Google Apps Takes on Microsoft Office Live. How Does it Compare?
February 22nd, 2007 (10:22am) Judi Sohn 24 CommentsTweet This
This morning, Google launched their long-rumored Google Apps Premier. It’s a hosted package aimed at businesses, featuring already-existing Google applications tied up in an ad-free bow, for a fee. While a lot will be said about Google’s frontal attack on Microsoft’s stranglehold on the Enterprise, this package of hosted applications is more interesting for the small business who lacks the infrastructure, time or know-how to set up an Exchange or SharePoint server for email, calendar and document collaboration.
Last year, Microsoft introduced Microsoft Office Live, a collection of tools for small businesses to get online and organized with minimal hassle. Google Apps is positioned as a solid alternative. However, the two products target the same market in very different ways. It’s not only about whether you prefer Google Docs (formerly Writely) to Microsoft Word for editing your documents. It’s is about linking a distributed workforce together through a common suite of tools, without any additional hardware or support investment. Microsoft has taken baby steps to move the focus off the desktop application, while Google has moved in the same direction with a giant leap.
Let’s take a deeper look.
Taken head-to-head, both packages are targeting smaller groups (5-10 users). You want you and your colleagues to get your business together online quickly and easily without spending anything on hardware. Maybe you have colleagues who are working all over the world, and you need to collaborate with them on documents and tasks/appointments. You live and die by email. You want your communications branded to your company. You want a website but don’t want to hire a consultant to get it all together for you.
So what are we talking about?
Microsoft Office Live Essentials:
- domain name for use with email and website
- website creation wizard
- 2 GB email storage (per user)
- 1 GB workspace storage
- 50 email accounts (name@company.com)
- business contact manager and workspaces for document collaboration (10 users)
- website add-ins sold as modules (for advertising and other purposes)
- $19.95 per month ($239.40 per year, assuming 5 active workspace users)
- domain name for use with email and website
- website creation wizard (Page Creator)
- 10 GB email storage (per user)
- no limit on document storage
- unlimited accounts (since pricing is per user, you get what you pay for)
- document collaboration through Google Docs & Spreadsheets
- leverage Google API for integration with other applications
- $50 per user, per year ($250 per year, assuming 5 active users)
Both applications offer mobile versions, and support via telephone. Google also makes a 99% email uptime guarantee, and will eliminate the Gmail ads for Premier accounts.
Are you looking to create a website to attract customers while you collaborate with co-workers and keep your business organized, or are you looking to collaborate with co-workers and keep your business organized while you have a website? It’s not the same question, and your answer may help you determine which package is better suited for you and your business needs. It’s not just about a preference for one company over the other.
Microsoft’s offering may be for you if:
- You don’t already have a website for your business and want to get something for the world to see that’s quick and easy.
- You and your co-workers are all using computers running some version of Windows.
- You and your co-workers already own some version of Microsoft Office and are prepared to continue using Outlook, Word and Excel as the hub of your business communications and processes.
- Your business is based on customers…attracting them, interacting with them, and keeping them.
- You won’t always have access to the internet.
Google’s offering may be for you if:
- You are more interested in having reliable tools for email and collaboration, than you are in having a new point-and-click website.
- You and your co-workers are using a mix of different platforms, including Mac OS X.
- You and your co-workers are comfortable using web-based tools for email, word processing or spreadsheets.
- Your business is not entirely based on attracting and cultivating customers. Maybe you have a handful of accounts, but don’t need to track a lot of customer interactions. Maybe you’re a nonprofit organization, school or faith-based organization. Maybe you own a blog network. The possibilities are endless, and you don’t want to be confined to a standard business model.
- You are always online.
Google is entering this market in a world already dominated by Microsoft. There may be people who are starting a fresh business with brand new computers that have never been spoiled by Microsoft Office applications, but I doubt those folks are easy to find. The majority of customers for either product have applications and work processes they’re already using. Google will be successful in wooing the small business away from Microsoft if they let customers keep one foot in the familiar, while they gently help them step into new territory.
Microsoft offers a free trial of Office Live, while Google is offering the Premier service free until the end of April. Which, if either, do you think is a better fit? Does Google have a chance of taking on Microsoft outside of the web worker die-hards?
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Neither. Desktoptwo is free, more user-friendly and fully interoperable. I’ve been using it for months and it’s great. It’s still in beta but certainly the best option as of now.
I think google is going to start putting a dent in Microsoft’s Marketshare in this space. It will not be overnight, they are going to chip away at the personal and small business market one user at a time. They’ve already chipped away at this user. Even though I have an Office 2003 licence I have chosen not to install it anymore and use google doc’s exclusively. The only thing missing currently is a presentation app which I keep open office around for.
-Jeff
http://blog.zemote.com
A few years ago Google announced a partnership with Sun vis a vis the OpenOffice.org suite. It’s about time they integrate OO.org with online storage of the documents so that they can remove the “You are always online.” requirement from their offering.
Personally, I’d go for Google over Microsoft’s offering on principal. I used Microsoft Money online and loved it. Then they killed it. Thanks, Microsoft!
GO GOOGLE GO !!!!!!
I think Google will dominate the web office space pretty soon. Microsoft’s hosted mail apps cannot come anywhere closer to Google’s in terms of functionality. If Google offers offline sync plugins for browsers, it will boost the user acceptance. I have only one issue with Google’s hosted apps. Suppose if I customize URL for mail as webmail.mydomain.com and setup the CNAME entry to ghs.google.com, I would want the URL to use webmail.geeklogix.com throughout instead of using google URL. I wrote to Google about it. They responded saying they will send the suggestion to the Apps team. I really don’t see any reason why they don’t allow this functionality. Maybe, they want to show high traffic for Google domains!!
I noticed that signing up for Google Apps took about twenty minutes and didn’t require anything more than a domain and an e-mail address.
Office Live on the other hand (which I was actually looking forward to trying out) required credit card information and a lot more hassle. So I gave up. Nice job, Microsoft.
Google it is for me. I did a Google Services roundup and of course Google is the winner.
Totally agree with Jeff. Finally the game is on! Google is competing with Microsoft at all levels, and winning in the most relevant ones. And it seems so much imminent than Linux vs. Windows on the Desktop (ha, remember that?)
As for a presentation tool, the rumors about Presently seem to be quite reliable.
informative…
thanks for the post!
Why do you think Google will not become another Microsoft?
Good question, Harush. Microsoft wasn’t *always* evil. There was a time that they were the underdog, no?
I think the key difference between office Live and Google Apps is the API. The API will enable many partner companies to develop additional applications… on the web and on the desktop. For example we are developing an FREE open source “business application platform” (think salesforce.com). Our first application is working tightly integrated with GOOGLE APPS. http://www.applicationexchange.com.
@Judi and Harush, Microsoft has been, historically and consistently, much more aggressive with its competition and its monopolistic strategies than Google has. Thus, it seems the “much less evil” perception Google has earned over Microsoft is going to hold for some rather long time.
Methegeek, true enough. But is it a fair comparison? I have to wonder had Microsoft and Google come out of the gate at the same time into the same world, would Google be all that different? Maybe it’s the cynic in me, but I don’t think any company can get that large without getting more than a little evil to get that way. Has Google reached that point? I don’t know.
Judi, what examples of Google’s ill doings are you thinking of?
What do you think of an OpenSource Google Apps alternative?
That would be sweet, wouldn’t?