Migrating to Office 365 can lower IT costs. It’s the tagline you hear over and over again. But what does that mean? What impact will it have on your business? How can you determine Office 365 ROI for your organization?
Thousands of enterprise organizations have realized the benefits of cloud computing and migrated to Office 365 from an on-premises based solution. Companies are now designing and strategizing capabilities to develop their own methods of computing through the cloud to decrease costs, remain competitive and minimize the amount of hardware needed.
When you’re looking at Office 365 ROI, organizations should start by analyzing their current IT infrastructure and current costs to maintain it. Here are the top areas where enterprises can will see ROI from an Office 365 migration.
Office 365 ROI for Enterprise
When it comes to the financial impacts of an Office 365 migration for enterprises, the findings look promising. A 2011 Forrester Consulting study discovered that Office 365 delivers an ROI of 321% and pays for itself within two months for midsize organizations. For organizations of a few hundred employees with remote workers and multiple global offices, the value only increases. The study included seven mid-sized companies who reported on non-risk benefits other organizations could expect. Some of these non-risk benefits included productivity gain per employee, increased mobile worker productivity, reduction of hardware, elimination of third party software, Microsoft license savings, web conferencing value and more.
Technology ROI
When calculating Office 365 ROI, it’s important to know that migrations have a high first-year cost, but lower annual costs for labor. It’s a large effort, but once implemented, Office 365 will save thousands of dollars a year over an on-premises solution. Implementation can also cost up to 40% less for comparable on-premises solutions and the manpower required to support an on-premises solution is reduced by more than half when switching to Office 365.
Mobility ROI
Organizations can now offer telecommute or remote work to employees with the mobility provided by Office 365. With Office 365, employees can access their work files anywhere anytime. This level of mobility can increase employee production and lead to faster market deliveries.
Employees who spend a considerable amount of time on the road can stay connected through Office 365. Downtime between flights, delayed flights, or other time wasted during travel can be regained by having access to everything stored in the cloud. Even saving as little as 15 minutes a day accessing files and data through their mobile device in the first year of use can have an impact. And productivity only increases with continued use — employees can save over an hour a day after several years of using Office 365 as they grow more dependent and skilled with the platform.
Familiarity with Windows
Because Office 365 uses the same familiar applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and SharePoint, the learning curve is minimal. Some training may be required for IT administrators to account for the differences in Office 365 vs. an on-premises environment, but the amount of required training for administrators drops significantly with each year of continued use, further realizing an Office 365 ROI.
Compliance ROI
Several features in Office 365 includes built-in security features such as file and email encryption that eliminates the need for additional third-party products. These features also help prevent data leakage, eDiscovery and other threats that can cause severe damage to organizations. This can lead to tens of thousands of dollars in savings by utilizing already build-in industry standards and best practices.
Eliminate hardware
As previously mentioned, Office 365 eliminates the need for physical servers, which can save enterprises hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase and host Windows and Office components such as SharePoint, Outlook, Skype for Business (now Microsoft Teams), and others. With everything in the Cloud, Office 365 eliminates the need for physical storage which involves a dedicated facility or server room.
Web conferencing and presence ROI
With Skype for Business, organizations can benefit from a complete web conferencing solution. This can save organizations over $100,000 in two to three years. This cost savings comes from the dependency on third-party conferencing solutions. Not only does Skype for Business provide web conferencing, it also establishes presence and an integrated connection to users when they are in Outlook or SharePoint. By default, users appear as available when they are actively working in an Office 365 application.
Office 365 subscriptions replace enterprise license agreements
On-premises solutions require perpetual licenses per user, per device. Office 365 subscriptions cover multiple devices and multiple users for cost savings over license-based software agreements. Some businesses can expect a savings of over $300,000 over a three-year time span. This offset estimate is based on Microsoft license costs and Office 365 subscription costs per user and increases the net cost savings. This estimate does not present a discount offered to enterprises or reduced costs charged by Microsoft.
Reduced travel costs
With Skype for Business, organizations can reduce the number of face-to-face meetings and avoid having to send employees to customer locations. Although a face-to-face meeting may be required for an initial kickoff effort of a major project, further meetings can be conducted via web conferencing. This can also save tens of thousands in associated travel costs. Recurring conferences with customers can also save time and money with more accurate requirements and reduced misinterpretations of requirements.
Pay only for required applications
With Office 365, organizations can pick and choose the applications they need. The three primary components most organizations often need are Outlook, SharePoint, and Office Professional which includes a standard set of business tools. Additional applications can be purchased and added on as necessary.
Unlock the Office 365 ROI Benefits for Enterprise
The uptick in productivity, flexibility and time realized from Office 365 ROI benefits can have a huge impact on your organization. Ready to take advantage of the Office 365 for enterprise? Or still unsure whether an Office 365 migration is the right move for your business? Learn more about Agile IT’s Office 365 migration services or get your migration questions answered today.
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