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Marketplace Community - Upcoming AI Events
**Updated 11/8/24 ISV Success is now supporting a series of AI-focused events to help partners maximize the AI opportunity when building and publishing solutions to the commercial marketplace. These events are open to all partners on marketplace – participation in ISV Success is not required to attend. Stay updated on the latest offerings bysubscribing to this post, where we will be regularly updating our list of upcoming events and sharing links to recent events. Full instructions on how to subscribe are posted at the bottom of this post. Check out our upcoming AI events below and comment with any of your questions! _____________________________________________________________________________________________ ISV AI Envisioning Day Trainings We are excited to announce the launch of two new ISV AI Envisioning Day training courses introducing tools and frameworks to leverage in building AI applications that drive innovation and business value. Microsoft ISV AI Envisioning Day: Identify and Prioritize Use Cases for AI Solutions This session guides you through the process of identifying and prioritizing business use cases for AI solutions. You will learn how to structure each use case to assess its viability, differentiate its value, and explore learning opportunities. Practical advice and actionable steps will be provided to help you kickstart your AI projects and accelerate time-to-market. Microsoft ISV AI Envisioning Day: Get the Framework to Develop AI Solutions In this envisioning session, you will learn how to effectively plan, build, and deploy your AI solution. You will be empowered with tools and frameworks to guide you through the technical and business considerations to evaluate when determining the best approach to use in building your AI application. Whether you’re just beginning to identify and prioritize AI use cases or are ready to begin planning, building, and deploying solutions, you’ll learn the steps to make AI a reality in your organization. Both ISV AI Envisioning Day training courses will run monthly in multiple time zones and are delivered in English. Check back for upcoming session dates and times. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Azure AI Partner Council & AI Visionaries The Azure AI Partner Council & AI Visionaries is excited to deliver new AI webinars to enhance your learning and help you navigate the future of AI. New trainings to be posted soon! _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Generative AI Fundamentals Trainings Join us to discover how to apply the latest AI advancements to your work, and to learn the foundations of language models and generative AI applications. You’ll also see how Azure OpenAI Service helps you deliver results using text, code, image generation, natural language summarization, and semantic search. Use the link below to see the full list of upcoming sessions available for registration. Multiple dates and time zones are available, and new sessions are added frequently. Generative AI Fundamentals Note that all sessions are delivered in English. Caption languages are available and noted in the session registration. Registration closes 2 days prior to scheduled date/time. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Microsoft Azure: Building Generative Apps with Azure OpenAI Service Trainings Join us at Building Generative Apps with Azure OpenAI Service to learn how to work with powerful large language models, including GPT. You’ll gain deeper insight into the benefits of natural language processing, including its ability to generate transformative content. You’ll also discover how to provision Azure OpenAI, deploy models and effectively use language models in generative AI applications. Use the link below to see the full list of upcoming sessions available for registration. Multiple dates and time zones are available, and new sessions are added frequently. Building Generative Apps with Azure OpenAI Service Note that all sessions are delivered in English. Caption languages are available and noted in the session registration. Registration closes 2 days prior to scheduled date/time. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Microsoft Azure: Accelerate Development using Azure DevOps and GitHub Build the skills you need to create new opportunities and accelerate your understanding of Microsoft Cloud technologies at a free Microsoft Azure Virtual Training Day from Microsoft Learn. Join us at Accelerate Development Using Azure DevOps and GitHub to discover the right tools and processes to make your move to DevOps. We’ll walk you through real-world challenges and show you how to resolve them using Azure DevOps and GitHub—for both admins and end users. Use the link below to see the full list of upcoming sessions available for registration. Multiple dates and time zones are available, and new sessions are added frequently. Accelerate Development using Azure DevOps and GitHub Note that all sessions are delivered in English. Caption languages are available and noted in the session registration. Registration closes 2 days prior to scheduled date/time. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Subscribe to this post If you're not a member of the Tech Community already, create an account at techcommunity.microsoft.com Select "subscribe" from the 3-dot dropdown in the upper-right corner of this post. Under "Notification Settings," select "Notify me ofAny edits & commentson knowledge bases articles I subscribe to," thenselect to receive updates to this post either immediately, daily, or weekly (I recommend weekly). Manage your subscription settings so that you can receive email updates on new events. Manage these settings by selecting your profile icon in the top right corner of the community, selecting "My Settings," and selecting "Subscriptions & Notifications." You can also subscribe to the entire marketplace community which will provide you with regular updates on all marketplace discussion topics happening in this forum. To do this, click "subscribe" in the upper right corner of the marketplace community homepage.justinroyalNov 08, 2024Microsoft
The countdown to Ignite is on!
