GroupDocs – Total Document Management for Teams

They say no man is an island, but trying to accomplish team projects without the aid of a document management and collaboration app can certainly feel like a lonely endeavor. GroupDocs is a tool that busy professionals can use to work together with colleagues, teammates, and clients on all types of important documents and files.

Whether your organization is large or small, GroupDocs will make your life easier when it comes to working together with colleagues and collaborating on major projects online. As soon as you’ve created a free account, you can start dragging and dropping files from your desktop to your GroupDocs dashboard page. The files you drag to your dashboard page will be saved in the GroupDocs application cloud, which means they’re accessible no matter what computer you’re using. To edit files and collaborate with colleagues, select the document you’d like to work on and click “Share.” GroupDocs will invite you to enter the email address of the person you’d like to share the document with, and that person’s avatar will show up next to the document on your dashboard page.

In addition to sharing and editing documents with colleagues, you can also use GroupDocs to annotate, assemble, convert, and sign virtually any type of digital file. The documents you select will show up within your browser window regardless of whether you have the software they were created in loaded onto your computer. You can even use the application’s digital signature service to collect signatures from clients without having to deal with time consuming faxes or expensive envelopes and stamps.

Practical Uses:

• Ask clients what they think about a new presentation you’re working on
• Compare two versions of a similar product report
• Get a real estate contract signed by all parties involved in the sale
• Open up a DOCX file even if you don’t have Word downloaded on your computer

Insider Tips:

• The Comparison tool merges documents and highlights the areas where those documents differ
• GroupDocs supports 16 different file types
• Users can drag and drop files from their desktops into the app
• People don’t need to have Adobe installed to use GroupDocs’ PDF annotator

What we liked:

• Colleagues can view and comment on each other’s documents using the Annotation tool
• Companies can save on printing costs by having documents signed digitally
• People can keep copies of important documents saved online
• Work teams can avoid errors by working together on group assignments

What we didn’t like:

• Users can’t convert documents to XLS format

Alternatives:

• Dropbox – https://www.dropbox.com
• Google Docs – https://docs.google.com
• Sync.in – http://sync.in

Company Info:

• Launched: February 2012
• Privately Held
• Headquarters: Australia
• Web site: http://groupdocs.com

Costs:

• Free plan
• Individual plan is $10 per month
• Group plan is $19 per user, per month
• Enterprise plan starts at $24 per user, per month