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Integration Opportunity:

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About Microsoft Teams:

The “fastest growing application in Microsoft history,” Microsoft Teams is a unified communications platform (chat, video, phone calls, file collaboration) that is native to the Office 365 suite and now used by over 13 million daily active users. Its robust developer platform and high traffic AppSource marketplace make it a best-in-class integration opportunity.

Category: Marketplace App

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Your SaaS wanted a Microsoft Teams App yesterday. Left Hook can build it for you quickly. Chat with us to get started.

Dimensions

About Dimensions

Dimensions Explained

Left Hook's business is building apps and tools for SaaS companies that leverage and distribute their API to drive customer retention, revenue growth, or both.

We build, manage, and support a range of Integration Opportunities for our clients. To help them evaluate which Opportunities make the most sense for their integration strategy, we research and quantify several useful dimensions for each, as seen below.

Bookmark this page, as we're constantly updating our knowledgebase regarding these Opportunities, and adding new Opportunities weekly.

Have questions about any particular dimension? Click on each title bar's question mark to read more, or chat with us anytime.

Market
Opportunity

Customer Base

Customer Base Explained

"Customer Base" is  the total number paying customers or users for Microsoft Teams.

Many of these companies do not widely share their user or revenue numbers; hence the possible listing here of "Unknown."

However, if a number appears in this field, that means Left Hook has verified it through a reputable, trusted source, to include SEC filings, podcast interviews, press releases, or other statements by company leaders.

  • 10M to 50M
Business Size Served

Business Size Served Explained

"Business Size" represents typical revenue of each Opportunity's paying customers or users.

Left Hook attempts to determine the "target audience" for each Integration Opportunity through a reputable, trusted source, to include SEC filings, podcast interviews, press releases, or other statements by company leaders.

However, we also judge target audience by their service's price point and other product characteristics, as well as how they market.

  • Very Small (Under $1M)
  • Small (Under $10M)
  • Mid-Cap ($10M-$50M)
  • Enterprise ($50M-$500M)
  • Giants ($500M+)
Potential Co-Marketing

Co-Marketing Options Explained

"Co-Marketing Options" describes the different marketing channels that each Opportunity offers its partners who publish an app or connector on their platform/marketplace.

A useful example is Zapier, which requires extensive co-marketing from any/all its listed Public Apps. Gaining exposure to Zapier's nearly 3 million users is often a consideration for companies exploring a Public App. New Zapier Public Apps receiving extensive mentions via Zapier's social media and email channels.

  • External Marketplace
  • Inside App UI
Marketer's Notes

Left Hook Notes on Marketing Dimensions

Our thoughts and observations. Questions? Chat with us.

Declared “the fastest growing app in Microsoft’s history,” Teams gained 13 million daily active users in less than two years, and is now significantly larger than Slack. Microsoft’s AppSource store features thousands of integrated ISVs, but the Teams-specific marketplace is still quite small (under 300 apps). With over 160 million Office 365 users, the search volume on AppSource is reportedly +3 million unique users per month, in part because searching and learning about apps is very easily done from within the Team UI (Desktop and Browser). And finally, AppSource facilitates app monetization (for a fee).

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User
Experience

Interface Options

Interface Options Explained

Many of the Opportunities listed on our directory offer multiple ways for a SaaS to offer their functionality to your users.

We classify three different approaches to user experience:

Internal UI: Your users can use some or all of another app's functionality inside your SaaS's app.

Example: Your SaaS offers a small business-focused sales CRM. If they enable this integration, your user can see the status (Paid or Unpaid) of a customer's Quickbooks Online invoice from inside your CRM's UI.

Target App's UI: Your users can access some or all of your app's functionality outside your UI, and inside another app's UI.

Example: Your CRM has an email list for new customers who just paid their first invoice. If they enable this integration, your users can mark an invoice as paid in Quickbooks, and automatically add that customer to the right email list.

Third Party UI: Many of our Integration Opportunities are platforms that require your end user to access a third party tool to build workflows or to map data. Your customer/end user will necessarily have to log into a third system to use it.

