Back­ground

Aberdeen Group, a Boston-based tech­nology research firm, provides a suite of research offerings consisting of bench­marking, market and solution assess­ments, solution selection and sales accel­er­ation programs to Fortune 5000 companies.

Aberdeen Group delivers a large percentage of their services to their clients via their website. In addition to being a hub for client inter­action, Aberdeen Group’s web hosting envi­ronment is also the company’s main vehicle for launching direct and indirect email marketing campaigns.

Aberdeen’s reliance on their web hosting envi­ronment as a primary revenue source prompted Aberdeen’s senior management to initiate a thorough eval­u­ation and reengi­neering of their web hosting solution.

Welsh Consulting was tasked with the successful completion of this initiative.

Aberdeen Group’s Objectives:

• Evaluate Aberdeen’s current web hosting environment
• Evaluate multiple managed hosting providers
• Design and implement a managed hosting solution to meet Aberdeen’s business requirements
• Migrate Aberdeen’s web hosting envi­ronment to their new managed hosting provider

Welsh Consulting’s Solution:

After assessing Aberdeen Group’s business needs, Welsh Consulting designed a new managed hosting solution consisting of four web servers. These servers were respon­sible for deliv­ering content, database, search, secure payment and email services. These business require­ments were then used to evaluate multiple managed hosting providers. Upon careful eval­u­ation and nego­ti­ation on the part of Welsh Consulting, NaviSite was selected.

Following the design and vendor selection process, Welsh Consulting’s staff worked closely with Aberdeen’s current hosting provider, NaviSite and Aberdeen’s tech­nical staff to manage and facil­itate a seamless tran­sition of their business critical systems.

As Aberdeen’s web site is accessed daily by hundreds of Fortune 2000 firms, including clients such as SAP, Oracle and others, as well as sending up to 75,000 emails at a time to clients on a regular basis, the need to seam­lessly tran­sition between hosting providers was imperative.

Welsh Consulting’s tech­nical staff utilized MS Project as a planning and orga­ni­zation tool to assure that all parties clearly under­stood their roles, respon­si­bil­ities and time require­ments of key project tasks. HP servers running Microsoft Windows Server, Internet Infor­mation Server and Microsoft SQL Server were employed to deliver the required core func­tion­ality. In addition, several third party appli­ca­tions were imple­mented to fulfill niche needs, such as PayFlow Pro, Ultraseek and a host of inter­nally developed utilities.

Results:

Aberdeen Group’s web presence was seam­lessly tran­si­tioned to their new managed hosting provider. This new solution resides on new network equipment, running the latest versions of various vendors’ software.

Aberdeen Group’s web presence operates from a secure, redundant hosting envi­ronment ensuring the continuous oper­ation of this vital part of their business.

Welsh Consulting continues on in an advisory and support role, providing strategic advice, proactive support and admin­is­tration of Aberdeen Group’s IT operations.