Why Use Google Drive Instead of Dropbox for Your Agency - #AgencyToolbox

Welcome back to episode number seven of Agency Toolbox. I'm your host, Gray MacKenzie, and today we are talking about file management solutions. This is always a fun topic. So I'm going to explain to you guys why my agency, Guavabox, eventually chose Google Drive over Dropbox for file sharing. Even though we started out using Dropbox. So through WordPress installs to gather content from clients after almost every call, if we're building a game plan for a client, the client's going to have a homework assignment where they're going to have to fill out a form. And it's not always just forms, but that's one of the big things. And so we can zap using Zapier, we can grab that information and pull it right into a document that we're actively working on inside of Google Drive. We also use HubSpot and the ability to draft a blog post inside Drive and zap it up to HubSpot or have a client do that is something that can be really handy. So the other thing is Drive is obviously because it's native, it's got a superior integration into things like your Google, into your Gmail and the other Google applications that you're using. So I prefer the integrations of Google Drive versus Dropbox. They both have awesome integrations if you're looking at what at different platforms that do file management and have links in from the different services. If you see one, odds are you're gonna see the other. Dropbox kind of got out in front before Drive. So I think that Dropbox right now has a little bit of an edge because they're a little bit farther along as a product than Drive. The third thing, this did not really factor into our decision making process and it probably won't for you because our relatively inexpensive file sharing solutions that allow you to share different folders, that allow you to drag stuff from your desktop directly into folders that will sync with the cloud and they both have awesome mobile apps that you can use to access your files on the go, all that kind of stuff. And they, they both handle a wide range of files. Text, documents, images, video files, pretty much anything that you want to upload, you'll be able to throw into one of these systems and then access elsewhere. So a couple things that I really liked about Dropbox and miss now that we're using Google Drive, and one of those, probably the biggest one honestly for me is the Selective Sync features. So Selective Sync is what allows you to using the desktop app for your computer. Selective Sync is what lets you decide what folders do I want to have synced and what do I not? So at this point, with 111 gigabytes or something worth of data in my Dropbox account, I don't want all of that information on my on my laptop every day that I'm using. So I want to have the majority of that stuff just sitting in the cloud because a lot of that stuff's archived, it's old, I don't use it on an everyday basis. So it's no big deal for me to go grab it when I actually need it because it's pretty rare. And I would much rather have to go through that hassle than have the hassle of that taking up a ton of space on my local machine. So the big difference here is both of them have selective sync. Dropbox and Google Drive both allow you to pick and choose what folders do you want to on your local machine and what ones would you like to not sync. The big difference is that folders that are inside a folder. So subfolders. So if we have one folder that's called Client Files and inside of that we've got Client A, Client B and Client C. In Dropbox I can choose I only want Client B synced and I don't want Client A or C Drive. I can't do that if I'm going to sync a parent folder, I get everything that's underneath that. So what that has meant for us in using Drive is we now have more top level folders than we had when we were using Dropbox. So I guess the combination, the other side effect is that I have more files on my local machine than I would if I was using Dropbox. So we don't always want to go to all these top level folders because that can become a mess as well. So there are folders that are on my machine right now that I. That I really never access. But I care about other things that for some reason we made the choice to use subfolders in Drive and we'll get into that more in episode number eight. So that's number one. That's a big pro for Dropbox. I like the desktop better with Dropbox. You can see you can get alerts on what files are being updated and you can just click on the little icon in your, in the top of your window on your machine. I use a Mac and see what files have synced lately or someone shared something with you. Access that right away. Now Google Drive has notifications too. I am just not as used at this point. To checking it and seeing what files someone just uploaded. So if I'm trying to see a mock up rather than forcing someone to send me a link, if they just saved it in Dropbox, a lot of times I can just grab it directly from the Dropbox drop down if you it really. This is a pretty minor concern, but it's something that I do prefer about Dropbox over Drive. And then the third thing is just the reliability track record, the speed. Dropbox has a really slight edge to me. It's not noticeable. But I know that a lot of people have stuck with Dropbox because they're worried about Drive. So that those are kind of the three reasons why you would choose Dropbox over Drive or three of the reasons. Let's look on the other side though, at why we wound up using Drive. And the biggest one definitely number one, is document editing. So the fact that there's an inline text editor, complete replacement if you prefer to use it over the Microsoft Word suite, in the whole Microsoft Office suite, you can kind of do away with if you get comfortable using Google Docs and Google Presentations or Google Slides and the tools that Google already has built in. So we deal a ton with content. And so this is really what swung us over is if you're an inbound marketing agency, you're dealing with a ton of content. And odds are that a good amount of that content is going to be collaborative and not having to constantly download Docs. The ability to work two people working on the same document at the same time without messing the other person up or saving conflicting files, which we used to run and do Dropbox all the time, that has been a big reason. Integrations, these are somewhat related. So we use a lot of Gravity forms through WordPress installs to gather content from clients after almost every call. If we're building a game plan for a client, the client's gonna have a homework assignment where they're gonna have to fill out a form. And it's not always just forms, but that's. That's one of the big things. And so we can zap using zapier, we can grab that information and pull it right into a document that we're actively working on inside of Google Drive. We also use HubSpot and the ability to draft a blog post inside Drive and zap it up to HubSpot or have a client do that is something that can be really handy. So the other thing is Drive is obviously because it's native, it's got a superior integration into things like your Google into your Gmail and the other Google applications that you're using. So I prefer the integrations of Google Drive versus Dropbox. They both have awesome integrations. If you're looking at what at different platforms that do file management and have links in from the different services. If you see one, odds are you're going to see the other. Dropbox kind of got out in front before Drive. So I think that Dropbox right now has a little bit of an edge because they're a little bit farther along as a product than Drive. The third thing, this did not really factor into our decision making process and it probably won't for you because the reality is that the value in those files is worth far more than these services cost. But if you do look at cost for comparable plans, you're paying five or ten times less if you buy Drive versus Dropbox. So I think we were paying ten bucks a month for Dropbox Pro and, and then for Drive we, I think it's like two bucks a month to upgrade and get a lot of space. I don't know if it's as much space as Dropbox, but it's plenty to cover our needs and I can grab a link to that information, throw it in the show notes, which will be@doinbow.com toolbox so cost wise, Drive is less expensive than Dropbox. Ultimately though, unless you are just starting out, that's probably not going to factor into the decision making process because whether it's 10 bucks a month per user or 2 bucks a month per user, you need to have those files either way. So I don't know how big of a, how big of a factor that cost is, but it's something to keep in mind as you are making the decision. All right, well I'm gonna stop talking there and let you guys do some more research. Think about this if you have thoughts. I would love to know what your agency is using right now and how you're using it or if you have any questions. So if you could drop me a note@graydewinbound.com I'd love to hear what you're using, give you any tips that I've learned and pick up any from you to share with the audience. And in the next episode, episode number eight of Agency Toolbox, we're going to dive into what that file management structure that we have set up for our agency, what that looks like. All right, I will see you next time. Have a great rest of your day. And I hope that this podcast, video podcast is continuing to make your life more efficient and more effective. And we will see you soon.