Byrne Tony Byrne

Follow Tony on Twitter @TonyByrne

Watch What WCM Customers Do, Not What Vendors Say

17-May-2011

Tags: Web Content and Experience Management, Implementation, Marketplace at Large, Selecting Technology, Sitecore

In the 15 years I've been working with Web CMS technology, there's always been a gap between what vendors say their tools can do, and what customers actually accomplish with those tools. Upon the 20th edition release of our Web Content Management vendor evaluations, it's become clear that this gap has never been wider.

You might think it would be otherwise. You might think that with savvier customers -- bringing greater experience and higher expectations -- enterprises would be leveraging the full breadth of what modern Web CMS tools can bring. For the most part, this is simply not the case.

Media and analyst reports can contribute to the sense that you're falling behind. Well, you're almost surely not. Today's analyst-vendor echo chamber is mostly an insiders' discussion over PowerPoints between current and former product managers. The latest breathless case study -- or the success stories you may see get posted in comments below -- are alluring, but also more the exception than the rule.

So while the products are increasingly feature-rich, from everything I can see, customers are using a smaller percentage of their web publishing tools than ever.

Implementation partners often know the real score. I recently listened to two different Sitecore integrators caution a prospect about Sitecore's Online Marketing Suite (OMS), one calling it "demo candy" that none of their customers were actually using. There's nothing wrong with the ambition behind OMS, except that in the real world it's extraordinarily complicated to deploy, and assumes you possess sufficient time and resources to properly exploit its personalization and metrics functionality. (It also assumes you're not obtaining those services from a 3rd-party provider -- a different story for a different post.)

What's going on? Well, for starters, you can find many dozen credible but smallish WCM vendors and open source projects competing out there. A rising tide is lifting all their boats, but they're all trying to differentiate themselves in a crowded marketplace. Those vendors have also largely (though not completely) ceded Intranet scenarios to SharePoint, and therefore focus more intently than ever on providing e-marketing services. Nothing wrong with that, except those features require substantial effort to exploit.

Sure, online marketing is increasingly important, even in an intranet context. Some advice: try to improve your internal competencies and datasets before investing in new tools. When you're ready to venture into the software marketplace, our updated evaluations now critique vendors across a wide range of engagement and experience-management services.

    Excerpt from the Sitecore Evaluation

    Web Content Management Report looks at... Visitor Permissions in Sitecore CMS

    "Registered visitor permissions are stored and managed in the same subsystem with internal contributors (albeit segmented out as "external users"). This is a simple and potentially convenient approach. Whether it scales well for large groups of registered visitors is another matter..."
    (p. 539)

    CMS Vendor Evaluations

    Learn the real strengths and weaknesses of major CMS vendors from around the world, in our Web Content and Experience Management research stream.