Item: Google Hangouts (Classic)
Rating: 9
Author: Ho'omana Nathan Horton

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Hangouts is used primarily to interact when collaborating on documents/files in Google Drive. Although Google Drive has built-in chat and commenting capabilities, it's nice to be able to have more of a record, and to communicate outside of the documents we're currently working in. This is especially nice since it's integrated with Google.

Pros and Cons

Hangouts makes it easy to transition between chatting, calling, etc.
Before the demise of Google+, it was beautifully integrated with that platform.
Hangouts keeps a nice record of your chats that can be accessed easily from within Gmail or other Google platforms.

Hangouts sometimes doesn't alert me to a new chat or invite, especially from people not already in my Google contacts.
There's not much to complain about, it mostly just works the way it should!

Return on Investment

Hangouts has provided an avenue for IM and calling outside of the organizational structure.
Hangouts has also streamlined our collaborative efforts, especially when using Google products.

Alternatives Considered

Zoom, Skype for Business (formerly Lync) and Microsoft Teams

As mentioned previously, the Microsoft products are much better for working within Active Directory, and especially when on the local network. However, Hangouts is a nice, quick and easy option for communicating from anywhere, and outside of that structure, so it's better for collaboration, including asynchronous collaboration and especially in Google products.

Support Rating

Not much to add here, except that Hangouts has nice documentation and any outages, etc. have always been resolved fairly quickly.

Key Insights

Do you think Google Hangouts (Classic) delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Google Hangouts (Classic)'s feature set?

Yes

Did Google Hangouts (Classic) live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Google Hangouts (Classic) go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Google Hangouts (Classic) again?

Yes

Likelihood to Recommend

Hangouts is ideal for chatting and/or calling people who are already in your Google contacts, and Hangouts can be especially nice if you're already working on something together in a Google product (e.g. Docs, etc.). However, for more standard, organizational interactions, there are better solutions I think (e.g. Skype for Business, Teams).

Hangouts is a nice IM\calling option for collaborating outside an organizational structure

Overall Satisfaction with Google Hangouts