Migrating to the Cloud from an Obsolete Version of the CRM

One of the main benefits of a cloud-based CRM solution such as Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement is that it’s updated automatically. However, in the case of on-premises systems, it’s not rare that organizations choose to push back their migration, sometimes for several years.

Although you may save time and money in the short term, you will have to settle the debt later on as it’s rarely possible to skip more than one version. For these reasons, JOVACO strongly recommends migrating every two versions.

But what happens when an organization wants to migrate to the cloud from an older version? While it’s entirely possible to do so and benefit from the advantages of a cloud-based CRM, migrating from an older system will create particular situations. Here are a few of the challenges that JOVACO had to address during such migration projects:

• The client used a version of the CRM that did not support third-party solutions and products. This means that we were not able to install Cobalt’s Migration Dynamics tool without migrating the system to a more recent version first. When that was done, we were able to install the solution and complete the migration of the CRM data to the cloud, facilitating the rest of the migration process.
• Forms were very different in older versions of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. If we wish to take advantage of the new forms after migrating the system, an analysis must be performed to verify the elements included natively in the basic forms. Otherwise, the old forms will simply override the new ones during the migration. To avoid this, the necessary configurations must be done to ensure that your organization can benefit from the new forms and features.
• A lot of code and configurations used to be necessary to offer features that are now available by default. This means we have to analyze the code that was added to your CRM to remove redundant elements before migrating to the new version. For example, the multibrowser update made obsolete a lot of code that had been necessary until then. Tools are however available to verify the code elements that need to be removed, updated or corrected.

Migrating to the cloud from an old version of the CRM involves additional steps. As computer languages evolve quickly, more time is needed to complete all necessary verifications and validations. However, once your CRM is migrated to the cloud, you will benefit from automated updates, greatly reducing the effort required to keep your system up to date as well as related fees.

Questions? JOVACO is here to analyze your current system and help you plan the migration of your CRM to the cloud as well as the long-term digital transformation of your organization.