Sitecore and SaaS - Our shared journey

Sitecore and SaaS - Our shared journey

Hello everybody! Thank you for having us. We’re honoured to have the chance to kick off the first Columbus SUG.

My name is Jason and I lead our global evangelism crew at Sitecore. Today I’m presenting together with Rob Earlam. Rob has more than 15 years of Sitecore experience and has been with Sitecore for over 5 years. He is senior evangelist on the team, based out of Melbourne Australia, and has expertise in DevOps, Commerce and a lot more.  Today, we are going talk about this evolution to SaaS and what this mean for you as a Developer, for our existing customers and new customers. Rob is going to be show us the products work together as of today with our new SaaS software options.

Sitecore and SaaS - The journey to SaaS

We’ve been talking about SaaS at Sitecore for a few years now, going back to the initial acquisition of Stylelabs which brought us to our Content Hub era. Back in late 2019, we also released our first SaaS AI service. And then earlier this year we released our first end-to-end SaaS solution for content with Content Hub and Edge.

I’m sure you’ve also all seen the news on our latest acquisitions of Boxever, Four51 & MooSend. Today we want to cover where these new options are going to take us on our journey.

The industry is moving, and it’s moving away from platform DXPs to something that Gartner has been calling the composable DXP. What’s the difference between a Platform DXP and a composable DXP?

The Traditional Platform DXP

We can start with the more traditional platform DXP. In this approach, everything is tightly connected together in a single architecture. Inside, there may be many moving parts and microservices, but you cannot separate them into separate products that operate on their own. They are pieces that are grown together to make the whole.

With this approach, you’re buying the full stack of digital marketing capabilities, bundled together. Everything you need at once. This is how Sitecore XP and other Platform vendors works today. There is a simplicity to a having all the features together, and it attracts a lot of customers looking to digitally transform and move everything to a unified solution.

Usually, the complexity to hosting and lack of flexibility is seen as the negative trade-off for the simplicity of integration.

The Composable DXP

Then we have what is termed the Composable DXP. In this model you have a bunch of standalone products. The customer then builds out their own DXP by integrating each of these different best-of-breed applications. Some of these different DXP components might be provided by the same vendor, but typically in this approach the customer is choosing products from a variety of different vendors.

The Composable DXP

You may have multiple content sources: a headless CMS, headless commerce solution, internal systems that you expose with API’s, or any other systems like a CRM.

The Composable DXP

Then we have the content mesh. This is where you build out your DXP combining the content sources with best of breed cloud solutions from one or multiple vendors. By “composing” the multiple sources and vendors you achieve the full DXP set of features that a specific business needs.

This mesh might be built out in Next.js, .NET Core, React… You get technology freedom in exchange for a more complex integration effort than the traditional DXP.

The Composable DXP

Working in this type of a custom mesh, this also means you have the benefit of deploying your solution to your favorite hosting vendor. Again it’s all about freedom of choice.

So why would people want to choose a Composable DXP? What are the advantages?

Why choose the Composable DXP?

A composable DXP provides the Perfect balance between ease of use for the business and technology flexibility.

It provides faster time to value having an API first approach and only implementing the part that you need for your business to succeed.

You get the most value for your business by using best of breed application for the features you need.

It’s all about what you need as a customer, you only implement the features and application you need.

While building out your Composable DXP you don’t need to replace your full marketing stack, you can use existing marketing stack and content sources.

Bringing a fully tailored end solution using the unique combination of sources and applications to cover your business needs.

All built with your favorite technologies, programming languages… it’s about complete technology freedom.

The evolution of DXP

Regardless of the model of DXP you go with, as Sitecore we see a DXP consisting out of three pillars;

Content, Experience and Commerce.

You can host a DXP in your cloud, if you want to host your self or with one of our partners. This would be a great fit for organizations that utilizing a close partner relationship or has specific hosting/security requirements.

With Sitecore, you can also host in our managed cloud. This fits well for organizations who want Sitecore to host everything for them - allowing us to provide additional value-add services (DR, Monitoring, etc).

There is also the option of As A Service, where Sitecore takes care of the full tech stack. This would be a great fit for organizations who don’t want to host anything – they want a Simple SLA to underpin full service. No IT, hosting, scaling concerns, and I think the biggest benefit is that Sitecore owns keeping the software upgraded, meaning customers get the latest benefits without having to worry about upgrade projects.

