In today’s fast-paced business landscape, organisations face growing challenges from information overload, disjointed workflows and evolving customer expectations. Therefore, success depends on the ability to automate processes and develop applications tailored to your specific needs.
Microsoft’s Power Platform makes this possible by streamlining processes, building custom apps, and turning data into insights without long development cycles. Here’s how…
Introduction to Microsoft Power Platform
Microsoft Power Platform is a low-code platform that helps businesses create customised solutions for their unique challenges by automating workflows and turning data into actionable insights – making it easier to work smarter, not harder.
So, how can it enhance your business performance? Let’s explore each component in detail.
1. Power Automate and it’s advantages
Power Automate is a powerful workflow tool designed to help you automate repetitive tasks and processes, eliminating the need for manual effort. Its user-friendly interface and seamless integration make it easy to share and access data across multiple services. For example, you can create a flow to automatically copy files or cloud-based data from Google Drive to OneDrive.
You can start a workflow in Power Automate in three main ways:
- Scheduled flows – run tasks automatically on a set timetable.
- Instant flows – launch manually or from a selected item whenever you need them.
- Automated flows – trigger automatically based on an event, such as a new item being created or updated.
Power Automate also offers the flexibility to create custom connectors for services beyond its built-in options, allowing you to tailor integrations to your specific needs.
How can I use this to help enhance my business?
Power Automate can be used for automating everyday tasks, such as copying files across platforms, sending follow-up emails to new leads or streamlining approvals for expensive reports. By reducing manual work and minimising error, you can save time and focus on higher-value activities that drive growth.
2. Power Apps and it’s advantages
Power Apps is Microsoft’s low-code development tool that lets you create custom applications for desktop or mobile, with an easy drag and drop interface. It provides a fast development environment where you can design apps that meet specific business needs. This provides rich business logic and workflow capabilities to transform your manual business operations into digital, automated processes.
You can connect your data in Power apps in many ways:
- Microsoft Dataverse – Microsoft’s underlying data platform.
- Online Services – such as SharePoint, Microsoft 365 and Dynamics 365.
- On-premises sources – such as SQL Server and more.
How can I use this to help enhance my business?
Power Apps can be used to create custom applications for various business needs such as expense approvals, creating customer-facing portals, or building apps to track inventory and service requests. By digitising manual processes, improving data access, you can save time and reduce errors.
3. Power BI and it’s advantages
Power BI is a Microsoft tool that lets you connect, visualise, and analyse data – helping you make informed decisions whilst embedding insights into the apps you use every day. Its interactive dashboards and ability to integrate seamlessly with other Microsoft tools, such as Excel and SharePoint, make it easy to explore trends, track metrics, and share findings with your team.
Benefits Power BI offers:
- Data Connectivity – It offers extensive data connectivity options, allowing you to connect to various data sources, both on-premises and in the cloud.
- Custom Visualisations – Ability to create custom visualisations to represent your data in a way that best suits your needs.
- Mobile Access – Provides mobile access, allowing you to view and interact with your reports and dashboards on the go.
How can I use this to help my business?
Power BI helps businesses make more informed decisions by transforming raw data into clear, actionable insights. You can monitor sales performance, track inventory, analyse customer behaviour, or build executive dashboards that bring key metrics together in one place. With real-time visibility into your operations, Power BI enables teams to act quickly, spot opportunities, and drive business growth.
4. Power Pages and it’s advantages
Power Pages is a Microsoft tool that lets you create, host, and manage secure, external-facing websites. This helps you deliver data-driven experiences to customers and partners. Its drag-and-drop design studio, customisable templates, and styling workspace makes it easy for users to build professional sites, while integration with Microsoft Dataverse ensures your data is connected and accessible.
What are the main features and benefits?
- Drag and Drop Design – Build professional, responsive websites quickly using a visual design studio and customisable templates – no coding required.
- Data Integration – Connect your site to Microsoft Dataverse or other data sources to display, collect, and manage data seamlessly.
- Secure & Scalable – Manage authentication, permissions, and security settings to control access for customers, partners, or internal users.
How can I use this to help my business?
Power Pages can help your business create customer portals, partner websites, or internal apps that centralise information and streamline interactions. For example, you could build a portal for customers to submit support requests, track orders, or access resources which can all connect directly to your business systems. Power Pages improves engagement and enhances the overall customer and partner experience.
5. Copilot and it’s advantages
Copilot is an AI assistant that combines advanced large language models with your organisation’s data, giving it context from documents, emails, messages, and more. This makes it far more powerful than a standard ChatGPT-like assistant, as every interaction is informed by the data your business already uses. It can boost productivity, simplify automation and provide contextual intelligence.
What are the different co-pilot usages?
- Copilot Chat – browser-based tool for research and content generation.
- Office App Integration – directly integrated into Outlook, Word, PowerPoint, etc
- Copilot Agents – quickly deploy bots that leverage existing app data, such as SharePoint document libraries.
- Copilot Studio – design custom agents from the ground up, with full control over knowledge sources, responses, and actions.
How can I use this to help my business?
Copilot can streamline work across your organisation by helping teams write, edit, and summarise content from a simple prompt, analyse and explore data with ease, and quickly transform ideas into polished presentations and documents. By tailoring it to your processes, you can unlock new efficiencies and give your teams more space to innovate and grow.
Want to learn more about how you can enhance your business with Microsoft 365? Watch our “Maximising Microsoft 365” webinar series, in partnership with Yoko:10. 👉 Watch here
