Why O365? Hotmail is just as good.

[Mainstay]

I'm about to climb the clock tower.

Almost 5 hours of answering every question from a potential new client and saying that O365 will solve 100% of all of their current email woes. Every principle I convince leaves totally stoked. Then their assistant or their wife or their husband or their damn golden retriever jumps in and says, "woah woah woah, I think Hotmail and a series of horrible @gmail.com accounts are doing just fine.".

So frustrated at the moment. They actually want a SoW to create and migrate a single mailbox on a domain that has NO EXISTING MX RECORDS!. Like what, 30 minutes of work + 30 minutes of documenting and invoicing? I am now on page 6 of my proposal.

Anyone have some amazing website or propaganda piece that just completely nails this issue? Something that makes it abundantly clear that O365 beats Gmail (no, not Google Apps, a free-fricken-gmail account!).

And this is a business with a crew of 25, a staff of 5, and equipment in the millions. They approached me.

 

[Mike McCall]

Who are you partnered with for O365? Don't they offer any propaganda? Sherweb does.

 

[Mainstay]

Who are you partnered with for O365? Don't they offer any propaganda? Sherweb does.

just sent off to my sherweb partner... but he's not always quite that reliable. Just want some slam dunk document that almost makes them feel silly for ever thinking otherwise

 

[Mike McCall]

If you're already with Sherweb, log into your Cumulus Dashboard and then go to your Partner Toolbox. Select O365 in the left hand menu and there will be a boat load of stuff available to you.

 

[Mainstay]

I, uh, didn't know that existed.

There is some nice brochure-y style material in there, but it is pretty dry and obviously made by MS or their cousin.

I was thinking of something more independent, and actually calls out direct comparisons with @ISP or @hotmail or @me or @gmail in a professional setting and how it costs you business.

 

[Mike McCall]

Hard to find stuff pre-made for your specific client as they're using a free Gmail account. Nevertheless, they do have a comparison of O365 and Google Apps which might be useful. Try downloading the Gray Label version and modifying it. Gray Label is co-branded with Sherweb, and White Label you can make your own. Didn't see a White Label for the Google Apps comparison, but there's lots of information both for you and your clients.

 

[Archon Prime]

or their husband or their damn golden retriever

HAHAHAHAHA!!!

 

[Markverhyden]

Situations like this I try to use a professionalism analogy of some sort. Obviously you don't want them to think that you think they are being amateurish, when in fact they are. Many small businesses grew up in the last 15-20 years so they started with those addresses when they were running on a shoe string. Time to put on those big kids clothes.

 

[SAFCasper]

A few ideas if you are making your own comparison.

- Premium support. Good luck getting ANY support for free gmail/hotmail accounts.
- Premium security & anti-spam
- 365 has 99.9% uptime backed by a SLA.
- No ad's in webmail
- Archiving
- Data Loss Prevention
- Retention Policies
- Distribution groups & Shared mailboxes
- Shared contact lists
- Data Compliance. For example neither Outlook.com or Gmail are HIPAA compliant. Or in the EU you will not be GDPR compliant as they store data on servers outside the EU.
- Central management and permissions. This is a big one.
What happens when a member of staff leaves the company without telling anyone their email password? With some luck you can reset it using recovery options, or maybe give them a call and ask.
Now imagine a staff member leaves on bad terms. Being malicious they decide to change the password and recovery details before they leave.
You now have no access to the account. You can't reset the password. The staff member can continue using the account even though they have left the company. What can you do to stop it? Absolutely nothing.

Also the obvious benefit of using your own domain name. Using @gmail.com address comes across as seriously unprofessional for a large company. To the extent I would consider if I even wanted to do business with them.

 

[Mainstay]

awesome stuff! looks like our lists compare nicely.

OK - so spent the night writing this up and now have a 34 page proposal to switch a single user account to O365.

good grief.

 

[kwest]

I wouldn’t give a proposal for one mailbox. You talk on the phone or in person and say that is what you recommend and why. If they question it then answer the questions and let them decide.

Don’t need to sell it if they are not interested.

 

[Mainstay]

I wouldn’t give a proposal for one mailbox.

To be honest, I was so gob smacked that they asked me to do this, despite having addressed all of their concerns clearly and with confidence, that I was using it as a giant mallet to smack them with. Basically - HERE, take this snarky document and shove it!

Then I started to write it and I actually used it as a tool to develop some of our language and our style in the written contract. It's good! I'll probably use some of this for other projects on the go and it definitely demonstrates to this demanding client that we ARE prepared to buckle down and do some serious work on your behalf.

I am still affronted. But I think I got something out of this project regardless if it isn't the client!

 

[DMC Unlimited]

I've sent this link to clients before who are wasting time and wanting to argue back and forth. It's mostly unbiased and lays out the pros and cons:
https://www.stylefactoryproductions.com/blog/office-365-vs-google-apps