The evolution of DXP

In your cloud and our cloud we have our Platform DXP. This works for many use cases and Sitecore is planning to keep investing in this platform.

For Content we have XM, Experience we have XP, and Commerce has XC.

The evolution of DXP

As SaaS we’re going to offer a Composable DXP providing best-of-breed capabilities in each of the 3 pillars. The SaaS solution will allow customers to compose the right solution for them by picking the pieces they need.

In the content pillar we’ll provide Hybrid CMS, Digital Asset Management, and Content Operation tools, like MRM and CMP.

In the Experience pillar we’ll provide solutions for Customer Data Platform, Omnichannel personalization and marketing automation.

And for Commerce we’ll provide solutions for Personalized Shopping, Storefront and marketplace and order management.

The evolution of DXP

For those composable DXP options, Sitecore already has strong solutions for content management and we’ll keep improving those.

For the other pillars, our recent acquisitions of Boxever, Four51 and MooSend allow us to extend SaaS offerings across those pillars.

What does this mean for new customers?

So if you’re a new customer what does that mean for you? Well it depends on your requirements……

I want to start by saying that there is no silver bullet for this. Every customer case is different and should be evaluated per case. But to give you a starting point I’ve define two clear use cases for the different solutions.

The customer wants An integrated or headless web experience built on the concepts of pages, layout & item-based modeling, including the ability to leverage prebuilt web controls.  Implemented using standard WCMS features, including WYSIWYG layout and content editing.

In this scenario you would choose Sitecore XP. XP provides a complete digital marketing tool, providing, a holistic view of customer data, and machine learning-generated insights to personalize experiences in real time. Including WCMS features like WYSIWYG editing/

Now if a customers wants A solution to deliver headless experiences to any channel, combining a best of breed marketing stack to deliver a tailored customer centric solution.

Freedom from vendor specific SDKs and ability to develop each channel in language & framework of choice.

CLICK In this scenario you would go for our Composable DXP. Our Composable DXP forms the backbone to your digital content, experience and commerce. Allowing you deliver headless experiences to any channel combining your best of breed marketing stack.

But what about our existing customers???

And for our existing customers?

While that is great for new customers who haven’t invested already in Sitecore products, there are also options available for existing customers.

The existing platforms are continuing to be invested in. The Composable DXP products provide new technology freedom and new hosting options, but if a customer chose to go with a traditional DXP platform, there was a reason and it’s likely still valid, You want to continue driving value from what you’ve invested in, but you may wish to look at ways to move to a more cloud native solution from the solution you have now.

Let’s say you’re on XM today, utilizing the powerful WCMS feature to drive all your WCMS needs. You might want to look at things like Content Hub, Boxever, etc. to start adding on other parts of the DXP through the composable DXP options.

Or, if you are on XP today, you driving value for your business with Sitecore complete end-to-end Digital Experience platform. Investing in some of the functionality that extends that platform (such as Edge and Content Hub) might be an option as you look to expand.

If you are on Experience Commerce, you can also extend with our SaaS portfolio to target things like PCM, or DAM.

So no matter your situation, you can start on a journey to SaaS, while also getting benefits out of whatever solution you have deployed today.

An example Composable DXP journey

I want to spend the next few minutes talking about a possible journey to the composable DXP .

We’re going to use the example of a customer who is using Sitecore XM today, and how they might begin to leverage these new technologies…….

Our shared journey to SaaS

Bottom line is customer requirements Build the website on Sitecore Experience Manager as WCSM, using feature; Page creation WYSIWYG editing of layout and content Content modeling Content creation Workflow Media management Published to Sitecore Edge for XM. Experience edge provide a SaaS delivery layer, removing the complexity of scaling and delivery servers. On top of that they build they website using out Headless SDK, which pulls the content and layout data directly from Sitecore Experience Edge

Our shared journey to SaaS

Now the customer wants to add personalization, tracking and testing for their website.

This is where a Boxever comes in to play. Boxever is a Customer Data Platform that not only provide personalization options but also Data Management providing historic and live customer data with a real-time CDP. Decisioning, providing next-best-actions based on live customer and business context. Including data-driven Experimentation, feature to Test and optimize the solution with.

