Are you looking to migrate from Google Workspace to Office 365? What seems like an innocent question at first can quickly become complex. Both are productivity suites with cloud capabilities designed to help your business collaborate and grow. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re nearly the same.
Anyone who’s tried switching from Google Docs to Word or Vice Versa knows about the superficial differences between the two systems. Those differences are even more significant on the backend. That you started your business on G Suite doesn’t have to mean that you stay there as it grows.
In fact, you might want to migrate to Office 365. Only thorough research can help you decide which of the two is a better solution for your needs. We’re here to help you get started on this research, with these 6 reasons to migrate from Google to Office 365.
1) Enhanced Scalability as Your Business Grows
The inherent goal of most businesses is scalability. Put simply, you have to make sure that any software solution you implement can grow with your business as it does, not adding new complications but solving the same types of situations regardless of the number of users attached to the solution.
That’s where Office 365 undeniably wins over G Suite. Scalability is built into the design, with centralized administration and security features that help you manage your entire workforce from a centralized station. That’s thanks to integration with Microsoft’s various other offerings, from Azure to Dynamics CRM. In addition, its Teams chat tool offers a valuable competitor to Slack that integrates seamlessly into Office apps, something with no direct equivalent on the Google side.
2) Reduced Price Per User for Web App Use
Pricing is naturally a major factor for any company looking to optimize its collaboration and productivity suite. As your company and teams grow, even a $1 dollar/user/month difference can make a major impact on your budget that could be better spent elsewhere.
Here, Google has pricing simplicity going for it. Only three tiers make it easy to see just where you stand. But that also brings with it a lack of flexibility; compare it to Microsoft’s multiple pricing tiers, and you begin to see the difference.
With Office 365, you won’t be pigeonholed into a tier that doesn’t match your needs. Instead, you can find a price specifically designed for a company like yours. As an added bonus, that price difference in favor of Office only increases if you choose to use only web apps on the platform.
3) Capabilities and Integration on Both Mobile and Desktop Apps
Speaking of web and desktop apps: Google G Suite is online only. If you want to use it, you better be connected to the internet. That brings with it the obvious advantage of remote work; collaboration is easy, natural, and intuitive. Still, the lack of desktop alternatives can become a significant hindrance.
With Office 365, you get the best of both worlds. In its most recent iteration, Word, Excel, and other productivity apps are all available as desktop versions that seamlessly integrate with their cloud-based counterparts. Use them through the cloud of offline at a desktop computer, depending on the environment. You can even work offline in Outlook, setting up rules and procedures for sending emails as soon as you get back online.
4) Better Security Against Phishing and Data Theft
As your company grows, data security becomes an increasingly vital concern. You cannot afford to suffer from significant data loss, simply due to phishing or other types of online theft. It might not be a good idea, then, to run your productivity suite through software that didn’t even disclose the breach the last time one of its major platforms was attacked.
Compare that with Microsoft, which spends more than $1 billion annually to keep its data (and its customers’ data) safe. Microsoft’s anti-spam and anti-virus protections are built into Office 365, including natural data encryption that makes your files more difficult to crack. Meanwhile, its Advanced Threat Protection functionality protects data through a proactive approach that has no equivalent on the Google side.