Microsoft offers Microsoft 365 in a variety of plans or subscription packages with different prices and capabilities for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). In this month’s issue, let’s make sure your business knows how to choose and buy the right plan. No matter the size of your business, there’s a Microsoft 365 plan that fits your needs with available add-ons like Microsoft Teams Phone. Whether you’re buying through our website, a reseller, or a Microsoft representative, you can get up and running in no time.
Microsoft 365 for productivity and collaboration
Microsoft 365
Ensuring you can communicate with your team and your customers is one of the first and most essentials steps of running a business. It’s crucial for productivity and collaboration. But how do you know what the right plan is? Here’s how to decide:
First, you will want to assess your needs by considering your business requirements and priorities. Does your company need email, cloud storage, collaboration tools, or advanced security features? You want to have a list of priorities in your mind.
Evaluate Plans: Microsoft offers various plans for businesses. Visit the Microsoft 365 website -- call us -- contact your favorite Microsoft partner to learn more. Starting at just $6 per user per month, there’s bound to be a plan for your company’s needs.
Consider User Count: Plans often include different features and benefits depending on the number of users. So you’ll want to see how many licenses you’ll need and choose a plan that fits your requirements. Note that some plans have user limits.
What’s Different About Each Plan?
If you’re just starting out and your company is small, or maybe you’re a solopreneur, then Microsoft 365 Business Basic is the right plan for you. It’s ideal for email, online meetings, and basic collaboration. You get web and mobile versions of all the well-known apps—Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams--so your company can quickly get to work, making documents and having online meetings.
If that’s not enough, you can step up to Microsoft 365 Business Standard to expand your productivity functionality. This popular plan adds desktop versions of Word, Excel, Teams, and more. You can run webinars with attendee registration and reporting so you can power internal training sessions, or customer events to grow your pipeline.
The top-of-the-line option for small-medium business is Microsoft 365 Business Premium, which adds advanced security features and device management. You can better discover, classify, and protect sensitive information. All our plans give you security capabilities to keep your information safe. Business Premium goes beyond and includes:
• Advanced Threat Protection: protects against malicious links and attachments.
• Device Management: manage and secure data on employee devices.
• Information Protection: data loss prevention and sensitivity labels.
• Identity and Access Management: provides more access controls based on conditions.
All plans come with 100GB of storage per user, which is enough for 100,000 documents of 1 MB each, a typical size. You can work in real-time while connected to the cloud, and with Standard, and Premium plans, you even get desktop versions of Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, which is perfect for the times when you don’t have connectivity. Plus, all plans have Microsoft Outlook, your comprehensive email management experience, with calendar integration, advanced filtering, and categorization options.
Making The Choice
Lastly, compare costs and choose the billing method that is best for you – billed monthly or annually. We even have a 30-day free trial to test things out before you commit. There are many related Microsoft products that can easily be attached to your Microsoft 365 plan. You could outfit your conference rooms with Teams Rooms video meeting equipment, or try Microsoft Copilot, your everyday AI companion.
Teams Phone
One of the other products that many small businesses add to their Microsoft 365 plan is Teams Phone, a cloud-based phone system that integrates perfectly with Teams, to make and receive phone calls, a key telephony solution that simplifies how you can manage communications in your company as well as with external partners and customers.
Teams Phone is the smart calling solution native to Teams. Users make and receive voice and video calls with other users on computer, phone, or mobile device using VoIP technology. And, you can turn Teams into your complete communication solution, with PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) connectivity and advanced call features like auto attendants, call queues, music on hold, and call forwarding.
Whether you are a 100% cloud-based business, require an on-premises setup with connectivity to legacy hardware, require mobility or speedy deployment, we have you covered.
Teams Phone offers four options for deploying and managing PSTN depending on the needs of different users in your organization and optimizing for specific calling scenarios and requirements. Moreover, you do not need to limit yourself to a single option, you can mix and match these options according to your organization’s requirements.
Microsoft Teams Calling Plans: With Teams Calling Plans, you can quickly set up a cloud-based calling system where Microsoft acts as your phone service provider. This is ideal if you need to get started quickly, prefer an all-in-one solution for easier management, and don't have any existing phone infrastructure. It's available in 36 markets.
Operator Connect: If your business has existing phone service/operator contracts or if you need PSTN calling in areas where Teams Calling Plans are not available, Operator Connect allows you to use your current provider or choose from a list of partners. This fully managed option lets the carrier and Microsoft handle all technical details, making it easier for you to focus on your business.
Teams Phone Mobile: Teams Phone Mobile is perfect for enhancing mobility, letting you assign a single, business provided cell phone number for desktop, mobile, and Teams use. Support your mobile and hybrid workers to stay connected and reduce fixed line service costs. With Teams Phone Mobile you can quickly and easily deploy, configure, and manage calling for Teams; and apply security, compliance, and policy settings across mobile devices. Choose “Mobile” in the “Offering” dropdown to see list of participating partners.
Direct Routing: If you have existing telephony investments that you want to continue to use and maintain your existing phone service contracts, Direct Routing is a highly customizable approach that enables connecting to Teams Phone by connecting your Session Border Controller(s) (SBC). These are subject to regulatory, compliance, or survivability requirements that dictate on-premises connectivity.
Download the Teams Phone PSTN guidance to understand which calling solutions may be right for you.
Regardless of the PSTN calling solution - or solutions - you choose for Teams Phone, we’ve got the planning and deployment resources to help ensure your success. The Teams Phone setup guide (requires admin access) is available to guide you through every step of the deployment.
No matter which PSTN calling solution you choose for Teams Phone, we have resources to help you succeed. The Teams Phone setup guide (admin access required) will walk you through the entire process step by step.
Learn more about how Teams Phone can help your organization stay connected and productive. Get started today with a Teams Phone trial or connect with your Microsoft account team or a certified partner to learn more about deploying Teams Phone.
Find Your Plan Today
Choosing the right Microsoft 365 and Teams Phone plan can significantly enhance your business’s productivity and collaboration. Whether you’re a small startup or a growing enterprise, there’s a plan tailored to meet your needs. Don’t wait—explore the options, take advantage of the free trial, and supercharge your business today. And remember, you can still browse last month’s Supercharge blog post on how AI capabilities in Microsoft 365 can simplify communications for you and your employees.
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