Microsoft Office 365 delivers a lot of functionality with it’s enterprise class platform that is widely used throughout the world.  If you are a small business owner, here are they key benefits of switching to Office 365.

Backup all your phone contacts automatically

If you run a small business you probably use your mobile phone an awful lot.  If you are using an iPhone, a blackberry, an android, or a windows phone, all of your contacts can synchronize automatically with your Office 365 email account.  So if you lose your phone all of your contacts will remain in your email account.  Once you get a new phone, all your contacts will be synchronized automatically to the new device.

Keep your desktop and phone in sync

Do you ever get frustrated with your phone and your email being out of sync?
You read an email on your phone, and it will appear unread on your desktop when you get back to your office.  When  using Microsoft Office 365, your email, contacts and calendars will sync with your smartphone.  If you send an email on your phone, it will appear in your sent items on your desktop and vice versa.

Take advantage of Office 365 cloud storage

Microsoft Office 365 gives you cloud storage with the SharePoint site you get with your ‘P’ or ‘E’ plan.  By utilizing SharePoint Workspace 2010, your files will synchronize with your cloud storage, giving you the peace of mind of not having to worry about backing up your files.

For information about how much Microsoft Office 365 will cost you, please look at the Office 365 Pricing.

Depending what option you choose, Office 365 is as little as $4 per user per month to a maximum of $20 per user per month.

We have compiled the following comparison table to help you select the appropriate option.

For most businesses the E1 solution is the preference due to its flexibility in allowing companies to grow.  For smaller businesses, plan P1 is a great way to provide all of the features of an enterprise plan at a competitive price, as long as your business is less than 50 users.

Contact us now if you want to know more details on how we can help you choose the correct plan for your enterpise.

Being a smaller, boutique consultancy, we aim to give you a more personal approach than you will get from the big players.  We will engage with you to find out where we can help you deliver the maximum value for money. 

We don’t have a dedicated sales team who will sell you anything just to make a commission, and you won’t get an account manager who doesn’t understand technology.  We like to ensure our whole team has a well rounded grasp of technology, and thus can work with your throughout the engagement from sales through to project delivery.

Maximise your demo time

At Modern Melee we will help you maximise your demonstration time.  We work with you to run through a full product demonstration, to show you the features and configure your clients and systems.*

To get the most out of your demo, it is good to set some goals such as these;

• how many people you want in your demo
• what you want to get out of your demo
  (e.g. proof that it works, advanced features testing etc.)

Since we are experts at managing Office 365, we can deliver demonstrations in a fraction of the time it would take for you to do yourself.  We will work with you to figure out your goals, and provide a suitable course of action.  Added benefits also include the fact you get to work with a Microsoft Partner who can answer all the questions you may have when considering deploying Office 365.

Get in touch now to find out how to set up an Office 365 demonstration.

* for Exchange Online, there are certain options to integrate it with your current email system, so the demo has a greater value

Download and read the following worked example of the cost savings a small company can make when moving to Office 365.  We have estimated that a small company can save over 57% by moving their email to Office 365.  Those calculations don’t even include the extra benefit you get from gaining SharePoint Online and Lync Online in the Office 365 package.

Worked Example - Small Customer Moving to Office 365

At Modern Melee, we have been involved in some major infrastructure implementations, such as Active Directory designs and rollouts, Desktop refreshes, Email migrations, Billing system implementations, Middleware configurations, WAN deployments, EPOS replacements, and the list goes on.

We can work on individual projects, but we do like to engage with companies to help them to develop an overall IT strategy, so we fully understand which direction their business is heading in, and what they require from the technology they implement.

Today, many companies are looking at cloud computing solutions as they offer great cost saving benefits. We are experts in integrating cloud computing with your current infrastructure, to ensure that you get the maximum value from your IT solutions.

In their blog they attribute the cost savings to economies of scale, and as such further drive home the message that cloud computing is delivering greater cost savings to businesses.

Don’t wait too long, as you could be taking advantage of these cost savings by moving your systems to Office 365.  Get in touch now for a free consultation.

“He who fails to plan, plans to fail”

Successful businesses don’t leave anything to chance, and that includes planning your IT strategy.  Plans and strategies can be as simple or as complicated as you wish to make them, but having a plan and a strategy in place accomplishes many goals;

1. It makes you understand where you are now, and where you are trying to get to
2. It also give others in your organisation understanding of your goals

To formulate a good strategy, you need to have the following:

1. an understanding of your current IT environment
   – where you are now
2. an understanding of solutions available in the marketplace 
   -  what is achievable
3. an understanding of where your business is going, and what you want to achieve
   - where you want to go

Here at Modern Melee, we like to work with businesses to achieve their goals.  To do this, we like to partner with companies to discuss your IT requirements, showcase the latest products and technologies, and plan a strategy of how we can best achieve those goals.

Contact us now to find out how developing an IT strategy can save you time and money.

BlackBerry

BlackBerry’s can connect to the ‘BlackBerry Business Cloud Services’ within Office 365, and thus utilize all of the services that a standard Enterprise BES server offers. 

iPhone

iPhones natively support the ActiveSync mobile access that Exchange Online offers in the Office 365 cloud service, and are extremely easy to configure.  They even support some of the mobile device policies such as remote device wipe, which is included in the Office 365 system.

Android

Most Android devices support the ActiveSync mobile access that Exchange Online offers in the Office 365 cloud service, and are also extremely easy to configure. They also support many of the mobile device policies such as remote device wipe, which is included in the Office 365 system.

1. of or pertaining to present and recent time; not ancient or remote: modern city life
2. designed and made using the most recent ideas and methods

example: lets take a modern approach when designing this building

MELEE

1. a confused struggle; turmoil
2. a large noisy uncontrolled crowd, in which people are moving in different directions

example: We lost sight of each other in the melee