We can’t wait to welcome you to Microsoft Ignite, Nov. 18-22! Discover how Microsoft’s latest AI and cloud tools can elevate your solutions and expand customer reach. Join ISV-focused sessions, hands-on labs, and immersive experiences to gain best practices on building, marketing, and monetizing AI-driven applications. Maximize your Ignite experience: Read about the ISV opportunityat Ignite. Register for virtual access to stream keynotes live and on-demand. Learn more aboutmarketplace content at Ignite Explore the session catalog with over 20 ISV-focused sessionsjustinroyalNov 07, 2024How Microsoft for Startups Helped Us Improve Customer Service with AI: A Success Story
We at MissNoCalls (MNC) joined the Microsoft for Startups program to take our AI solutions to the next level and solve real-world problems for our clients. One of our biggest recent successes was with Mold Busters, a company that specializes in mold inspection and cleanup. Mold Busters needed help keeping up with a high number of customer questions and wanted to offer support 24/7. With help from Microsoft for Startups, we created Bruce, an AI voice bot that could handle Mold Busters' customer service around the clock. This article explains how our AI voice bot, powered by Microsoft's resources, helped Mold Busters improve customer satisfaction, response times, and efficiency. Read the full success story here. How Microsoft for Startups Helped Us Build AI Solutions The Microsoft for Startups program gave us the tools and support we needed to grow our business and create Bruce, a customizable AI voice bot that’s making a real impact. Here’s how Microsoft’s resources helped us transform customer service for companies like Mold Busters: Microsoft Azure AI and Cloud Solutions: With Azure’s advanced AI tools, we created Bruce to handle lots of calls and answer customer questions with security and reliability. Azure also let us fine-tune Bruce’s conversations, so customers felt they were talking to a helpful assistant instead of just a regular automated system. Technical Guidance and Support: Microsoft for Startups gave us access to tools and resources that helped us make Bruce’s responses more natural and accurate. This helped make customer interactions more efficient and satisfying. Networking and Visibility: Being part of Microsoft for Startups connected us with companies like Mold Busters. These connections let us show how AI can improve customer service and get feedback to keep making our product better. Customer Survey Results with Mold Busters: Real Success After we set up Bruce for Mold Busters, they did a customer survey to see how it affected satisfaction, service quality, and response times. Here’s what they found: Higher Customer Satisfaction: The survey showed that 43.3% of customers felt Bruce fully solved their concerns — a big win for us. Customers liked that Bruce could answer questions quickly and accurately, especially for common questions. Our goal has always been to make AI that feels helpful and engaging, and this feedback shows we’re on the right track. Clear and Understandable Voice: 67.7% of customers rated Bruce’s voice as clear or very clear. Having a clear voice is really important for a good AI experience, and this feedback shows that our investment in Azure’s voice technology is paying off. With fewer misunderstandings and better instructions, we’re helping Mold Busters have smoother and more satisfying interactions. Good Interaction Speed: With 74.1% of respondents saying the interaction speed was just right, it’s clear that Bruce is doing a good job of balancing quick responses with ease of use. We’ve worked hard to make sure Bruce responds fast but without making customers feel rushed, and this feedback shows we’re getting it right. 24/7 Availability for After-Hours Service: Thanks to Bruce’s 24/7 availability, Mold Busters saw a 75% increase in after-hours responses. For a company like Mold Busters, being able to respond at any time is really important. Bruce makes sure every customer gets heard, day or night, and that no opportunities are missed. How Microsoft for Startups Helped Us Bring AI to More Businesses Microsoft for Startups has been a key partner in helping us grow our AI skills. With access to Microsoft Azure, we can deliver solutions that are secure and work well across different industries. The success we’ve seen with Mold Busters proves that small and medium-sized businesses can really benefit from AI — especially with strong support from Microsoft. Using Azure’s infrastructure, we’ve been able to meet high standards for reliability and scalability, which means Bruce can handle customer inquiries across many sectors. Whether it’s environmental services like Mold Busters or other industries, we’re helping companies use AI to solve customer service problems and make a bigger impact. Final Thoughts We’re really proud of what we’ve done with Microsoft for Startups. Our work with Mold Busters is just one example of how AI can change customer service, making it faster, more reliable, and always available. By working closely with Microsoft, we’re expanding what’s possible in customer interactions and helping our clients succeed. If you’re curious about how AI could improve your customer service, we’d love to share our experience and explore new opportunities together.M365 Copilot: Developer Camp: join us this Thursday!
