Google Enterprise Campaign Shifts Into High Gear on Eve of Sharepoint Conference
On the eve of Microsoft's Sharepoint conference in Las Vegas, Google is launching the international phase of an advertising campaign that is the largest ever for its push into the enterprise and one of the most extensive in the company's history.
The "Gone Google" campaign is significant in a number of ways.
Sharepoint is one of Microsoft's crown jewels. It's a huge business. The technology generates a cool $1 billion in revenues. The technology is at the heart of Microsoft's strategy to remain king of the enterprise. Steve Ballmer says Sharepoint will surpass 1 million developers in the next year.
Steve Ballmer is banking on customers making major investments in Sharepoint 2010. With the upgrade, customers face a host of new IT expenses.
For example, Sharepoint 2010 requires upgrading from 32-bit to 64-bit technology on all servers. Office 2007 will run on Sharepoint 2010 but Microsoft is recommending investments in Office 2010 for richer integration. Office 2003 users will need to upgrade to Office 2007 to even run Sharepoint 2010.
Google App services require no IT environment to manage, no expensive software upgrades and no new server purchases. That's enticing for any sized business.
The Google campaign highlights why the Microsoft model may be slipping a bit. Companies are questioning if they need to make such major investments in Microsoft technology.
For its part, Google has more than 2 million businesses on Google Apps, representing 20 million users. Google is expanding its Google Apps service to the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Japan, Australia and Singapore. Clients include Motorola, New York Life and Konica Minolta.
The "Gone Google" campaign is a continuation of the roll-out that Google did over the summer. It features changing messages from businesses that have switched to Google Apps, Google Search Appliance and services such as Google Postini, their hosted security and archiving service.
The campaign is now running across the globe. With the launch, Google released a montage video. We find this interesting. If nothing else, YouTube offers Google a great way to promote its own products.
Google has not slowed down with its service offering. In September, Google announced an application program interface (API) for its Google Sites technology, effectively providing users with a way to import and export apps from Microsoft SharePoint sites. Google Wave is a collaboration platform. It has received mixed reviews; its effectiveness in the enterprise still too soon to tell.
Google and many others see in Microsoft a giant that can be slow and at times uneasy in how it steps through the market. With each step, they face a community network of micro-sized businesses that are proving formidable with their best-in-breed technologies.
It's a big week for Microsoft. Sharepoint is at a juncture. With Google in such an aggressive mode, Microsoft will have to move faster with its own product development and convince its customers that what it provides is still the best choice for the enterprise.
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We migrated off of SharePoint over to Google Sites earlier this year.
The "Gone Google," campaign is significant in a number of ways.
Is it Gone google or Going Google ? i hope its an typo..
Definitely the biggest battle in technology right now. I think google's aggressiveness will pay off for them. Microsoft is slow.
This isn't a battle. It's hype. Google apps isn't anywhere close to ready to replace Microsoft Office or Exchange for the overwhelming majority of businesses out there. The spreadsheet application by itself is one reason companies can't switch. The re-training of people using outlook to use g-mail is another. I think there have been a lot of studies recently showing that Google apps isn't really gaining any traction as a replacement. Some people use it for collaboration because it's great for that. If Microsoft includes on-line collaboration in the next version one big reason to use Google apps is gone. Google has to get some basic blocking and tackling done before it's ready for prime time.
Task reminders
Excel - I won't even list all the stuff
Ability to attach Google documents from the g-mail interface
Conversation thread options, a lot of people are used to the outlook way and don't like the Google way.
Send to from the browser. You can't use send to for google apps. You can for normal gmail, but not google apps
There is more, but this gives you and idea.
We have been using the free version for about 8 months now and if we had to pay $50 we would switch back. All of the MIS Directors I talk to that have more than 10-15 people feel the same way. Hopefully Google can make the service better, because competition is good.
Also, of the 2 million business users, how many like us are using the free version and how many have actually switched completely of the Microsoft platform.
No mention of Microsoft's response to Google with BPOS? Microsoft offers you the opportunity to manage the stuff on your own or have it hosted for you (by Microsoft or a partner). So Microsoft's model consumes Google's model and offers more on top.
So we should just switch because others have done it??!How ridiculous & implistic is that? What a boring ad! It highlights exactly how their mentality has evolved... this pleasure of putting their brand on a world map...Why dont they tell more about the actual value-added of whatever they offer..?They are good when it comes to searching the internet, but it doesn't make them good at everything. The more they want to compete with Microsoft and attack them, the more they look like them..or worse!
The whole point of cloud computing is to let somebody else handle the IT side for a small business. Share point is too much hassle for SMB's. They are better choices out there like www.binfire.com. It does not do everything share point does right now, but it has all functionality a small business needs and is a lot less expensive!
i like google's products
We shouldnt see the collaboration space as solely a Microsoft vs. Google battle. There are other good solutions as well, which infact have better solutions for their target segments. For example HyperOffice for small businesses, Zimbra for enterprises.