Microsoft Copilot is Microsoft’s AI-powered assistant, created to support and protect your organisation.
AI has risen in popularity in recent years. As such, tools like Copilot are being spoken about much more often.
However, one of the major concerns still lingering is how safe AI is. Businesses especially are seeking ways to utilise it without compromising their data. Copilot offers a perfect solution.
It’s secure, boosts productivity, adapts to your needs, drives efficiency and makes data-driven decision making easier.
We delve into the details of Microsoft Copilot, including its common uses, benefits and how to access it.
Microsoft Copilot use cases_
It seems there are no bounds to AI’s capabilities. So, it’s not a surprise that Microsoft Copilot can do a lot. It will help you generate copy, summarise meetings and predict data patterns – all within your existing Microsoft apps.
Copilot is also useful across multiple business areas and departments. Here are some specific use cases for Copilot with your organisation:
Sales_
Sales teams can leverage Copilot in many ways. It learns from your existing data to predict future sales, so you can plan accordingly. It can also take notes during customer meetings, prompt follow ups, and personalise emails to customers, using behavioural data. It’ll even help you create project plans, lead scoring templates and suggest sales approaches.
Copilot also brings the same data to your different sales tools. Everyone has access to the same context for total alignment and a consistent sales approach.
Marketing_
Marketers can use Copilot to summarise and analyse customer history. This allows for personalised experiences for existing customers, as well as better targeting of new prospects. It also bridges any gaps with the sales department by giving everyone sight of the same data.
Copilot can generate copy for a myriad of marketing communications, including emails, blogs, social media posts and documents for faster creation time.
Customer Service_
Copilot works as a customer service assistant, empowering customer service agents to speed up case resolution and use data insight to improve care.
It summarises issue and product information, so agents can enhance their knowledge and respond to queries in real-time.
You can also use Copilot as an AI chatbot to answer simple queries and direct customers to the right contact point.
Security_
Copilot strengthens your organisation’s security. It can predict future threats by analysing previous incident data and monitoring bot patterns.
It also detects incidents and summarises reports to help you keep tabs on your security and build stronger preventative strategies.
It’s worth mentioning that Copilot offers protection to your organisation to prevent data being leaked externally, which is a concern that surrounds many other AI tools.
Finance_
A common obstacle facing finance teams is the ability to share data in real-time. Copilot will quickly generate reports, including profit and revenue forecasts, using historical data. This removes the manual input involved and allows the finance team to work faster.
It can also share relevant data with other departments. Everyone gets the insight they need to make better decisions, and finance effectively serves as a data partner.
Development_
Developers can work with Copilot to perfect their code and speed up the development process.
Copilot responds to natural language questions and offers coding suggestions and improvements. It can also complete code and identify errors for enhanced quality.
Types of Copliot_
That’s right – there’s more than one type of Copilot!
Microsoft has implemented AI across its products to better support customers. As a result, there are several Copilots available, each boasting unique purposes:
- Copilot for Microsoft 365 – works alongside all your 365 apps to drive productivity and improve capabilities.
- Copilot Pro – offers commercial data protection for organisations.
- Windows Copilot – centralised AI support within the Windows platform.
- Sales Copilot – designed for Sales teams to efficiently manage their pipeline and close deals.
- Dynamics 365 Copilot – integrates with Dynamics 365 for improved customer relationship management.
- Security Copilot – secures your systems and protects data with the power of AI.
- GitHub Copilot – supports developers in the completion and quality control of code.
- Power Platform Copilot – assists with building apps within the Power Platform.
- Copilot for Microsoft Fabric– supports the creation of data flows within Power BI.
You can even design your own Copilots to assist with specific processes and functions, using Microsoft’s Copilot Studio and Azure AI Studio.
What Microsoft apps does Copilot work with?
One of the most significant advantages of Microsoft Copilot is that it works perfectly with existing Microsoft tools you already utilise in your business. Here are some examples of how it can expand the capabilities of your common workplace applications:
- Teams – by using Copilot in Teams, you can summarise meeting notes and pick up actions. If you’re late for a meeting, it’ll also tell you what you’ve missed.
- Outlook – Copilot will share relevant data about recipients, allowing you to create tailored emails with full context. It’ll also generate copy so you can draft emails in seconds.
- Word – Copilot will offer suggestions as you write for faster content creation. It can also summarise large Word documents.
- Excel – Copilot can explore your data within Excel and provide suggestions for improved analysis.
- PowerPoint – summarise presentations quickly with Copilot. You can also use natural language prompts to get design and content suggestions.
Essentially, most Microsoft applications will receive support from Copilot, helping you to complete tasks faster. It can also work with third-party apps to improve data visibility and streamline processes.
Why use Copilot over other AI tools?
With the emergence of AI, new tools are constantly appearing. So, why choose Copilot over other options on the market?
One of the most significant benefits of Copilot (if you have a Pro licence) is that it offers data protection. Unlike some other tools, you can share organisational data and not worry about it being regurgitated to external users.
Microsoft is committed to responsible AI, with emphasis on fairness, reliability, inclusivity and transparency. You can be confident that the AI you’re using has been developed ethically and won’t exclude your employees.
Because you can safely share your data with Copilot, there is no harm in giving it full access to your organisation. It will learn from this data over time, enabling more accurate responses and better predictions.
Another advantage is that it integrates with your existing tools, including Microsoft and third-party applications. This brings increased connectivity, allowing you to share data between your systems and use it to empower your next steps.
Finally, Microsoft announced in 2024 that there would no longer be a minimum seat requirement to use their Pro version of Copilot. Now, even small businesses can harness the power of it to overcome skills gaps and increase capacity.
How to get started with Microsoft Copilot_
It’s easy to get access to Microsoft Copilot. You can begin with the free version, but if you want full capabilities for your business, you’ll need to subscribe to the Pro plan. For this, you need a license for Microsoft 365 Business Standard, Microsoft 365 Business Premium or Microsoft 365 E3 or E5.
Although AI has never been easier to access, and it has the potential to transform your operations, it’s also a sizeable change for any organisation. There is still some resistance, mainly due to fears of the impact and lack of understanding.
Commonly, the biggest challenge of adopting AI is understanding how to use it and gain value for your business.
We’ve put together a guide stuffed full of Copilot use cases that you can try out today. We also give our top tips for finding specific ways AI can benefit your business and encouraging everyone else to get involved.