Summer may be over for most of you, but it's not too late to join the M365 Copilot: Developer Camp - this Thursday, November 7 at 9:00 am PT! This is an exciting live event designed to inspire and empower developers to build next-generation Microsoft 365 Copilot Agents. We are inviting you in this adventure to learn directly from the experts behind Microsoft’s developer tools and have some fun together. During this 90-minute live event, we’ll dive deep into building Copilot Agents and explore the possibilities they bring to the Microsoft 365 ecosystem. We’ll cover everything from declarative agents to custom engine agents, alongside games, doodles, in studio interviews and panel discussions with the leaders shaping the future of developer tooling at Microsoft. Learn more: Join the Microsoft 365 Copilot: Developer Camp - Microsoft 365 Developer Blog Additional Resources: Copilot Developer CampjustinroyalNov 05, 2024Microsoft GenAI Accelerator: developing the UK's best and brightest AI-focused startups
Microsoft launches GenAI Accelerator with NVIDIA and GitHub to boost UK AI start-ups Important news for all UK startups!Microsoft has launched the GenAI Accelerator initiative in partnership with NVIDIA and GitHub to develop the UK’s brightest and best AI-focused start-ups and springboard them to future success. This initiativewill provide exclusive resources and opportunities to companies looking to build, market, and scale up their generative AI products and services. The Accelerator will run from January 2025 to early March 2025 and is specifically tailored for UK AI start-ups that have secured seed funding and are looking to take their products to the next level. Microsoft is seeking companies whose innovative AI-powered products have the potential to change people’s lives for the better, create jobs, and have significant economic impact. The Accelerator will culminate in a Demo Day, during which participants will have the opportunity to showcase their products to top venture capitalists and private equity firms. Participants will receive one-to-one support from Microsoft’s AI ‘Black Belt’ team – specialists in AI and machine learning – as well as access to workshops and help provided by partners NVIDIA and GitHub. Learn more about the benefits of this initiative and how to apply:Microsoft launches GenAI Accelerator with NVIDIA and GitHub to boost UK AI start-ups.justinroyalNov 04, 2024
Get a Sneak Peak and Give Feedback on New Co-Sell Experience Concepts
I’m a UX researcher on the Commerce + Ecosystem team at Microsoft, and I'm looking for ISV partners who would like to help shape the future of Co-sell. I’m inviting you to participate in a 1:1, 45-minute research interview via Microsoft Teams. During this session, I will show you design concepts of proposed changes to Partner Center and the Co-sell process, including creating offers from the Marketplace. Your feedback on these concepts can help shape future improvements. If you're interested, please find a timeslot here: [Book time with Dane Andersen: New Concepts for Partner Center Feedback] Thank YoudaneandersenNov 04, 2024Managing your marketplace community subscriptions
As the marketplace community continues to grow, I recommend managing your subscriptions to get the content most relevant to your top areas of interest, at the right time. About Labels and Subscriptions: You may have noticed that posts within this discussion forum contain labels such as "Build," "Publish," "Grow," and "ISV Success." These labels are applied to help you identify focused on specific marketplace topics (Building apps for the marketplace, publishing apps, growing your sales of apps on the marketplace, etc.) There are similar labels applied to all blogs on the marketplace blog: "Thought Leadership" - includes content on best practices, interviews with marketplace partners, etc. "Roadmap & Functionality" - any content related to the marketplace roadmap and new features/functionality You can "subscribe" to certain labels based on your areas of interest, which allows for a more customized community experience. For example. on the marketplace blog site, if you are most interested in Roadmap & Functionality content. you can adjust your settings to be notified immediately when new content with this label is published. And if you are interested in other topics, such as ISV Success, you can still subscribe, but just elect to receive notifications less frequently. Starting with subscriptions Refer to this general help article on subscriptions and notifications:Managing Preferences, Subscriptions and Notifications - Microsoft Community Hub If you're not a member of the Tech Community already, create an account at techcommunity.microsoft.com Manage your subscription settings so that you can receive email updates on the content you are interested in. Manage these settings by selecting your profile icon in the top right corner of the community, selecting "My Settings," and selecting "Subscriptions & Notifications. You can also subscribe to the entire marketplace community which will provide you with regular updates on all marketplace discussion topics happening in this forum. To do this, click "subscribe" in the upper right corner of themarketplace community homepage. Getting Started in the Community: General information about starting on the community can be found via these resources: Getting Started on the Tech Community - Microsoft Community Hub Contributing to the Community - Microsoft Community HubjustinroyalNov 04, 2024Certified Software GA - Marketplace Rewards
