A few months ago I wrote my first article for another blog about Google Apps and its potential to change the way small businesses address their technology needs. Google released Google Sites a month or so ago, so for my first article for Rev2, I thought I’d revisit the topic and take a look at the impact it could have.
After spending the weekend playing with the capabilities and building a Site to address a specific problem my wife is dealing with at work, I can say without a doubt that this is another watershed moment in the evolution of web based applications. In a few hours I was able to assemble a series of spreadsheets, calendars, forms and gadgets to create a completely customized application that solved a problem that she has been struggling with for years. It isn’t quite as functional as we would like, but I’m sure that as the features evolve with time we’ll get all the capabilities needed.
So, why is this so significant? Their are several reasons, but I’ll touch on just a few. First and foremost, Google is again giving away something that we have been accustomed to paying for. Google may know better than anyone exactly what Chris Anderson means when he talks about ‘economics of free‘. They are letting anyone use the applications for basic domain services, alleviating a major strain on small business infrastructure.
With Google Sites, they are letting the users tie their applications together to create custom interfaces for their data and collaborate more effectively. In my simple Site I hooked up multiple spreadsheet and calendars to create a simple call log and staff schedule tracker. By combining the information in them with the functionality of gadgets you open up endless possibilities for using the data.
This functionality, while not the same currently, could one day mimic that of companies like LongJump and Coghead. What’s more interesting is that some small business owners might be much more comfortable with the idea of setting up Sites with spreadsheets and documents than trying to create a ‘database driven web application’ for one simple reason - they have already been doing it for years. All of sudden taking those things online and creating a dynamic application doesn’t seem that complicated anymore.
Google is allowing people working together to address process issues and apply custom solutions using tools they are already comfortables with. This is a very liberating concept for a lot of businesses, especially if it means that a smart team doesn’t need a developer to get the features they need.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. There is still a lot left to add before this is truly a competitor to online application service providers, but Google could close the gap fast. One major missing point is interactivity with embedded page elements. This will come with a more robust permissions system, but not being able to enter data on a spreadsheet (without a corresponding form) or add events to an embedded calendar certainly hold the overall functionality back. When they enable this, and if they’re able to integrate things like email processing and dynamic data mash-ups, we’ll have a whole new way to process business information.
If there’s such a thing as a Google fanboy, I probably fit the mold, but Domain Apps is worth the praise. I think it’s hard to argue with free applications that are powerful enough to run a business on. It’s time to take a close look at how to incorporate this new capability in your work.
