Google Collaboration Software is a set of cloud-based services that enable organizations to work more effectively. These collaboration apps bring information from different parts of your organization together in a single place, so you can confidently make decisions and collaborate with others.
Our Google collaboration software includes real-time chat and video, screen sharing and file-sharing tools to keep your team working better together.
Trello
Trello is a popular web-based project-and-task-management tool. It lays out your projects as a series of lists. Each list item—called a “Card” in Trello parlance—can contain attachments, checklists, images, deadlines, and discussion notes. Cards can be dragged and dropped between lists.
Trello’s interface is ideal for visual thinkers, and it’s flexible enough to work as a collaboration tool for business teams, a personal planner, and even a GTD system.
You can add files to your Trello account directly from Google Drive. Just open a Card, click Attach File then select Google Drive. Choose your files and click Select to upload.
Asana
Asana started out as a team task tracker but has evolved into a full-featured project management tool. You can break down projects into smaller tasks and assign them to collaborators, communicate with team members, and track goals and deadlines.
Of course, you can also upload project files to Asana. From Asana’s task pane, click the paper-clip icon, select Attach From Google Drive, and pick your file. It will be added along with the Google Drive icon.
Slack
Most teams use multiple tools to collaborate: chat programs for quick messages, email for longer discourse and sending files. It can make communication clunky.
Slack streamlines the process by bringing all communications into one tool. Conversations are organized into channels. You can create channels for projects, departments, or any other team grouping that makes sense, and they can be private or public. You can also attach files to share with with other team members.
One of Slack’s many strengths is its integration with a variety of third-party apps, including Google Drive. To share a Drive file with a team member, paste the link to the file into your message and it will create a thumbnail preview. Files retain their original permissions set in Drive, and any changes to the file will be automatically synced. Best of all, attached files become searchable in Slack.
Microsoft 365
Share and edit documents, now with messaging
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REASONS TO BUY
+Familiar software+Collaborative editing+Teams provides UC+Cost-effective bundling
Microsoft Office may not be the first platform you think of when it comes to collaboration, but this now runs at the heart of the Microsoft 365 cloud-based office suite.
This is important because Microsoft Office remains the most used and therefore important office suite out there, and while there are competitors such as OpenOffice and Google Workspace (formerly G Suite) they still haven’t caught up to the same level of functionality and ease of use.
Therefore as Microsoft Office is likely to be at the heart of many businesses, the move to Microsoft 365 offers a number of advantages, not least the ability for teams to collaborate directly on the same set of documents. This could be anything from work shifts in an Excel spreadsheet, to a presentation in PowerPoint, to client reports written in Word.
Added to this is that Microsoft Teams now comes bundled with a number of Microsoft 365 packages, allowing for Unified Communications integrated with the traditional office software.
What makes Microsoft 365 more attractive is that as a cloud-hosted platform it can be used not just with Windows, but also Mac, Android, and iOS.
Pricing depends on whether you are buying for personal or business use, with fees starting from $6.99 or $8.25 a month per use, with business use requiring pre-paid annual plans.
However, one little advertised alternative option is Microsoft 365 Business Basics, which offers most of the same software packages and options as above, but only comes in at $5 per month per user when paid annually. This makes the entire package extremely cost-effective, especially when compared to standalone UC and collaboration software prices.
Overall, Microsoft 365 doesn’t simply offer a great office suite, but one that is also firmly designed for collaboration and sharing with teams.
Podio
A mobile-friendly collaboration tool
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REASONS TO BUY
+Easy-to-use interface+Quality mobile apps+Wide range of integrations
Podio describes itself as a flexible and customizable online platform for work and communication among teams. In other words, it gives you a way to organize large stacks of work and to delegate tasks between employees.
Just like many of the other business collaboration apps out there, Podio provides you with the tools to share files, view the status of ongoing projects and get feedback on the things you’re currently working on. These functionalities are combined into an easy-to-use interface.
Podio is also equipped with quality mobile apps for when you’re out and about, and need to use your smartphone or tablet, and it has an impressive amount of integration with third-party services and apps including Dropbox, Google Drive, Evernote and Zendesk.
Flock
A communication-focused Slack alternative
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REASONS TO BUY
+Easy to use interface+Neat productivity tools+Free to use
Flock is another application very similar to Slack but is arguably a little less daunting to use and offers more comprehensive communication tools.
Flock supports channels for different teams as well as 1:1 or group conversations. Users can search through messages, files and links and Flock will find it no matter who sent it and where.
There are audio and video calls and screen sharing as well as productivity tools such as polls, note sharing and reminders, while users can assign tasks to certain members of the group.
There’s also integrations with third party applications like Google Drive and Twitter, with notifications appearing directly in channels.
Flock has a free tier, but searches are limited to 10,000 messages, there is a 5GB storage limit and only five third party integrations are permitted. A Pro plan adds unlimited search, 10GB of storage per user, and admin controls, while the Enterprise plan ads 20GB of storage per user, more admin controls and dedicated support.
Visme
Visme is developed specifically for collaborative online reports, presentations, and infographics. Aside from promoting branding support and aiming to reduce design costs, analytics are provided so you can see which presentations and reports result in the most engagement, and adjust accordingly. Visme recommends itself for sales and marketing, HR and recruiting, internal communications, as well as education and in-house training. The software is specifically priced around individual, business, or education use.
Basecamp
Basecamp aims to be an all-in-one collaboration and communications platform, to bring features of multiple software offerings into a single place so that it’s easier to sort through information, and, of course, keep it all in one easy to manage place. Features include chat, messageboards, to-do lists and scheduling as well as automated check-in, as well as a single place to store all documents, files, and folders. Unlike other collaborative software that charges per user, Basecamp charges a single fee of $99.99 for unlimited users, which could make it especially attractive to larger organizations.
Wrike
Wrike is more of a project management and scheduling tool, that makes it easy to see where everyone is in terms of completing a project. As a standalone it might seem quite limited compared to some of the others here, but its strength lies in its extensive range of integrations, which includes Google, Dropbox, Salesforce, Microsoft, Adobe, and Github. This means Wrike can work as a central platform tied to a number of others software apps, allowing you to cover a wider range of options and features than some standalone software options.
Monday.com
Monday.com is a platform that allows you to plan, track, and collaborate on projects in a visually simple manner. Drag-and-drop functionality and ease of use make this a particularly good platform for project management and general workflow management among teams. It also integrates with Slack, Trello, Google Drive, Dropbox, and others, so you can use it a central focal point for teams to work together. As above, these integrations mean that monday.com can be used to achieve a wider working remit than the standalone platform itself.
Conclusion
The Google Apps for Business solution was designed to provide a simple, yet comprehensive, cloud computing platform that allows businesses of all sizes to take advantage of the latest online collaboration services. Using a variety of tools from Gmail and Google Calendar to Group Drive and Docs, businesses can communicate faster and more efficiently by utilizing Google services. The system’s document management features allow users to share all types of company data in real time, while Google Talk allows workers to collaborate online in a single instant messaging program.