How to Choose a Data Migration Company

How to Choose a Data Migration Company to Ensure a Swift and Seamless Transition

The complexity of data migration presents a set of challenges unique to your business. Here’s how to choose the best data migration company to guarantee a seamless migration of data – no matter how simple or complex it might be.

Tips for Choosing the Best Data Migration Company for Your Business

Working with an experienced data migration company makes a huge difference in guaranteeing a seamless migration with your data completely intact. Here’s what to look for when choosing the best data migration company for your project:

• Strong Communication Skills: Make sure the data migration company you choose has a detailed intake process they can share that will yield a thorough understanding of your specific needs and requirements. You should be able to preview either the forms you complete or the questions you will answer.
• Test Planning and Development: Experienced data migration companies will pilot or test data subsets before executing the entire project. You should be able to receive their test plan and what the KPIs are that indicate the project is prepared for its final steps.
• Excellent IT Skills: Seek a data migration company that features the essential IT skills necessary to achieve the successful migration of data. This is not just a software challenge. Many times obstacles within networks or hardware need to be solved.
• Wealth of Audit Experience: Your data migration company should possess a wealth of experience in one of the platforms involved in your migration
• Compliance Knowledge: Make sure you can rely on your data migration company for in-depth knowledge of all regulatory guidelines and regulations pertaining to your specific data migration. That means they communicate what, if any, data is protected and that the levels of protection and security are consistent after the migration.

Overcoming the Risks and Challenges of Data Migration

Here are some of the most common risks and challenges facing businesses during database migration (and why it’s so necessary to choose an expert data migration company):

• Risk of Data Loss: Unfortunately, data loss during data migration sometimes occurs and can take quite a toll on your business.
• Compatibility Issues: Conflicting operating systems, unsupported file formats and other issues can seriously impact database functionality.
• Extended Downtime: A faulty data migration plan can cause extended downtime that may disrupt your business operations.
• Poor Execution: A poorly run data migration can lead not only to extended downtime and loss of data, but also time and budget overruns and sub-par performance all around.

In fact, according to a Gartner research article – “Make Data Migration Boring: 10 Steps to Ensure On-Time, High-Quality Delivery” – about 50% of all data migration projects will either exceed their budget and timeline “due to flawed strategy or execution.” In addition, a recent Forbes article titled “Overcoming the Challenges of Data Migration” states that “there is no IT project more dreaded or risky than a data migration project.”

How to Prepare for a Successful Data Migration

The success or failure of your data migration plan largely depends on how carefully and thoroughly you prepare for it. That’s why a comprehensive data migration plan should follow a common, recognizable series of steps that include:

• Set a Realistic Budget and Timeline
• Define and Design the Scope of Migration
• Build the Migration Solution
• Conduct a Test
• Review Test Results for Agreed Upon KPI’s
• Go Live
• Conduct a Comprehensive Audit of the System Both Before and After Migration

What’s Included with Naviant’s Data Migration Services

At Naviant, our comprehensive and customized data migration services allow you to move data quickly, easily and reliably through:

• Data Profiling: We meticulously examine your data and use it to gather statistics and informative summaries about the data.
• Data Cleansing: We provide you the highest functionality your system can achieve by modifying or removing incomplete, duplicated or improperly formatted data.
• Data Validation: We verify that your data has undergone cleansing, thereby ensuring its precision and usability.
• Ongoing Quality Assurance: We index and track every item at the source to easily validate, reconcile and provide transparency.

Rely on the Expertise of Naviant for Robust Data Migration Solutions

Enjoy seamless data migration from one of the country’s most experienced digital content movers. With Naviant, you receive:

• Robust Solutions for Any System No Matter How Complex: We’ve successfully migrated billions of complex records with our customized and comprehensive data migration service solutions.
• The Combined Knowledge of Our Data Migration Specialists: We’re data lovers who enjoy successfully solving complex challenges. We possess the experience and drive to provide your best possible solution for data migration.
• Experience in all Major Industries/Levels of Government: Our diverse range of experience is forged through migrating records for organizations operating in all major industries and levels of government and the private sector.

Take a Look at Some Recent Examples of Our Data Migration Success

At Naviant, we specialize in crafting customized solutions for both large and small data migration challenges. Here are some recent examples of our successful data migration: 

• Successful Migration of 180 Million Documents from SIRE (50+ Cabinets)
• 1.5 Billion Data and Document Migration from IBM FileNet Content Manager
• Migration from 1750 Lotus Notes Databases Contained Within a Single IBM Notes System

In fact, over the past 25 years, we’ve successfully migrated billions of complex records from a multitude of platforms. These data migrations have taken place for many diverse reasons such as:

• Mission critical software systems that no longer meet the business requirements of an organization.
• A legacy system that is no longer supported.
• A vendor that migrated to a new technology platform and issued an end-of-life notice.
• An in-house application custom developed by a programmer who has decided to leave the company.
• An old piece of hardware that is no longer supported.
• An older operating system that requires an upgrade (but the application only works using an older OS).

In addition, there are new challenges in supporting users via the web, mobile devices or other new business opportunities that stretch the capacity of a legacy system that was never designed with the extensive scope, large number of users or volume of data/documents to keep customers happy.

“Continuing to use these legacy systems can result in a huge cost that takes the form of employee time, frustration, customer service response times, efficiency gains, lost business and, of course, cybersecurity risks,” says Naviant’s Vince Hanson, VP of Federal and Florida State Government Accounts, who specializes in integrating low-code platforms to unify mission critical data.

It’s a tough spot to be in. Fortunately, a successful data migration can overcome these challenges.

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