Microsoft 365 guides
Licences, Outlook, Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive explained. 50 plain-English guides for small and medium businesses.
- Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Standard or Premium: which one does your office need?Business Basic suits staff who work in a browser or on a phone, Business Standard adds the installed desktop apps, and Business Premium adds the security and device management most offices handling client data should have. Many small businesses end up on Premium for office staff and a cheaper plan for everyone else.
- Microsoft 365 plans outside the business range: frontline, email-only and enterpriseMost small offices only need the business plans, but a few other licences save money or solve specific problems: frontline plans for shift workers on shared devices, email-only plans for people who never touch documents, and enterprise plans once you pass the business user cap or need advanced compliance. The right mix often costs less than putting everyone on the same plan.
- Outlook search not finding emails: why it happens and how to fix itWhen Outlook search misses emails you know are there, the cause is usually a broken or incomplete search index on the computer, a cached mode setting that only keeps recent mail locally, or searching the wrong scope. Checking those three things in order fixes most cases in under an hour.
- Outlook mailbox full: how to free space without losing important emailA full mailbox stops you sending and eventually stops you receiving, so act on the first warning. Find out what is taking the space, clear large attachments and deleted items, then move older mail into the online archive so the main mailbox stays well under its limit.
- Outlook rules: setting up inbox rules that work and avoiding the ones that cause troubleGood Outlook rules move predictable mail, such as notifications, newsletters and supplier statements, out of the way so the Inbox holds what needs a person. Keep rules few and specific, make sure they run on the server, and review them now and then because attackers also create rules in hacked mailboxes.
- How to set up and use a shared mailbox in Microsoft 365A shared mailbox gives a team one address, such as accounts@ or info@, that several people can read and reply from without sharing a password. An administrator creates it in a few minutes, grants access to the right staff, and it appears automatically in their Outlook.
- Outlook delegate access: letting an assistant manage email and calendars properlyDelegate access lets an assistant read, send and organise meetings for someone else from their own login, without knowing that person's password. Set it up from the manager's Outlook or by an administrator, choose permissions folder by folder, and decide up front whether the assistant should see private items.
- Shared calendars and room booking in Outlook for a small officeOutlook can show who is free, which meeting room is booked and when the company van is out, as long as calendars are shared deliberately and rooms and equipment have their own resource mailboxes. Set that up once and double-bookings largely stop.
- Consistent email signatures for every staff member, on every deviceThe simplest way to get matching signatures is a single approved template that each person sets up in Outlook, with roaming signatures syncing it across their devices. For more than a handful of staff, a server-side signature tool or a mail flow rule applies the signature centrally so nobody can get it wrong.
- Distribution list, shared mailbox or Microsoft 365 group: which one to useUse a distribution list when you just want an email to reach several people's inboxes, a shared mailbox when a team needs one inbox to work from together, and a Microsoft 365 group when the team also needs shared files, a calendar and possibly a Teams space. Picking the right one avoids messy inboxes and lost replies.
- Setting up email on your own domain in Microsoft 365To use addresses like [email protected], you add the domain in the Microsoft 365 admin centre, prove you own it with a DNS record, then point the MX record at Microsoft and add SPF, DKIM and DMARC records so your mail is trusted. The DNS changes take minutes; planning the switch so no mail goes missing is the part that needs care.
- How long should a business keep email, and how to set it up in Microsoft 365Keep business email for at least as long as the records it contains must be kept, which for most NZ businesses means several years for anything tax or contract related, and delete personal information you no longer need. Microsoft 365 retention policies and the online archive can apply that rule automatically instead of relying on each person's habits.
- How to recover deleted email in Outlook and Microsoft 365Check Deleted Items first, then use Recover Deleted Items in Outlook, which can usually bring back mail deleted within the last couple of weeks. After that window, or for a whole mailbox, you need an administrator search, a retention policy that kept a copy, or a separate Microsoft 365 backup.
- Out-of-office replies and email forwarding: what to do instead of the risky habitsA short out-of-office reply that names an internal contact and leaves out travel details is safe; forwarding all work email to a personal address is not. For staff on leave, use delegate access or a shared mailbox so colleagues can cover, and keep external auto-forwarding blocked.
- Outlook keeps asking for your password: causes and fixesA repeating password prompt in Outlook usually means saved credentials are out of date, the Outlook profile still uses an old connection method, or a sign-in policy is rejecting the device. Clear the saved credentials, sign in again through the modern Microsoft sign-in window, and recreate the profile if the loop continues.
- Microsoft Teams channels versus chats: a simple structure for a small officeUse chats for quick, short-lived conversations between a few people, and channels for ongoing work that belongs to a team, a client or a project, where files and decisions need to be findable later. A few agreed rules about which is which make Teams far more useful than an endless stream of group chats.
