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OLX Group: Building a global community with Google Workspace

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With Google Workspace and NextNovate, the OLX Group made collaboration on a global scale easier, faster, and more frequent, and brought its worldwide community together with a social hub.

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The OLX Group operates a network of trading platforms in over 40 countries, creating win-win exchanges for people, communities, and the environment.

Features used
Drive
Docs
Forms
Google Meet
Sheets
Slides
olx group hero image for web 960x415

With Google Workspace and NextNovate, the OLX Group made collaboration on a global scale easier, faster, and more frequent, and brought its worldwide community together with a social hub.

Google Workspace Results

Broadcasting leadership meetings to employees worldwide

• Communicates company-wide goals effectively and clearly with live streams of meetings in Google Meet with YouTube

• Fosters greater communication between teams with a social hub built on Google+

• Makes collaboration easier and faster with shared files and live editing in Google Docs

By focussing on win-win outcomes for buyers, sellers, and the communities in which it operates, the OLX Group has become a leading online trading platform with 17 brands, 4,000 employees across the world, and 300 million monthly users. With South African media giant Naspers as a primary investor and a global presence, the OLX Group has the security and resources of a multinational but always strives to keep the vitality and energy of a startup. When the company wanted to improve communication and collaboration between teams around the world without imposing a top down solution, it used Google Workspace.

“We needed to connect everybody and have a product that we could scale to the whole world. Our leadership and culture embrace change, so there's always an open door to test new technologies that will help us improve and move fast. Google is, I think, a perfect example of that,” says Ana Garcia, Global Head of Communications at OLX Group.

Fostering collaboration with Google Workspace

“I can't imagine my life without Google Docs, Slides, and sheets. Having a single document where managers in every country can input content at the same time is great. It’s the ultimate collaboration and I think it’s something that only Google can do for you.” Ana Garcia, Global Head of Communications, OLX Group

Operating across dozens of countries, the OLX Group has a truly global presence. At the same time, the company works hard to serve each community according to its specific needs. “Our official headquarters is in the Netherlands but we try to be as decentralized as possible,” says Garcia. The OLX Group wanted to help its leadership team communicate its goals effectively and keep its local teams empowered. The company looked for a solution to address its communication needs and improve collaboration in a simple, easy-to-use way that could be rapidly deployed across its workforce.

The OLX Group turned to Google Workspace, teaming up with Google Partner NextNovate to help ensure a smooth delivery and help its staff through the transition. Keen to go beyond a typical Google Workspace rollout, NextNovate and the OLX Group developed an internal social hub based on Google+, which allowed teams across the world to chat, transfer files, share content, and connect with each other with a speed they never had before. The OLX Group and NextNovate also came up with an innovative way of broadcasting leadership Google Meet on YouTube to the wider community across the world, who could ask questions and interact with the meeting via Google Forms. Meanwhile, with the full range of Google Workspace products such as Google Docs, Drive, and Google Meet, the company was able to solve many problems with a single, integrated platform.

“I can't imagine my life without Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets,” says Garcia. “Having a single document where managers in every country can input content at the same time is great. It’s the ultimate collaboration and I think it’s something that only Google can do for you.”

Global communication, local empowerment

“In some ways, having Google Workspace and this platform feels like we’re speaking face to face. Teams feel so much more part of the global community. You kill the middle man. People can share ideas and solutions without going through headquarters. They just do it themselves.” Ana Garcia, Global Head of Communications, OLX Group

Google Workspace helped the OLX Group bring its workforce closer than ever before. Its ease of use and NextNovate’s comprehensive change management program meant that the OLX Group employees adopted Google Workspace quickly. “90% of our employees who are on Google Workspace are connected to our Global Social Media—the Google+ Communities. The engagement there keeps growing every month," says Garcia. The live-streamed Google Meet and social hub saw user engagement jump with each broadcast, while the feedback via Google Forms helped employees shape future meetings. In addition, with its simplicity and seamless integration of several products, Google Workspace has helped the OLX Group speed up its collaborative processes across several time zones. With Google and NextNovate, the OLX Group has found a solution that connects all its teams across the world without compromising autonomy.

“In some ways, having Google Workspace and this platform feels like we’re speaking face to face. Teams feel so much more part of the global community,” says Garcia. “You kill the middle man. People can share ideas and solutions without going through headquarters. They just do it themselves.”

*Google Workspace was formerly known as G Suite prior to Oct. 6, 2020.

Deployment Partner (Google Workspace authorized reseller)

NextNovate

NextNovate helps companies to integrate and implement cloud computing solutions and provides a change management program to make those solutions a reality.