Microsoft’s new plan is to get you to subscribe to Copilot Pro

Have you been tempted to purchase Copilot Pro in the last few weeks? If not, Microsoft wants to know why. The company is going full bore with advertising its premium AI service, and it’s still packing on features and bonuses for people to enjoy. As such, no matter what you feel about Copilot, Microsoft’s newest plan is to get you to subscribe to Copilot Pro.

Copilot is Microsoft’s biggest potential moneymaker

Finally striking gold after so many years

How does Microsoft make its money? Maybe a decade or so ago, you could have understandably argued that it makes its profits through operating system sales; after all, Windows is the most popular OS on the market right now. But with so many people sticking with Windows 10, and Microsoft desperately trying to encourage them to upgrade for free to Windows 11, selling operating systems isn’t the big money-maker it once was.

We’ve seen Microsoft try a few money-making plans in the past. The company has tried to add advertisements into the operating system, which it removed after user backlash. It moved Office to a cloud-based subscription service, swearing off standalone products before returning to them once more with Office 2024. The company added apps like Clipchamp to Windows by default, then charged money for premium features.

How successful were these ventures? We don’t have access to the sales numbers, so it’s impossible to say. However, the idea of people willingly paying $20 a month for Copilot Pro, or $30 to combine it with a Microsoft 365 subscription and unlock Copilot features in Office apps, must have really piqued Microsoft’s attention. The company is now going full steam ahead with fleshing out both Copilot and its premium features, including causing a small outcry after it added a QR code to download Copilot to the Windows 11 lock screen. And with AI PCs arriving in people’s homes across the world, there’s never been a better time to invest in artificial intelligence.

Microsoft wants Copilot Pro subscribers to be more productive than non-subscribers

Pay up, or pay the price

So, Microsoft is sitting on its next golden goose, and it knows it. The problem is that it needs people to actually subscribe to Copilot Pro before it can reap the benefits. So, how does it plan to encourage you to subscribe to it? Easy; it makes using Copilot Pro such a potent productivity booster that you’d be actively hamstringing yourself by not subscribing.

As reported by The Register, Microsoft knows that $30 a month for the combined price of Copilot and Microsoft 365 is a little steep. Jared Spataro, corporate vice president of Modern Work & Business Applications at Microsoft, admits that it’s “a substantial price tag for sure,” and that he wants to work on “showing [customers] and then helping them realize that value.” And to do that, he wants to demonstrate just how much Copilot can help people get stuff done:

“People are definitely trying understand, who should I get this for? Is this for everyone in my organization? Is this for a certain segment or population? And it’s just based on hard facts. Are we saving enough in terms of time? Are we generating enough value? Previous Microsoft-commissioned research found Copilot testers worked 29 percent faster, and 77 percent that used it for two weeks found it indispensable.

“So let’s say, everybody saves ten hours a month. Does that mean I should allocate more budget to this [Copilot]? Or how do I think about an IT budget that is fairly fixed or not growing by leaps and bounds? So building that business case is right where we are.”

This explains why we’ve seen Microsoft focus a ton on productivity-boosting features for Copilot Pro, such as letting OneDrive dive through your files to answer your queries about their contents. The company wants to make it so that people who subscribe to Pro will have a quicker, easier time in the workplace than those without, which encourages people to give the subscription service a try for themselves.

Related

Copilot Pro vs ChatGPT Plus: Which subscription is best for you?

If you’re looking to spend $20 on a subscription tier to a generative AI platform, then which is better? Copilot Pro and ChatGPT Plus are very similar

Microsoft won’t stop convincing you to subscribe to Copilot Pro

Microsoft has added a ton of new features and tools to Copilot Pro, and the service only came out a few months ago. Given its potential as a steady source of revenue for the Redmond giant, it’s firing on all cylinders to ensure your subscription money doesn’t go to its rivals, such as ChatGPT Plus and Gemini Advanced. If Microsoft manages to prove to individuals and companies alike that Copilot Pro is a productivity powerhouse, it’ll be a lot easier for them to justify subscribing to the $ 30-a-month service. As such, it’ll be interesting to see how public opinion shifts as Microsoft continues to add more features to its premium AI plan.