Success Stories: Power Platform revolutionises SMEs

Last month, Madrid hosted the major international event for the Microsoft: Power Platform World Tour 2019 and Next-Step Consultores,  we participated by making a presentation on : "Power BI: Digital Transformation in the Enterprise".

In this talk, we analyse the experience of customers who, starting from an initial need with Power BI, initiated projects that have revolutionised the traditional way of doing things, improving productivity and efficiency. In addition, we present demos and case studies of success with Power Platform in large companies and SMEs.

What's new in Microsoft Power Platform

 

We told you all about Microsoft Power Platform in our previous article:

https://next-step.es/power-platform-inteligencia-artificial/

However, in Power Platform World Tour announced many new features, which had already been presented a few weeks earlier in Microsoft Ignite 2019:

Power Platform is a suite of enterprise products that includes several of Microsoft's flagship solutions for businesses:

• Power BI: The leading business intelligence tool on the market. As a novelty, many improvements in security, Artificial Intelligence and natural language have been incorporated.

 

• Power APPsPower Apps: The tool for generating applications quickly and almost without programming. The novelty of Power Apps is the new function of Portalswhich allows the construction of web portals, displaying the data stored in the Common Data Service.

 

• Microsoft Flowthe tool that allows you to create automated workflows, has been transformed into a Power Automate, adding new robotic process automation functionalities.

 

 

• Power Virtual Agents, the former Virtual Agent for Customer Service of Dynamics 365, one of the biggest news, as it has recently joined Power Platform. This service allows us to create virtual agents in a simple way, almost without programming.

 

 

• Finally, further integration has been achieved with Microsoft TeamsOfficce 365's teamwork tool, which incorporates chat rooms, video conferencing, and more.

 

Microsoft Power Platform is seamlessly integrated with the rest of Microsoft's products, connects seamlessly with the Azurethe ERP Dynamics, Office 365or the document manager Sharepoint, for example.

In addition, of course, it must be ready to connect and exchange data with third-party solutions.

The Power Platform represents a digital transformation in companies, but not only in large, innovative companies, it is also being successfully implemented by many small and medium-sized enterprises.

SUCCESS CASE: Power Platform optimises the performance of an SME

We are going to tell you about a successful case of the implementation of Power Platform in a medium-sized company in the Distribution Sector.

This company received the orders by email and they were handled manually by a worker. From Monday to Thursday, everything worked perfectly and orders were delivered within 48 hours at the latest. The problem was at weekends, when the company was closed. Orders that came in by email from Friday onwards could not be dealt with until Monday. The person responsible for dealing with orders on Monday was overwhelmed and orders were often not delivered until Tuesday or Wednesday, which led to complaints from some customers, as they did not meet the 48-hour delivery commitment.

Following an analysis of the situation, it was decided to implement the Microsoft Power Platformto automate some processes and tasks within the company.

With the tool Power Automate (Microsoft Flow) we manage to automate and standardise the process of receiving and dispatching customer orders. Let's take a closer look at this process:

This company worked with Microsoft Office 365 and Outlook as an e-mail tool. The following Microsoft technologies were implemented:

• Microsoft Power BI, for data analysis and visualisation




• Power Automate (Flow), to automate tasks




• SSIS: Integration Services. The Microsoft Business Intelligence ETL program. A program that takes data from one source, transforms it, and moves and stores it to another destination.

Power Automate (Microsoft Flow) automates order management process with Excel. We have created an automatic order so that every time a new email arrives with an order:

• A rule is applied when a new email arrives from certain senders, with an Excel sheet attached and where the "Subject" field of the email contains "Order". In this case, Power Automate extracts the information from the email and the attached Excel sheet. The information is extracted, processed and cleaned by Integration Services and stored in a SQL Server database. Once the data and information about the order are in the database, I can consume them from Power BI, the business intelligence tool, with an analysis of the data in real time, to start with the automatic management of the order.  

Example of automatic order: When a new mail arrives in the inbox, from certain senders (customers), with an Excel attachment and that the word "Order" is included in the text of the Subject, extract, debug and file it in this database. Afterwards, proceed to generate and send it.

The importance of Power APPs:

Thanks to Power APP we have developed an application for the entire order management. In addition, within the Power BI report we have been able to insert controls from Power APPs, such as "block a customer".

The result has been a success. Previously, orders generated at the weekend were handled by a single person on Mondays, who was swamped, and were not delivered until Tuesday or Wednesday.

Now, thanks to the implementation of the various Power Platform solutions, and Power Automate in particular, the process is automatic. The person responsible for the ordering area only has to supervise and weekend orders are delivered on Monday morning, which generates greater customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Thanks to the implementation of the powerful suite of solutions from Microsoft Power Platform (Power BI, Power Automate and Power Apps)In the last few years, we have successfully advanced in the digital transformation of the company, the standardisation and automation of processes and the optimisation of management, improving productivity and customer satisfaction.

Find out how Power Platform can transform your business

Next-Step Consultores, we are Microsoft Partner and experts in Power BI and Power Platform. If you want to improve the efficiency of your company, contact us and we will advise you without obligation on how to transform your business thanks to the technology of Microsoft Power Platform:

https://next-step.es/contacto/