Search Engines and Office tools to be used
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Written by Robert on April 10, 2008 – 9:25 pm
Despite the many services offered by Google, it never hurts to explore other options for online office tools. Some of these services are analogous to those of Google, while some are not.
For a small business, one of the major draws to Google products is their price, which is, for the most part, nothing. While certain services, such as Ad-Words, or the Premier Edition of Google Apps, do come with a price tag, it remains relatively low compared to comparable competing services.
It is important to keep in mind, however, that other companies offer services free of charge, as well, and that there is no way to predict which tools will be most perfectly tailored to fit your particular business’s needs without first testing some of them out. Try to think about what types of services you are offering, and what tools or products you will need to implement them. If you simply need an online workspace plus email, for example, then Google Apps is probably sufficient. If, on the other hand, you’ll be doing, say, aggressive marketing or business forecasting, then something like Salesforce.com, which costs more, but also provides more robust sale-tracking, might be a better fit. Here are some links to and brief descriptions of competing services or simply other providers of online office tools so you can go and have a look yourself.
Competing Search Engines
According to Nielsen NetRatings, as of June 2006, 49.2 percent of all search engine searches were made through Google. While this is an impressive and dominating figure, it’s always worth checking other search engines if a Google search doesn’t give you exactly what you’re looking for.
Yahoo!, which was launched in 1994, is one of the oldest search engines on the web, and continues to be one of the most popular, accounting for a reported 23.8% of all web searches. Originally powered by Google itself, Yahoo! has used several search engines throughout the years, eventually combining the attributes of each to create its own proprietary engine. Because of its partnership with AT&T, Yahoo! features are automatically integrated directly into the web services of many Internet users. Like Google’s search page, Yahoo! offers you the possibility of searching in Web, Images, Video, etc., and has a link to its advertisement embedding service (Ad Programs). Unlike the Google ‘Classic Home’ search page, Yahoo!’s search page also includes a listing of links to the top daily news stories directly.
Windows Live Search, Microsoft’s successor to MSN Search, was launched in its final release form on September 11, 2006. MSN accounted for 9.6% of all web searches in June 2006 (technically before Microsoft’s search engine was released in its current form). Like Google, Live.com’s basic page presentation is relatively Spartan, and can be personalized according to which features you choose to incorporate. Also similar to Google’s Personalized Search, Live.com allows searches to be saved and updated automatically. Unique to Live.com is the ability to view additional search results on the same page, instead of having to scroll through several pages.
Formerly known as AskJeeves.com, this search engine was founded in 1996, and distinguished itself as a ‘‘natural language’’ search, allowing the user to enter a naturally phrased question, to which an answer would be produced. While now accounting for only 2.6% of all web searches, Ask.com retains its prominent position in the web community due both to its ownership of many web destinations (Excite, MyWay.com, iWon.com, etc.) and to its former mascot, Jeeves. Ask.com now supports keyword searches, as well, and relies on the ‘‘ExpertRank’’ algorithm to list search results in order of authoritativeness. Because Ask.com was slower to index many newer web pages, its user traffic fell behind Google, Yahoo!, and MSN.
Other Search Engines and Metasearch Engines
All other search engines combined account for only 8.5 percent of total web searches. It can be useful, however, to be aware of ‘‘meta search engines,’’ which amalgamate the searches of other sites. Here are a few metasearch sites that I have found useful:
Essentially, this site displays search results from Google, Yahoo!, MSN, Ask.com, and others simultaneously.
This site claims to be ‘‘the single best source for facts,’’ and displays not only a Google search, a Yahoo! search, and an MSN search, but also a Dogpile search. It also has links to news, dictionaries, weather, and more.
This site is notable because it provides a mix of U.S. Government tools, educational, news, and other sources.
Competing Online Office Space
Not surprisingly, companies offering competing search engines also tend to offer competing online office tools. Therefore, along with Google’s search engine, both Yahoo! and Microsoft offer online office tools comparable to those of Google. This barely scratches the surface of what is available, however. Here are some of the better products out there:
Office.com provides the Virtual Office application, which consists of 15 services, including email, calendar, address book, etc. It can also send updates to a PDA or pocket PC. The amount of web storage, attachment size, number of users, etc., varies depending on the package you choose:
- Virtual Office Free: free
- Virtual Office Light: $5.95/3 mo.
- Virtual Office Regular: $10.95/3 mo.
- Virtual Office Advanced: $19.95/3 mo.
- Virtual Office Hyper: $34.95/3 mo.
Microsoft Office Live provides a variety of office suite services, including a domain age, business application workspace size, number of features, etc., once again varies based on the package you choose:
- Office Live Basics: free
- Office Live Essentials: $19.95/mo.
- Office Live Premium: $39.95/mo.
Yahoo! Small Business also provides services such as web hosting, domain names, business email, etc., but they are listed separately, and must be subscribed to separately on its website, and you will have to pay even for the most basic version of any service. Here is a list of the prices at the most starter level of Yahoo! Small Business applications:
- Web Hosting - starting at $11.95/mo., $25 setup fee Ecommerce - starting at $39.95/mo., $50 setup fee (ATTENTION: LAST TIME WHEN I USED THIS SERVICE THEY DID NOT ALLOW SUPPORTED .HTACCESS FILES)
- Domain Name - starting at $9.95/yr.
- Business Email - starting at $34.95/yr.
- Marketing Services - Customizable deposit amount and maximum payment amount per ad click
- Internet Service - starting at $15.95/mo. (first year/dial-up)
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