Many organizations that haven’t taken the leap into cloud productiveness providers have lots to achieve from them. The first step that organizations should take is choosing a vendor.
The most ubiquitous choices available on the market are Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, which transcend fundamental e mail internet hosting, or storage and collaboration instruments. They additionally provide cloud-based personal department trade, enterprise course of automation providers and information visualization instruments.
Debating cloud productiveness providers: Microsoft 365 vs. Google Workspace
Organizations seeking to choose one in all these cloud productiveness choices ought to be taught what instruments, options, apps and providers every supplies. Whether a corporation is a startup or a longtime enterprise seeking to transfer on from its on-premises mail service, Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace — formerly G Suite — are each high quality choices.
Organizations should perceive the 2 sides of the Microsoft 365 vs. Google Workspace debate to find out which suite is the most suitable choice for them based mostly on collaboration, enterprise content management (ECM), pricing, safety and cloud storage. Microsoft 365 tends to be in style amongst enterprise shoppers, whereas Google Workspace is widespread within the schooling sector, nonprofits and startups, however organizations ought to examine the small print of every bundle to their assets and desires.
IT administrors, executives or buy decision-makers ought to examine these two cloud productiveness suites based mostly on a number of standards together with assist, license fashions and compliance.
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Collaboration instruments and assist
Collaboration instruments have been a staple of enterprise productiveness suites for years, and the COVID-19 pandemic, together with the following distant work growth, has solely emphasised that. Organizations choosing a cloud productiveness service ought to begin the analysis of those two choices right here.
Microsoft 365
Microsoft has launched a number of iterations of its collaboration platform as a part of a productiveness suite, beginning with SharePoint and Office Communicator and ending with Microsoft Teams. This newest iteration of Microsoft’s platform supplies prospects with audio and video conferencing, chat and accessibility to enterprise content material. Microsoft has realized from a number of the successes of the Slack collaboration software and integrated a number of new options into Teams, together with the next:
Support for Microsoft Office and Office 365 software integrations
Microsoft 365 Groups integration
Basic Teams subscription plan obtainable free of charge
Support for dial-in numbers
Support for screen-sharing
Microsoft PSTN calling integration
Support on Windows, macOS and Linux OSes
Support for interactive bots
Integration capabilities with different third-party software program by way of connectors
Integration with Microsoft Planner for process administration
Real-time translation and transcription providers
Microsoft Teams supplies features and integrations that concentrate on 4 key areas: chat, meet, name and collaborate. Users can go from group chat to video name with the contact of a button, and so they can entry, share and coauthor recordsdata in actual time. The instruments provide quite a lot of flexibility for accommodating teams of various sizes and with totally different necessities.
For instance, a person can immediate message different people, chat with a bunch of individuals, make and obtain PSTN telephone calls or take part in a video name with as much as 300 customers. Microsoft Teams even helps reside occasions for as much as 10,000 attendees. In addition, the platform affords consumer software program for a number of desktops, cell OSes and in style internet browsers, making it doable for customers to collaborate on a variety of gadgets.
Google Workspace
Google now affords the Chat and Meet platforms as a part of its Google Workspace plans. Chat replaces Google Hangouts and supplies messaging and collaboration providers and instruments for simply migrating from Hangouts to Chat. Google Meet affords enterprise-grade safe video conferencing for groups and companies. Like different Google Workspace providers, Chat and Meet give attention to ease of use and supportability. Google Workspace options embody:
Support for Google Apps
Support for video and voice conferencing
U.S. or worldwide dial-in telephone numbers
Support for digital whiteboarding
Ability to avoid wasting assembly recordings to Google Drive
Support for screen-sharing
Both Chat and Meet present a number of vital options. Organizations can use Chat to collaborate on Google Docs, Sheets and Slides and create devoted digital rooms for monitoring tasks. Chat additionally helps each one-to-one and group messaging. Customers can use Meet to carry safe video conferences with as much as 250 contributors. However, Meet remains to be a piece in progress, with a number of options underneath improvement, equivalent to moderation controls, hand elevating, breakout rooms and attendance monitoring.
