This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

The seasons are changing and we have a lot of news to share! This blog will cover what we’ve recently shipped and what’s coming in the next few weeks. You can also find recent updates for Yammer from Microsoft Ignite in this session on-demand.



New Yammer as default experience


The new Yammer is generally available, and starting next week, all users on web will default to the new Yammer experience. Check out our new Yammer resources for tips and a guide what’s changed. But don’t worry, users will still be able to use the slider to toggle back to the Yammer classic experience.


 


https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/EgKC34sZbRM


 


New design for Yammer Discovery and Digest emails


We’re updating the design and making content enhancements to the Discovery and Digest emails in Yammer to align with the new Yammer styling and UX. Coming soon. 


Updated Yammer Email.png


Essential Announcements


This feature allows Yammer community admins to achieve a guaranteed distribution of important community announcements via email for all members of that community, even if its outside of their preferred notification settings. 


 


essential announcments in Yammer.png


 


SharePoint News in the Yammer Home Feed


Spark conversations and share company news directly from SharePoint to the Yammer home feed. This is now available on iOS and Android mobile experiences and coming soon to the web.


 


SharePoint news in Yammer.png


 


New Yammer Desktop Experience (PWA)


You can now install the web version of Yammer as a progressive web app (PWA) in Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome, or Mozilla Firefox. After you install the web version of Yammer as a progressive web app, it will work like any stand-alone desktop experience. You can pin and launch the app from your computer’s home screen or task bar, and you can opt in to receive notifications for relevant announcements and messages from Yammer.


 


New Yammer Desktop Experience.png


 


Suggested Communities


This new section on the right rail of the Yammer homepage will suggest relevant communities for people discover and join. This is rolling out now.


 


Suggested Yammer Communities.png


 


New Yammer Insights now available


Improve your live events viewership. Monitor attendance, measure engagement, and recognize trends.


 


Conversation insights – See which conversations perform best. New insights into impressions, total views, click-through rate, and a breakdown of reactions.


 


Yammer Conversation Insights.png


 


Live event insights – Improve your live events viewership. Monitor attendance, which segments had the greatest viewership, and see where those views are coming from, all geared to help you optimize your current and future events. Learn more on our announcement blog.


 


Yammer live events insights.png


 


New Embed widget options


Allowing you to easily create and customize embeddable Yammer feeds to place on your own sites.


Yammer Embed Widget1.png


This is coming soon to preview. We are now collecting sign-ups for interest, sign up here.


 


Azure B2B Guest Access GA


External collaboration is a key ingredient for the success of any organization. Yammer guests allow you to call in experts, such as consultants or vendors, from outside your organization. Users can invite guests to a community and quickly start a rich conversation by sharing access to community resources like files while ensuring that privacy, access, governance and compliance policies remain intact. Now, Guest Access with Azure B2B is generally available.


 


-	Communities with external members are denoted by a globe icon.– Communities with external members are denoted by a globe icon.


Cross-geo external collaboration for External Networks for the EU


With this release, guests from Yammer networks associated located in the European Union can be invited to Yammer External Networks hosted by a Yammer network located in the United States.



Retention policies in Yammer


This update enables organizations to apply retention policies on Yammer messages.


 


apply retention policies on Yammer messages.jpg


 


Additional updates


Here are a few other changes planned that you’ll be seeing in your Yammer network soon:



  • New file views: Browse community files stored in SharePoint with SharePoint library structure and capabilities. You’ll also get the ability to browse files in your document library while in native mode.

  • Collapse pinned posts: Pinned conversations now collapse automatically after a user has viewed them.

  • Updated community settings: There are new community settings on web for communities and All Company community.


See what else Yammer has planned on our public roadmap and keep an eye on this blog for more news, updates, and best practices relating to Yammer and communities in Microsoft 365.



– Mike Holste
Michael Holste is a senior product marketing manager for Yammer + Employee Engagement

Brought to you by Dr. Ware, Microsoft Office 365 Silver Partner, Charleston SC.