(De-google – 10 minute read)
Funny how some brands become so ubiquitous that they become verbs. Brands like, well, Google. Over the past two decades, Google has become the biggest name on the internet. To search for something, we say ‘Google it!’. Google then created a whole bunch of workplace apps (Google Drive, Docs, Mail, etc.) that made it easier for businesses to ‘Google-up’.
We used to be one of those businesses. But now, to use another google adjacent verb, we’ve successfully ‘de-googled’ our business.
Why did we do it? You can read all about that here.
Suffice to say, de-googling our business has led to better work efficiency and heaps of monetary savings. Which wasn’t really what we sought to achieve initially, but a pleasant surprise nonetheless. This article aims to educate you, dear reader, how to wean yourself off Google Dependency. Maybe that may even inspire you to look at weaning off other Big Tech providers (Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, etc.).
As a small business owner, being dependent on a single tech provider is a big risk. By finding alternatives to big tech, you’re creating more robustness to your business operations and promoting business longevity. Not to mention monetary savings!
But before we talk about how we did it, here is a brief overview of how thoroughly ‘Googled’ our business was.
De-google step #1: Changing email providers
The first step was to change email service providers. For the past 20 years of my life, I had used Gmail for all my email solutions. I never even thought to look at other email providers. It was good that we ran the de-googling exercise, because it made me look at the alternative providers out there.
On the recommendation of our resident ITP (IT Person), I checked out Fastmail. Fastmail offers private email hosting for you or your business. They have a free account as well if you want to give it a try for free.
Similarities: Gmail and Fastmail
At first glance, Fastmail looks very similar to Gmail. The layout, the labels, the search bar and even the built-in calendar (which is activated by default with Fastmail).
You can pin important emails with Fastmail, place labels on them, categorise them and organise everything to your heart’s content, much like you can with Google. So really, its everything that I ever used Gmail for, but for a fraction of the price (and none of the moral quandary of enriching Big Tech!).
Why Fastmail?
Fastmail’s biggest selling point is its price point. As of August 2024, a single user Google Workspace (which is what you need to have Gmail setup for your company) subscription is $9 NZD a month per user. This gives you 30gb storage per user. Note that this includes Google Drive and Gmail storage. In our small business, we had about 5 users who needed emails – that means it would have cost us almost $50 NZD a month to run. On top of that, Google storage is shared across all Google apps. This means that our drives, photos and emails are all using the same storage space.
Comparatively, with Fastmail, a solo account will cost you $10.20 a month. Which is close to Google’s price. But where it gets REALLY competitive is when you sign up for the ‘Family’ plan that costs $23.80 NZD a month for up to 6 emails. Yes. 6 emails. No, there aren’t any caveats stopping a business setting up as a ‘family’. Which works out really great for our small team. With that alone we’ve cut our email costs in half. Yay! Also you can bulk pay up to 36 months which gives you more savings (which you can’t do with Google).
Minor point: I like how Fastmail doesn’t auto sort all my emails into social and promotion categories (unlike Google). I can now actually keep track of important social media messages and good deals on stuff I’m interested in!
What do I miss about Gmail?
Nothing really. What I miss more was Google Calendars. Fastmail comes bundled with its own calendar system, which uses iCal. Its not quite as user-friendly as Google Calendars. Also setting up repeating events (IE-only repeat every weekday) is not as robust as Google Calendar. iCal takes a bit of learning, like downloading email invites and attaching them to your calendar. Overall the experience isn’t too different from Google Calendar, so I didn’t find the shift too jarring.
De-google step #2: Finding a new shared drive for the team
This one was trickier. Since everything that makes us an awesome paperless accounting firm exists on our Google Drive. So I had to find an alternative that wouldn’t break the budget. Naturally I checked out Dropbox, the most obvious competitor. However their prices were not that great. I’d be looking at $15 USD a month per user. Which means I’d be spending more than what I was with Google for my whole team.
Once more, our ITP came to the rescue and suggested Syncthing – an open source file sharing software.
Why Syncthing?
