Customer engagement solution architecture and Dynamics 365 Portals

Customer engagement solution architecture
and Dynamics 365 Portals
Jukka Niiranen
Pekka Halonen

On the agenda
• Hello from Pekka, Jukka & Digital Illustrated
• Dynamics Portals introduction
• XRM portals: the history & the evolution
• What are Dynamics Portals good for, where are they less than
optimal
• MS Cloud architecture big picture & where does Dynamics
Portals fit in

Bio – Pekka Halonen
• Consultant @ Digital Illustrated
• Experience on Microsoft
enterprise technologies since the
start of the millennium
• Over 10 years of experience on
Dynamics CRM / 365 from
various industries
.

Bio – Jukka Niiranen
• Consultant @ Digital Illustrated
• Working with CRM for ~15 years (customer &
consultant side)
• MS Dynamics CRM since v3.0
• Blogging at http://survivingcrm.com/
• #MSDyn365 –tweets as @jukkan
• MS Business Solutions MVP since 2013
Jukka Niiranen
@jukkan
Consultant @ Digital Illustrated
Microsoft Business Solutions MVP

Digital Illustrated in brief
• We are an agile technology agency that creates business value by
providing enterprise-grade solutions with Microsoft Cloud.
• We help organizations to accelerate sales, improve customer
experience, and increase productivity with Office 365, Dynamics 365,
Azure and Microsoft’s Data Platform (e.g. Power BI).
• We combine business-driven approach with user-centered change
management and top-notch Microsoft expertise.
• Our goal is to create the highest customer and employee satisfaction
within the Microsoft partner ecosystem.
• Growing fast, highly profitable and owned by the Norwegian Visma
group.

Dynamics Portals for newbies
• Responsive, multi-language SaaS portal that is tightly
integrated with the Dynamics 365 platform
• Publishing and editing of Dynamics 365 data without the need
for custom development
– Services for both anonymous and logged in users
– For external and internal user groups
• Customer = contact record in the Dynamics Portals data model
• Themes and design of the portal layout can be tailored to
follow the organization’s branding guidelines

History of the XRM portals
• ~2008: Adxstudio released a portal product built on top of
Dynamics CRM 4.0
• 2010: Microsoft adopted Portal Framework as part of XRM SDK
• 2015: Microsoft bought Adxstudio
• 2016 spring: first MS hosted version of Dynamics Portals
released
• 2016 fall: Parature portal license sale discontinued
• 2016 fall: Portals on-premises license sale discontinued

Dynamics 365 Portals releases
• Updates released at
least once a month
• Version numbers are
tied to the core XRM
platform version (v8.2.x)
• http://bit.ly/365portals

Cost of setting up a portal
Back in the days:
• CRM external connector license
• Windows license
• Server capacity
• Application maintenacne
• Backups
• Failover
Today:
• Every Dynamics 365 Enterprise
subscription gets a free Portal (1)

Portals trial 1-2-3
1. Applications /
Portal Add-On /
Manage
2. Name, URL,
instance, language,
portal type
3. Portal is ready
for use!

Portal types and features
Accessibility
Ads
Azure Integration
Bootstrap Design
Branding
Case Deflection
Case Management
Charts and Graphs
Content Publisher
Discussion Forums
Entitlements & SLAs
Entity Actions
Entity Forms
Entity Lists
Entity Permissions
Invitations
Knowledge Management
Links
Location Finder
Ratings and Comments
Open Data Protocol
Polls
Profile Management
Redirects
Responsive Design
Localization into 43 Languages
Search and SEO
Multi Lingual Portals
Sitemap
Web Design
Web Forms
Web Pages
Web Roles
Web Templating
Workflow Automation

CafeX Live Assist & Dynamics Portals
• Preferred Vendor Solution for Dynamics 365 Customer Service
– Installation from Dynamics 365 Admin Center, automatic trial
activation
– Licenses sold by CafeX, not via Microsoft
• Live chat & co-browse features can be added to any website
via a widget script
• Customer service representatives UI can be either Dynamics
365 web client or Unified Service Desk
• Integrates with Portals user authentication

CafeX customer support scenario (1)
1. Customer logs
in to Portal
2. Customer
reviews his own
support cases list 3. Customer
initiates new chat
session

CafeX customer support scenario (2)
4. Service rep sees new
chat request in CafeX
sidebar in Dynamics 365
5. Customer’s contact
record opens automatically,
thanks to Portal login info

When to use Dynamics Portals?
External channels
•How could I collect
information from
customers and other
interest groups to
Dynamics 365?
Internal channels
•How could I offer
information from
Dynamics 365 to our
(licensed)
employees?

