Microsoft to discontinue Social Engagement, focus efforts on Dynamics 365 Market Insights

Microsoft has discontinued sales of Social Engagement (MSE), its social listening toolset, and is urging existing customers and new prospects to look to the new Dynamics 365 AI for Market Insights application.

Current MSE customers can access their service and add any additional social post capacity until either the expiration of their subscription or January 16, 2020, whichever is earlier, wrote Microsoft's Raja Banerjee last week.

MSE allows businesses to monitor a range of online sources, from social networks to blogs and new sources, analyze those signals for language and sentiment via Azure services, and present the analysis in formats that are easy for marketers to understand and take action on.

The main difference between MSE and D365 Market Insights is the addition of "social and web insights" rather than merely "social listening", according to a Microsoft comparison of the tools. If that distinction does not clear things up, Microsoft offered a table identifying the differences as follows:

Other comparison tables covering social insights, brand reputation, social care, and social selling will cover nearly identical areas. Microsoft identifies one feature that Market Insights will not offer that MSE did, the Social Selling Assistant.