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Definitive Guide to Using Microsoft Teams for Content and

Pursuits Libraries

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Contents

Introduction 3

Overview 4

How to use this guide 4

Setting up your content library in Teams 5

Setting up your Pursuits Library in Teams 8

Connecting the two, using Qorus 11

About Qorus Software 15

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Introduction

At Qorus, we work closely with Bid, Proposal, and Sales teams around the world. They often turn to us for help and advice on how to quickly prepare targeted, engaging proposals. They also want to make sure that their Bid Managers, Business Developers, and subject matter experts (SMEs) can locate and use content efficiently and collaborate remotely on documents.

Organizations that are coupling Qorus’ proposal management software with Microsoft Teams are bringing their very best minds together to boost their remote teams’ ability to create proposals that win deals, faster.

By blending Teams’ person-to-person collaboration capabilities with Qorus’ advanced intelligence, you can:

• Drive greater alignment and collaboration among remote teams

• Draw on approved, well-thought-out content

• Leverage data-driven insights for continual, iterative improvement

Bringing these capabilities to life involves three key steps:

• Building a single center of excellence to access, search, manage, and update your Content Library (which includes marketing assets and various items of corporate collateral) and Pursuits Library (which includes materials for sales pitches, RFX responses, and discrete projects), all using the powerful platform and functionalities provided by Teams,

• Using Qorus to connect the two areas, and

• Continually building on and refining your Libraries, over time.

What you may not know, is that provided you have a Microsoft O365 subscription that includes Teams, you already have everything you need to get started!

Not all organizations have Content Libraries in place, or the dedicated resources to manage them. They also might not have a formal sales Pursuits Library. Each business has its own way of managing these functions today. But that’s not

a problem! Regardless of your current scenario, using Qorus with Teams can immediately boost collaboration between your content marketing and sales functions and make accessing the latest, most relevant materials easier for everyone.

We asked Glen Pankhurst, Strategic Customer Success Manager at Qorus, to share some simple steps to laying a foundation for more powerful and productive teamwork, using these platforms.We hope you’ll find this guide helpful and encourage you to share it with your colleagues, clients, and wider network. We’d also like to invite you to see Qorus in action via our demo that you can check out here.

If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions, please share them with us by emailing marketing@qorusdocs.com.

Best wishes,

Jennifer Tomlinson Executive Vice President of Marketing

Remember, the ”nirvana” of building and maintaining fully integrated Content and Pursuits Libraries isn’t achieved overnight, or through one giant leap. It’s usually an iterative journey, but regardless of the nature or size of your business, you need to start somewhere.

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Overview

Most businesses have created Libraries where they store various types of content and materials:

• One may be your Content Library which often includes various items of corporate and marketing collateral.

• Another could be your Pursuits Library which contains documents and data related to discrete client accounts and the materials sales teams use to support pitches, proposals, and RFP content.

NOTE: You may not have these Libraries now, but they’re easier than you think to build as you go and connect via Teams.

Once you start on a journey of integration and collaboration between these two areas, you’ll immediately improve your Sales teams’ ability to create proposals that win deals, faster.

That’s because:

• Everyone has instant access to the documents and supporting collateral they need.

• In addition to Teams, the solution allows for seamless integration with Microsoft 365, including the Office suite, OneDrive, SharePoint Online, Dynamics 365, and Salesforce, which enables users to search multiple sources at once to locate the best content for proposals.

How to use this guide

This guide aims to show you how you can start adopting best-practice approaches and activities – irrespective of your current content architecture. Our approach hinges on integrating these two Libraries into Teams and then using Qorus to connect them:

• Section 1 explains how to set up your Content Library in Teams.

• Section 2 explains how to set up your Pursuits Library in Teams.

• Section 3 explores how to connect the two, using Qorus.

Let’s get started!

We’re here to helpThe prospect of building an integrated platform can be daunting, but we’re here to assist you. Visit our Help Center, where you’ll find useful tips and hints for creating an easy-to-use interface that serves the needs of all functions involved in content management and sales pursuits within your business.

We can also offer you a once-off engagement to help you set up these platforms to be best leveraged for your business and assist you to connect them quickly, using Qorus. To find out more, contact us here.

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Setting up your content library in Teams

To begin, open your Teams application.

1. On the left-hand side, under the Teams option, you’ll see the existing list of teams to which you already belong. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on Join or create a team.

