Wakefly's operations, from managing customer information to web hosting to data analysis. âSecurity is critical for th
> SMB SNAPSHOT Wakefly Everyone in business knows the rules for marketing are changing. Online marketing is central to that change, and a static, “brochureware” website isn’t enough anymore. Wakefly, a ten-year-old, 25-person online marketing firm based in Westborough, Massachusetts, has ridden changes in the marketing game to a coveted spot on the 2012 Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing companies. Wakefly was recognized for creating great-looking, highly transactional websites that convert browsers to buyers.
THE ORGANISATION WEBSITE: www.wakefly.com
WHY SYMANTEC? • Simplicity in management
INDUSTRY: Business Services
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Protection against mal-ware
EMPLOYEES: 25
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Simple management console
HEADQUARTERS: Westborough,
Massachusetts, U.S.A. THE SOLUTION • Symantec™Endpoint Protection.cloud
THE INFRASTRUCTURE • Software-as-a-Service Environment •
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) used for hosting
– Outsourced Applications
Wakefly works with about 200 clients a year, ranging from software firms to healthcare companies, most of which have more than $10 million in annual revenue. Wakefly develops the websites; drives traffic to the sites using pay-per-click, search engine optimization, other techniques; and automates the tracking of leads and nurturing of leads into customers. “We know what we’re doing,” CEO and co-founder Dean Dorazio says confidently. “We’re perceived in the business as operating each of the three facets of our business at the highest level.” THE CHALLENGE
Information security is a necessary foundation for all of Wakefly’s operations, from managing customer information to web hosting to data analysis. “Security is critical for the protection of our image,” Dorazio explains. “We get a black eye if we don’t know how to protect our information, or our clients’ information.” But in late 2011, security at Wakefly—using ESET NOD32, and hosted in-house—was taking too much time and effort for the small company. “The management interface was a nightmare,” Dorazio recalls. “Deploying new computers was hard. Deploying patches and upgrades, all that stuff, was hard.” THE SOLUTION
Apart from his dissatisfaction with its old solution, Dorazio wanted to move Wakefly’s security into the cloud. After all, many of Wakefly’s other business processes were procured on
a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) basis. “We believe strongly in running a SaaS-based company,” he says. “We outsource our email and phone systems, for example. I try to run a very lean environment here, so we’re not bogged down with overhead and IT.” A local IT consultant recommended that Dorazio look at Symantec™ Endpoint Protection, and after running some tests he chose Symantec Endpoint Protection.cloud. Purchased directly from Symantec, the protection was pushed out to 30 desktops and 10 servers. THE BENEFITS
All features of Symantec Endpoint Protection.cloud, including the firewall, intrusion prevention, device control, and application control, work hard at Wakefly. Dorazio reports that dozens of viruses, risky cookies, and misleading applications are blocked in a typical week. Security administration—a stumbling block with the old solution—is now largely automated. “I spend close to zero time on it, which is fantastic,” Dorazio says. “The product has basically been able to resolve all the issues that we’ve had on its own—which is great.” And Wakefly’s staff, which includes power-user developers working on high-end workstations, don’t notice a performance hit. “In a developer environment, lots of times they’re checking in and checking out a whole website, which might be tens or hundreds of thousands of files,” Dorazio explains. “Anvirus scanning can be a major issue, but with Symantec Endpoint Protection.cloud it’s pretty transparent.”
“I spend close to zero time on [administration],
which is fantastic. The product has basically been able to resolve all the issues that we’ve had on its own—which is great.” Dean Dorazio CEO and Co-Founder, Wakefly
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