Well folks, this ends my 3 part series of Office 365 tips. I’ll close with discussing support which is a very important part of your Office 365 experience.

So you want to buy, you read my tips and now you have to decide what to do. Buy from Microsoft directly? Go through a vendor or buy through your local computer tech (Me or your tech of choice).

Many folks get so excited about getting into O365, they buy direct from Microsoft and then learn some lessons right away. There are no instruction manuals on how to use the products and Microsoft will not migrate your email from your current email host to their Exchange product. They don’t have easy instructions to follow to setup OneDrive correctly or how to use SharePoint. Teams is pretty easy to figure out as well as Skype for Business, Bookings and other new add-ins, but the first three I mentioned usually requires help from an experienced technician. If you buy from Microsoft, you will have to use their support for everything if you don’t have a vendor or technician.

Now let’s say you are about to buy and decide to work with a bigger vendor on your own. They should handle the migration work and will help with first level work, but any detail work is not their sweet spot. This is when I start getting calls, when issues arise outside of their knowledge range.

If you have now decided to work with your local technician or myself, this is what you should expect. Experience and Managed Expectations.

Plus you are supporting someone who owns their own business, has pride in their work, usually answers calls quickly and you are their client, so you and should expect faster service and never have to call Microsoft yourself.

I am one of the local techs (*remote counts) and use AppRiver as my vendor. So I have 24×7 backup for my clients. When I set up a client with AppRiver, they pay Appriver, call them for basic first level needs and I help with the rest. I don’t have contracts but sell prepay tickets. Each local tech company will have their own setup, some might have a monthly managed service plan that includes support and some like me, might use another vendor. And there are some that work straight with Microsoft and you still should only work with the local tech company.

With so many ways to support Office 365, what is best option? Consider your budget before making any decision. While it may appear to be a bit more heavy on the budget to pay a smaller company, you usually get better support and customer service. Remember you get what you pay for and downtime can be costly for you.

Below is a link to check out my pricing for migration work and my Office 365 support. Feel free to compare with other companies while you are searching for your next support company.

https://callthatgirl.biz/microsoft-office-365-pricing