Microsoft Drives Operational Efficiency Across Its Global Digital Stores

Microsoft’s eCommerce

Microsoft’s eCommerce team is responsible for selling Microsoft, as well as third-party, products and services from the company’s digital store.

As a multinational technology provider, it is critical for Microsoft’s eCommerce team to keep their global website updated with information and content for all product lines. The content publication process is very complex, involving many levels of approvals and collaboration between resources from several teams to keep hundreds of pages updated across more than 240 regions.

For many years, the publishing process was managed via Excel spreadsheets. Content, images, and other publishing information were tracked in different spreadsheets. In some cases, there were 200+ spreadsheets to track updates for a single page on the website. Content approvals were handled manually, often resulting in bottlenecks and delays in the publishing timeline

Microsoft turned to K2 Software and its Professional Services team to deliver an automated solution to handle the Microsoft.com publication process for the global team. With Nintex K2 SmartForms and workflow engine, Microsoft has a streamlined publishing process that allows regional marketing managers to submit content via an online portal. Pre-production approval tasks are automatically routed to the right group based on region and content is automatically queued and scheduled for entry into the content management system (CMS).

Publishing errors have been decreased by as much as 30% in some areas by ensuring that the right content and asset information is captured as part of the initial request. Full auditing and tracking capabilities provide visibility into the process and ensure that strict publishing schedules are met.