Google Workspace additionally includes other features to support collaboration, equivalent to shared calendars and content material creation, and it helps interoperability with Microsoft Office recordsdata, together with paperwork and spreadsheets. Requirements for working with Google Workspace rely upon the precise service. However, most options are accessible by way of a supported browser on Windows, macOS, Chrome OS, Linux gadgets, or a service-specific app for iOS or Android gadgets, such because the Google Meet and Google Chat apps. The collaboration options in Google Workspace can profit organizations of all kinds and sizes, though the shortage of precise desktop purposes could problem some organizations.
Compliance
Compliance issues will differ considerably from group to group. However, for organizations with important compliance concerns to satisfy, these points can massively hinder their enterprise targets.
Microsoft 365
Microsoft meets lots of the core compliance certifications that healthcare or finance organizations might have concerning safety and compliance. Some of those certifications embody HIPAA, HITECH, ITAR FedRAMP, FISMA, EU Model Clauses and Privacy Shield, ISO requirements, SSAE and SOC 1, 2 and three. In addition, Microsoft 365 makes it doable for patrons to implement info safety controls on their subscriptions to deal with privateness and compliance necessities such because the GDPR, California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) and Brazil Data Protection Act (LGPD). Controls embody sensitivity labels, information loss prevention, Office message encryption and entry controls for Teams and Sites.
Customers also can entry the Microsoft 365 compliance heart, which supplies information and instruments for managing their compliance wants. The compliance heart helps prospects simplify how they handle compliance, supplies risk-based scoring that measures their progress towards finishing advisable actions and affords workflow capabilities and built-in management mapping for finishing up enhancements. However, Microsoft remains to be growing the compliance heart, so it has not added some deliberate performance on the time this text publishes.
Because the Windows OS and Office product suite are so extensively applied, Microsoft has made a concerted effort to address compliance issues and assist their prospects meet necessities with out requiring any customizations or extra steps. These efforts will be particularly useful to enterprise organizations working in extremely regulated industries and have lots at stake in the case of defending privateness. They must really feel assured that their Microsoft 365 content material is secure and adheres to relevant laws, and Microsoft supplies an assortment of instruments and providers to assist them obtain these targets.
Google Workspace
Like Microsoft. Google meets lots of the core compliance certifications that healthcare or finance organizations might have. Some of those certifications embody ISO 27001, SOC 1, SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI DSS, CCPA and GDPR. Google additionally often undergoes third-party audits during which an unbiased auditor examines the controls that Google has applied in its information facilities, infrastructure and operations.
Google invests quite a lot of effort in defending its programs as the seller began within the cloud and has been addressing safety points since its inception. In addition, enterprise providers run on the identical infrastructure as Google’s operations, so Google is extremely motivated to safeguard these programs and convey its broad data and experience to its prospects’ cloud infrastructure and purposes. Google Workspace additionally affords its enterprise prospects management over their system and software settings whereas offering built-in Cloud Identity options to handle customers and implement multi-factor authentication.
One of the issues that many executives have regarding privacy is Google’s fame of information mining and its give attention to commercial. This causes some prospects to imagine that Google is analyzing their information to achieve insights into worker conduct. However, Google clarifies that it isn’t mining consumer information for any promoting objective. Nevertheless, this notion might nonetheless harm potential buyer curiosity in Google, particularly these working in extremely regulated industries.
Enterprise content material administration
Similar to collaboration instruments and suites, ECM is fairly ubiquitous throughout enterprise organizations. SMBs, nonprofits, faculties and lots of different sorts of organizations have to seek out the precise ECM platform. Purchase decision-makers equivalent to executives or group leaders ought to be taught the ins and outs of every service’s ECM options.
Microsoft 365
SharePoint is Microsoft’s providing for ECM, and for over 20 years, the platform has seen some important adjustments. Most Microsoft 365 plans — F3, all enterprise and business plans — embody SharePoint Online. This platform supplies a number of the core capabilities utilized by OneDrive for doc versioning, collaboration and enterprise workflow automation. The SharePoint platform can also be extremely customizable, making it engaging for bigger organizations with the assets to customise its kinds and streamline workflows. In truth, there are millions of third-party apps equivalent to timesheet trackers, time-off managers and assist desk programs that flip SharePoint right into a enterprise app.
