See what’s coming to Dynamics 365 Sales, Marketing, Customer Service, and more in the 2023 wave one release.
As one of the only solutions to combine the capabilities of both CRM and ERP solutions, Dynamics 365 provides organizations with a single, easy-to-use business management system. The cloud-based suite provides features and functionality that enable sales, marketing, customer service, and HR teams to meet both business and customer needs.
The 2023 release wave 1 (beginning April 2023 to September 2023) for the solution included new innovations that further empower businesses to transform their processes. Hundreds of new features were added to the platform’s applications, including Sales, Field Service, Customer Service, Finance, and Project Operations.
Below, we’ll highlight a few of the new updates, specifically Customer Services’ new omnichannel capabilities, Sales Accelerator sequence functionality, portal licensing, and new Sales features.
Sales Accelerator Sequences
This is one of the most under-utilized capabilities within Dynamics 365 Sales; however, when utilized, it can help sellers complete the sales cycle more efficiently. Essentially, the tool acts as a playbook for sellers and outlines a set of best practices to be followed throughout the day. Sequences can then be connected to specific leads or opportunities which appear directly in Dynamics 365 Sales. Within each sequence, sellers can see actions and next steps that need to be completed for each lead to close deals. Ultimately, this results in more productive sellers, a more efficient sales process, and a better experience for both new and current customers.
Omnichannel for Customer Service
Today’s buyers are engaging with businesses through numerous channels, including web channels, social media networks, mobile sites, and more. To ensure businesses are actively engaging with customers across all channels, Microsoft added omnichannel capabilities to the Customer Service application. The feature provides customer service representatives with contextual information, productivity tools, real-time notifications, knowledge base integration, case creation, and search capabilities.
For example, customers who engage with a business’ chatbot for support will be connected to an agent via the omnichannel capability. The agent has access to the customers’ previous conversation history, enabling the agent to provide faster, more accurate support.
License Updates
Prior to the 2023 wave one release, the price of Dynamics 365 Power Apps Portal was based on per login, per day. The new licensing model for Power Apps Portal is per user per month. Organizations pay for external users to use the portal and only have to pay licensing costs once per month rather than paying for each day of the month that users logged in. Essentially, this means that Power Apps is now more of a niche offering, allowing organizations to use the Power Apps portal in numerous use cases.
New Dynamics 365 Sales Capabilities
To enable sellers to close deals more quickly and successfully, Microsoft released numerous new features to the platform, including:
New opportunity management experience: This feature allows sellers to visualize the sales funnel and track deals while simultaneously editing opportunities on the go.
Sales execution and sales force automation: Microsoft added additional capabilities to this Sales feature, including preventing duplicate leads from entering the system, automatically creating follow-up tasks, streamlining the creation of leads, and using AI to get account-based suggestions.
Sales engagement: Leveraging AI-powered capabilities, these new features will help sellers maintain a more successful relationship with customers. Some of the new features include engaging a bot for initial customer outreach so only top leads reach sellers and get seamless customer insights on each call.
These are just some of the features recently released to Dynamics 365 Sales. Brandon Gorton, Dynamics 365 CRM Practice Director at JourneyTEAM, described the new SMS capabilities coming to Sales: “The upcoming wave one of 2023 brings some of the most anticipated features requested for Sales which is the native SMS integration capabilities. This includes the following capabilities:
Admins will be able to assign specific numbers to any user/team for SMS
Receive customer responses for SMS sent and revert to build an ongoing conversation
Send and receive SMS from all relevant Dynamics 365 Sales entity forms
Get real-time notifications for incoming SMS.”
Leverage the Power of the New Dynamics 365 with JourneyTEAM
As Microsoft continues to release new capabilities to Dynamics 365, it can be overwhelming for businesses to navigate the myriad of features. This may result in lost opportunities, lower productivity and efficiency, fewer customer leads, and more.
To ensure your organization is taking full advantage of the innovative platform, contact JourneyTEAM. Regardless of what your business goals are, JourneyTEAM ensures you have the right solutions in place to meet them.
Ready to get started? Contact JourneyTEAM today.