Thursday, May 28, 2015

Choosing between SharePoint On-Premises vs O365 (SharePoint Online)

SharePoint is one of the software used in large number in various organizations to connect and collaborate organizational data in between their employees behind firewall.Its one of the top selling software in Microsoft product gallery. Organizations are believing in it because its not only  having features like CMS,collaboration or document management but its more than that. In one sentence i can say that now its becoming face of organizations.

Microsoft has introduced online version of SharePoint called as O365 (SharePoint Online). When I attend the prospect meetings it has been always asked by client for which version to go for.. Its very hard to answer them in first meeting without understanding their requirement because the answer is depend on their exact need, type of data transaction, usage and many other key requirements.

There are some pros and cons in choosing the O365 vs SharePoint on premises. you will get lot of detailed material on internet but its important to satisfy your customer with minimum explanation with maximum information. I tried my level best to describe it in below five bull-ted points which could easily help to answer in quick time and satisfy your customers.

1.Cost- This factor is always considers though you talk to any SMB or big entrepreneur. Organizations works on CAPEX and OPEX modal and its always a pain point for them that if OPEX cost is more and keep increasing then that become something over head for them.So while purchasing its always thought what would be the initial investment and then how much is required for its support and maintenance annually.

Here O365 do not involved in CAPEX cost as it purely based on subscription licensed modal. Microsoft provide the SharePoint services on cloud along with outlook,office. So here only customer will have to pay for yearly subscription.

SharePoint on premises needs supporting hardware,SharePoint admin skilled people to maintain it and there is also CAL license concept for it.Over all  CAPEX cost is huge along with OPEX cost in SharePoint On prem.

So the organizations which has capability to invest and required it for some future plans for more services from it then they can go SharePoint on premises version. Those who are not required other SharePoint services and satisfied with available feature of O365 then O365 is better for them.

2. Customization Flexibility- SharePoint on premises is very flexible and support any kind of customization. O365 also support some level of customization but have some limitations for customization.

3. Data Storage- Its always been expected by organizations that any application will hold the data and then there will be slice and dice of it to prepare some meaningful information from it and that will help in organization growth.
O365 has some limitations for data storage.SharePoint on premise server can be scaled at any level and due to this there is no more limitations for data storage.
4.Custom Development- When organizations purchase any software they always look into it to customize it as per their company need. This is also one of the decision making point as O365 has limitations for custom development while SharePoint on premise can support all kind of custom development
5. Business Continuity- This is one of the important factor while making the decision.Those do not have any future plans for SharePoint and want to use it for particular time period then O365 is only the right choice for them. But those who have some big plans for data and information then they must go for SharePoint on prem..


Hope this will help SharePoint experts to talk with their prospects in better way for comparison point.