Dito

BACKGROUND

Can you provide a brief overview of your company?

We’re in the entertainment business, and we have multiple businesses. One of them is we have stages that we rent out to our customers. So, they’ll come and shoot fashion, a video, a commercial, or a TV series, whatever it is. We also rent out vehicles. Perhaps our clients will rent a motor home and go onsite, and they’ll rent all of our equipment and gear so they can do their videos or fashion shoot. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was your main goal for undertaking the project with Dito?

When I started, we were running Exchange. We had an underpowered machine that wasn’t reliable; I was concerned about backing it up and redundancy. I was concerned about licensing and making sure that people can connect when they're on the Web. We didn’t have OWA set up properly, so it wasn’t a good experience for our end user. I had to decide whether to upgrade Exchange, which would cost quite a bit of money and licensing; it would cost more than if we went to a cloud solution. I was looking at Google Apps and Exchange. At the time, I think it was called BPOS, but now it's called 365. 

What made Google Apps stand out over Office 365?

At the time, Google was a more mature product. Microsoft was a little late to the game and they were playing catch-up, so their solution wasn’t as refined. Google had been doing it for quite some time. We also have a younger user base and most of them have a personal Google account, so they’re familiar with Google and Gmail. I thought the learning curve wouldn’t be terrible. It would be pretty seamless.

SOLUTION

What was your process for discovering and choosing Dito?

I called Google, and they recommended Dito to me. I spoke with one other local vendor, and Dito just stood out. I had a good conversation with their sales rep initially, and he put me at ease. They're a preferred partner of Google, which I found out first hand because Google recommended them. That was how we chose Dito.

What parts of the project were they involved in, and at what stages?

They were involved from the very beginning, and they held our hand because this is a big move for us. We didn’t have an Exchange admin on staff, and I didn’t want to be the one – I had never done that migration from Exchange to a cloud solution. I was much more comfortable, and the price was right to have them lead that project. I worked closely with all of their guys, and they gave me the support group that we needed to pull it off. It was super successful with no downtime, and all of our documents transferred over. It was a really positive experience. Once we went live, they were prepared to give us many training sessions, and they're still very accessible. That’s one the great things because now we’re using Gmail, and they’re on my chat window. If I ever have a question, I could always just send them a chat message. They’re really responsive; they either get me that information and if they don’t know it, they’ll find it.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

How do you feel about Google Apps so far?

I’m not married to Gmail – I like it. It works. Every company is different, but it’s a good fit for our company, especially in terms of collaboration. Before, we created an Excel file, emailed it, somebody would make a change and email it, and there were about 50 different versions. Now we create a Google doc, share it, and everybody can collaborate and make changes at the same time –it’s just one document. Microsoft is also going that route, but this is definitely working for us.

Was there anything that you found unique about Dito when you were working with them, compared to other IT vendors that you’ve worked with in the past?

Their accessibility. It's easy to talk to those guys. I really like the fact that they were on an instant message site and many times, we didn’t have to call them. I would just chat and they'd say, “All right, I’m doing this,” and I'd reply, “Okay, I’ll do this.” We work together as a team. I would make changes and change the next records, and it worked really well. The whole solution from the beginning to end was a fun project.

BACKGROUND

Could you please provide a general description of what your company does?

We are a vacation rental and realty home sales company on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We have about 500 vacation homes in our program and we have offices in three separate locations on the Outer Banks

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was your main goal or objective for undertaking the project with Dito?

To have 100 percent uptime with our email because that’s one of our primary methods of daily correspondence, We had a series of problems with the equipment based on the island being inaccessible due to storms. One way to mitigate that was to put Exchange servers offsite, or to switch to something akin to Google Apps. Google Apps ended up being the more comprehensive solution for us.

What was your process for discovering and choosing Dido to work with?

I had actually corresponded with somebody at Google, I believe, who then put me in contact with Dito. I don’t remember if they had a series of organizations or not to select from. The only folks I spoke with were from Dito. They presented a great package and that’s why we chose to work with Dito.

SOLUTION

Can you talk more about the scope of the project?

Dito was involved first with really educating me as the IT contact as to what the benefits would be of having Google Apps versus something else. They were very familiar with my scenario of having Microsoft Exchange and being in a precarious location. They were able to walk me through all of the benefits of not just the email, but the entirety of the whole package with Google Apps. They offered their whole migration services, which was phenomenal. In addition, they understood fully the difficulty that IT professionals have managing change and the perception of change within the organization, and they were able to lend guidance with how to manage the folks who would be anxiety-ridden about having to learn a new process and system. They provided training for them and their whole migration and installation was flawless.

How long ago was the project completed?

It was in 2009.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Are you satisfied with the work they’ve done?

I’m 100 percent satisfied. It’s a phenomenal company. Every person that I’ve interacted with at Dito is just a top-notch professional and extremely knowledgeable.

In working with Dito, is there anything that stood out as being unique or special compared to other IT vendors that you’ve worked with?

I would say the comprehensive package that they were able to provide to the people who were able to explain the technical details as well were extraordinary. The transition from the salesperson to the technical people to whoever did the training, every single link in their chain was 100 percent top-notch. I think that’s a unique quality for companies to have. To be able that maintain the same level of service no matter what department you’re dealing with. Everything that they said they were going to do, they did in the same time frame that they outlined. They don’t just leave things hanging; they follow-up. They’re 100 percent accessible and 100 percent dependable.

Looking back on the project, is there anything you would do differently a second time around, or think they can improve upon?

No. It’s rare that I would say that because, in the way I work, I’m always looking to do something better. Not that anything is subpar, but one can typically always find a way to improve the process. I swear, though, with Dito, that migration and rollover from Microsoft Exchange, given all of the different variables that I was dealing with, being the only IT person, it was such a relief for me. As much as I wish I could offer something to do better for them, they know what they’re doing.