Solution architecture:
external channels
• Should I use Dynamics Portals or…
– Custom/CMS web form?
– Voice of the Customer survey form?
– Marketing automation system (e.g. ClickDimensions) form?

Portals vs. custom/CMS web forms
• Brining anonymous web contact forms
to Dynamics 365 with Portals is often
overkill
– Lots of work needed in fusing the UI/UX
with the customer’s existing web presence
• For one-way data transfer there are
more lightweight options available in
MS cloud
– For example, a JSON payload posting from
the web form to a Logic App and passing it
along to Dynamics 365

Portals vs. Voice of the Customer
(VoC) surveys
• VoC question types and conditional logic
are more powerful than Portal forms
• VoC surveys aren’t suitable for “update
your own information” type of scenarios
• Survey respondent can be identified
automatically from the personalized VoC
survey request link without the need to
log in
• There’s no other web content available
“around” the VoC survey form, no support
for own scripts, limited theming
capabilities

Portals vs. marketing automation
(e.g. ClickDimensions)
• Marketing automation system can identify
the customer without requiring an explicit
login
• Form data can be updated directly to
Dynamics 365 entity records without
“exposing” the information to the customer
• Portals forms can update also other entity
records than just contacts and leads
• Portals doesn’t currently have its own
website visit tracking
– Marketing automation + Portals = “better
together”

Dynamics 365 “lightweight UI"
• Portals vs. MoCA (Dynamics 365 Mobile app)
• Portals vs. PowerApps
• Portals vs. custom

Portals vs. MoCA
• Portals adapt responsively to any
screen vs. MoCA installation
• Portals data is always up to date
• “Configure once” experience on
both clients
– Portals can contain mobile optimized
forms & navigation for several
different use cases
– MoCA can have a cut-down version of
the entity form (less
tabs/fields/logic), but only one
version for all users

Portals vs. PowerApps
• Portals is suitable for presenting
both static and dynamic content,
tight integration with Dynamics
365 application
• PowerApps allows quick
development and publishing of
task specific apps that can
communicate also with other
services than Dynamics 365 if
needed

Portals vs. Custom app
• Configure vs. develop & maintain
• Platform update management vs.
tailored app testing and
maintenance (OS/device specific)
• Tailored app can consume and
update data from several
background services

Portals and the future of XRM
• Ever fewer Dynamics 365 deployments are limited to internal
facing usage -> Portals are a central part of modern Customer
Engagement systems
• External parties are transforming into active participants in
digitalized business processes -> Portals is just one client type
for Dynamics 365
• New and expanding capabilities of Portals are based on Azure
services -> Portals as an independent web application is fading
to the background

Portals: most wanted features
1. Deploy & run
custom code
2. Integrate with
SharePoint
3. Non-production
licenses
4. Move config and
content
https://ideas.dynamics.com

Portals & MS Cloud: limitations
• SharePoint
– Earlier Adxstudio Portal integration with SP was based on stored
credentials, new S2S based model in Dynamics Portals removed this
capability
• Power BI
– XRM chart support was recently added to Dynamics Portals, but
embedding Power BI content into Portals is as difficult as with XRM itself…
• Azure Blob Storage
– All Portals content is stored into Dynamics 365 database (including
pictures, attachments), no readymade connector to cheaper blob storage

In case of errors…
• Portals solution developer
cannot currently access the
error message details
(without opening an MS
support ticket)
• Error message displayed to
Portals end user cannot be
modified (or localized)

Cloud portal extensibility pattern
?
Portal
Dynamics 365
Business logic
4
3
5
6
7
1
2

What about on-prem?
• On-prem: no more
– New licenses are not sold by Microsoft
– Old Portal version source code has been released as open source, BUT will
not be maintained
• Hybrid: no-go
– Distance between Portals app and XRM must be as short as possible to
minimize latency and performance impact
• Migration: TBD
– As with XRM, there is no automated path for migrating existing
deployments from on-prem to cloud

Summary
• “Portals are the web enablers of Dynamics 365”
• Use cases are not limited only to traditional self-service portals
• All web app needs should not try to be solved with Portals,
however
• Developing portal solutions in the hosted MS cloud requires a
new approach to architecture design

Thanks for your attention!
Find us at http://www.digitalillustrated.com/
Confidential
PETRI SÄKKINEN
CEO & Consultant
petri.sakkinen@digitalillustrated.com
+358 40 864 3065
DIGIT AL ILLUST RAT ED
Bulevardi 16 B
00120 Helsinki
FINLAND

Customer engagement solution architecture and Dynamics 365 Portals

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