Gmail vs. Outlook - Which one?

We spend a significant amount of the day reading and replying to emails, so using the right email client is imperative for optimized productivity and efficiency. The most prominent and favoured email solutions to date are Google's Gmail and Microsoft's Outlook.

To decide which solution works best for your business, it's crucial to address the kinds of features and functions your users require. Outlook is generally the 'comfort zone' option for a lot of users, and has been for some time; it's a familiar and popular application. However, Gmail has been steadily growing in popularity (surpassing 1 billion active users in Q4 2015) and in our experience, it's taken the throne away from Outlook—but how? While Outlook and Gmail both offer a similar experience with basic send/receive functionality, Gmail has taken a step further with lightning-fast mailbox searching, integrated voice and multi-person video chat, and other productivity enhancements such as Priority Inbox. Furthermore, Gmail integrates Google Hangouts, the communication platform of choice of the next generation. Gmail also includes the ability to easily attach and link files stored in Google Drive. Google Apps Learning Center offers a great overview of Gmail and Google Apps.

Although the majority of Gmail 'converts' really enjoy it, we've come across users who prefer Google Apps but insist on using Outlook because of their familiarity with the old-school interface. Many users may struggle and even dislike the change to conversation view in Gmail, but once trained on the benefits, the majority find it really helps manage large volumes of emails without using time consuming methods like sorting by sender and filing in individuals folders. Placing Outlook on top of Gmail excludes users from many powerful Gmail features that can really boost productivity and efficiency. For example, Gmail can merge emails into a single "conversation," which makes it much easier to navigate messages compared to Outlook. This enables the user to view or hide any related correspondence with a simple mouse click, instead of having to shuffle through multiple messages from the same sender. Gmail also upgrades folders with labels, which means that one email can have as many labels as needed versus Outlook, which only understands folders so users can only file a single email in a single folder - how old school is that?! Despite being able to assign multiple tags to one email, once trained with tips to use Google's powerful email search capabilities, many users stop filing in folders and using labels altogether.

Having instant access to your email and files, along with seamless collaboration, is another big selling point for Google Apps. There is no need to download, install, update, and sync legacy applications like Outlook since Google handles all the related maintenance and automatically updates Gmail, so users always get the latest innovations. This way, when you click open your browser or pick up your tablet or smartphone, it just simply works.

One of the other powerful features of Gmail is it's advanced spam filtering system. Gmail offers superior spam filtering which acts like a funnel through which only legitimate mail can pass. By the time you step into your office in the morning, Google ensures that any email that was collectively marked spam by others across the world does not end up in your inbox. Neat!

Gmail spam filtering

Although Outlook offers a familiar interface, Gmail and Google Apps for Work remain the email service of choice for most of our customers. More than 5 million businesses worldwide have moved to Google Apps, allowing their employees to productively collaborate, wherever and whenever they work. Be sure to check out some of the differences and benefits you'll get by switching to Gmail from Outlook and a legacy Exchange ecosystem. We here at InterlockIT have led many migrations, so contact us to schedule yours!

To Cloud or not to Cloud? Google Apps for Work

Google Apps and Cloud computing in general has always been uniquely susceptible to myths due to the confusion and hype surrounding it. Although moving to the cloud has undoubtedly become a growing trend among various kinds of business and organizations, the vast majority of IT decision makers frequently ask us questions about how moving to Google Apps will affect them. These questions, if not addressed with the correct knowledge, can impede innovation, distract from real progress, and sometimes even induce fear. Ultimately the truth gets skewed and myths are born. Here are the most common ones:

Myth 1: Cloud is more expensive.

Google Apps is delivered to your business over the web at a fraction of the cost of installed systems. It may seem like purchasing a continuous cloud subscription of services over a one-time on-premise installation is costing you more money, but when you review the total cost of ownership you'll recognize that cloud-solutions such as Google Apps for Work save you money in the long run. The cloud yields substantial savings as you no longer need to invest in hardware, IT personnel, maintenance, upgrades etc. for on-premise infrastructure.

Myth 2: Cloud isn't secure and it's better to keep data on-premise.

This is probably the most common one. Kimbley IT goes over some of the security myths of Google Apps. Over 5 million businesses already use Google Apps for Work and it's helping them improve teamwork and reduce costs without compromising security. Some business owners still have concerns about security and understandably so if they've been given the wrong impression of the cloud. Google does not sell your information and your data will always belong to you. Unless you use the services to do so, Google does not share your data with other people and protects its transit over the internet with SSL encryption. Plus, most SMB owners don't have recent back-ups and don't secure their data off-site. With Google Apps, data is automatically backed up in global data centers, protecting it from accidental damage, loss, theft, and fire. You can also enable extra security protocols like 2-step verification in addition to your password to make unauthorized access nearly impossible. Learn further details on Google Apps security.

Myth 3: You are ‘locked-in’ once you move to the cloud.

Google keeps your data for as long as you have an account with them - but in the rare event of wanting to exit the cloud, they have tools to help you export your emails, contacts, calendars, documents, and sites. For example, you can export your documents to various Microsoft compatible formats. Check out Google Takeout for further details.

Myth 4: Migration to the cloud is more hassle than its worth.

While some cleaning and infrastructural management may be required, especially if you are running on very old servers, migrating into the cloud is relatively pain free if you work in partnership with a trusted and experienced cloud migration company like us! It can all happen fairly quickly and seamlessly with minimal downtime. What is important to understand is that the short-term inconvenience cannot and does not outweigh the long-term benefits of having greater efficiency, cost effectiveness, and a business that is virtually future-proof, regardless of the changes the market brings.

Between its reliability and low cost compared to other sources, the Cloud is a piece of technology that isn't going away anytime soon and is growing rather rapidly. Cloud solutions have given SMB owners access to the same level of services as larger companies and solutions like Google Apps have leveled the playing field and introduce an incredible amount of power, efficiency, and collaboration to its users. H3 Secure Cloud Services do an excellent job explaining the benefits of switching over to the Cloud. If you're looking to take your organization off of it's outdated footprint into a new and improved direction, be sure to contact us at InterlockIT to help you make your leap into the cloud!

Earth Shattering news: Migrating from Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps now even easier

For me as an insider this is teary-eyed stuff.  Customers should care because data migrations to Google Apps from Microsoft Exchange will be easier and more cost effective with this tool.

And our team and I will get to spend less nights waking up multiple times to check on desktop data migrations.  Getting ahead of myself... Let us put it through the paces on our own internal Exchange Server test beds first.  Overall Google has always impressed me with the quality of their product releases.  There are third party tools that do the same but most were poorly documented.

• Migrating from Microsoft Exchange now even easier