The document provides an overview of Microsoft's new Communication Sites feature in SharePoint. It begins with background on the evolution of intranets and publishing sites in SharePoint. It then defines communication sites as SharePoint sites designed to broadcast information across teams or organizations using configurable templates. The document discusses the key components of communication sites including predefined designs, web parts for heroes, news, events and documents. It also covers limitations around navigation, branding and lack of approval flows. The document concludes by suggesting communication sites are best for publishing to audiences with limited editing rights and provides some example use cases.

1. DEEP DIVE INTO COMMUNICATION SITES
Louis-Philippe Vallée
December 12th 2017
Product manager at Sharegate

2. @valleelp
@Valleelp
https://en.share-gate.com/blog
SHAREGATE | PRODUCT MANAGER | SPEAKER
LOUIS-PHILIPPE VALLEE

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WE ARE HERE
BECAUSE
IT HAPPENED

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MICROSOFT
DID IT
AGAIN

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THEY RELEASED
A GAME
CHANGING
FEATURE

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COMMUNICATION SITES

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WHAT’S THAT?

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DON’T WORRY

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WE’RE
GOING TO
FIGURE IT
OUT
TOGHETER

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What it is

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How it works

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Is it an intranet
out of the box?

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Limitations

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When should i
use it?

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Before we begin let’s go
BACK IN TIME

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So you understand
our history

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First, there was the publishing portal

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And they made it better …

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And better …

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And search oriented

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SHAREPOINT BECAME THE
MOST COMMON
LARGE ENTERPRISE
INTRANET SOLUTION

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What about
today?

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SHAREPOINT ONLINE PUBLISHING SITE

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NOTHING HAS
CHANGED

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ANYTHING
BETTER TO
OFFER?

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Communication site
perfect for internal cross-company campaigns, weekly and monthly
reports or status updates, product launches, events and more.

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WHAT IS IT?

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It’s actually a
SHAREPOINT SITE

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That looks great on any device

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That is easy to create

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HELPS BROADCAST
INFORMATION TO OTHER
TEAMS OR TO AN ENTIRE
ORGANIZATION
to help you jumpstart getting your message out fast,
communication sites provide configurable templates
for the sites and pages within.

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Like a microsite?

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Yeah, why not?

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What you get

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Pre built designs

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Topic design
Hero web part
News web part
Events web part
Documents web part
Quick links
People web part

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Showcase design
Hero web part
Image gallery web part

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Blank design
No web part

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ARE YOU READY TO DIVE IN?

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Live walkthrough

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IS IT AN
INTRANET?

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YOU TELL ME
DOES IT OFFER
EVERYTHING YOU NEED?

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LET’S PUT THE
QUESTION
ASIDE FOR A
MOMENT

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GIVE ME MORE DETAILS
ON THE NEW STUFF IN A
COMMUNICATION SITE

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How it works

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Hero webpart
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Use-the-Hero-web-part-d57f449b-19a0-4b0d-8ce3-be5866430645?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US
• Not every tile needs an image
• Each tile is a link, not an item
• History is not preserved
• It’s possible to re-order the tiles

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Event web part
• Events are stored in a sharepoint calendar
• Links to a full event page
• Includes bing location integration
• Events don’t show in search results

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People profile web part
• List of people cards from delve
• No editable properties

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COMING soon TO PEOPLE CARD :
LINKED IN
INTEGRATION

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Comments on page
• Appear only after you've
published a first version
• Not linked to yammer or teams
• Stored in the site page item
(in a column)
• You can delete your comments
but not edit them

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THAT’S ALL?

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THE BEST PART
IS COMING

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MODERN
EDITING

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Flexible page layouts
Users now have the flexibility they need to present information
more efficiently, and the way THEY want to present it.

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COPY PASTE THAT ACTUALLY WORKS

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Set focal point

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IT’S LIKE
IMAGE
RENDITIONS
BUT BETTER!

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Coming up for contributors

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Other Things you
should know

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NAVIGATION CAN HAVE ONLY 2 LEVELS
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Customize-the-navigation-on-your-SharePoint-site-3cd61ae7-a9ed-4e1e-bf6d-4655f0bf25ca?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US

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GLOBAL
NAVIGATION
KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR HUB
SITES!

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WHO CAN
ACCESS
YOUR
COMM SITE?

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Anyone it is shared with
even external users

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Behind the scenes
A communication site is a standalone SharePoint site
It goes under the / sites managed path
It’s not associated with an Office 365 group
The site template is « Sitepagepublishing#0 »
But cannot be created through powershell yet

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THE LIMITATIONS
Pnp provisionning not supported yet (But will be)
Not available on prem
No global navigation
Custom page layouts/content types not supported
No multilingual features
No approuval flow
It’s not possible to make it your root site collection yet
Can’t activate publishing features (and vice versa?)

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WILL I BE ABLE TO
BRAND MY
COMMUNICATION
SITE?

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- OOTB site theming and branding
- Custom site themes and site
designs
ANNOUNCED AT
IGNITE 2017

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SO IS IT AN
INTRANET ?

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Branding (images?)

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SITES WITHIN A HUB SHARE
Navigation Search scope

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Coming up for
owners and
end users
AND MORE

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WHEN SHOULD WE USE A
COMMUNICATION SITE?

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Most often, a Communication Site
has a small number people who
have permission to author content
and many more people who only
have permission to read content.

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Possible scenarios
• Governance and Training for your intranet
• Travel team publishing guidelines about corporate travel
• Policies and procedures
• Micro-site for a new corporate initiative
• Resources for the sales team for a product or service
• Organizational achievements—summary or report of key
business metrics to highlight for the rest of the
organization
https://www.computerworld.com/article/3212834/enterprise-applications/what-to-choose-a-communication-or-team-site-in-sharepoint.html

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HOW DO YOU FEEL?

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THAT WAS
EASY!

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LET’S END WITH A
REAL LIFE EXEMPLE

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Other referencesMicrosoft presenting Communication sites:
https://www.slideshare.net/markkashman/sharepoint-communications-sites-overview-presentation
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/Communications-Sites-AMA/bd-p/CommunicationsSitesAMA
Microsoft vision on intranets:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/building-blocks-your-intranet-mark-kashman/
Customizing modern pages:
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/pnp_articles/modern-experience-customizations-customize-pages
Blog post on communication sites
https://en.share-gate.com/blog/sharepoint-online-communication-sites-explained
Roadmap presented at Ignite 2017:
https://en.share-gate.com/blog/microsoft-ignite-2017-takeaways-an-updated-sharepoint-roadmap

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Thank you!
Follow me for
more @valleelp