Disaster Recovery Case Study: GSD&M
Largest Southwest U.S. Ad Agency Keeps Email Up & Running – No Matter What – With MessageOne’s Email Management Services (EMS)
With clients including many of the world’s leading companies such as Southwest Airlines, Wal-Mart, U.S. Air Force, DreamWorks and the PGA TOUR, Omnicom’s GSD&M is one of today’s premier advertising agencies. GSD&M has over 600 employees, an estimated $1.3 billion in billings (2003) and over 26 clients – making communication an essential part of doing business.
Background
Founded in 1971, Austin, Texas-based Omnicom ad agency GSD&M, believes that you have to stand for something – even if you’re an advertising agency. At GSD&M, they don’t make ads. They think of ideas – visionary ideas that get their clients where they want to go faster than anyone thought possible. With an estimated $1.3 billion in billings (2003) and world-known brands as clients such as Southwest Airlines, Wal-Mart, U.S. Air Force, DreamWorks and the PGA TOUR, GSD&M has come to realize that communication is key to a successful relationship with clients, and thus successful to business.
Situation
As with most ad agencies, one of the primary communication tools at GSD&M is email – it’s the principle way that the staff communicates and collaborates with each other and with their clients. It is essential to the day-to-day functioning of the agency.
“We needed a solution that would guarantee email would always be up and running – no matter what. That’s why we turned to MessageOne’s EMS – it’s low-cost, easily deployed and serves us well.”
Jerry Rios, Senior Vice President & Chief Technology Officer
GSD&M (an Omnicom Company)
“Over the past few years, email has largely replaced the telephone and fax as the way we communicate with our clients,” says Jerry Rios, Senior Vice President & Chief Technology Officer at Omnicom’s GSD&M.
GSD&M knows all too well that interrupted email costs the agency their clients’ trust and money. After experiencing multiple email outages, Rios and his team had to find a cost-effective backup email system that would reside outside of the agency and would be available at a moment’s notice in the event of an email outage, no matter what the cause. Ideally, this email system would be resistant to viruses, worms and other “malware” that target the Windows platform. That’s when they turned to MessageOne’s EMS Email Continuity as their email continuity solution.
Solution
GSD&M didn’t have to look far for such an email backup system. MessageOne’s EMS Email Continuity proved to be the right combination of assurance and cost savings.
“We needed a solution that would guarantee email would always be up and running – no matter what. That’s why we turned to MessageOne’s EMS – it’s low-cost, easily deployed and serves us well,” said Rios.
EMS provides “Email Dial Tone” for enterprises. Designed as a hot-standby email system that kicks in when a company’s primary email system has been taken down by any one of a number of natural, man-made or technology disasters, EMS guarantees the uninterrupted flow of business-critical information between a company and its customers, partners and employees.
Built on Linux, it is also resistant to zero-day viruses and poison pills that can incapacitate the typical enterprise- messaging infrastructure. Finally, its built-in notification system allows management to communicate with employees during a disaster using multiple “channels” (SMS, RIM, pager, personal email, etc).
All of this is delivered in an incredibly affordable package (less than one-tenth the price of traditional, replicated backup email systems) that deploys in well under a day and requires zero ongoing maintenance/ management. Moreover, it can be hosted at world class, hardened disaster recovery facilities run by SunGard and IBM.
Take the Next Step
For Omincom’s GSD&M, MessageOne’s EMS Email Continuity represents the most affordable and effective hot-standby backup email system. EMS guarantees email continuity – no matter what. To find out more about how you can guarantee email continuity for your organization, contact MessageOne at 888-367-0777 (512-652-4500) or register for a free product demonstration.
View a PDF version of the GSD&M Disaster Recovery Case Study.