SharePoint can simplify and streamline document management, serving to prospects higher management their content material and improve productiveness. For instance, SharePoint allows prospects to centrally management content material and doc properties whereas managing metadata globally, making it simpler to prepare and discover content material that spans a number of places. In addition, organizations that handle digital video and audio media can use SharePoint to optimize their media libraries and management content material. They may even play media straight utilizing the gamers constructed into SharePoint merchandise. SharePoint additionally supplies data administration capabilities, which can assist enhance authorized and regulatory compliance and safe vital data. Lastly, it affords internet content material administration, making it fast and simple to create and publish content material.
Google Workspace
Google acknowledges that finish customers working inside Google Workspace could need assistance managing their digital belongings and content material. Therefore, the seller consists of an ECM software referred to as Google Drive. It affords options equivalent to information loss prevention to make sure firm information by no means leaves the ECM system, a system for auditing information and the AI-driven Quick Access characteristic that helps customers find the files they need.
Google Drive supplies an easy-to-use platform for storing, accessing and sharing recordsdata from one safe location. Google Drive helps over 100 file varieties and leverages Google AI for predicting and surfacing vital content material, collaborators and occasions. The platform additionally makes use of machine studying to reinforce search capabilities and join customers with recordsdata that want their consideration. In addition, prospects can manage their recordsdata in shared areas that allow person teams collaborate in a safe setting. These options allow organizations to simply entry and edit their content material from any location by connecting from a supported system.
Additionally, Google Sites supplies a personal intranet service that permits customers to add paperwork and create, management and ship digital content material by way of a browser. Google Sites is simple to make use of and administer, making it a pretty platform to publish occasions, bulletins and totally different paperwork that staff may want.
Organizations can shortly construct web sites with out programming or design abilities, making it simple to entry and show Google Workspace content material, together with Drive paperwork and shared calendars. Google Sites robotically optimizes how the content material is displayed based mostly on system kind, so info is simple to learn on desktops, tablets or smartphones. With Google Sites, organizations have a useful software for successfully sharing and co-creating content material. For instance, particular person groups can simply arrange their websites utilizing drag-and-drop operations after which collaborate on the location’s content material in actual time.
Cloud storage
When organizations plan for information backup, catastrophe restoration and file sync and share, cloud storage must be on the heart of these plans. Each service affords related choices for cloud storage, however some notable variations might make the entire distinction for sure organizations.
Microsoft 365
Organizations could look to undertake hosted e mail providers and paperwork into Microsoft’s cloud storage providers. Microsoft OneDrive is a cloud storage platform that provides prospects a beneficiant quantity of storage to securely add and entry paperwork and information from any system. Microsoft supplies its Microsoft 365 subscribers with a certain amount of storage per person, relying on the subscription plan. For instance, the Microsoft 365 for Business editions present customers with 1 TB of OneDrive cloud storage. However, Microsoft affords limitless storage for E3 and E5 subscriptions of 5 or extra customers, beginning with an preliminary 5 TB per person.
OneDrive allows prospects to share files securely inside or outside their organization and apply insurance policies that management entry. OneDrive additionally affords options equivalent to file auditing and reporting, information retention, eDiscovery and sensitivity labels. In addition, prospects can entry and edit their recordsdata from any supported system or browser whereas being able to work on recordsdata offline. The platform can also be absolutely built-in with each the online and desktop variations of Office merchandise, making it properly fitted to organizations dedicated to the Office ecosystem, no matter their dimension.
Google Workspace
Similar to OneDrive, Google Drive supplies a cloud storage platform that provides prospects a generous amount of storage, relying on the subscription plan. For instance, the Business Starter version supplies every person with 30 GB of storage, the Business Plus plan affords 5 TB per person, and the Enterprise plan provides prospects as a lot storage as they want. Users additionally get Drive File Stream, enabling them to stream their Drive recordsdata straight from the cloud to their Macs or PCs, releasing up native disk area and community bandwidth. In addition, organizations could make Drive recordsdata obtainable for offline entry, which they’ll then sync again to the cloud when customers are on-line.
Google Drive additionally supplies integration with a whole lot of third-party apps. For instance, prospects can use DocuSign for e-signatures or CloudLock to supply extra safety layers. In addition, Google Drive supplies plug-ins for Microsoft Office and Outlook, making it simpler for organizations that depend on Office merchandise to suit Drive into their workflows. However, a number of the Drive options aren’t obtainable with the Business Starter version.