- Working with clients and contractors in Teams: guests, external chat and shared channelsTeams gives you three ways to work with people outside the business: external chat for simple conversations with other organisations, guest access to bring someone into one of your teams with its files, and shared channels for joint work between two organisations. Pick the lightest option that does the job, and review guest access regularly.
- Running better Teams meetings in a small officeMost bad Teams meetings come down to poor audio, unclear meeting settings and nobody running the meeting. A decent headset or speakerphone, sensible lobby and recording settings, and an agreed way to run hybrid meetings make far more difference than any new feature.
- Teams Rooms basics: setting up a meeting room that just worksA Teams Room is a dedicated meeting room system with its own compute, camera, microphones and a touch console, signed in with a room account, so anyone can start a meeting with one tap without bringing a laptop. For many small offices, a simpler bring-your-own-laptop setup with a good speakerphone and screen is enough; Teams Rooms makes sense when the room is used daily for hybrid meetings.
- Microsoft Teams, Slack or Zoom: choosing for a small businessIf you already pay for Microsoft 365, Teams is usually the sensible default because chat, meetings, files and calendars are included and work together. Slack can suit tech-focused teams that live in chat and integrations, and Zoom remains strong for external meetings and webinars, but running all three often means paying twice and scattering information.
- Using Microsoft Bookings to take client appointments onlineMicrosoft Bookings gives your business a web page where clients pick a service and a time, checks staff availability against their Outlook calendars, and sends confirmations and reminders automatically. It is included with many Microsoft 365 business plans and suits consultations, site visits and simple appointments; businesses needing deposits, complex rostering or clinical records usually need a dedicated system.
- Using Microsoft Forms for everyday small business tasksMicrosoft Forms turns paper forms, emailed requests and ad-hoc surveys into simple online forms whose answers land in one place and can be opened in Excel. It suits staff requests, customer feedback, event registrations, simple checklists and training quizzes, and it is included with most Microsoft 365 business plans.
- Planner and To Do: managing tasks in a small team with Microsoft 365Use To Do for your own personal tasks and Planner for work shared by a team, such as a project, a recurring process or a department's workload. The two are connected, so tasks assigned to you in Planner also show in your To Do list, giving each person one place to see everything they need to do.
- Microsoft 365 on staff phones: a practical setup guideInstall the Outlook, Teams, OneDrive and Microsoft Authenticator apps rather than using the phone's built-in mail app, sign in with the work account, and set notification and quiet-hours preferences on day one. For personal phones, app-level protection lets the business secure work data without managing the whole device.
- What to do with Microsoft 365 licences and data when staff leaveBlock the person's sign-in on their last day, hand their email and files to a manager, then remove the licence once the data is safe, either by converting the mailbox to a shared mailbox or keeping it under a retention policy. Doing it in that order stops access straight away, keeps client history and stops you paying for an empty seat.
- SharePoint, OneDrive or Teams: where should each file live?Save it in OneDrive if it is yours and still a draft, in a SharePoint library if the business owns it, and in a Teams channel only when that channel is where the team works on it. Teams files are actually stored in SharePoint, so the real choice is between personal and shared.
- How to organise a SharePoint document library people can actually useKeep libraries shallow, split them by who needs access rather than by topic, and agree on a naming pattern before anyone uploads. Most SharePoint mess comes from copying an old shared drive's twelve-level folder tree straight across.
- Moving a shared drive or file server to SharePoint without losing a weekClean up and redesign before you copy, migrate in two passes with a short freeze at cutover, and leave the old drive read-only for a few weeks. The copy itself is the easy part; deciding what goes where is the work.
- How to fix OneDrive sync problems on a work laptopMost OneDrive sync problems come from a handful of causes: a file that cannot sync because of its name or path, too many libraries syncing at once, a file open in another program, or a signed-out account. Find the specific error first, then fix that, rather than unlinking and starting again.
- OneDrive Known Folder Move: protecting the Desktop and Documents foldersKnown Folder Move redirects each person's Desktop, Documents and Pictures folders into their OneDrive, so files saved there are synced to the cloud automatically. It quietly closes one of the most common gaps in small-office data protection: work saved only on a laptop's desktop.
- How to share files with people outside your business safelyShare with named people rather than anyone-with-the-link, set an expiry date on links that leave the business, and keep sensitive libraries closed to outside sharing altogether. Microsoft 365 lets you set those rules once so staff get the safe option by default.
- Version history and restoring files in OneDrive and SharePointEvery file in OneDrive and SharePoint keeps earlier versions you can open and restore, deleted files sit in a two-stage recycle bin for a limited time, and whole libraries can be rolled back to an earlier point. Know the time limits, because after they pass the file is gone unless you have a separate backup.
- Microsoft 365 retention versus real backup: what is actually protectedMicrosoft keeps your Microsoft 365 service running and your data replicated, but restoring what you deleted, overwrote or lost to an attacker is largely your responsibility. Retention policies help keep data from being destroyed; a separate backup is what gets it back quickly and independently.
