Google is much more than just a search engine these days. Google+ is growing in popularity as a social medium where people can promote their businesses, network and connect with friends and family. Google Docs gets plenty of use as does Google Adwords. But nothing is perfect, and one person at least thinks that the imperfections in Google’s product offerings could hurt the company’s bottom line.
Adam Metz wrote a post for Tech Republic about what he thinks are the five reasons that Google Apps lose deals. Three stood out for me.
Google lost several large government contracts because of security concerns. The government has to be extremely cautious. Google’s penchant for sharing user information with various and sundry vendors and other third-party organisations could threaten national security. In a post for ZDNet about Google Apps Engine, Garett Rogers says that he would feel comfortable putting his company’s information on Google’s platform because he knows “it’s proven to be secure, scalable and robust over the last several years with their own services.” Having said that, there’s nothing wrong with erring on the side of caution and limiting the amount of company information you put on Google’s platform. The same is true for Google Docs. Storing documents in the cloud is convenient and cost-effective, but some data really should be literally kept under lock and key, even if stored electronically.
Microsoft is taking Google Apps seriously as a SkyDrive competitor. The difference between these two might be more a matter of taste than anything else. Each one has its own quirks, as far as document sharing is concerned, that can not only stall productivity but also simply frustrate to you the point of pulling your hair out. To really know which one is going to work better for your business, you would have to try them out and compare while keeping in mind your day-to-day needs and overall business goals.
Google only recently became committed to uptime. According to Metz, Google promises uptime 99.9% of the time. It recently improved uptime, for Gmail at least, to 99.984%. That’s a significant improvement that may make it to the proposed 99.99% overall, which would be great.
Yes, Google Apps has some weak spots that could use a little strengthening. But what business doesn’t? Time will tell whether or not Google thinks those weaknesses are worth the trouble.
