How many hours a week do you think you spend either looking for documents that you know are somewhere on your hard drive or digging through email attachments trying to find the latest version?
Well Google Apps had found a way to make searching for documents super easy with their search feature while providing collaboration through file sharing with Google Docs. However, only Google Docs files could be stored there, limiting the usefulness for those of us who also use other file types like Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, image files, Adobe .pdfs, etc. Because of this limitation, people tended to add on box.net or dropbox to store and share non-Google files. With Drive, that has all changed.
Of course Google wanted to make it easier for us to keep everything centrally located and accessible from everywhere so Google recently launched their Google Drive Business Storage product and we love it! With Google Drive you can now have access to all your documents – everywhere. Google Drive is on the web, in your home, at the office and on the go. So wherever you are, your stuff is there.
Google Drive allows you to store all your files in one safe place. You can save your documents, music, photos and videos in one place. It also syncs with your mobile devices and your computer which is great because if you make a change on your mobile device, it automatically shows up if you were to access it somewhere else.
Another nice thing about Google drive is that it tracks your changes so if you make an edit, you can look back through all your revisions over the last month. And you have all the features of search that Google is known for so finding documents through keyword search or images is easier than ever.
Finally, with Google Drive you can collaborate with others as you work. Share files with exactly who you want and edit them together, from any device. Google Drive gives you instant access to Google Docs, a suite of editing tools that makes working together better—even when your teammates are miles away.
Business Intelligence 101 is a Premier Google Enterprise Partner. For a demo of the new Google Drive, please check out this short video we put together: