What is Dynamics 365 Copilot, and how can it transform your business?

Gone are the days of endless manual data entry, content generation, and mind-numbing notetaking. Instead, cutting-edge tools harness the power of Generative AI to revolutionize the way you work. Prepare to witness a surge in productivity and a wave of creativity as Dynamics 365 Copilot seamlessly automates tasks, frees up your time, and unlocks new realms of innovation. Get ready to supercharge your business outcomes across every line of business with the dynamic capabilities of Dynamics 365 Copilot.

What is Dynamics 365 Copilot?

Imagine having an intelligent assistant by your side, tirelessly working behind the scenes to free up your time and make your work life easier. That’s precisely what Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 brings to the table. This remarkable tool is like having a highly skilled copilot who takes care of all the mundane tasks, leaving you with more time to focus on what truly matters—your customers and their needs. Let’s take a closer look at how Copilot can transform the way you work.

Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales

Think of Dynamics 365 Sales as your organized teammate. It keeps track of leads, deals, and customer details, like a central hub for your team. Copilot is your personal assistant. It helps with tasks, summarizes meetings, and even takes notes for you, saving your team tons of time. Viva Sales is the bridge between your team and their data. It brings key information into their Microsoft Teams workspace so they can collaborate and stay informed without switching windows.

• Writing emails
  Speeds up email writing by suggesting greetings, sentences, and closing phrases, adapting to your communication style for a personalized touch.
• Populating records
  Autocompletes fields in forms and records using contextual clues, saving time on data entry. For example, when adding a new contact, it can prefill the address, company name, and job title based on your input.
• Opportunity summaries
  Automatically creates concise opportunity summaries when updating records, eliminating manual abstracts.
• Document narrative
  Suggests text for opportunity descriptions or account summaries customized to your tasks, saving time on crafting original content.
• Surfacing insights
  Analyzes customer data in Dynamics 365 to provide proactive insights, including relevant news about a customer’s company or cross-sell opportunities, keeping you well-informed.

Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Viva Sales

• Smart message composition
  Offers tailored responses and sales messaging suggestions in Microsoft Teams’ conversations for personalized communication.
• Guidance on best practices
  Draws on sales playbooks and institutional knowledge to provide real-time guidance on new opportunities and resolving issues.
• Effortless meeting summaries
  Automatically generates meeting notes and summaries in Teams based on transcripts and context, saving documentation time.
• Task management assistance
  Recommends next steps and action items in Viva Sales interactions, seamlessly adding tasks to Dynamics 365 and providing timely reminders.
• Content recommendations
  Suggests relevant sales collateral, conversation starters, and talking points customized for each account from Dynamics 365 and synced cloud repositories.

Benefits and use cases

64% of users said Copilot helps them spend less time processing email. 85% of users said Copilot helps them get to a good first draft faster. Here are a few of its key benefits:

• Fast onboarding: Copilot guides new sales reps, helping them learn processes quickly.
• Less admin work: Saves time on admin tasks like data entry, letting reps focus on selling.
• Timely customer insights: Provides quick customer insights for better win rates.
• Swift communication: Speeds up email and Teams chat responses to customers and colleagues.
• Focused sales process: Keeps reps on task and focuses on the right priorities during the sales process.

Dynamics 365 Sales is the foundational CRM application, Viva Sales extends its capabilities into Microsoft Teams, and Copilot enhances the user experience by providing intelligent suggestions within both platforms. Together, these tools create a happier, more productive sales team that hits their targets and exceeds expectations.

Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Service

Dynamics 365 and Copilot work together like a dream team for customer service. Copilot learns from Dynamics 365, getting smarter with every case. It analyzes past interactions, suggests solutions, and makes agents experts, leading to faster resolutions and happier customers. Dynamics 365 uses Copilot’s insights to anticipate needs. It automatically surfaces relevant articles and answers. The result? Faster resolutions, smoother workflows, and a win-win for everyone.

Email writing assistance
Based on past interactions, it offers quick and personalized suggestions for greetings, content, and closing phrases in customer email responses.

Automated case summaries
Automatically generates key details when creating new case records, saving time on manual documentation.

Knowledge article suggestions
Proactively finds and suggests relevant knowledge articles during case reviews, aiding agents in providing accurate solutions promptly.

Systematic note-taking
Transcribes and highlights essential details during customer calls, facilitating the creation of call summaries.

Upsell recommendations
Analyzes customer data to recommend additional products or services based on profiles, past purchases, and interactions, helping agents identify upsell opportunities.

Workflow guidance
Guides agents on the next best steps to progress cases according to service guidelines, including recommendations on when to escalate a case.

Alerts and notifications
Monitors cases and sends reminders based on service level agreements (SLAs), ensuring timely follow-ups for quick issue resolution.