2. On the screen that opens next, click the top left-hand box: Create team.

3. On the next screen, click on Build a team from scratch.

4. Next, specify whether to make your new team private or public. (If you select Private, you’ll need to invite people to join the team by email and only they will be able to view and access the contents of the Team. If you select Public, the team, and all its contents, will be visible to anyone within your organization.)

5. You’ll then be prompted to give your new team a name (for example, “Content Library”, and, if you wish, a description. Then click Create. If you’d selected to create a private team, you’ll now be given the opportunity to add your members.

6. Back on the landing page, you’ll now see your newly created team appear in the list on the left-hand side. Next, click on the tab below it, called General. This channel displays a feed of any posts or activity made by any members of the team.

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Now, let’s take a closer look at how to add additional tabs to your navigation bar, and populate their contents:

7. On the top navigation bar under General, click on the Files tab. In here, you can create your own folder structure, and name each folder according to the type of content it will contain. Click on New and then select Folder to add as many folders as you require.

8. Within each folder, you can create sub-folders to further categorize your content into more discrete buckets.

9. Now you’re ready to upload your files. Within each subfolder, click on the Upload button on the top of the navigation bar. You’ll then be able to browse your computer and select the files – or even bulk-upload entire folders and the files saved within them. Simply click Open once you’ve selected the relevant content items and they’ll be copied into Teams, using exactly the same folder structures and naming conventions. All files are supported – there are no limitations to the file types that you can upload to Teams, and it’s safe to say that there are no real size limitations either.

TipWhen it comes to folders and subfolders, less is more – that’s because you want to avoid the same content living in multiple locations, as this

with will make it onerous to maintain the content and you’ll also run the risk of not updating the content in all the places it’s stored. This could

lead to unwelcome legal headaches!

TipIf you already have an existing, working content and folder structure on your computer, you don’t have to recreate this in teams – you can just

upload the entire architecture, and all the content it contains, to Teams.

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10. Once you’ve uploaded all your content, you can add additional functionality and tabs by clicking on the + [Add a tab] button on the top navigation bar in Teams. You’ll be taken to a store that contains a range of additional applications that you can select to add to your team. Available applications include both Microsoft and non-Microsoft products, which you may or may not already be using. Use the More apps button to search for and filter the applications available in the Teams store by app type (such as “Productivity”, “Analytics and BI” or “Project management”.)

11. You could choose to add the Microsoft Planner application to your Team, where it will appear in your top navigation bar. If you’d like to rename it to, “To Dos”, for example, you can click on Rename on the drop-down menu.

12. You can then customize your view by adding columns or buckets such as “To do”, “In progress”, and “Completed” to track and manage different workflows, schedule meetings, and assign tasks and deadlines to specific team members. Tasks can be moved from column to column, as they progress through their lifecycle towards completion. You can also add other details to each task such as checklists, priority levels, comments and links to any relevant attachments or files located in your Teams Content Library folders, SharePoint, or external URLs.

13. The application also gives you a snapshot overview of the current status of all your tasks and projects by clicking on the Board, Charts, or Schedule buttons.

TipAll of the Microsoft applications you see may be used free of charge

(subject to any limitations on your current subscription plan).

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14. Any meetings that you’ve had with your team members which have been recorded, may also be stored in a single location. To add this feature, select the “Microsoft Stream” application from the Teams store by clicking the + [Add a tab] button. It will then appear as a new item on your top navigation bar, and again, you can rename it to, for example, “Meeting recordings”, if you like.

15. By selecting the “Microsoft OneNote” application from the Teams store, you can also add a “Notes” tab to your top navigation bar, in which you can store miscellaneous information or documents.

Congratulations! Your Content Library is now live in Teams!

Setting up your Pursuits Library in Teams In this section, we’ll explore how to set up your Pursuits Library in Teams. In many ways, the process is very similar to setting up your Content Library.

First, let’s define exactly what your Pursuits Library is, and its purpose within your business:

It’s the location where the content that your Sales teams use when working on RFPs, RFIs, SOWs, client responses, and proposals is stored.

1. To start creating your Pursuits Library, open your Teams application. On the left-hand side, under the Teams option, you’ll see a list of teams to which you already belong. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on Join or create a team.

2. Give your team a name, for example, “Pursuits Library”.

TipAll meetings recorded in Teams include a time-stamped transcript in the

sidebar. So no longer do you have to keep separate meeting notes!