Marketplace Rewards is far and away my all-time favorite Microsoft program, and it just got even better with extra benefits for partners that hold a Certified Software designation! The Certified Software program is now generally available, and it will do the heavy lifting for you in four areas: your Microsoft co-sell playcard (which gets uploaded to MSX upon completion for easy discovery by Microsoft sellers), nurture emails you can use with customers and/or to raise visibility with Microsoft sellers, a solution FAQ document, and a 2-page solution brief. Extra incentive to earn a Certified Software badge if you don't already have one + four more reasons to love your Marketplace Rewards engagement manager. 🙂 #MarketplaceChampions #SponsoredA story about our journey on the marketplace. I hope it will inspire and help on your journey
I would like to share my experience with publishing transactable apps on the Microsoft commercial marketplace, the Microsoft 365 App Certification Program, Marketplace Rewards, and certified software designations. Starting with publishing our apps on to the marketplace: We have several apps that operate within the context of Microsoft 365, including apps for Outlook, Microsoft Teams, Copilot Agent, Office, and SharePoint. We have been in AppSource for many years and have customers worldwide. We developed an in-house license application to manage our customers' licenses. Before the commercial marketplace, we managed all invoicing and license management manually. Now, everything has become much easier. We have published monetized SaaS apps connected to the AppSource apps. Using the SaaS Fulfillment API, we integrated the purchasing process with our in-house license application. We have gained numerous benefits, including: Significant time savings in the invoicing and billing process, as purchasing, adding, removing, or cancelling licenses is automated and managed by Microsoft Customers appreciate the ability to manage licenses themselves, finding it easier Improved market awareness due to promotion in the marketplace And new customers are joining regularly. It is also important to mention Marketplace Rewards, which offer various benefits. For example, customer case stories can be published through Marketplace Rewards on Microsoft customer case stories. Here is a link to our latest story: Microsoft Customer Story - Design for Leisure improves efficiency 30% with iGlobe solutions and Microsoft Planner. Additionally, the Transact & Grow Incentive Campaign has provided us with financial incentives through marketplace sales, as well as Azure sponsorship credits to offset deployment costs. Considering these advantages, there is potential to make the apps CSP Ready as well: https://aka.ms/P2PeBook. Equally important is obtaining the Microsoft 365 App Certification. Certification confirms that an app solution is compatible with Microsoft technologies, compliant with cloud app security best practices, and supported by Microsoft. This is significant because: It provides certification from Microsoft, confirming app security and compliance It saves time in the sales process, as security and compliance are already verified It makes the app easier to find on AppSource, the Commercial Marketplace, and in the Teams App admin portal, where it will be listed in a special category Achieving sales in the marketplace, having customer case stories, and obtaining the Microsoft 365 App Certification provides the foundation to obtain Certified Software Designations, which come with additional benefits and opportunities for co-selling with Microsoft. Today two of our apps have achieved the Certified Software Designation for Modern Work. Soon iPlanner Pro for Teams that includes a Copilot Agent will follow as well. I share this story not to boast but to inspire and motivate others. There is nothing exceptional about us or our experience here – it can be completely replicated by leveraging the resources that Microsoft provides.Was it all very easy…. No. Is it doable? Yes!
Transforming AI Development: Microsoft Azure AI ‘s new capabilities and tools announced
Microsoft is thrilled to introduce new tools designed to simplify AI app development at GitHub Universe this week. These innovations aim to empower developers with enhanced capabilities, making it easier to build and deploy AI applications and further integrate Microsoft Azure AI services into your favorite dev tools. See how tools like GitHub Copilot for Azure builds upon the Copilot Chat capabilities in VS Code and integrates with tools you already use like GitHub and Visual Studio Code. See the full list of tool and capability announcements made at GitHub Universe that will transform your AI development process.Azure at GitHub Universe: New tools to help simplify AI app development.j_wellerOct 29, 2024