To be fair, I wasn’t 100% sure about using an open source free software. BUT, what makes Syncthing great is that none of my client data is hosted by a third party. Here’s how it works:
- With syncthing installed on my PC, I can create a folder (on my local drive) in which I can store all our company data.
- The other team members also install Syncthing on their PC. They give me their unique Syncthing ID.
- I then share the folder on my PC with my team members by connecting to their unique Syncthing ID.
This means that all team members have a copy of our company data on their local PCs as well. Whatever modifications I make to my shared folder will be reflected in my teams’ folders everytime Syncthing syncs up our folders.
Syncthing VS Google Drive
First of all, Syncthing is hosted locally. You’re basically turning your computer into your company server. Then the team members can remotely access that server. Google Drive is different because your data is hosted on Google’s servers. This means that if Google wanted to, they can access your data (legislation notwithstanding). Also, if Google got hacked, your data is free for the world to see.
Syncthing also has no arbitrary limits. With Google drive you need to pay for more storage. Syncthing is only limited by the size of your physical hard drive on your computer.
Also, Syncthing is free. But because it is free and open source, it can be a bit tricky to set up for the first time. Fortunately there are handy tutorials on how to get setup. The only disadvantage is that you can only access your shared drives from devices that you’ve connected to your Syncthing network.
De-google step #3: Replacing Google Meets
So I used Zoom. Bad idea. The free version only gave me 45 minutes of time. Not great if you have a client with a long list of tax questions. No one likes getting cut off while talking about taxes. So we shopped around for alternatives.
Fortunately for our team, we use a browser based meeting software called Jitsi Meet for internal meetings. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner really. Once again, it was our ITP that pointed this out to me.
Google Meet Jitsi, your replacement
Haha. Ok, I couldn’t resist the bad dad joke there. Jitsi is quite similar to Google Meet in a lot of ways. They’re both browser based and do everything you would expect a meeting software to be able to do. This includes screen sharing, running chats and inviting multiple attendees. There are a few differences though:
- Google Meet automatically creates a unique meeting room each time you schedule in a meeting, doing the same with Jitsi means having to manually create a unique room each time.
- You can have one standard unique room for all your clients – but this means that sometimes clients may barge into the same room if they both clicked on the link at the same time. Not a deal breaker but sometimes a little bit annoying.
Why Jitsi?
I wouldn’t say Jitsi is superior to Google Meets. Really, the best thing going for it is that it is not Google. This may be just my personal experience but clients have less technical issues with Jitsi compared to Google Meet. There’s a lot less mucking around trying to get sound to go through. But if you’re looking for a free Zoom alternative that isn’t Google Meet – then Jitsi is your best bet!
Other little bits and bobs to de-google
In removing Google from our whole operation, we found that we had to change up some of the other software we used. Most of it was just as simple as removing Google as our main form of login and creating a new login. The biggest pain for me was not using Calendly because it wouldn’t work with Fastmail’s calendar.
So for that we switched to YouCanBookMe. A Calendly alternative which works with Fastmail. As a bonus we got it working with Jitsi too. Hooray!
In the process of de-googling I also came across a really cool todo list software called Todoist. I’ve never been a big fan of todo lists, but I used Google Tasks in the past to keep note of things I have to do but it was always very meh. Todoist has shown me that todo lists can be awesome and a great way of keeping me on track, work wise.
De-google your business – it is easy!
The main reason I wrote this article is to show how easy it is to de-google your business and stop giving money to Google. The next steps for me are to see if I can de-google my personal life, getting rid of all things Google – I’m talking about the stuff I use for free.
From a business perspective, reducing your reliance on one provider is a great way to boost your business’ sustainability. Being ‘all in’ on one provider creates a massive vulnerability for your business if anything happens to that provider. By distributing our software reliance, we’ve created a more robust organisation that can quickly bounce back from technical setbacks. In other words, don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
From a personal perspective, I can’t morally support Google anymore. If you’re like me, and you think that Google has lost its way and are looking for alternatives, this article is for you, my friend.
Take care.
Stay positive!