As Copilot takes off, AI may disrupt your business. But not if you get there first.

It’s repeated so often that it’s already a cliché, “AI won’t replace you, but someone using AI will.” By putting AI within reach of millions of organisations globally, Copilot for Microsoft 365 takes this to the next level. Now, the big threat to your organisation is competitors using AI. So, how do the benefits stack up to the risks of inaction?

Depending on which expert you listen to, the subscription costs of Microsoft Copilot are either too costly for high-volume users, or a no-brainer investment that pays for itself on day one.

Having been early adopters at Nexon, and with our clients, we’ve already seen Copilot in full swing. In this article, we draw on our hands-on experience to show you how it boosts productivity for everyone from the C-suite to sales teams – including calculating how long it takes to break even on your investment.

The horse has bolted on AI. Innovators are already using Copilot to move faster than competitors. For business leaders, the question is not if you leverage AI, but how?

How Copilot can help your teams today

Let’s look at examples of how Copilot saves time and improves productivity across roles.

The CEO:

Digest information and communicate clearly

Running a growing startup, Kim has to stay across vast volumes of information, create impactful strategic documents – such as business plans, vision statements, pitch decks and executive summaries – and communicate with investors, the board and employees via email and chat.

CEOs are faced with a barrage of information and tasks. Copilot speeds things up:

Cut email time: Summarises key points and actions and suggests concise replies.

Fast-track meetings: Analyse calendars to schedule optimal meeting times and generate data-driven agendas and follow-ups. It can even summarise missed meetings.

Write quickly and precisely: Helps draft emails, reports, and presentations, translate languages on the fly, and add impactful images, charts and graphs.

Digest news: Monitor industry news, identify competitor activities and research specific topics with insightful summaries.

Make data-driven decisions: Analyse KPIs, generate reports and anticipate potential issues to help make the right calls.

Filter distractions: Flag suspicious emails, manage passwords securely and filter out distractions with security and focus features.

The marketer:

Create content and analyse results

Ari is a marketing specialist in a national retailer, responsible for creating promotional product descriptions, landing pages, ads and emails. With a role driven by increasing conversions, sales and revenue, Ari has to schedule and optimise campaigns using various tools and metrics.

Copilot is tailor-made to make marketers and content creators more efficient:

Craft compelling content: For example generate or edit creative marketing ideas and draft captions specific to social platforms.

Personalise marketing at scale: Customise email subject lines, body copy and benefits for targeted audience segments based on CRM data

Analyse feedback and market research: Identify key sentiment trends in reviews and surveys, allowing for quicker adjustments to marketing strategies.

Optimise digital ads: Generate A/B testing variations of ad copy and analyse performance data to improve click-through rates.

Brainstorm concepts: Suggest ideas for headlines, calls to action, promotions, blog topics, SEO keywords or web copy based on a defined brief.

Meeting summaries: Transcribe meetings, summarise notes, identify tasks and draft follow-ups for creative teams and agencies.

The sales rep:

Communicating with customers and hitting targets

As a senior B2B sales consultant, Sam prepares sales proposals, contracts and follow-up emails, and negotiates and closes deals. Motivated by meeting quotas, commissions and bonuses, Sam deals with hundreds of prospects and clients throughout a typical month.

Copilot can make Sam faster and more effective in many ways:

Close deals: Craft personalised email follow-ups and proposals in minutes with AI-powered suggestions based on CRM data and meeting notes.

Sharpen presentations: Generate data-driven sales pitches that match pain points with features/solutions, illustrated with impactful graphs and charts.

Book meetings: Track calendars and suggest optimal times for calls and meetings to maximise outreach.

Monitor the market: Track and summarise competitor activity and industry news to identify sales opportunities, tailor pitches and reach out to prospects.

Build rapport: Generate engaging introductions and sign-offs and draft appropriate responses to questions and objections based on past experience.

Automate tedious tasks: Automate tasks like data entry into CRMs, reports, proposals, follow-ups, reminders and more.

The bottom line: When will Copilot deliver an ROI?

There’s no precise way to calculate the benefits of emerging AI tools. However, building on the work of Chris O’Brien, the table below takes a back-of-the-envelope approach to calculate how much time needs to be saved to justify a Copilot subscription.

As you’ll see, if the use cases detailed above save just a few minutes each day, then you’ll be way ahead. For example, an employee on a $100k salary only needs to save 45 minutes per month to break even, and just 26 minutes for a more senior employee.

Beyond these incremental efficiencies, O’Brien makes the case – with detailed analysis and a downloadable RO spreadsheet – that broader benefits like higher quality, faster speed, better insights, clearer communication and finding new opportunities will deliver huge returns over time.

The real strategic question is: What are the potential costs and risks of ignoring AI tools as your competitors take them up?

If you’d like to explore getting started with Copilot in your organisation, or preparing and training your staff to get the most from it, we’d love to share our experiences with you.

Infographics

The rise of Generative AI: Transforming productivity

Microsoft’s Copilot for Microsoft 365 emerges as a noteworthy solution in this landscape. Copilot integrates generative AI capabilities directly into the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, providing users with intelligent assistance throughout their workflow.

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PS: I’d estimate that using Copilot to brainstorm use cases and research benefits saved me at least an hour on creating this post alone.