There are a lot of things that take up your employees' time that don't have to do with your core business, servicing the guest. Wouldn't it be nice if some of these "lights on" tasks could be taken care of for you? Your employees could spend more time creating innovative solutions that enhance the guest experience vs. keeping the lights on. With Microsoft Online Services we take care of the IT tasks that can relieve your IT staff and minimize hardware investments: your e-mail, web conferencing, portals, IM, and presence.
"With Microsoft Online Services, we could save 3 million SEK [U.S.$334,000] annually in server depreciation costs, as well as reduce our support costs." Pia Hofstedt, Director of IT, Scandic Hotels
Especially suited for the hospitality industry, due to its franchise business model and distributed organization structures, the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite is a set of messaging and collaboration solutions hosted by Microsoft and delivered to you as a subscription service. The Business Productivity Online Suite consists of these products:
Microsoft Exchange Online is a hosted enterprise messaging solution based on Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. You'll get:
- Improved e-mail security
- Access to e-mail for your employees from wherever they work - the front desk, the house keeping cart, the conference or ballroom - or from home
- Enhanced operational efficiency for your IT staff , resulting in cost savings for your business
Microsoft SharePoint Online gives your business a highly secure, central location where employees can efficiently collaborate with team members, find organizational resources, manage content and workflow, and gain the business insight to make better-informed decisions. Employees can create and manage custom team- and project-focused intranet sites for collaboration and document sharing. Enable your employees to resolve guest issues with efficiency and authority with better access to the information they need through SharePoint.
Microsoft Office Communications Online delivers robust instant messaging (IM) and presence functionality that enables real-time, person-to-person communication via text, voice and video, across your organization. Through presence awareness, your employees can quickly detect a colleague's availability for a time-sensitive consult or business-critical decision-and then connect rapidly using a reliable, security-enhanced IM solution. For example, imagine your front desk personnel identifying a lost reservation issue during check-in, using IM to instantly identify the right personnel to address the issue on the spot, and confirming resolution immediately to your guest. Watch your customer satisfaction scores soar.
With Microsoft Office Live Meeting you will save time and money by holding online meetings, training sessions, and events in real-time, with staff in multiple locations. Features include:
- Web client support for remote attendee flexibility and deskless workers
- Interactive application and desktop sharing and whiteboard tools
- Active speaker video switching, multi-party video, and multi-party VoIP audio
- Rich-media presentations, native video conferencing, high-fidelity recording, and Web-cam capabilities
- Training and event management with event and class registration and virtual breakout rooms
The latest technology without the work
With the Business Productivity Online Suite you get the latest software offered by Microsoft as soon as it's available, reducing the cost and impact for your IT team to track and perform upgrades. And you get the flexibility to modify your solution without new hardware and staff. Better yet, you experience significant cost savings in servers and power consumption.
Now you can quickly roll out e-mail and web conferencing without the impact on on-site IT staff. And you can add employees easily without additional time and effort. Plus you know you'll get high availability, comprehensive security, and infinite scalability because it's hosted by Microsoft - one of the largest managers of data centers in the world.
Empower your deskless workers
As more and more of your employees are becoming deskless-using mobile technology or light NetBook computers - there's a need for these people to access business applications from remote locations. With the Business Productivity Online Suite these workers can access their Exchange e-mail and SharePoint portals wherever they go. Live Meeting web conferencing and Office Communications IM and Presence are available from individual or shared PCs.
Now your employees can manage their schedules from home, on a mobile device, or on a shared computer on-site. From the front desk to housekeeping, event support or servers, all employees can access a corporate portal for timekeeping or to manage tasks. And you can use Live Meeting to communicate broadly to all of your properties at the same time.
Business-class security and reliability
Microsoft uses our knowledge and expertise for a reliable, secure online solution. Our multiple data centers, some of the best in the world, and our dedicated personnel give you backup, support, and security that is unsurpassed.
- Microsoft Online Services run on a global network of world-class data centers
- Our datacenters and services are protected by multiple layers of security and operational best practices
- Microsoft Online Services guarantee a service level agreement of 99.9% uptime
- Our centers are managed by rigorously screened and highly trained staff