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3. Next, create sub-sections within the team, naming each one according to the client or type of pursuit.

4. Within each sub-team, you can tailor the top navigation bar by adding new tabs such as:

• Posts

• Files

• To Dos

• CRM Opportunities

• Reports

• Recordings

• Notes

Let’s take a closer look at how to add these tabs to your navigation bar:

Click on the + [Add a tab] button on the top navigation bar in Teams. You’ll be presented with a store containing a range of additional applications

that you can browse and select to add to your team. Available applications include both Microsoft and non-Microsoft products, which you may or may not already be using. You can easily rename applications to suit your personal preferences (for instance, you can add the Microsoft Planner application to your team, but if you’d like to rename it to, “To Dos”, for example, you can so by clicking on Rename on the drop-down menu.)

5. In the “Files” tab, you can create folders and sub-folders, relevant to your pursuit / client. Some folders and sub-folders will include client-facing materials, while others may be restricted to internal use only.

6. Within each subfolder, click on the Upload button on the top of the navigation bar. You can then browse your computer and select the files – or even bulk-upload entire folders and the files saved within them. Simply click Open once you’ve selected the relevant content items and they’ll be copied into Teams, using exactly the same folder structures and naming conventions. What’s more, there aren’t any limitations regarding the file types or sizes that you can upload.

TipThere’s no need to start from scratch: If you have an existing folder

structure on your computer that’s working well for you, there’s no need to rebuild anything separately in Teams. Simply copy the entire set of

folders (and their contents) from your computer into Teams.

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7. In the “To Dos” tab, you’ll be able to customize your view by adding columns or buckets such as “To do”, “In progress”, and “Completed” to track and manage different workflows related to responding to the client pursuit, and ensure that you’re meeting various checkpoints and completing proposal reviews on time.

8. You can also schedule meetings and assign tasks and deadlines to specific team members. You can move tasks from column to column, as they progress through their lifecycle. You can also add other details to each task such as checklists, priority levels, comments, and links relevant attachments or files located in your Teams Content Library folders or SharePoint, or external URLs.

9. The application also allows you to get a snapshot overview of the current status of all your tasks and projects by clicking on the Board, Charts, or Schedule buttons. This is particularly useful in the sales pursuit process as timelines and deadlines associated with submitting your responses are usually very tight. These views allow you to ensure that your sales team is on track to complete their tasks, on time.

10. Another functionality that you can integrate is Microsoft Dynamics 365. (Click on the + [Add a tab] button on the top navigation bar and search for and add the application.) You can also rename the tab if you wish. In the example below, the tab has been renamed to “CRM Opp”. Once you add Dynamics 365, you can link to any entity, account, lead, or opportunity that currently exists in the application. As this team is pursuit-related, you’d want to link to the opportunity, as opposed to the other options. This will provide you with more granular information about the client and their unique pain points and details that you need to highlight about your solution that can help them solve them.

11. You can create a “Report” tab on your top navigation bar. To do this, add the Power BI app from the store first, and select the most appropriate one from “My workspace”. This allows you to view and track various activities associated with a specific pursuit. You can access your pursuit data by linking the Qorus report here, once you’ve set up that report. (Note: We’ll explain more about how to integrate Qorus with Teams in the next section).

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12. You can add both a “Meeting recordings” and a “Notes” tab to your top navigation bar by adding Microsoft Stream and Microsoft OneNote applications to the team, respectively, from the store. Just click on the + [Add a tab] button on the top navigation bar and search for and add the applications.

13. There are many additional applications available in the store that will be particularly useful for pursuits teams. For example, by adding the “Tracking Time” app, you can monitor the number of man-hours spent on each client response.

Congratulations! Your Pursuits Library is now live in Teams!

Connecting the two, using Qorus In this section, we’ll step through the process of connecting your Content Library and your Pursuits Library, using Qorus. This will allow you to search multiple sources at once to locate the best content for proposals. And, it will allow your content to be usable directly in your Office applications while responding to customers’ requests.

First, let’s connect to your Content Library:

1. Open SharePoint and locate and copy the relevant link to your Content Library.

TipPinning channels within each team to the very top of your left-hand

navigation bar makes them quick and easy to access. To pin a channel, simply right click on it and select “pin”.

