when budgeting your AI investments.   

Customer story: Bread n Butter’s recipe for success with Copilot  

A recurring theme we hear from our customers is the need to manage costs while providing teams with the tools to compete and grow. In this blog, we explore how a thriving creative studio utilizes Microsoft 365 Copilot to empower its team members to produce award-winning campaigns with efficiency and confidence. 

As an innovative brand strategy and design studio working with high-profile clients, Bread n Butter routinely tackles tough business challenges and tight deadlines. The company deliberately runs lean, with a flat organizational structure staffed by experienced communications professionals. While they were interested in the potential of Copilot, there was a high bar for it to prove its value and justify the added expense. 

Bread n Butter is a brand strategy and design company with headquarters in Seattle, WA

Bread n Butter initially enabled Copilot for a small group to test its utility and manage costs. They quickly saw the value of this new tool across a wide range of uses, such as automating the documentation of client meetings, synthesizing long chat threads, and drafting project briefs and client communications. After just ten days, they chose to roll it out to everyone in the company and haven’t looked back. 

Jessica Michaels Kane, CEO of Bread n Butter, highlighted that Copilot has been useful throughout the agency, from the operations team, to administrative staff, to the Chief Strategy Officer. Copilot's power is that each team member has found different ways to use the tool effectively. 

“We were very aware from just a couple of days of usage that this is going to have a material shift on how we do business. Once our team started using Copilot, it became part of their daily DNA based on their current disciplines and skill sets,” said Michaels Kane. 

While Bread n Butter was quickly exploring the potential of the tool, they deliberately wanted its adoption to be organic, allowing team members to find ways to use Copilot to yield better outcomes – whether in the form of completing projects faster, validating hypotheses, or enabling improved client service. This flexibility led to quicker adoption and a more expansive set of scenarios where Copilot added value. This approach allowed team members to figure out how to make the tool work best for their needs. 

There was so much enthusiasm for this new AI assistant that the company created new meetings and Teams channels expressly for sharing best practices and continuous learning. 

Copilot’s organization-wide impact 

Jake Ferrigno, Bread n Butter’s Chief Strategy Officer, highlighted that Copilot has been incredibly beneficial on the administrative and tactical side, helping with notetaking, clarifying next steps, and catching up on meetings. He was also impressed by Copilot’s value at the beginning of projects to overcome the challenge of where to begin.  

“At the start of projects, Copilot has been helpful for creative concepting, ‘How would you solve for this?’ ‘Give me three different ways to do that.’ It removes the blank page and helps you get to human answers faster,” said Ferrigno. 

Ferrigno shared Copilot has also improved efficiency in several areas: 

  • Administrative tasks: Copilot has been particularly useful for administrative tasks such as note-taking, clarifying next steps, and catching up on meetings. It has helped Bread n Butter streamline administrative processes and save time. 
  • Project initiation:At the beginning of projects, Copilot helps Bread n Butter’s strategy teams generate initial ideas and drafts, making it easier to get started on complex tasks. 
  • Digital busy work: For Bread n Butter, Copilot has been effective in handling digital busy work, such as referencing past meetings and quickly understanding ongoing projects. 

More than workplace efficiency 

Bread n Butter realized some unexpected benefits from their use of Copilot, many of which have been as significant as the functional benefits of time savings and efficiency: 

  • Improved organization: Copilot has helped Bread n Butter’s team members feel more organized. This sense of organization has positively impacted their daily work experience, making them feel more in control. 
  • Enhanced connection:Copilot has also enhanced the connection between team members and their work. By providing better insights and summaries, it has made it easier for team members to stay connected and engaged with their projects. 
  • Boosted confidence:Using Copilot has boosted the confidence of team members, knowing that they have a reliable tool to help them question, test, and validate their decisions and outputs. 

To this last point, Ferrigno added, “We’re now taking hypotheses to Copilot and asking whether these can be validated by examples, evidence, or references in research. My strategy team can synthesize data faster, but perhaps more importantly, they have more confidence in what they see and what they believe, because they're able to get an additional set of ‘eyes’ on the same things that they're looking at.” 

Bread n Butter’s tips for getting the most from Copilot 

Both Michaels Kane and Ferrigno highlighted the importance of training and crafting effective prompts for Copilot to help shorten learning curves and realize a faster return on their AI investment. When rolling out Copilot, organizations should consider: 

  • Importance of training: Because different team members will use AI differently, Bread n Butter highlighted the need for robust training to help employees understand how to use Copilot effectively -- not just for initial training but ongoing support and learning opportunities. 
  • Social learning: They also called out the importance of social learning, where team members share their experiences with each other. This approach helps in discovering new ways to utilize Copilot and improves overall adoption. 
  • Prompt playbook:Bread n Butter is exploring the creation of a “prompt playbook” to guide team members on how to write effective prompts and get the most out of Copilot. 

Bread n Butter's success with Microsoft 365 Copilot is a testament to the transformative power of AI in the workplace. By embracing Copilot, they have not only streamlined their operations and enhanced productivity but also fostered a more connected and confident team. 

Imagine the possibilities for your organization. Whether it's improving efficiency, sparking creativity, or boosting team morale, Copilot can help you achieve remarkable results. 

 

 

 

 

Take Action 

Learn more about using Copilot to transform your business, sign up for a trial, or contact our team for a personalized demo. 

Try out some of the ways Bread n Butter used Copilot 

  • Catch up on meetings and tasks with Copilot in Teams 
  • Co-create marketing content with Copilot Chat 
  • Expedite drafting, editing, and proofreading content with Copilot in Word 

Become a Copilot power user! 

If your company has used Microsoft 365 Copilot to grow and you’d like to share your story, we’d love to feature you. Comment below and a member from our team will get in touch! 

 

Angela Byers 

Microsoft 
Senior Director, Copilot & Growth Marketing for SMB 
Let's connect on LinkedIn 

 

Meet the team 

The monthly series, Grow Your Business with Microsoft 365 Copilot, is brought to you by the SMB Copilot marketing team at Microsoft. From entrepreneurs to coffee connoisseurs, they work passionately behind the scenes, sharing the magic of Copilot products with small and medium businesses everywhere. Always ready with a smile, a helping hand, and a clever campaign, they're passionate about helping YOUR business grow! 

From left to right: Angela Byers, Mariana Prudencio, Elif Algedik, Kayla Patterson, Briana Taylor, and Gabe Ho

About the blog 

The Grow Your Business with Microsoft 365 Copilot blog aims to inspire and delight you with insights and stories on how AI is changing the game for business. This monthly series is designed to empower small and mid-sized businesses to harness the power of AI at work. Each month, we feature scenarios where an SMB is using AI to transform, scale, and grow. 

Updated Feb 06, 2025
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