Benefits of Google Apps For Business

Google’s web-based messaging and collaboration apps require no hardware or software and need minimal administration, creating tremendous time and cost savings for businesses. End users can use the familiar Microsoft Outlook interface for email, contacts and calendar as they transition to Gmail and Google Calendar. A leading research firm found that Google Apps is as little as 1/3 the total cost of competing solutions

50 times more storage than the industry average

Each employee gets 25 GB for email storage, so they can keep important messages and find them instantly with built-in Google search.

Gmail is designed so employees can spend less time managing their inboxes, and more time being productive. Time-saving features like message threading, message labels, fast message search and powerful spam filtering help employees work efficiently with high volumes of email.

Mobile email, calendar and IM access

With several options for accessing their information while on the go, employees can be productive with Google Apps even when they’re not at their desks.

At no extra charge, Google Apps supports over-the-air mobile access on BlackBerry devices, the iPhone, Windows Mobile, Android and many less powerful phones.

99.9% up-time reliability guarantee with synchronous replication

Google guarantees that Google Apps will be available at least 99.9% of the time, so your employees are more productive and so you can worry less about system downtime.

With synchronous replication, your data and activity in Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs and Google Sites is simultaneously preserved in multiple secure data centers.

If one data center is unable to serve your requests, the system is designed to instantly fall back to another data center that can serve your account with no interruption in service.

The Radicati Group found that Microsoft Exchange typically has 60 minutes of unplanned downtime per month. Google Apps customers typically experience less than 15 minutes of downtime per month.

Information security and compliance

When you trust your company’s information to Google, you can be confident that your critical information is safe and secure.

Google’s information security team, including some of the world’s foremost experts in information, application and network security, are focused on keeping your information safe. Google and many other customers trust this system with highly sensitive corporate data.

Businesses get these customizable security features with Google Apps:

• Custom spam and inbound mail filtering tools, powered by Postini, to complement powerful spam filters that automatically work with no up-front configuration.
• Custom outbound mail filtering tools to prevent sensitive information from being distributed, powered by Postini.
• Custom information sharing rules to determine how broadly employees are allowed to share with Google Docs, Google Calendar and Google Sites.
• Custom password length requirements and visual strength indicators to help employees pick secure passwords.
• Enforced SSL connections with Google Apps to ensure secure HTTPS access.
• Optional email archiving, up to 10 years of retention.

Full administrative and data control

• Administrators can deeply customize Google Apps to meet their technical, branding and business requirements.
• Integration options let you connect Google Apps to your existing IT infrastructure.
• Single sign-on API connects Google Apps to your existing authentication system.
• User provisioning utility and API connect Google Apps to your existing user directory system.
• Email routing and email gateway support let you run Google Apps alongside an existing email solution.
• Email migration utility and API let you bring mail from your existing email solution into Google Apps.
• System branding and data ownership give Google Apps your look and feel, and ensures customer ownership of employee data.
• Custom user accounts on your company’s internet domain.
• Custom logo and colors in the applications.
• Contractual customer ownership of employee data.

Helpful 24/7 customer support

Google Apps is highly reliable and easy to operate, but SimCloud® support is available for administrators should you need it.

Support options include:

• Phone support for critical issues
• Email support
• Self-service online support