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As Sir Henry Royce, founder of Rolls-Royce, once said, “Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten.” Yes, a low price is great, and free is even better. But by itself, neither is an advantage. The quality must be there to back it up.
One of the benefits of Microsoft Office 365 is that it’s both competitively priced and high quality. And in the end, the quality of Office 365 produces its own time and cost savings.
Many customers who first tried Google Apps eventually switched to Office 365 because they felt Office 365 offered higher-quality tools. Take D&L Representative Payee Services, California-based nonprofit that provides financial management services for those who need help managing their Social Security and Supplemental Security Income benefits. The organization initially used Google Apps for multiple online services, including Google Docs for accessing and sharing documents. But employees became frustrated by the default settings in Google Docs that automatically changed document formats upon saving. What’s more, Google Docs required users to save documents and then copy those documents to Google Docs for sharing, an extra step that was time-consuming and easily forgotten in the midst of a busy day.
“We’re accustomed to using Microsoft Office products and wanted to continue to use them, so the compatibility issues with Google Docs caused concern,” says Paul Lovette, Vice President and Executive Manager for the nonprofit. “We were always worried, for example, that our forms’ layouts would be skewed by whatever formats Google chose.”
Love My Lessons, a Florida-based computer training and website design firm, also switched to Office 365 after first trying Google Docs. “I tried Google first, because it was free, but found that it wasn’t easy to use,” says Owner Karen Kotzen. “I didn’t like the fact that you had to create a Gmail account first, which I didn’t want, and it took time to set up. Office 365 gives me everything Google Docs did plus a lot more—and it’s much easier to use.”
At $6 per month, Kotzen says Office 365 is well worth the investment: “For only U.S. $6 a month, you get email, website design software and hosting, a place to share and manage documents, a videoconferencing program, instant messaging software, screen-sharing software, and Microsoft Office Web Apps … I would pay $6 a month just for the screen-sharing software alone (Microsoft Lync Online).”
Microsoft’s white paper, “Look Before You Leap into Google Apps,” examines the hidden costs of Google Apps on an organization. The paper, based on many customer experiences, highlights the many problems that customers have discovered with Google Apps.
In short, quality matters. It’s a mistake to look at price alone. In moving to the cloud, quality and price should always be examined in unison.
To learn more, check out the Look Before You Leap Into Google Apps white paper. Also, please share your experience. Did your company switch from Google Apps to Office 365? If so, why?
To be fair, this is aimed at businesses with fewer than 50 employees and limited IT support...
"Look before you leap" assumes Exchange users are using or want to use every feature of Exchange. For example, I have never found a small business using Information Rights Management. Only a few have ever used Public Folders and in general abandon them in favor of file shares. Although it might cost extra to implement such features in Google Apps, it is moot for companies not using these features.
What is very helpful is that Microsoft has pointed out what features you need to consider before migrating to Google Apps. One thing you point out is that Google Apps changes regularly which could be aggravating to companies that don't want their software automatically updated. Google's rapid improvement make analyzing the differences between Apps and Exchange challenging. For example, delegated authority has been improved in Google Apps but your analysis states that it is not available. With Microsoft and Google working hard to compete, any analysis of features and costs will quickly become inaccurate.
There are also cases where the "down side" of Google Apps is a benefit to some companies. Active Directory is a great example. I know of several companies that were able to eliminate Active Directory (or domain controllers) from their network. A few years ago this would have been unthinkable but with the proliferation of mobile devices, non-Microsoft PCs, and remote workers, Active Directory isn't as necessary or helpful as it once was. (Large companies can't go without it but smaller companies can in certain circumstances.) For this reason, companies that use Google Apps benefit from the "lack of integration with Active Directory."
Lastly, the financial analysis assumes a worse case scenario. If a company is using every feature of Exchange, they will probably not be considering Google Apps. I have never had a client that needed an add-on product for Google Apps. I have never had to pay for a tool to migrate companies to Google Apps or Exchange. These costs are rare in my experience.
In short, if your company needs every feature of Exchange, then Exchange is the best product for you. If Exchange is overkill for your small business, Google Apps is an alternative but you will have to go without some of the features you may have grown used to. Regardless of the tool you choose, using a cloud service like Office 365 or Google Apps can reduce your IT overhead significantly.
What is the cost of Microsoft Office, & what does it do? I am a single retired computer user. No business activities...