Most small businesses move to Microsoft 365 for the same reasons: professional email at their own domain, Teams and SharePoint for a team that's stopped fitting in a shared inbox, and security that doesn't depend on everyone remembering to do the right thing. The migration itself is more predictable than it sounds — here's what's actually involved.
1. Working out the right licensing
Business Basic, Standard, or Premium — the right mix depends on what your team actually uses day to day, not what sounds impressive. A team that mostly needs email, Teams, and cloud storage doesn't need the full desktop app suite; a team handling sensitive data usually needs Premium's extra security features. Getting this step wrong is the single biggest reason businesses end up overpaying for licences nobody uses.
2. Domain and tenant setup
Your custom domain (you@yourbusiness.com.au) gets connected to your new Microsoft 365 tenant, which means adding and verifying DNS records — largely invisible to your team, but easy to get wrong if you're doing it for the first time, since a mistake here can knock out existing mail flow mid-migration.
3. Migrating mail, contacts, and files
Existing mailboxes, calendars, and contacts get copied across from Gmail, an old hosted provider, or an on-premises Exchange server. The cutover is planned so mail keeps flowing throughout — nobody should lose an email or wake up to a dead inbox. If the business also relies on shared drives, that content typically moves into SharePoint or OneDrive at the same time.
4. Switching on a security baseline
Multi-factor authentication and sensible anti-phishing and anti-spam defaults should be part of day one, not an afterthought — most Microsoft 365 compromises trace back to an account with no MFA. Businesses that also want their domain protected against being spoofed by others typically pair this with an SPF, DKIM, and DMARC setup.
5. Training and handover
The team gets shown how their mail, files, and Teams actually work day to day, and whoever manages the tenant afterwards gets documentation covering what was set up and why — so nothing is a mystery six months later.
What actually drives the cost
Rather than a flat number, a handful of factors move the price: how many mailboxes are moving, how much historical mail and file data needs migrating, how messy the existing setup is (multiple old email providers are harder than one), and whether ongoing management after the migration is included or handled separately. Any reasonable provider should be able to walk you through which of these apply to your business before quoting.