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2. Then, open your Qorus application and follow these simple next steps:

• On the left-hand sidebar, under Manage, click on Content Sources. In the search box, type in and select the SharePoint Online Library connector (NOT the “Microsoft Teams” connector), and then click Add.

• Next, you’ll be prompted to give your content source a name (in this example, “Content Library”).

• Paste the relevant SharePoint URL into the “Site” box.

3. After clicking Next, you’ll see all the content in the specified SharePoint library, and you can select which parts of it you’d like to be displayed in Qorus, by ticking the relevant boxes. Then click Finish.

4. The next step is to repeat this process to connect your Pursuits Library to Qorus. Follow the same steps outlined above, but rather use the “Microsoft Teams” Connector than the “SharePoint Online Library” connector, if possible.

5. First, open Qorus and on the left-hand sidebar, under Manage, select Pursuit Types.

6. Select Microsoft Teams as your connector type. Add your preferred team from the drop-down list and give it a name. You can also populate other fields such as description, permissions, and whether the item is outcome- or deadline-based.

TipWhen connecting to Teams in Qorus for the first time, you may be

required to complete a security review.

TipIf you can’t connect your Pursuits Library to Qorus using Teams, you

can use the SharePoint Online library connector instead ( just as you did with your Content Library).

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7. Each Pursuit Type links to a single team only. And, depending on the size of your organization, it will typically be based on either your response type (e.g. proposal or RFX) or geographic location.

8. Once you’ve created your type of pursuit, you can start creating pursuits of different types (in the example below, “Proposals” or “RFXs”).

9. By way of example, let’s assume you wanted to create a new proposal. You’d click on the Proposal button in the left-hand navigation bar and then click Add.

10. Next, populate the various standard fields for the proposal.

11. Click Save.

12. Then click on the Next Smart Fields button at the bottom.

13. Populate your smart fields (i.e. Customer Name, Due Date, Area, Industry).

14. Click Next.

15. Now you’ll see that an area has been created for your proposal, under “Pursuits”.

16. If you open the proposal, you’ll see you also open the Teams channel, where your newly added proposal will be visible.

TipRemember that the Pursuits Library is the pursuit type, while the

channel is the individual client working area.

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17. Now you’re connected! Everything you do in Qorus is replicated in Teams – and anything you build in Teams can be used in Qorus. For example, you can start uploading content from your computer into Qorus, as indicated below.

18. Once you’ve uploaded and clicked on it, it will open in the relevant Microsoft application (in this example, Word).

19. Click on Open in Desktop App.

20. If you now open Qorus, you’ll see it on the right-hand side of your screen. You can then view, access, and search for material within both your Content Library and Pursuits Library.

21. The “Search” function allows you to locate the most appropriate content items and copy blocks and insert them into your proposal document, under the relevant sections. (In the example below, we’re searching the Content Library for information about Dynamics365 , for input into the proposal template).

22. You can also easily search through old RFPs located within your Pursuits Library, for content that can be re-used in your current proposals.

There you have it! We hope that this guide is helpful to you. If you have any questions or other tips to share, we’d love to hear them. Please contact us at marketing@qorusdocs.com.

About Qorus Software

Bring your best minds and content together to create proposals that win. It is essential that your sales team has every tool available to respond to each new sales opportunity and win more business. With Qorus, you’ll deliver customized proposals in minutes instead of hours, using pre-approved, and branded content. Gain valuable insights to create smart follow up.

Use Qorus’ powerful recommendations engine to locate the perfect attachment in seconds without endlessly browsing through files. Search multiple content sources at once and use our filters to enable your team to find the most up-to-date and relevant components, even as your content library continues to expand.

Easy to use and intuitive, Qorus enables your sales team to quickly craft a targeted, professional, and engaging pitch. Built on Microsoft Azure, you’ll create secure proposals up to five times faster, all from within your familiar Microsoft Office environment or CRM system. Over 4,000 Microsoft partners currently use Qorus, including Ingram Micro, Tech Data, SYNNEX, SherWeb and Arrow.

With Qorus’ built-in measurement tools, you’re able to track what prospects are looking at within your content, what they’re sharing, and the time spent on each page.

And, 62 percent of Qorus users have reported a spike in productivity, resulting in 20 percent higher sales velocity and a $20,000 annual productivity savings per user.1

Empower your salesforce with Qorus, designed to close more deals faster.

For more information please visit:

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