Note that some of our Integration Opportunities offer multiple UI options, and this field will reflect this by including any/all UI options available to SaaS partners.

  • Internal UI
  • Target App's UI
Capabilities

Capabilities Explained

Our listed Integration Opportunities offer three different approaches to integration:

Point-to-Point: The integration tool is limited to helping your end user move data or manage workflow directly between your app and another paired app; often a simple user experience.

Point-to-Many: The integration tool can move data or facilitate workflow between your app and many different apps; your end user can build several different integrations from the same UI.

Multi-Step Workflows: Your end user can build a sequence of different events into a chained multi-step workflow, often with conditional logic to determine branch sequences. Your SaaS may be the triggering event that kicks off the chain, or could simply be one step in the middle.

Note that these options are not mutually exclusive; any/all options are listed in this field.

  • Point-to-Point
UX Notes

User Experience Notes Explained

Our thoughts and observations. Questions? Chat with us.

The Microsoft Teams developer platform offers several use cases and user experiences, including:

Search & Polling Bots- sending chat messages to groups and individual users, or allow users to query or converse with your app via chat responses, and take action on responses or alerts

Cards & Tabs- embed third party apps and/or allow external data to be displayed inside Teams and Channels

Connectors- sync data to/from Teams (i.e. adding/removing user data)

Task Modules- enable modal popup experiences that run your custom Javascript/HTML code

Calls & Meetings- interactive voice response (IVR), call control, and access to real-time audio and/or video streams for calls and meetings, including desktop and app sharing

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Developer
Details

Hosting

Hosting Explained

We classify three different hosting environments for any/all code required to power this Integration Opportunity:

Internal: You can host code on your own internal servers; you are responsible for the security of the hosting environment.

Target App: Code is handled by the Integration Opportunity; you must build your app on their platform, and keep your code on their servers.

Custom: You can host your code on a third party server environment like AWS or Heroku. Left Hook often builds and maintains custom code on third-party servers.

Example: Because we build most of our client work in the MERN stack, we often use Heroku or AWS Lamba to host code. Your SaaS may be built on Ruby, PHP, or Microsoft's dotNet; it's unlikely you'll be able to run our custom code on your servers.

These options above are not exclusive, and we've included any/all options that apply to this Integration Opportunity.

  • Custom
Cost to Publish

Cost to Publish Explained

Some Integration Opportunities will charge SaaS companies to appear in their marketplace or connector library. This is not the typical model, but some important exceptions require classification.

If there is any ongoing costs for your SaaS to engage with , we'll detail it here.

Publishing Cost: Microsoft Teams does not charge any fee to publish your App in their App Directory. If you choose to monetize through their AppSource store, a percentage fee may apply.

Code Hosting Cost: Microsoft Team’s platform facilitates some functions, but most of integration’s code will run on an independent third-party server like Azure, AWS, or Heroku. Left Hook may also need to build custom UI elements for user authentication, field mapping, and related implementation steps. These costs will scale depending on number of users and the amount of data moving between apps; for most SaaS companies, this secure infrastructure will cost between $50 and $200 per month. Contact us to explore these costs in greater detail.

 

Backend Difficulty

Backend Difficulty Explained

To help you gauge the relative difficulty of publishing an app/connector on a marketplace or platform, we offer these three relative classifications:

Easy

Medium

Challenging

These are mutually exclusive options determined by our development team. Look for helpful explanation in the Notes field below.

  • Challenging
Frontend Difficulty

Frontend Difficulty Explained

To help you gauge the relative difficulty of developing a User Interface to facilitate this Integration Opportunity, we offer these three relative classifications:

Easy

Medium

Challenging

These are mutually exclusive options determined by our development team. Look for helpful explanation in the Notes field below.

  • Medium
Dev Notes

Left Hook Notes on Marketing Dimensions

Our thoughts and observations. Questions? Chat with us.

The Teams platform offers so may different user experiences and functionality options,  half the battle is choosing what to build first. We’d love to have that conversation!

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20 Madbury Road #3
Durham, NH, 03824

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