2023 Wave 1 Review - Dynamics 365 for Sales

2023 Wave 1 Review - Dynamics 365 for Sales

Microsoft Dynamics is constantly evolving and bringing new features and 2023 is no exception.

Actually 2023 Wave 1 was announce few weeks ago and this is definitely bringing some exciting and promising new features within all modules.

Nevertheless we will go through the most noticeable and valuable for business. Let's go straight to the point and see what a good vintage Microsoft has prepared for us.

In this article, I will introduce features regarding Dynamics 365 Sales module sort by release date.

Dynamics 365 Sales

Manage opportunities more effectively using the new pipeline view

Early Access/General availability : February 2023/April 2023

This new feature refers to a new pipeline view for managing opportunities within Dynamics 365 for sales. This is a graphical representation of stages regarding an opportunity to see progress from initial stage to closing.

The new pipeline is changed in order to be more modern and intuitive. It is suppose to help to identify what are the weakness or the strengths observed while going through an opportunity.

Configure forecasts for multiple business units

General availability : April 2023

This feature allows users to create and manage forecasts for multiple business units within a single instance of Dynamics 365.

It provides a flexible and customizable solution for forecasting, allowing users to define the forecasting periods, configure the forecasting models, and set up the forecast hierarchy according to the needs of each business unit. It will have also an intuitive user interface for creating and managing forecasts, making it easy for users to create and update their forecasts as needed.

Guide sellers to favorable sales outcomes with next best step

Early Access/General availability : February 2023/April 2023

This feature is made in order to help sales people to achieve favorable sales outcomes by providing a guidance on next best step to take during the sales process.

There will be recommendation that is based on sales data, customer behavior and other relevant information.

This is a feature using machine learning algorithms supposed to improve sales within organizations.

Work efficiently with enhanced Sales accelerator worklist items

Early Access/General availability : February 2023/April 2023

The Sales accelerator is a feature in Dynamics 365 that helps sales teams prioritize and manage their sales activities, by providing them with a consolidated view of their worklist items.

With this feature enhancement information will now be more detailed and relevant. Additional details such as customer history, recent interaction will be added into it.

The navigation experience will also be improved.

Get improved user experience with new and enhanced opportunity form

Public preview/General availability : February 2023/April 2023

This feature is a new capability that provides sales representatives a more intuitive and user friendly experience on Dynamics 365.

That's basically an improvement of existing Opportunity and Lead forms. It includes new and improved layout options, better support for custom fields, business logics and new ways to visualize and manage opportunities.

Redact sensitive personal data from customer calls

Public preview/General availability : February 2023/September 2023

This feature is made in order to allow customers to protect sensitive data. They would be able to redact or mask certain personal information from a customer call.

This is an important tool that could help companies to be compliant with privacy legislation.

Prevent duplicate record creation to improve data integrity

Public preview : April 2023

We are all fully aware that duplicates records can occur when multiple users create similar records or when records are imported from different systems.

This feature will be able to detect when a duplicate is created and immediately notice the user in order to check whether or not that's a duplicate. Then they can choose to update the existing record rather than creating a duplicate.

The value of such feature is of course to have a better data integrity within Dynamics 365 CRM.

Engage with your Customers using SMS conversation

Public preview/General availability : April 2023/May 2023

This feature will allow users to use SMS in Dynamics 365 for sales.

allows organizations to send SMS messages to customers, and receive and respond to incoming SMS messages, all within Dynamics 365. The SMS conversations are stored within Dynamics 365, alongside other customer interactions, making it easy to view and manage the full history of customer interactions.

Leverage manager dashboards to coach sellers

Public preview/General availability : April 2023/September 2023

Manager dashboards can provide valuable insights into the performance of sales reps, including metrics such as deal pipeline, win rate, and average deal size. This information can help sales managers to identify areas where their reps may need additional support, such as training on specific sales skills, or to track the success of coaching efforts.

With this feature sales managers can access a range of metrics, graphs, and charts that help them to better understand the performance of their team and to make more informed decisions about how to support their reps.

It will also include advanced features such as the ability to filter data by specific parameters, such as business unit, team, or individual rep. This allows sales managers to quickly find the information they need to effectively coach their sales representatives and to track their progress over time.

Get tips and suggestions while on a call with customer

Public preview/General availability : April 2023/September 2023

This feature provide in new guidance and support to agent during customer interactions. It is using artificial intelligence and machine learning to analyze interactions with customer and provide suggestions or responses based on past successful interactions and best practice.

Provide intelligent suggestions to improve seller effectiveness

Public preview : May 2023

Use of artificial intelligence and machine learning to provide sales representative real time suggestion. It leverages data such as customer interactions, sales performance and best practice in order to make recommendations to sales representatives regarding their next move.

Visualize key stakeholders and take action with the smart organization chart

Public preview : June 2023

This feature will provide a visual representation of an organization structure, relationships and key stakeholders. Users will be able to easily identify key decision makers. 

This is made with artificial intelligence and machine learning which provide real time insights and recommendations based on relationships and connections within an organization.

Get insights for calls made through third-party softphones from Dynamics 365

Public Preview : July 2023

Softphones refers to software application used in order to make and receive phone call using a computer or mobile device. 

With this feature, users will now be able to receive insights and data on calls made through those softphones software. User will have direct access to call duration, call type and outcome of the call directly inside Dynamics 365 for sales.

Automate the creation of follow-up tasks

Public preview : July 2023

This feature use artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate creation of follow up tasks and therefore giving more time to sales representative to focus on sales.

Sales representatives will be able to define criteria that would automatically create a customer meeting after a certain period of time on the phone for example.

Capture crucial details of a sales call

Public preview/General availability : August 2023/September 2023

This feature allows sales representatives to capture important information while they are in a call with customer.

It could be about customer's needs, preferences or objections that are logged immediately in Dynamics 365 ensuring that information is accurately captured and in a timely manner.

Identify cross-sell and upsell opportunities with timely product recommendations

Public preview : August 2023

This feature is using artificial intelligence and machine learning make real time product recommendation based on customer data, purchase history or other relevant factors.

The goal is to help sales representatives to identify customer interest easily.

Improve forecast accuracy with yearly and weekly forecasts

General availability : September 2023

This will allow users to create and see forecasts at yearly and weekly level. This in order to make more comprehensive and accurate expected performance.

Improve lead qualification with intent detection

Public Preview : September 2023

This is a feature using intent detection. Intent detection is a technology that uses natural language processing and machine learning algorithms to analyze customer interactions and understand the underlying intentions behind those interactions.

Now, Dynamics 365 will be able to use intent detection to analyze customer interactions and identify leads that will most likely get converted as paying customers.

This is definitely a really valuable feature that will help organizations to effectively engage their time in resource on leads. This feature will also help users to understand the needs and preferences of their leads and therefore suggest the way to communicate with potential customers in a tailor way.

Manage duplicates when importing leads in bulk

General availability : September 2023

New feature to prevent duplicate records to be created in order to maintain data integrity within Dataverse.

This feature will help to identify duplicates whenever Leads are imported from a file containing duplicates and prevent them from being created.

 

Conclusion

The Dynamics 365 Wave 1 2023 release brings exciting new features to PowerApps, Sales, and Marketing modules. The updated Sales module streamlines sales processes for better deal closing. Overall, this release is set to revolutionize sales and give businesses a competitive edge.

2023 Wave 1 Review - Dynamics 365 for Sales