Hi everyone, Kevin here. Today we are going to
look at what is Microsoft 365. You might have heard of it before. It's this subscription thing
that Microsoft offers, but anytime I bought a computer in the past, I've already had Office.
So why would I want to pay for something like that on an ongoing basis? And this reminds me of
a conversation I had with my dad a long time ago. I was working at Microsoft at the time and I
remember I flew home to visit him in New Jersey and my dad said, hey, Kevin, come over here. I
have something I want to ask you. And I said, yeah, what's up? What do you want to ask me?
He said, you know, this whole Microsoft and this subscription thing for software, I just,
I really, really don't like it. I just want to buy my software and just have it. Now, first
off, that was kind of like a stab in the heart because this is the stuff I was working on and
my dad was questioning whether it was worthwhile paying for. But at the same time, I really kind of
understood his perspective. This is how software was sold for the longest time. You'd go to the
store, you'd buy a new computer and you'd get Microsoft Office and then you wouldn't worry
about it until you bought your next PC. Today, we're going to look at what is Microsoft 365? What
do you get with it? What are all the benefits? At the end of this video, I'd love to hear your
comments down below. Do you think you'll become a subscriber or do you think it just makes sense
to buy Microsoft Office one time, or maybe you'll even use some of the free alternatives? I'd love
to hear what you think. Before we jump in, I think it makes sense to take a moment to look at how we
even got here. In the past to buy Office, well, typically what would happen is you would go to
Dell or you go to HP and you'd buy a new computer. And as part of that process of buying a new
computer, they would push Microsoft Office. And you could buy Office for maybe two, three, $400,
depending on the version of Office you wanted. And then that would come with your computer and
you now had Office and you wouldn't have to think about it again for a very long time. And most
consumers with PCs, the refresh cycle tends to be about three to four years before you buy your
next PC. So, people wouldn't think about Office for probably about four years, and then they'd
go through that same process again. Now what's really interesting is Microsoft too also matched
this same exact buying cycle. So Microsoft would have three year releases and every three years
you'd have a new big release of Microsoft Office. So you'd spend the first year planning out what
you wanted to build as part of that next release. Then you'd spend the next two years going through
and actually building it and then testing it and getting it ready to ship. As an interesting
aside at Microsoft, usually what would happen is you'd join a team and you'd be part of that
team for three years. And then once the big shipment happened, you'd go, and you'd switch
to a new team and try working on something else. And that process continued many, many cycles. But
when you think about that, waiting three years to get a new release out, that's a really long time,
especially in terms of technology. These days you have new features, new functionality coming out
on a monthly basis. Some cases even a weekly basis and at the extreme, even on a daily basis. Now the
industry was shifting, and Microsoft had to match this. So that's when they introduced a service
called Office 365. The reason it was called Office 365 is it pulled together all of the traditional
Office apps. And when you think of traditional Office apps, those are things like Word, Excel,
and PowerPoint. So you could get a subscription, you got access to that software and you would get
frequent and constant updates and fixes over your service term. Now over time, they've had this
thing Office 365 and Microsoft has continued to add more things into that subscription.
So instead of just Word, Excel, PowerPoint, now you get a lot more than just that. You get
Forms, you get To Do, you get Family Safety, you get OneDrive, you get all of these other
things, which aren't really considered part of the traditional Office or the Office suite.
And so Microsoft said, well, we should probably update the name to reflect the broader scope.
That's when the name Office 365 shifted over to Microsoft 365. And that happened back in April of
2020, just to reflect that larger scope. Now you might be wondering why is it called Microsoft 365?
OK, I get it. There are a lot of products included as part of this subscription, but where did the
name come from? Why does it have a 365 at the end? Well, Microsoft views it and many consumers view
it as a service. You're getting constant updates, you're getting storage space, you're getting all
of these benefits on an ongoing basis. So the 365, well, that represents how many days are in the
year, and you get your service every single day of the year. So that's what brought together
Microsoft and 365. And now you could argue on a technicality that it should be 365.25 because of
leap year, but you get the point. Anyway, let's jump in and actually see what are the benefits
of Microsoft 365 and what do you get with it? First off, you can install all of the different
traditional Office apps on your computer. Here, for example, you can install Word, Excel,
PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher, and Access. And not only can you install them on your PC,
but you can also install them on your tablet or on your phone. And best of all, anytime any
software updates come out or maybe new features get released, you get access to all of those. Now,
what are some examples of that? In Microsoft Word, there's now a new dark mode that changes the
canvas to dark, helping your eyes relax a little bit more. In Microsoft PowerPoint, you can
now create and save your very own animated GIF. In Microsoft Excel, you can now very easily
convert data from a PDF into an Excel spreadsheet. Also, there are a whole bunch of new data types
where you can easily import data related to any one of these categories. Now, those are
just some of the most recent examples of new features in these different products, but
keep in mind, anytime something new comes out, you get access to that with a Microsoft 365
subscription. Now you might be thinking, well, hey, that's great, but really, I just need a
basic word processor and my old version of Office or even some of the free alternatives out
there, well, they do all that. Basically, a word processor is a commodity these days. Why
would I want to pay for a subscription? OK, I got it. Why don't we jump in now and let's take a look
at Word, Excel, and PowerPoint and look at how they're starting to connect to different services,
so you get value on an ongoing basis. I'm now back within Microsoft Word and here's an example of
a service that has been integrated into Word. Up here on the Home tab, over on the far side,
there is something called Editor, and this will help you improve your writing. So here I could
click on that, and I get spelling suggestions, I get grammar suggestions, and then here it
also helps me refine and improve my writing. So, if you've ever used Grammarly before, this
is Microsoft's equivalent of it, and you get this included with your Microsoft 365 subscription. In
Microsoft Excel, you get access to money in Excel, and this helps connect your Excel spreadsheet to
your banking information. So, this way you can stay on top of your finances directly in Excel.