Benefits and use cases

• Onboarding acceleration
   Guides new agents through processes and suggests responses for faster training.
• First-contact resolution boost: Proactively recommends knowledge articles, increasing first-contact resolution by 20%.
• Consistent service delivery: Ensures standardized service by detecting sentiment; suggests empathetic responses, resulting in a 22% improvement in CSAT scores.
• Escalation avoidance: Notifications assist agents in addressing cases early, reducing escalations by 32%.
• Increased productivity: Manages tasks like note-taking and reduces administrative work. Integration led to an 18% increase in customer contacts per agent.
• Continuous growth: The system learns from interactions and feedback, providing tailored suggestions to boost individual agent performance over time.

Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights and Marketing

Microsoft Dynamics 365 helps you create stronger customer engagement with less effort. Customer Insights unifies customer data into one platform and builds detailed profiles for future engagement. D365 Marketing automates personalized campaigns across different channels, creating unique customer journeys. Copilot suggests and completes tasks automatically, saving you time.

In Customer Insights, Copilot assists users by:

Data unification
Suggests potential matches and relationships to unify customer records, accelerating profile unification when connecting data sources like CRM and ERP systems.

Customer segmentation
Recommends audience filters and attributes for building targeted customer segments, simplifying the process for impactful campaigns and messages.

Trend identification
Analyzes customer data to uncover behavioral trends, providing insights into churn risk factors and loyalty drivers. This valuable information shapes engagement strategies.

Summarizing profiles
Creates concise summaries of key facts, including demographics, preferences, and recent interactions when exploring customer profiles and segments.

According to Microsoft, during initial testing, Copilot reduced the time spent creating unified customer profiles by over 30%. With AI assistance, marketers can build 360-degree views faster.

Copilot in Marketing

When AI enriches human expertise, marketing and analytics teams can accomplish more and drive better engagement. Benefits include:

Content creation
Based on customer data and segments, it suggests personalized content for emails, landing pages, and campaigns.

Journey design
Recommends interactions across channels for mapped customer journeys, aligning with proven nurture pathways in Marketing.

Performance optimization
Analyzes campaign metrics and provides suggestions to improve results, including adjustments to segmentation or sending follow-up emails.

Process streamlining
Guides marketers through campaign execution steps in Marketing, automatically configuring settings based on best practices.

In studies by Microsoft, marketers completed campaign configuration and launch activities 25% quicker with Copilot. The AI assistant also improved campaign performance metrics such as open and conversion rates.

Use cases and benefits

• Accelerates customer data unification for complete views.
• Simplifies complex customer segmentation for precision targeting.
• Extracts insights from customer analytics to inform strategy.
• Optimizes campaign performance with data-driven recommendations.

Copilot in Dynamics 365 Field Service

Dynamics 365 Field Service orchestrates your entire operation, from scheduling to dispatch to work tracking. Copilot learns from past service data and suggests solutions and relevant resources based on historical trends and reports. Need to update customer records or generate reports on-site? Copilot handles it seamlessly, saving valuable time.

Assisted work order creation

• Assists frontline managers, dispatchers, and technicians as they create, review, and edit work orders.
• Users leveraging Generative AI can manage work orders directly within the Microsoft 365 integrations and the Field Service core application.
• This streamlined process results in increased frontline productivity and smoother work order handling.

Productivity boost for Field Service agents

• Copilot supplements the work performed by agents.
• It reduces the time spent on manual tasks, allowing agents to focus on more meaningful customer interactions.
• All frontline workers can view, create, and manage work orders with the assistance of Generative AI.

Native integration

• Dynamics 365 Copilot is natively built into both the CRM and ERP platforms.
• Its purpose is to assist business users in creating and developing ideas faster, completing tasks quickly, and gathering insights for informed decision-making.
• Within Dynamics 365 Field Service, users benefit from faster and more efficient work processes thanks to Copilot.

Benefits and use cases

• Assisted work order creation
  Copilot uses generative AI to streamline work order creation within Outlook. Prepopulates relevant data, which enhances efficiency and accuracy. Work orders automatically sync to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service.
• Technician scheduling optimization (upcoming feature)
  Copilot will provide data-driven recommendations for efficient technician scheduling. It considers factors such as travel time, availability, and skill set. The result is improved resource allocation and faster response times.
• Customer message summaries (upcoming feature)
  Copilot will accelerate responses to customer messages by summarizing key details in email drafts. This will help frontline managers better handle customer inquiries and requests.
• Integration with Microsoft Teams (upcoming feature)
  Copilot will be available within Microsoft Teams, enhancing collaboration and task management for frontline teams.
• IoT-based solutions
  Summarizes and updates work orders based on IoT solutions. Streamlines service workflows, improve response times, and enhance customer service quality.

Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central

Copilot learns from Business Central, becoming your business brain. It analyzes data, identifies trends, and suggests actions. Business Central leverages Copilot’s insights for proactive automation. Experience automatic expense categorization, intelligent payment reminders, and even personalized customer communications, all powered by Copilot’s understanding of your business.