For instance, Business Starter prospects can’t use shared drives, which offer groups with safe shared areas for working collectively. However, different prospects have entry to all of the Drive options, making it a superb match for organizations that may afford plans apart from essentially the most fundamental.
Pricing
For many organizations, pricing may very well be the most important issue on this determination. After all, if there is not room within the funds for a complete model of Microsoft 365, Google Workspace stands out as the solely choice. Find out how these two choices stack up with pricing choices and the worth of these licenses.
Microsoft 365
Microsoft costs differ considerably relying on the subscription plan. For instance, a few of these plans are:
Business Basic plan is $5 per person per thirty days
Business Premium plan is $20 per person per thirty days
E5 enterprise plan is $57 per person per thirty days
Microsoft additionally affords add-ons that enable organizations so as to add options that are not part of their licensing plan.
For instance, prospects may need to add Microsoft’s Power BI, Workplace Analytics or the Office desktop purposes to their subscriptions. Organizations can add these providers to their plans individually, no matter which subscription mannequin they select. However, they should be cautious when together with additional options as a result of subscription charges can add up shortly, leading to a lot greater prices than anticipated.
Google Workspace
The Google Workspace subscription construction is way easier than Microsoft 365. Google publishes pricing for its three Google Workspace Business plans.
Business Starter is $6 per person per thirty days
Business Standard prices $12 per person per thirty days
Business Plus runs $18 per person per thirty days
Google now not publishes the subscription charges for its Enterprise plan.
Google now not publishes the subscription charges for its Enterprise plan. For this info, organizations ought to contact Google gross sales straight. Customers also can buy add-ons with their subscriptions, equivalent to Jamboard, Chrome Enterprise or Google Voice. As with Microsoft 365, organizations ought to proceed with warning when including providers to keep away from sudden fees.
Analyzing Microsoft 365 vs. Google Workspace
One of the most important promoting factors for Microsoft 365 is its native integration with Office merchandise and the truth that many plans embody the desktop model of the Office merchandise. Most enterprise organizations proceed to make use of Office for his or her on a regular basis operations, and Microsoft 365 suits into the Office ecosystem fairly properly. Microsoft 365 additionally supplies a seamless expertise between the desktop and the cloud. This will be particularly useful for organizations that desire the standard desktop software expertise — and all the ability and options that go together with it.
That’s to not say that organizations cannot be productive with Google’s apps, and Google makes the method of working with Office paperwork pretty painless. There can typically be minor glitches when changing recordsdata between the Office and Google codecs, however Google has come a great distance in delivering instruments that work exceptionally properly. Even so, Google Workspace was conceived as a cloud-based, browser-centric service and continues to stick to this mannequin, despite the fact that Google has added assist for some offline operations.
For many organizations, selecting between the 2 providers will doubtless come all the way down to how they function internally and the place they understand the best productiveness and administration beneficial properties. An group that is absolutely vested within the Office ecosystem — particularly in the case of desktop purposes — may desire the simplicity of transferring to Microsoft 365. Of course, a corporation can license the Office desktop products and use Google Workspace as their productiveness suite. However, the potential financial savings and options won’t be price the additional complexity.
It will be troublesome to match the 2 providers based mostly on pricing alone as a result of they provide sufficient distinctive options to set them aside. Even the plans inside the identical service can differ considerably. However, in the case of Microsoft 365 vs. Google Workspace, each provide comparable fundamental providers, equivalent to enterprise e mail, productiveness apps and communication instruments. As with any enterprise know-how service, the satan is within the particulars. Organizations ought to first decide what options they want after which consider the 2 providers based mostly on these necessities.
This course of is likely to be a bit simpler with Google Workspace as a result of the service affords a a lot easier licensing mannequin than Microsoft 365, which is par for the course with Microsoft. In truth, Microsoft’s strategy to product licensing is likely to be one purpose that organizations gravitate to Google Workspace, particularly in the event that they’re attempting to chop their ties with Windows and Office merchandise. Of course, organizations selecting between Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace should take pricing into consideration, which requires a cautious complete price of possession breakdown.
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