Microsoft SharePoint is an essential part of the Office 365 platform (now known simply as Microsoft 365) and the cornerstone of corporate intranet development since its first launch in 2001. In this article, we'll talk about what SharePoint is and we'll take a closer look at its role within the Office 365 environment, its integration with other Microsoft 365 applications, and who to turn to to make the most of its functionality and optimize your company's IT infrastructure.
Microsoft SharePoint is the Microsoft tool developed for collaboration at work It is mainly used for content management, electronic document management and knowledge sharing in the company. SharePoint is a centralized and secure platform where work teams can collaborate, optimize data management, and increase efficiency.
Precisely because of its mainly collaborative characteristics, SharePoint is used to create corporate intranets and digital workplaces. In fact, the numerous functionalities of the platform make it much easier for people to work together on ad hoc projects and establish standard business processes for sharing information, publishing documents and recording sensitive data.
SharePoint is an integral part of Office 365 (now renamed and known as Microsoft 365), the suite of cloud-based services offered by Microsoft designed to improve productivity and collaboration within companies.
The 365 environment includes a wide range of applications and tools for carrying out business practices and increasing the productivity of your workforce, such as the core applications of previous versions of Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, etc.) together with Teams, OneDrive, Viva Engage, the software of the Power Platform suite (Power Automate, Power BI and Power Apps) and, of course, SharePoint.
There are two main versions of SharePoint offered by Microsoft within its Office 365 subscription packages.
The presence of two different versions (Online and On-Premise) can often give rise to a bit of confusion in users who are approaching for the first time choosing the best SharePoint solution to adopt for their business.
So let's see together what they are and what distinguishes them:
As can be seen, both versions offer a series of collaboration and content management features that are similar if not identical in many aspects, but the choice between SharePoint Online and SharePoint Server is mainly dictated by the organization's specific needs related to accessibility, budget and hosting infrastructure preferences.
SharePoint Online is available with all Microsoft 365 subscription packages, on the contrary, the On-Premise version is available only with the subscription to specific Office 365 E plans. We'll talk about it in more detail in the section dedicated to licensing options.
Integrations in Microsoft SharePoint allow the application to communicate and interact with other apps, services, or external data sources. They work through the use of preconfigured connectors for connecting to numerous external services and platforms.
Integrating other apps is therefore nothing more than merging different applications or programs to make them work together more quickly and efficiently.
SharePoint is a native application of the Office 365 suite and, as such, it works in perfect synergy with the other applications of the Microsoft 365 environment to offer its users the best possible user experience.
In a business environment, having different apps with different functions and formats and extensions that are not compatible is a rather common reality. The integration with SharePoint allows the use of functions and data from each of these apps within a single and convenient application.
The integration between SharePoint and other Microsoft 365 applications is a fundamental aspect of the Microsoft collaboration platform that amplifies and extends its potential and functions, allowing users to make the most of the functionality provided by the application.
Let's take a look at the main advantages of the integration between SharePoint and the rest of the Microsoft office suite:
After seeing what the advantages are for your company's digital infrastructures, let's now take a look at what these integrations are and some examples of their implementation in the business environment.
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Core Microsoft Office applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook are fully integrated with SharePoint. Users can open, modify, and save documents directly from Microsoft SharePoint using Office applications, thus maintaining the full consistency of the information contained within the documents and the collaboration of users on them.
A team that uses Microsoft Word to draft their documents, using SharePoint integration, can directly open and save a document to a SharePoint library, allowing the team to collaborate and edit the file in real time.
A finance department that uses Microsoft Excel to manage monthly budgets can directly link Excel spreadsheets to SharePoint sites, ensuring that all financial information is always updated and accessible to users who need to consult it.
An employee who receives an email with an important attachment can, using the integration between Outlook and SharePoint, save the attachment directly to a document library, making it easily accessible to all members of their team, while a sales department that uses Outlook to send proposals to customers has the ability to directly link SharePoint documents to the emails sent, providing customers with quick and secure access to shared information.
Few people know that, behind the scenes, Microsoft Teams is solidly based on the SharePoint data sharing structure.
Every time you create a Team in Microsoft Teams, a new SharePoint site is created to store the documents that are stored in the Teams channels. Every time you create a private channel or a shared channel, a new SharePoint site is also created.
A department that uses Microsoft Teams to communicate and collaborate can then easily share SharePoint documents and resources within Teams channels and access and make changes to SharePoint documents in real time, giving all team members the opportunity to access relevant materials and work on them as a team directly from the communication interface.
A company's employees can use OneDrive, the cloud storage platform offered by Microsoft, to upload and synchronize their work documents across multiple devices.
Thanks to the integration with SharePoint, its users will have the ability to automatically synchronize their documents saved on the web platform with OneDrive, allowing them easy and quick access both in the office and on the go, both on fixed devices and on mobile devices and with the guarantee that all documents they are working on are always updated to their latest version.
By integrating OneDrive into an intranet created with SharePoint, employees can collaborate in real time on shared documents using the co-authoring features of Office 365, quickly access their files and folders stored on OneDrive without having to navigate to other platforms, and implement file backup and restore policies to ensure the security and integrity of the data stored within the intranet and those stored on OneDrive.
SharePoint is tightly integrated with all the applications of the Power Platform suite, which includes Power Apps for developing custom apps, Power Automate for process automation, and Power BI for data analysis and dynamic reporting. Users can create custom apps, automated workflows and dashboards for analyzing their business data that integrate directly with data and documents on SharePoint.