• Efficient data input
  Pre-fills fields and completes records based on contextual information, automating tasks, for example, populating header info and line items when creating a customer invoice.
• Automated narratives
  It generates customized descriptions and notes for various records, such as customer accounts, product catalogs, and project plans, eliminating the need for manual writing.
• Error detection
  Reviews data entries and transactions in Business Central, identifying potential errors like duplicate invoices and unrealistic amounts for users to correct.
• Workflow recommendations
  Based on best practices, it guides users through the recommended steps for key processes such as collections, budgeting, and financial close.
• Insightful reporting
  Analyzes KPIs and financial reports, presenting insights about performance and potential issues for users to explore.
• Customer reminder alerts
  This service monitors customer accounts and sales orders and proactively reminds users about outstanding payments, orders nearing default, and expired quotes.

Benefits and use cases

• New users become proficient 70% faster with Copilot guiding them through essential processes and transactions.
• By automating manual data tasks, Copilot increases productivity by over 20% for bookkeepers, accountants, and operations staff.
• Copilot’s insights and alerts empower managers to identify trends and risks, improving decision quality by 30%.
• Copilot’s error identification capability reduces input errors by 18%, enhancing data quality.
• Proactive notifications on orders and payments decrease customer delays by 22%, ensuring staff stays on top of commitments.

Copilot in Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations

Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations (F&O) acts as your central nervous system, meticulously managing your finances, operations, and supply chain. Dynamics 365 leverages Copilot’s insights for real-time predictions. Meanwhile, Copilot integrates with Dynamics 365 Finance & Operations, learning from your data and workflows to provide real-time insights and automation. It analyzes past data, identifies trends, and suggests solutions for tasks, such as:

• Finance: Analyzes invoices for potential fraud, suggesting optimal payment schedules, and generating draft budgets.
• Operations: Predicts inventory shortages, optimizes production schedules, and suggests supplier recommendations.

Sidecar Experience

• Copilot appears as a sidecar alongside the application interface, providing conversational support to users.
• It offers a natural language chat experience to help users work with application functionality and data.
• For instance, the generative help and guidance with Copilot (preview) feature is accessible through the sidecar.

Embedded Intelligence

• Some Copilot features are embedded directly into the application itself.
• These features add intelligent capabilities to various pages and workflows.
• For example, in the Confirmed Purchase Orders with Changes workspace, AI capabilities built into the page assist users in understanding and reacting to changes in confirmed purchase orders.

External Agents

• Copilot can also be used outside the application to orchestrate across different apps and tasks.
• Users can ask questions about finance and operations data using Copilot.

Responsible AI

• Microsoft is committed to applying responsible AI practices with Copilot.
• Stringent data protection measures ensure user privacy and content generation is overseen to maintain relevance and safety.

Benefits and use cases

• When used alongside Dynamics 365 Finance, Copilot significantly increases productivity, especially for collections managers.
• It provides AI-powered assistance for tasks like accessing credit and payment histories, which are crucial in financial management.
• In Dynamics 365 Finance, Copilot assists collections managers in prioritizing and personalizing communication with customers.
• Users can also dig deeper by asking pointed questions to refine and approve changes, allowing them to adapt sourcing plans swiftly to meet customer and partner needs.

Copilot in Microsoft Supply Chain Center and Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management

Copilot analyzes past data, identifies trends, suggests solutions, and proactively empowers your team to manage inventory, orders, and logistics. Dynamics 365 supply chain leverages Copilot’s insights for predictive capabilities. You can receive real-time alerts for potential stockouts or delays, make informed decisions, and adjust your supply chain accordingly.

Inventory optimization
Analyzes data to recommend ideal stock levels and transfer orders, reducing shortages and excess inventory.

Intelligent demand planning
Uses machine learning on historical data to improve demand forecasting accuracy by up to 18%, enhancing production and sourcing plans.

Production scheduling
Generates optimized production schedules, which improve line efficiency by approximately 20% and take into consideration multiple constraints and priorities.

Substitution suggestions
Identifies alternative materials or suppliers to avoid shortages when materials are limited.

Shipment tracking
Monitors supply chain events and proactively alerts users about late shipments, quality issues, and exceptions for rapid response.

Guided workflows
Provides guided assistance for critical workflows such as new product introductions, plant maintenance, and master data management.

Benefits and use cases

• Achieve a 6% reduction in inventory costs by planning seasonal demand more accurately.
• Improve plant efficiency by optimizing production schedules and minimizing changeovers.
• Avoid stockouts through material substitutions and smart inventory transfers.
• Accelerate new product launches with guided workflows.
• Boost supply chain analyst productivity by 20% through automated insights and alerts.

With Copilot, supply chain professionals spend less time on routine data tasks and focus on high-impact initiatives. Enhanced forecasting and optimization also lead to tangible cost reductions and service improvements.

But Copilot does not stop there. It goes above and beyond to provide valuable insights and assistance in other areas of your business. In a time-crunched world, Copilot handles the boring stuff, gives clever suggestions, and spots challenges before they hit. With Copilot on board, you can do the important stuff—building relationships, delivering excellent service, and boosting business growth. Are you ready to let Copilot transform the way you work? Let Copilot be your co-pilot, guiding you toward success in the dynamic landscape of modern business. Talk to us to learn more about Copilot and make the most of Dynamics 365.