Our shared journey to SaaS

The media library worked well for the web channel but now they want improved media management. They need a DAM solution that can integrate with other marketing technology including the web content management system. They also want to provide better tools for collaboration between teams and reduce workflows Also the DAM will provide a single source of truth for the media assets to ensure brand consistency and brand integrity across all channels, so not only web but also print, advertising, etc. This replaces the Sitecore media library.

Our shared journey to SaaS

For marketing Content Hub provides best in class marketing friendly tools that allow marketing to implement a centralized content strategy that maximized value of content Content Hub is an integrated marketing friendly solution for unified content planning, production, collaboration and management . It provides a single source of truth for all the content and assets in an organization

This is where CMP comes in CMP provides marketing friendly tools that allow marketing departments to implement a centralized content strategy that maximized value of content. Content hub products unifies content planning, production, collaboration and management for any channel, including the webchannel. The content is planned, written and reviewed in CMP and published to XM for use in the web channel. CMP together with DAM is providing a single source of truth for all the content and assets in an organization.

Our shared journey to SaaS

The customer now has they full content strategy in CMP, they are successfully creating content for all channels. Both offline and online. They want to extend to other channels and create a compelling experience for their customers across all channels.

This is where Edge comes in. Experience edge provide a SaaS delivery layer for published content exposing that content with a Content API based on GraphQL.

This content can be served to all channels, a delivery layer that’s high performance and scalable and will enable true omni-channel experiences. Reaching to all channels from online, to offlice including JAMStack architecture based web experiences.

The virtual Assistant and native mobile app directly pulls the content directly from the Sitecore Edge. Boxever is in the middle to provide personalization and tracking of all interactions across all channels. Providing a seamless, consistent experience that consumers expect these days.

Our shared journey to SaaS

The customer is very happy with their omni channel DXP solution, now they want to add conversions and start selling on products in from the web and mobile channel.

The native mobile app and the website will be extended with commerce functionality using Four51 Ordercloud headless cloud platform for B2B, B2C, and B2X.

It delivers cloud-based, API-first, headless eCommerce architecture. Limitless customizations and endless freedom for growth to support your complete commerce strategy.

Including  HeadStart toolset that provide customizable apps for buyer, administrative, and supplier experiences.

Our shared journey to SaaS

Now as a final step they want to have they Product Catelogue management in the a marketing friendly tools for the business.

PCM centralizes and automates the management and maintenance of product data that feeds directly into OrderCloud.

Here we have it an example of a composable DXP build, highlighting how both existing and acquired Sitecore products can work together today.

But enough talking let’s switch over to Rob in Australia to show this in action.

Let’s see this in action!

To view the demo, jump to the YouTube video here: https://youtu.be/jEiIzpHp-U0?t=1291

The evolution of DXP

So really what myself & Jason have been talking about here is the Optionality that Sitecore is looking to offer moving forwards. There will be customers who want to jump on the SaaS train as fast as possible able use the latest and greatest headless technologies and we’re really looking forwards to working to help those customers achieve their goals.

But we don’t want existing customers, or new customers who don’t want to, or maybe cant’, adopt SaaS yet are going to be left behind. There is still a highly capable quite of Sitecore products here to help those customers out as well.

It really is all about Sitecore being available wherever our customers need us to be.

Looking ahead for the composable DXP…

To wrap up, I’d like to recap where we are today, and where Sitecore is heading.

We just saw how you can take these standalone products today and construct a Headless DXP. It’ll be a best of breed solution assembled by direct API integration. But we don’t want to stop here.

Looking ahead for the composable DXP…

Our next milestone is to work on the integration between these products. We 100% want them to remain as stand-alone, individually sellable products, but we also want customers who choose multiple products from Sitecore to get an integration that comes as a standard feature.

Looking ahead for the composable DXP…

After that, ultimately we want to be The Leading Cloud DXP. We want our composable DXP to contain products that are individually sellable, but have a unified UI & API across the product suite. It should become a natural first choice for customers to select Sitecore products first.

Question break!

Any thoughts on what’s coming? You can also reach us at: @StCyrThoughts @RobEarlam