Introduction

As we mentioned in a recent blog, Microsoft Teams is now evolving into a juggernaut in the video conferencing realm. There are two versions of it, the Premium, and the Basic. In this blog, we review what the latest is in the premium version.

What is New In Teams Premium?

There are a number of strategic benefits, which include the following:

  1. Meeting customization:

Given the technological advances of today, one simply cannot have a business meeting at the local coffee shop. Instead, you need to customize it so that it fits the needs of what you are trying to accomplish with your audience. Because of this, Teams Premium comes with a brand-new functionality called “Meeting Guides”. With this, you can create the environment that is best suited for your meeting, in order to make it as productive as possible. You can select a template that is most appropriate, and from there, you can then drill down into the minute details in order to make your guests feel as comfortable as possible. Thus, you can literally brand your meeting so that it fits your company’s brand and reputation, portraying a stronger image on your part.

  1. AI is built into it:

Let’s face it, meetings are not the most exciting time for anybody, whether you are a manager or an employee. They can run a very long period of time, and because of that, the attention span of the attendees can dwindle off very quickly. To help aid in the productivity of your meetings, Teams Premium comes in with a brand new functionality known as “Intelligent Recap”. With this, you can harness the power of AI to suggest action items along the way, so nothing important is missed. Secondly, this new tool will allow you to catch up with the important parts of a meeting, in case you have to leave early. This is also know as “Smart Recordings”. For example, you can only listen to those parts of the meeting when your name was announced, or there was an action item or follow up that was assigned to you. That way, you don’t have to listen to the entire meeting. Also, transcripts of the meeting are provided with a powerful search engine so that you can review what certain attendees covered. Finally, if you have co workers in other countries, whatever you speak in the meeting will be automatically translated into their native language, no matter what country they may reside in.

  1. Enhanced security:

For the most part, setting up a meeting is easy in Teams. All you have to do is confirm the time it is at, the attendees, and from there, send out the invite. But, there are also times when you need to have a confidential or private meeting. How do you prevent other co workers from finding about this? Teams Premium comes with a new security feature which is called “Advanced Meeting Protection”. With this functionality, you can apply watermarks, sensitivity labels, as well as to what degree the meeting can be recorded. This will prevent your private meeting from being leaked throughout your entire organization.

  1. Creation of Virtual Appointments:

After a successful meeting, you will probably want to have a follow up appointment with your client or new prospect. Now with Teams Premiums, there is no need for them to download a special mobile app to join in. After they receive the invite, they can simply join in on any browser of their choice (Edge, Chrome, Safari, etc.). All of this is made possible with the “Virtual Appointments” functionality. It also comes with the following components:

  • You can custom brand your appointment invites with your own company logo and branding;
  • Setting up a large number of appointments can be a messy task. So with Teams Premium, you can set everything up through one central dashboard;
  • You can even gain analytics to see how successful (or not) your appointments have actually been.
  1. Creation of webinars:

Webinars are a great vehicle in which you can educate your existing customers, and attract pools of new prospects. With the “Advanced Webinars” that is now available in Teams Premium, you can create just about any kind of webinar that suits the needs of your objectives. Also, managing the invites and the waitlist is done once from a centralized console, thus giving you a birds eye view of who is attending, and those that are waiting to be invited. There is also a “Virtual Green Room” in which you and your attendees can virtually meet and socialize before the actual webinar starts.

Conclusions

If you have questions about Teams Premium, please contact us today. Information about licensing and pricing can be seen here.