And in Microsoft PowerPoint, up on the Home tab over on the far side here too, you get access
to design ideas. So here I created a slide called the Kevin Cookie Company and PowerPoint
looks at the content of my slide and here it's identified all of these different design ideas for
my slide. Here I have some animated backgrounds and I have different images that match the text
on the slide. So, this will help me create a much more beautiful looking presentation. Along with
design ideas, up here too, by being a subscriber, I get access to a massive quantity of different
fonts. Here as I scroll through all of my fonts, you'll see this cloud icon next to all of these
different fonts. I can download these fonts for free for use in my presentations. So now I can
really make my slide look how I want it to look. Also, by being a subscriber, I get access to an
ever-expanding collection of templates. Here on templates.office.com, you can see a preview of all
of the different templates that you get access to across all of the different traditional Office
applications. Back within Microsoft PowerPoint, but also available in Word and Excel, I get access
to thousands and thousands of royalty free images that I can use in all of my creations. Here I can
search for different images and here you can see just a sampling of the different images that I get
access to. Along with images, I also get access to thousands of different icons, cut out people,
stickers, and I even get stock videos as well that I can incorporate into my content. So far we've
been looking at the traditional Office apps and the value you get from them. However, there's a
lot more than just that. You also get access to a service called Microsoft OneDrive, and this allows
you to store files in the cloud. With my account, I get one terabyte of space. Now, in my opinion,
the storage alone is one of the most compelling parts of a subscription. With my OneDrive account,
I set up my PC so it automatically syncs with OneDrive and I can back up all of my files. Once I
put my files in the cloud, I can access these from anywhere. So let's say I go on a trip to Europe,
I can get to my files wherever I happen to be. Also, I can share these files with others
if I want to work together with people. So here I can share a folder or I could share
an individual file. So if I click on this, I can share and we could work together now.
Along with all of that, you also get something called the Personal Vault, and this is a place
where you can store very sensitive information, like maybe your passport photo or your social
security card. To be able to access this folder, you need two-factor authentication, and then it'll
lock after a set amount of time. Moving on, in Microsoft Outlook on the web, you can check your
email and there are no advertisements that appear alongside your messages. This way you can just
focus on your email. This now brings us to Skype, and this was one of the most popular messaging
apps back in the day, before FaceTime, Messenger, WhatsApp, and all these other communication
apps came along. And yes, this is also part of a subscription. To be fair, I really don't
use it all that much, but there is one really nice perk. You get 60 minutes of free worldwide
calling with a subscription. And anytime I travel, I've used this often if let's say I need to call
a local number. Now you're probably starting to get a sense for why it's called Microsoft 365
instead of Office 365. There's a lot of additional value beyond just the Office apps. And here's yet
another example of an app called Family Safety. This is a place where you can set screen time
limits. You could set gaming limits all for your family. And Microsoft is trying really hard. If
Microsoft products alone aren't compelling enough, they also offer partner deals as well that come
with a Microsoft 365 subscription. So here you can get a three month membership with Adobe, or
you can get some credit towards one-on-one private lessons. Now, personally, I don't think these are
that compelling. However, Microsoft promises that more value is constantly coming to all of these
different partner offers. And lastly, with a subscription, you also get live tech support. So,
if you have any questions or maybe you're running into some issues, you can talk with someone at
Microsoft via chat and you can get support. We've looked at all of the different value you get from
Microsoft 365, but of course the question arises, what is all of that going to cost me? And do I
think the cost is less than all the value that I'm going to get? Microsoft 365 offers two different
plans. One of them is a personal plan. So, if you're just an individual and you want to get
it for yourself, it's $70 per year. If you're part of a family, or if you have multiple people coming
in with you, it'll cost you a hundred dollars per year. This is a plan that I'm personally on and
I have a full family. So, we have six people using this plan. And when you have six people,
it's an incredible deal. It's a hundred dollars per year, but if you divide that by six, it
works out to $17 per year or $1.40 per month. And to get one terabyte of cloud storage space
per account for only $1.40 a month, and also get access to all of these different Office apps
with stock images and all the other functionality, it's pretty much a steal. Now, despite all of
this, you're still going to have some people who just don't like getting a subscription.
So, it's like my dad, you just want to pay one time. And luckily Microsoft does still offer some
options. Here, for example, if you want Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and you just want to pay
once, it costs $250. If you just want Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, and you don't care about Outlook,
there's also another option called Office Home and Student. And for $150, you just pay one
time and then you have access to all of these apps in perpetuity. At least for this version.
The next time the subsequent version comes out, you'll have to either dish out money again, or you
could just keep using the 2019 version. All right. Well, that in a nutshell is what Microsoft 365 is.
And if you're wondering, well, am I personally a subscriber? Yeah, of course I am. Why would I pull
together a video on this? At least for me, I see enough value that exceeds what I end up paying.
So, for me, it makes sense. Now I would love to hear from you. Do you think it makes sense to get
a subscription to Microsoft 365? If not, why not? I know there are a lot of other options out there,
but I'd love to hear your thinking down below in the comments. Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed
this video. If you did, please give it a thumbs up. To see more videos like this, make sure to hit
that subscribe button. Also, if you want to see me cover any other topics in the future, leave
a note down below. All right, well, that's all I had for you today. I hope you enjoyed. And
as always, I hope to see you next time. Bye.
