Google has taken the “corporate only” wraps off its Google Sites service and made it available to all users.

At its most basic level, Google Sites offers a simple website creation tool with all the standard WYSIWYG fanfare – made as simple as possible. Being that its a Google offering, it has all the social and multimedia integration you’d expect (e.g. video, pictures, calendars etc).

Don’t have a domain? No problems. Your Google site can sit as a subdomain on the Google sites address e.g. sites.google.com/sites/[your site]

So is Google Sites worth investing your time and effort in? If your website looks like a throwback from the 80′s, then it does offer a simple and FREE way to build a reasonable good looking basic website, with some pre-loaded themes to assist the creatively challenged.

Here’s a quick one I whipped up for ineedhits.

It’s all child play to create the site, with simple gadgets and inbuilt functions to make your site more interactive. Spread across three design tabs – you’ll be able to change appearances, add analytics, and even allow others to edit, view and comment on the site.

That said, there are probably more feature filled website building tools out there that are free, (or almost free).

So the real value of Google Sites (in my opinion) is the collaborative nature of it. If you have a community group, or need an office intranet to share ideas and information, then Google sites could be the answer.

While it’s not as feature rich as some of the other “wiki” style collaborative site builders out there (i.e. Basecamp), its Google product integration will place it in good stead in this growingly important space.

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