As a small business, you’re always looking for ways to make your life easier and streamline your processes. Google offers free tools and services that are beneficial for business owners that you’re probably already using like Gmail, Google Docs, Google Analytics, and more.

These free services are great when you’re just starting your business, but as you grow, you’ll want something that brings a little more functionality, flexibility, and convenience to your business. That’s exactly where Google’s G Suite comes in.

G Suite can help you manage your business more efficiently by enhancing your workflow and improving communication between your team and your customers. In this blog, I’m going to share just a few of the many benefits of G Suite so you can determine if your business is ready to take things to the next level.

It’s Cost Efficient

You most likely are already familiar with Gmail, Google Drive, Docs, and Calendar because these are all free resources. So why spring for the paid version? Well, because you get a ton more features when you upgrade to G Suite!

G Suite is one of the most affordable ways to streamline your business and enjoy the benefits of an all-in-one system without costly work orders and interruptions. It also eliminates the need to be tech savvy or hire an outside consultant to fix any issues.

There is no purchasing of software or installing it on your computer. Rather, you simply log into your G Suite account and get to work. Their pricing is simple and straightforward. Here’s a breakdown:

• The basic plan costs $5/month per user. With this plan, you’ll get all the apps plus 30GB of storage.

• The business plan costs $10/month per user. With this plan, you’ll get 1TB storage and businesses with five or more users will get unlimited storage.

• Enterprise plan costs $25/month per user. This plan comes with everything that you get in the business plan plus additional administration and management tools that come in handy for larger companies

Efficient and Professional Email Management

One of the best features of G Suite is that it allows you to set up your own domain as your mail server. This means that you can create an email address with your company name. For example, instead of yourname@gmail.com, your address can read as yourname@yourbusiness.com. This feature allows you to have a more professional, polished look.

Additionally, G Suite allows you to keep your emails super organized by using tags, separate folders, and colors to keep track of things efficiently. This makes my organizing heart sing! You can also now schedule your emails to go out at a designated time and create canned emails, too. This is so helpful for those late night emails you are working on but don’t want to send out till normal business hours.

Calendar Management for Maximum Productivity

Google’s calendar is connected directly to your Gmail account and it makes it incredibly easy to stay organized and on the same page with your team regarding schedules, deadlines, and events.

With Google Calendar, you can plan and organize meetings, schedule projects, track deadlines, and more. Your entire team can view this calendar, update it, mark deadlines, track milestones, and keep track of meeting times.

Additionally, everyone can stay on track thanks to features such as color-coding to mark any changes or events and reminders that can be sent directly through email since it’s integrated with your Gmail account.

Unbeatable Team Collaboration and File Sharing

With G Suite’s intelligent apps, you and your team can work together on documents at the same time. You can see any edits that you or your team members make, and everything will be saved automatically in real-time in the cloud. My favorite part because let’s get real – I always forget to hit save.

G Suite includes apps like Docs, Sheets, and Slides, which replace the need for Microsoft Office and even take it a step further by allowing real-time collaboration and editing.

Docs is used for written content, Sheets is for spreadsheets, and Slides for presentations. All of these connect to your Drive storage within G Suite so you can share these freely amongst your whole team, on any device.

You have the ability to give the editing capabilities to all your team members, or just a select few. And as your team works on the documents, they can use the chat feature to leave notes and communicate with other collaborators.

These features allow you and your team to collaborate on projects and share your progress faster and easier than ever before, eliminating the need to send dozens of back and forth emails with various updates and versions of the same documents.

Hangout Virtually with Your Team

With G Suite, you’ll also have access to the video conferencing app Google Hangouts. This app allows you to easily collaborate and communicate with both your team members and your clients via live webcam video. If you run a virtual team, this feature can be invaluable in bringing everyone together and getting them on the same page when an in-person meeting isn’t possible.

This app can be run right through your Gmail account and up to 25 people can join the call, connecting from any device. Other similar technologies cost more than the monthly total of G Suite and you get a lot more with G Suite!

Secure Cloud Storage

Google Drive is a cloud storage platform so you and your team members can safely store data automatically and then access it from any device you wish. This differs from typical office servers because G Suite stores information in Google data centers which are spread all over the world. This means that if one or more servers were to fail, your information wouldn’t be lost and you’re able to access it whenever you need it.

There are no more downloading documents, saving to hard drives, emailing, etc. You have access to your drive no matter where you are or what device you’re logging in from. This eliminates a lot of fear and anxiety related to lost documents and information.

Final Thoughts on G Suite for Business

Switching to G Suite allows your business to streamline all its processes. You’re likely already used to or at least familiar with some of Google’s features and apps so the switch to G Suite should be pretty seamless for your team.

For a low price, you can take your business productivity, professionalism, and collaborative efforts to the next level all while ensuring your data is stored safely. It’s well worth the small monthly investment!