By Stacey Farrar, product marketing manager at BitTitan
Until recently, Microsoft’s free solution for tenant-to-tenant migrations was utilized by many IT professionals for their migration needs. However, some users of the tool currently face a vexing challenge during the process: Microsoft recently changed its terms-of-use restrictions, which now require users to purchase a license if either tenant is bound by an Enterprise Agreement.
As a result of this change, many IT managers may be considering other free and third-party solutions for their migration needs. With an array of migration providers to choose from, it’s important to select a solution that best fits your business and operational needs. However, this process can be overwhelming, especially when you aren’t sure what to look for.
Here are a few factors to consider when looking at migration tool options, including a closer look at the pros and cons of free first-party tools versus third-party solutions-and how IT professionals can select the right one to execute smooth, successful migrations.
Pricing Considerations for Choosing the Right Migration Tool
On the surface, free migration tools sound like a convenient, cost-effective option. But in reality, free migration tools are designed for narrowly prescribed scenarios with fairly restrictive sets of support dependencies and requirements. Additional service configurations, expensive certifications and other costs are often necessary, depending on the migration needs. In addition, many so-called “free” solutions also come with hidden fees such as software licensing, hardware and engineering costs.
Third-party solutions, meanwhile, often go beyond the basics and offer improved configuration and control over the migration. As a result, IT pros can streamline the migration process and rely more on the migration tool to complete the project, saving time, resources and money.
Third-party solutions also have different pricing structures to best meet the needs of the migration project. For example, third-party tools will often offer bundles based on how much and what type of data needs to be migrated-mailboxes, documents, or personal archives, for example. Companies can take advantage of an all-in-one price that meets their migration goals without any hidden fees or unexpected costs.
Configuration, Scalability, and the Limits of Free Tools
Migration speed is affected by numerous factors, including type and amount of data, available bandwidth, throttling, and source environment. Free tools may be an option for smaller, less complex migration projects, such as moving the basic components of a mailbox, including mail items, calendars and contacts.
Free tools often target the most common migration scenarios, such as direct moves between Gmail and Exchange or between Office 365 tenants. However, free tools rarely scale to handle user counts in the thousands-and they typically cannot migrate as many users concurrently. In addition, many free tools offer limited customization and reporting options.
Unlike free tools, third-party solutions continuously undergo feature and performance updates, making them faster, more reliable and scalable for larger, more complex projects. With paid third-party solutions, users aren’t required to have a firm grasp of the migration process, as the tools typically do much of the heavy lifting. However, if users have the resources to plan, configure and test their own migration, a free tool may work to their benefit.
To determine which tool is best for their migration project, IT professionals should conduct proof-of-concept with a small number of users to test the performance and configuration time necessary to complete a migration. As a result, the team can better understand the process while determining whether a free first-party or third-party solution is best for the project.
Live Reporting and Error Identification
With any migration project, errors are bound to happen. So it’s important that users can easily, quickly and seamlessly grasp the functionalities of the tools they are using. This will enable them to understand where those errors occur-down to the individual item level-so IT can troubleshoot and guide migrations along, helping avoid bottlenecks.
In some cases, free migration tools may not provide the same live, granular reporting on project status and errors that paid solutions can provide. When using a free tool, such reporting may not be readily available-but it’s a critical resource, especially when dealing with high user counts or high compliance environments. This is another factor that may not seem so obvious during the decision-making process for which migration tool to use, but mid-migration, it will become painfully obvious for the project managers who will be digging to find the errors in their migrations-a common frustration when dealing with the bare-bones visibility of common free tools.
Considering the Differences in Support
Even the most successful migration projects can have setbacks. For example, an item may not migrate and cause an error, a password could be entered incorrectly or a source endpoint may be misconfigured. While most errors can be fixed quickly, some require support to get things back on track.
When using free tools, teams must usually rely on large vendors for support throughout the migration project-meaning these migrations are unlikely to be a top priority. With third-party tools, however, you often get a dedicated support team to help with your migration needs, enabling critical 24/7 support no matter what the issue(s) may be.
Decision-Making Time
No matter which way you cut it, companies are going to dedicate resources, time and possibly money toward their migration projects. However, it’s up to them to decide how they want to spend and allocate those resources.
It’s important that migration project managers thoroughly think through their migration needs and desired outcomes to ensure they select a solution that is right for them. If the migration is fairly simple and straightforward, a free tool may be the right route as long as managers consider that hidden fees and costs may pop up during the process.
However, if a migration is more complex and requires scalability, they may want to consider a third-party tool that can best address those needs. In the end, organizations will pay one way or another, so they should think very carefully before the migration-not during it-about what their options are in order to ensure a successful project.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Stacey Farrar
Stacey Farrar is a product marketing manager at BitTitan, where he oversees go-to-market strategy and product messaging for MigrationWiz. His areas of expertise include cloud automation, SaaS, product marketing and management, digital marketing, customer engagement, and business development.