The interaction between SharePoint and Power Apps allows users to easily create and customize business applications using the data and content stored in SharePoint. Practical examples of integrating SharePoint into your apps developed with Power Apps include creating project management, activity tracking, or document management applications that integrate directly with SharePoint sites.
Power Automate can be used in combination with SharePoint to automate, for example, ticketing processes, with the creation of automated workflows that connect directly to SharePoint data, improving the operational efficiency of the teams that deal with their approval and registration.
The integration with Power BI makes it possible to create interactive dashboards that show sales data in real time on sites created with SharePoint, using the latter as a central repository for sales data where transaction data, sales metrics and other relevant data can be stored in dedicated lists or libraries. Once the report has been created with PowerBI, it is possible to embed it directly into a SharePoint page using the Power BI web part, giving users the opportunity to access the sales dashboard and interact with the data in real time directly from the SharePoint site.
Microsoft Viva Engage, the freemium corporate social network platform used for private communication within companies and organizations, can be integrated into their SharePoint sites to offer intranet experiences and knowledge sharing that are more accessible and easy to navigate for users of their company.
Using Viva Connections, it is possible to integrate the Microsoft Viva experience directly into the SharePoint-based corporate intranet, adding a dashboard to the intranet homepage that allows employees to easily access company news, events, communications and useful resources directly from their main SharePoint page.
It is also possible to incorporate social features such as comments, likes and sharing within SharePoint pages, allowing employees to interact with each other, share feedback and collaborate on projects directly within the intranet.
By integrating Viva Topics into its SharePoint intranet, it is possible to enrich the company's knowledge base and improve the search for relevant information, and with Viva Insights it is possible to obtain detailed analyses on the use of the intranet and on employee engagement with content, monitoring the number of page visits, social interactions, research trends and more, allowing the company to evaluate the effectiveness of the intranet and identify critical areas for future improvements.
A SharePoint Professional Service is nothing more than a service offered by experts and consultants specialized in the implementation of SharePoint and in the integration of the latter with the other applications of the Office 365 environment, aimed at all those companies that want help in creating and customizing intranet portals, extranet sites and customized applications developed with the help of the web platform and carry out these projects tailored to meet the specific needs and needs of the company.
In most cases, these services are offered by official or certified Microsoft partners who have access to the resources and official support of the Redmond company, thus guaranteeing their customers greater reliability and quality of the solutions implemented.
Relying on a professional service offers several advantages for all those businesses that intend to implement, customize and optimize their experience with SharePoint and the software of the Office 365 suite and by collaborating with experienced SharePoint developers, companies can unlock the full potential of the platform, maximizing the efficiency of their digital infrastructures.
The services offered by these partners may include the design, development and development release of SharePoint sites, ensuring that users have as functional an experience as possible while collaborating with their teams and full access to information within the platform.
An implementation partner with extensive experience in the development of corporate intranets using SharePoint, who fully understands their functionality and capabilities, can allow a company to create customized solutions and help its business on its journey from the early design phases to the final implementation. Now let's see how:
Microsoft offers several purchasable subscription plans for SharePoint, designed to meet the different organizational needs and budgets of companies that want to implement it. Understanding these options is crucial to making an informed decision that aligns with your business needs.
Subscription plans are based on a monthly or annual subscription formula, where companies pay a fixed cost for each user. This subscription model allows companies to access the services offered without having to invest in traditional software licenses, but rather paying only for the actual use of the services and functionalities offered. This approach allows for greater flexibility and scalability, as companies can add or remove users based on their needs and update or change subscription plans at any time.
Although there is the possibility of purchasing subscription plans for SharePoint Online only, we will focus here on describing the Office 365 E subscription plans that include, in addition to SharePoint, all other Microsoft digital workplace software, thus offering a more complete set of tools to improve office productivity:
It should be noted that the E3 and E5 plans are the only ones to offer the latest on-premise version of SharePoint. If you want to implement it in your organization, you must have an IT team, a Microsoft partner, or an authorized SharePoint distributor install it on your current server.
From the simple and secure management of all company content (from requests for information to marketing materials to financial data) to the creation of corporate websites and intranets to keep users updated, SharePoint is now an essential element of the Microsoft 365 environment and, with its perfect integration with the other applications of the Redmond company's digital workplace, offers a complete solution for collaboration between employees.
Used today by more than 200,000 companies to build and manage intranets and corporate digital work environments thanks to its collaborative capabilities, SharePoint has established itself over time as one of the best document management systems currently on the market and all that remains is to invite you to make the choice of your subscription plan by consulting the official Microsoft website and touch first hand the potential of SharePoint for the development of your business networks.
Office 365 SharePoint is a Microsoft platform for collaboration, document management, and knowledge sharing within organizations. It integrates with other Microsoft 365 apps to enhance productivity and streamline business processes.
There are two versions: SharePoint Online (cloud-based) and SharePoint Server (On-Premise). SharePoint Online is part of the Microsoft 365 subscription, while SharePoint Server is for organizations needing more control over their infrastructure.
Office 365 SharePoint integrates seamlessly with apps like Teams, OneDrive, Power BI, and more, enabling enhanced collaboration, data management, and real-time access to information.
Professional services offer expert support in implementing and customizing SharePoint, ensuring optimal configuration, integration, and ongoing maintenance tailored to your business needs.
Microsoft offers various Office 365 plans, including E1, E3, and E5, with SharePoint included. E3 and E5 plans also provide access to the on-premise version of SharePoint Server.
The Modern Work team effectively and swiftly addresses IT needs, primarily focusing on software development. The technical staff is well-trained in implementing software projects using Microsoft technology stacks and is skilled in managing both agile and long-term projects.
