Is it time to ditch Exchange for Google Apps?

This is the question posed on Small Business Technology last week. To be fair, the actual question is both a statement and a question: "Google Apps (Cheaper and More Features): Is it time to stop using MSFT Exchange?"

As with most such questions posed without any articulation of the desired end-state of the arrangement, there's no one right answer, of course. But the initial assumptions are a little worrisome and I would suggest if you pose the question while holding them, you're almost certainly going to come up with the wrong answer.

Does Google Apps have more features? On a bullet-point list, obviously, yes; you have a spreadsheet, word processor, and collaboration site together with Gmail and Google Calendar software, so it's as if you got Exchange plus Microsoft Office together. Sort of. Because if you actually break down each of those products and compare it to the opposite feature by feature, you'd find that in fact, Microsoft offers a lot more features. And between Exchange/Outlook and Gmail, an awful lot more. Features are, in fact, the one big reason to stay with Exchange for most companies, because Gmail doesn't yet come close to implementing many of the business and collaboration features Exchange offers. Mind you, I am not suggesting that bundles of features are necessarily a plus; that's another unquestioned assumption from the original. But both are wrong.

Next, is it really cheaper? The original article compares the $60 a month the author pays for Exchange hosting with the $50 a year Apps charges. I don't dispute either of those numbers, but I will say you're getting taken for a ride if you are paying $60 a month for a single user Exchange host. Ten dollars a month is closer to the market rates. While that is still twice as expensive as the $5 a month that Apps breaks down to (both rates being per user), it's not nearly as expensive as the comparison being made... and in some cases, well worth it for those extra features Exchange offers that Apps does not.

On the whole, I am an Apps fan, because I actually believe that most of the features offered by Exchange and Outlook are under-utilized and rarely worth the money. But I don't think it's an option that should be ignored based on erroneous assumptions.