Month: October 2023

Can you imagine making 100 copies of a 100-page document entirely by hand, with just pen and paper?

That’s what we would be doing if not for digital duplicators, photocopiers, and scan-to-print devices. Those machines have made document reproduction much faster and easier, as inventions and tools do.

One recently popular tool is AI. We have seen the likes of ChatGPT and DALL-E, and more yet are coming. In business, Microsoft Copilot is emerging as a highly useful digital assistant. How exactly can Copilot help you work smarter? Look at these specific ways.

1. Proposal Generation in a Legal Services Firm

Let’s say you are a lawyer in an estate law firm, and you need to prepare a consulting proposal for a client. You can use Microsoft 365 Copilot in Word to draft the proposal. Just provide information such as the client’s name, the purpose of the proposal, the services you are offering, its benefits, and a call to action.

After Copilot generates the document, you can review and make changes. You may also ask Copilot to check your grammar, spelling, and punctuation and offer suggestions to improve your writing.

You could even have Copilot help you to format the document according to the best practices in your industry. Use it to suggest and apply styles, headings, bullet points, tables, charts, and images to your proposal.

Before submission, use Copilot to share your proposal with your colleagues and get feedback and suggestions. It can help you to track changes, comments, and revisions and keep your document up to date.

2. Data Analysis & Visualisation for Nonprofit Resource Allocation

If your non-profit needs to decide about resource allocation in, say, promoting disability rights, you can use Copilot to gather and process data for your basis.

Also use Copilot to help you:

• Collect data from a variety of sources that you specify
• Check the data for errors and inconsistencies
• Use a tool like Excel to analyse your data and identify patterns
• Generate charts/data visualisations for clearer presentation
• Check the data for errors and inconsistencies
• Create a report and a presentation to communicate the results

3. Patient Report Writing for a Healthcare Provider

Periodic patient reports are a regular task for healthcare professionals. A medical specialist can use Microsoft Copilot to automate report generation, summarising a patient’s medical history, current medications, treatment plans, and patient progress updates.

The report writer can ask Copilot for help in:

• Collecting data from electronic health records (EHRs), billing systems, and databases
• Instructing Copilot how to create the report, using a JavaScript or Python script
• Actual report generation
• Filing the reports and sharing with relevant personnel

4. Chatbots for a Financial Services Business

If your organisation offers financial services, chances are you will often receive queries and customer support requests. You can use Copilot for:

• Training chatbots to answer common customer questions and about your offerings
• Providing real-time support to your customer support staff, including finding relevant and accurate information, drafting standard responses, and resolving issues speedily
• Generating reports and analytics about customer interactions, to identify and address areas for improvement in customer support

5. Legal Document Templates Generation

Lawyers, legal secretaries, and paralegals can get smart with Microsoft Copilot when creating templates for non-disclosure agreements, wills, trusts, and other documents. Just identify the templates that you need, then provide Copilot with relevant data such as your business name, address, and contact information.

You may use a Copilot script to specify how to generate the legal document templates. You could then run the script, review the templates, proofread and improve them. Copilot can also assist in formatting your document templates and, if needed, convert documents from Word into PDF or HTML which could be easier to share and use.

6. Marketing Campaign Automation for Non-Profit Fundraising Program

If you work in a non-profit organisation aiming for increased donor engagement, improved efficiency, and better fundraising campaign insights, Copilot can assist you in several ways:

Generating Personalised Email Campaigns

Marketing staff can tap Copilot to generate personalised email campaigns for donors and potential donors. This can help increase open rates and click-through rates.

Creating Social Media Posts

Copilot can be used to create social media posts tailored to the interests of target supporters. This can increase engagement on social media and even drive more traffic to your website.

Segmenting Donor Lists

Fundraising staff can use Copilot to segment donor lists based on factors like donation history, interests, and demographics. This can help you to target donor audiences more effectively.

Tracking Campaign Results

Copilot can help executive staff track the results of campaigns, including email open rates, click-through rates, and social media engagement. These can help you improve on future campaigns.

7.Financial Modelling & Analysis (FMA) in Education & Training

If a private training institution is proposing a new set of courses, they can do an FMA to make decisions – about launching the courses, for resource allocation, and to find out the financial impact on the organisation. In particular:

• Copilot can be used to analyse data (e.g., government reports, industry surveys, and social media) to identify the potential market for new courses. For example, Copilot can help identify fast-growing industries and develop new courses that will train students for jobs in those industries.
• Copilot can help to estimate the costs of new courses, including course materials development, hiring instructors, and marketing the courses. Copilot can also be used to estimate the potential revenues and recommend the tuition fee rates.
• Copilot can be used to evaluate the financial impact of new courses on the overall business. For instance, Copilot can help estimate the increase in revenue, the increase in course costs, and the impact on the overall profit margin.
• Copilot can help in creating reports and presentations that communicate the financial benefits of new courses to stakeholders. For one, Copilot could be used to show how new courses can increase revenue and achieve strategic goals.

Microsoft 365 Copilot: Your Smart AI Assistant

Can you imagine how efficient and productive your organisation can become with Microsoft Copilot compared to without it?

The tool will be available from the 1st November 2023 to Microsoft 365 customers on a Business Enterprise agreement for an extra $30 USD per user per month. For related information, you may reach out to ADITS right now. For other practical technology guides, you may check out our free business IT resources.

Australian businesses are starting to reap the benefits of artificial intelligence (AI).

