Find Dynamics 365 Data in Outlook using mentions

Today I stumbled across a feature that is pretty new! This feature was just released on March 6th and I have to say I am loving it! Apparently, it has been in preview, so I am not sure how I missed it, but I guess with so many new features being pushed out on a regular basis, it is to be expected that some features slip through the cracks! First, let me explain what this feature allows users to do. If you’re working with Dynamics 365 CX you might send emails to your coworkers related to a Dynamics 365 record all the time. Maybe you’re asking about an opportunity you’re working on together, or about a company or contact, or even a case. Until now you always would’ve had to get out of Outlook, and then log into Dynamics 365, which by itself is time-consuming, and a pain to do! Then you had to find the record in Dynamics 365 and copy the link of the Dynamics 365 record, go back to Outlook, and paste the link into the email so that the other person would know which record you were talking about. That works fine, but it requires you to open Dynamics 365, find the record, open the record, and copy and paste the URL into Outlook! All and all a lot of clicks! The feature I’m writing about in this article makes this process a lot easier, as it allows us to ‘mention’ a Dynamics 365 record directly from within the Outlook web client! When this happens, the link to the Dynamics 365 record gets embedded into the email and the recipient can click the link directly from within the email message. Keep in mind the sender and recipient needs to have access to the Dynamics 365 row to embed and access it.

Enable the Feature

Like most features in Dynamics 365 CX, this is also a feature that has to be enabled by a system admin. This can be done by navigating to the Power Platform Admin Center and navigating to environments. You then need to select the environment for which you want to enable this feature, by clicking on the settings button on the command bar. From there you’ll need to expand the ‘Product’ section on the top of the page and open the ‘Features’ setting. 

Like most features in Dynamics 365 CX, this is also a feature that has to be enabled by a system admin. This can be done by navigating to the Power Platform Admin Center and navigating to environments. You then need to select the environment for which you want to enable this feature, by clicking on the settings button on the command bar. From there you’ll need to expand the ‘Product’ section on the top of the page and open the ‘Features’ setting. 

On the right side of the page, you’ll see the ‘Search for records in Microsoft 365 apps’ setting, which you will need to switch to ‘on’. It’s interesting how below the setting it reads “When on, people can search for and add links to Dataverse records in Microsoft 365 applications like Outlook and Word. Data may reside outside your compliance, service, and geographic boundaries.” However, when I tried to add a link to a Dataverse record in Word, it didn’t work for me, so I am not sure why that is mentioned. Don’t forget to save the changes you made!

Using the Feature

After you have enabled the feature in your Dynamics 365 environment, you’ll need to wait a few minutes before you can test it. When you’re ready to try out the new feature, open Outlook on the web and create a new email message. The mentioning of a Dynamics 365 row is very easy, all you have to do is type ‘/’ followed by the name of the record you want to add, to the email message. If you’re using Copilot for Sales, there is additional functionality that your users can take advantage of, like the card view of the tagged Dynamics 365 record in the body of the email. Users will also see the card if they copy and paste a URL from Dynamics 365 in Outlook on the web. 

I did notice when I tried to search for records when using the mention (/) function in Outlook on the web, unfortunately not all records are available, but there seems to be a bit of logic to it. It looks like you’ll be able to mention any records that you have recently accessed. I also noticed that it doesn’t seem to matter which table you’re trying to get a record from, which means there are no restrictions there, as long as you have access to the table of course. But since it can’t cache the entire database, it makes sense to me that recently accessed records are available when trying to mention a record. However, I did find that it does take a little bit of time for the recently accessed Dynamics 365 record to show up when you are trying to ‘mention’ it in Outlook on the web. Unfortunately, this functionality is only available for Outlook on the web, and not in the Outlook client that you download and install on your laptop or PC. 

Conclusion

In my opinion, this feature makes the process of sharing information about Dynamics 365 records via email a lot more efficient and seamless! This is particularly useful for sales teams who need to collaborate on opportunities, or for customer service teams who need to discuss a particular case. With this feature, users can easily mention the relevant Dynamics 365 record in the email, and the recipient can access it with just a click. Overall, this feature is a great addition, and I’m sure it will be appreciated by many users. I hope you enjoyed this article! Be sure to check in again next week for a new article or subscribe here to never miss another post!