Sooner or later, your organization will reach the limit of your Dynamics 365 database. Maybe your marketing department has outdated data sets it doesn’t need anymore. Perhaps you have income reports you could move to a different data storage option that charges lower prices. There are numerous ways to reach your limit and it will inevitably cause disruption to your business.
The good news is that Dynamics 365 sends you an alert when you reach 80% capacity. The bad news is that adding storage space means spending more money. You don’t need to spend more than what’s strictly necessary, though. Experienced professionals can almost always find ways to cut storage costs. Some of them include things like review and maintenance of your storage capacity, staying on top of your licensing, performing an audit of your security roles, and doing a quarterly clean up. Let’s dive into these areas and discuss how much time you should dedicated to them.
Review and Maintain Your Storage Capacity
Do you know how much storage space your organization currently uses? If you haven’t gotten close to the amount you pay for, you could save money by changing your plan. Once you get close to the plan’s limit, you can move up to the amount of storage space you need.
Reviewing and maintaining your storage capacity should also include removing unnecessary files. In particular, look for:
- Unnecessary email attachments you don’t need anymore
- Old audit logs
- Suspended workflows you don’t plan to use in the future
- Duplicate files
You might also consider moving some of your data from Dynamic 365 to a document management system that charges lower fees. SharePoint stands out as a good option. You could also save money by using Azure Blob Storage.
Azure Blob Storage is a strong contender because you don’t have to pay extra for effective security features like:
- DDoS protection
- SQL encryption
- Application firewalls
- Database auditing
- Firewalls
- Data backups
How long does it take?
Reviewing and maintaining storage capacity takes only about an hour.
Learn how to create blob storage in Azure on your own or allow us to take that project off of your hands.
Review Licensing for Unused Modules
Does your organization use every feature included in the license you pay for? Maybe you never use Supply Chain Management, Microsoft Relationship Sales, and other products in your license. Removing those products will immediately cut your Dynamics 365 costs.
You’ll need to review your license to find any modules you don’t use. Take time to double-check your findings. You don’t want to lose features that team members rely on to do their jobs.
Combing through your licenses could also reveal missed opportunities. Ideally, you’ll find features you can add to your subscription by cutting unused modules.
How long does it take?
Licensing review typically takes about five hours.
Security Role Auditing
Each person with access to Dynamics 365 products adds to your overall cost. Security role auditing could help identify accounts that don’t need to use some of your organization’s tools and features. It could also help prevent employees and managers from saving unnecessary or excessively large files to your database.
Additionally, you get security benefits from auditing account statuses. Following the principle of least privileged adds to your organization’s security by making it more difficult for hackers to escalate accounts and access sensitive information. Whether or not security role auditing cuts your D365 storage costs, it’s worth the investment.
How long does it take?
Comprehensive security role auditing should take about eight hours.
Conduct a Quarterly Data Cleanup
Your company almost certainly has files and data sets you don’t need anymore. Perhaps you collected a massive amount of data about your customers a few years ago. If you still have that information on your Dynamics 365 database, you’re probably spending more money than necessary for storage.
More than likely, you can delete that old data because it doesn’t apply to your current projects. If you want to retain insights from the information you harvested in the past, use business intelligence software to focus on the most valuable insights. You might not remove every piece of data related to the project, but you can delete irrelevant files to create more room for future data collection.
Depending on your industry, regulations might force you to retain some files longer than you want. Trained professionals can keep regulatory requirements in mind while scrubbing your database of unneeded files and data sets. Conducting a data cleanup helps ensure you always maintain access to the information you need without wasting money storing data you no longer require.
Migrating data to a source outside of Dynamics 365 could also help. Dynamics Consulting Group can review your data and migrate files, products, and documents to SharePoint or Azure Cloud. Experts with years of data migration experience can compare your options to determine which one will save your business the most money without compromising security or speed.
How long does it take?
The time required can vary by organization, but you can expect your quarterly data cleanup to take about three hours.
Talk to Dynamic Consultants Group for Help
Dynamic Consultants Group has worked on more than 700 Microsoft Dynamics 365 projects, so our team of experts can help with everything from reviewing your storage capacity to auditing security roles. You don’t have to tackle these tasks on your own. Instead, you can get professional services at fair prices.
You should also know that cutting storage costs is just one of the benefits you get from partnering with our experts. We can help you take advantage of data migrations, business intelligence, Dynamics 365 integrations, and innovative implementations that push your business to higher levels of success.
Reach out to our team today so we can help you utilize SharePoint or Azure Blob Storage to augment your storage in Dynamics 365.
