Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Ensure Simpplr app is enabled in Microsoft Admin settings
- Connect MS Teams account to Simpplr
- Connect integration at the user level
- Link MS Teams to a site
- Promoting content to Teams
- Send alerts to Teams
Introduction
Simpplr has an out-of-the-box integration with Microsoft Teams that exists at the site level, meaning content and feed posts from Simpplr sites can be posted directly to Teams channels. Posts in site feeds show up in the linked Teams channel. While team members don't typically live on their intranet, some do spend a lot of time in Teams and leave it open throughout the work day. So posting in Teams is another way to reach your audience where they are and bring them back into the intranet to read long-form content.
Ensure the Simpplr app is enabled in your Microsoft Admin settings
Your Microsoft Global admin user will need to ensure the Simpplr app is allowed to be installed in the Global org settings. Depending on your org's settings, you'll see a pager similar to the one below.
- Head to your admin page, then Teams apps > Manage apps.
- Search "Simpplr" from the list of apps, select it, then click Allow.
- Now head to Permissions policies. Choose your Org wide settings. If you have Allow all apps selected for Third-party apps, no further action is needed.
- If you don't have this option selected, Choose to allow access to specific apps. You'll be asked to choose at least one app. Search "Simpplr" and click Add. Then click Allow.
Connect your org's MS Teams account to Simpplr
To get started, an App manager must first enable the integration at the application level. Note, the first user to connect must be your org's Microsoft admin user. So if your Microsoft admin user does not currently have App manager settings in your intranet, they will need to be made an App manager.
- Go to Manage > Application > Integrations > Messaging.
- Click Connect account under Microsoft Teams.
- Accept the permissions Microsoft is asking to finish connecting the account.
- If you want Simpplr alerts in MS Teams, toggle on the option to Allow alerts to be displayed in.
All Simpplr content will unfurl for all users in the channel without any secondary connection to Simpplr. However, Private and Unlisted site content will show a message stating that a preview is unavailable.
Simpplr content unfurled in Teams
Connect integration at the user level
Note:
The first person to connect at the user level must be the Microsoft Admin user for your org.To connect at the profile level:
- Go to your user menu, then Profile & settings. Click Edit profile & settings.
- Click the External apps tab and choose Connect account in the Microsoft Teams label. Follow the requested prompts from Simpplr to connect.
- The Admin user will need to accept the permissions Microsoft is requesting from Simpplr, as shown below. For more information on Microsoft integration security, check out this article.
- The End user will need to accept the permissions Microsoft is requesting, as shown below.
Link MS Teams to a site
For an intranet site to post MS Teams content, that site must first be linked to a Team in MS Teams. To do this:
- Go to Manage site > External apps.
- Enable Microsoft Teams, select which site activity you want posted in Teams. Note that regardless of channel membership, all users' feed posts on the site will be automatically shared to a Teams channel. So if John Doe is not a member of the Engineering Teams channel, but is a member of the Engineering intranet site, and makes a feed post there, that post will be shared to the Engineering Teams channel.
- In the Team dropdown, select a Team to link to the site.
In the Channel dropdown, select a channel to link to the site.
Promoting content to Teams
Once enabled at the App management level, all Content managers will begin to see the option to post to Teams when publishing content. If the Content manager has also connected their account, they will be able to select the Team and the channel to post the content to. If they haven't connected their Teams account, this option will be disabled and they'll be prompted to connect their account.
In addition to newly published content being promoted, all existing content will be able to be promoted by content managers at any time.
Sharing content to Teams
All users that have connected their Teams account will be able to click the share icon and select to share the content to a specified Team and channel.
Note:
Feed posts from a site will automatically display on the Teams channel once connected to that site. See the image below for an example of feed posts being shared to the site.Teams channel display
Once posted to a Teams channel, the post will be made on behalf of the user. It will show the user's icon and Teams name just as if they had pasted the link themselves.
Click to chat
When a user has connected their account, their MS Teams user name will appear on their profile and all search results. This is a clickable link that will open MS Teams and enter a chat with the given user.
Send alerts to MS Teams
Alerts can be configured to be sent to select MS Teams channels. To do so:
- Go to user menu > Alerts. Click Add alert.
- Configure the alert.
- Under External distribution, select Microsoft Teams.
- Choose whether to directly notify recipients directly (only recipients who are members of the distribution method you chose, like Audience, will be notified on Teams), or post the alert in the Teams channel. If both are selected, MS Teams users will receive two alerts.
Select the Team and channel for the alert. Click Display alert.
Comments
the images are not displaying, could you kindly fix, thank you
Hi, Matthew! The six screenshots in the last four sections (beginning with "Promoting content to Teams") are showing up as broken images.
Hello Nashe and Betsy. Apologies for that! The images should be fixed now. Please refresh and make sure you can see them.
I can see them now. Thanks, Matthew!
I'm a System Admin on Simpplr: I have followed all the directions and added the webhook to each site. When I login as a different user it automatically connects to my MS teams account! What am I doing wrong?
Hi Brittany. I'd love to help here, but I think a video or screen capture explaining your issue may be more useful for us. If you haven't already, could you please submit a Support ticket informing the team of the problem? That would give us a better idea of where to start with troubleshooting.
Hi Matthew,
Just wanted to confirm...
Is this what the "shared" intranet page looks like in the Microsoft Teams channel?
Hey Aileen. Yes, that is what the shared page looks like. For now it's only a link to the intranet page. There is a product enhancement request to get a rich preview of the page.
Matthew Rawls is there any update on the product enhancements? I have had my Simpplr sandbox environment updated to the latest version as of today, and still showing as plain text in the Teams Channels.
Hey Bronson. Are you asking specifically about MS Teams enhancements in relation to Simpplr? There wasn't anything new in the latest release. I see you had a case open back in October. It seems like there was unexpected functionality happening in your sandbox. Without access to your org's environment, I'm unable to go in and test it. Could you reopen that case with Dave, so we can dig further if the problem still isn't solved?
We are looking at integrating MS Teams with a mandatory site that would be public to all users. My question is if we do that, would users who didn't want to recieve notifications in Teams be able to diable the updates or would they be mandatory because the site is mandatory?
Hi Megan, good question. So if you push content from the site to MS Teams, the users would need to be members of the Teams channel you're pushing the content to. Otherwise, even if they're members of the site in Simpplr, they won't see the MS Teams notification. If you're pushing content to a Teams channel that is also public and mandatory for all users, then all users would be notified in Teams, unless they stopped being members of that Teams channel. Their Simpplr configuration wouldn't have anything to do with that. You may even have users who never connected their Teams accounts to Simpplr, but they'll still see that there's something new from the intranet on the Teams channel.
Does this help?
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