- The Microsoft 365 security settings small businesses should switch onTurn on multi-factor sign-in for every account, block old sign-in methods that skip it, stop mail being forwarded automatically outside the business, and make sure someone receives and reads the security alerts. Those four changes stop most of the account takeovers that hit small offices.
- Security defaults versus Conditional Access, in plain termsSecurity defaults is a free, one-switch package that forces multi-factor sign-in and blocks old sign-in methods for everyone. Conditional Access does the same jobs with rules you write yourself, such as only allowing sign-in from company laptops, and needs a higher licence such as Business Premium.
- Microsoft Defender basics for a small businessDefender is a family name for several Microsoft security products, and the two that matter most to small offices are Defender for Office 365, which filters email and links, and Defender for Business, which protects laptops and desktops. Business Premium includes both; other plans include parts, so check what you actually have before buying anything extra.
- Microsoft 365 admin roles, and why nobody should be global admin day to dayA global administrator can do anything in your Microsoft 365 tenant, including delete every user and read any mailbox, so that power should sit on a separate account used only when needed. Give everyday admin work to narrower roles such as user administrator or billing administrator.
- Moving from Google Workspace to Microsoft 365Email, calendars and contacts move across with Microsoft's migration tools or a third-party service, Drive files go to OneDrive and SharePoint, and the switch happens when your domain's mail records point to Microsoft. Plan for the things that do not migrate cleanly, such as Google Forms, Sites and sharing permissions.
- Moving business email from a web host or ISP to Microsoft 365Set up Microsoft 365 and verify your domain, copy existing mail across with an IMAP migration or by importing old data files, then switch the MX record so new mail arrives in Microsoft 365. Calendars and contacts usually need moving separately, and old POP mailboxes stored on one computer need special care.
- Merging two Microsoft 365 tenants after a merger or acquisitionA tenant merger moves the users, mailboxes, files and domains of one Microsoft 365 organisation into another, usually over a planned cutover weekend. The copying is well supported; the hard parts are domain timing, identity changes for staff and everything else that signs in with the old accounts.
- Getting your Microsoft 365 ready for Copilot: fix oversharing firstMicrosoft 365 Copilot only shows people what they already have permission to see, but it finds that material far faster than any person searching. Before rolling it out, find files that are open to everyone by accident, tighten the worst of them and start with a small pilot group.
- Sensitivity labels in Microsoft 365, explained in plain EnglishA sensitivity label is a tag such as Confidential that a person or rule applies to a document or email, and it can carry protections like encryption, watermarks and limits on who can open the file. Unlike folder permissions, those protections stay with the file when it is emailed, downloaded or copied.
- Where is your Microsoft 365 data stored? Notes for NZ businessesYour tenant's data location is shown in the Microsoft 365 admin centre, and for many older NZ tenants it is Australia. Microsoft now runs a New Zealand cloud region, but where your core Microsoft 365 data sits depends on when the tenant was created and which options apply. Either way, the Privacy Act 2020 holds you responsible for keeping that information secure.
- Offboarding a leaver: their mailbox, OneDrive and accessOn the last day, block sign-in, sign the person out everywhere and remove their multi-factor methods. Then convert the mailbox to a shared mailbox or hand it to a manager, move any business files out of their OneDrive, and only then remove the licence. Doing it in that order keeps the data and stops the cost.
- Using the Microsoft 365 audit log to find out what happenedThe audit log records actions across your tenant, such as who signed in, who deleted a file, who created a mail rule and who changed a setting. Check it is turned on now, because it cannot record events retrospectively, and know how to search it before you need to.
- Microsoft Intune basics for a small officeIntune lets you manage every work laptop and phone from one place: apply security settings, install apps, control updates and wipe a lost device. It comes with Microsoft 365 Business Premium and some other plans, so many small offices already pay for it without using it.
- Protecting work data on staff's personal phones without managing the phoneIntune app protection policies secure company data inside apps like Outlook, Teams and OneDrive on a personal phone, without enrolling or controlling the phone itself. You can require a PIN for those apps, stop copying into personal apps and remove only company data when someone leaves.
- Windows Autopilot: new laptops that set themselves upWith Windows Autopilot, a new laptop is registered to your business before it arrives, and when the staff member signs in with their work account it joins your tenant, enrols in Intune and installs your standard apps and settings. It replaces most of the hand setup that new laptops usually need.
- SharePoint site permissions: owners, members and visitorsEvery SharePoint site has three basic groups: owners who manage the site, members who can add and edit content, and visitors who can only read. Put people into those groups, ideally through security or Microsoft 365 groups, and avoid granting access file by file.
- SharePoint storage full? What uses the space and how to free itSharePoint storage is shared across the whole tenant and grows with your licence count, so a few large sites, heavy version history or old project archives can use it up. Check the storage reports, trim versions and archive stale material before deciding whether to buy extra storage.