• Every AI-related initiative resulted in an average incremental revenue of AUD $361,315.
• Eight in ten decision-makers are expecting to see revenue growth from their AI investments in 2023.
• The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation describes the AI ecosystem as “rapidly transforming” and “where businesses are generating significant new revenue streams and efficiencies using AI technology.”

But what do those mean to you?

Implications of AI for Business

Forbes Advisor found majority of business owners believe AI will positively impact these:

1. Customer relationships
2. Productivity
3. Sales
4. Cost savings
5. Response times

“We’ve never seen a technology move as fast as AI has to impact society and technology. This is by far the fastest moving technology that we’ve ever tracked in terms of its impact and we’re just getting started,” echoed Paul Daugherty, Chief Technology & Innovation Officer at Accenture. With such acceleration, 75% of executives are apprehensive that they might go out of business within five years unless they scale AI in their business.

AI Opportunities for Your Business

We have seen much of generative AI apps like ChatGPT, but there is so much more to AI. Consider these other opportunities that could benefit your business.

1. Responsive Customer Interactions

Sales and marketing leaders feel that AI has been the biggest game-changer when it comes to improving customer experience. With automated chatbots, customers can now have a 24/7 responsive channel, plus it frees up your human resources for more complex tasks. In fact, 85% of customer service interactions are now responded to by chatbots.

2. Unbiased & Objective Decisions

AI can help analyse large amounts of data to provide insights, helping businesses make informed, data-driven decisions. Data centre services provider AirTrunk is looking to use AI in finding suitable locations for data centres.

3. Savvy Business Foresight

Predictive analytics helps business to see future trends and behaviours. This enables them to be proactive and stay ahead of the competition. For example, Snack producer Frito-Lay has been turning to AI-powered analytics to leverage their data for predicting store openings and shifts in demand.

4. Personalised Experience

According to Semrush, 71% of marketers believe that AI is useful for personalisation. AI can in fact personalise customer experiences by analysing individual behaviours and patterns. One key benefit of this is increased customer satisfaction and loyalty. Bill Gates said, “A decade from now, we won’t think of those businesses as separate, because the AI will know you so well that when you’re buying gifts or planning trips, it won’t care if Amazon has the best price, if someone else has a better price — you won’t even need to think about it.”

5. Operations Efficiency Boost

AI is useful for automating routine tasks, improving efficiency and productivity. More than half of businesses now apply AI to improve their production processes or process automation. Others use AI for:

• Search engine optimisation tasks
• Data aggregation
• Generating ideas, plans, presentations, reports, and website copy
• Streamlining internal communications
• Writing code

6. Real-Time Assistance

Provide 24/7 help to customers and to staff with AI tools, improving communication and efficiency on both sides. Cynthia Scott of Zip Co also cites the possible use of real-time generated scripts for call centre workers. AI apps can also assist your team in real-time. Microsoft Copilot is integrated into Microsoft 365 so staff can use it while working in Word, PowerPoint, Excel, OneNote, and Outlook. It can provide post-meeting recaps, help with drafting documents and presentations, and project status updates, among others.

7. Smart Security Safeguards

Fraud detection and cyber security services now use AI for:

• Finding patterns in data
• Spotting new cyber threats
• Battling bots
• Predicting data breach risks
• Improving endpoint safety

8. Supply Chain Upgrades

AI also figures in supply chain optimisation, by predicting demand and optimising delivery routes. The use of AI has led to a 44% decrease in costs for the supply chain management industry in 2019. Thoughtworks CTO Dr. Rebecca Parsons shared with Harvard Business Review how “supply chain planning addressing disruptions in the supply chain can benefit [from AI] in two ways” – by directly handling the easy problems and by providing support in more complex cases.

9. Spot-on Talent Acquisition

The recruitment process is significantly improved with help from AI:

• Tap a larger talent pool and crawl millions of profiles when sourcing for candidates.
• Screen resumes and objectively score applicants without bias.
• Post highly targeted job ads to yield better results.
• AI can also help predict candidates’ job-fit.
• Automate other recruitments tasks, such as doing offer letter templates, background checks, and onboarding paperwork.

10. Customer-Centric Products

AI helps in developing new products by analysing market trends, customer feedback, and competitive analysis. The Lottery Corporation CEO Sue van der Merwe noted: “AI is actually not necessarily about offering more products. It’s about offering the right products.” Other areas where AI can help are:

• Generating ideas for new products or product improvements
• Automating or enhancing production processes
• Optimising the product development cycle

Emerging Business AI Assistant: Copilot

In addition to the above opportunities, Microsoft has recently introduced its AI everyday assistant, Copilot, which is now available to businesses of all sizes. How can it help you?

(*Copilot for Microsoft 365 is now generally available for small businesses with Microsoft 365 Business Premium, Business Standard, Office 365 E3 or E5 subscriptions with no minimum seat requirement.) While it’s tempting to try the myriad of AI apps flooding the market, here are some of the key reasons why you should use Copilot:

• Copilot offers a broad range of data for companies that want comprehensive search results combined with customisation options.
• As they’re part of the Microsoft ecosystem, they are a trusted source and allow for seamless integration with their other apps.
• Microsoft has a track record and commitment to enterprise-grade security.
• Your business data isn’t leaving your technology ecosystem, minimising your risk of data breaches.

Use AI Strategically

Like it or not, AI is revolutionising the way businesses operate. If you want to keep your edge or gain the lead, you must adopt AI wisely. Plan well for AI adoption in your organisation so you can strategically use the right AI tools for your needs. If you want to explore beyond AI and discover IT solutions that can help your business, book a free consultation with ADITS’ specialists. We can help you find the right technology to achieve your goals.