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Allison Gauss

Allison Gauss is a Sr. Content Specialist at Contentstack.

Posts by Allison Gauss

Sep 03, 2021

Why You Can’t Run a Modern Enterprise Without Modern CMS Architecture

In the enterprise business world, 2020 and 2021 brought more than just hardships—these pivotal years also provided lessons. And one of the biggest lessons of all wasn’t a new one but an old standard that keeps getting reinforced time and time again: The only constant is change. According to Subrah Iyar, a leader and legend in the enterprise software space, the biggest change of which today’s businesses need to be aware is the growing importance of digital experiences. “Consumers’ expectations have gone digital, and there’s no turning back,” Iyar said. “Businesses need to adopt digital solutions to keep customers satisfied and continue growing their businesses. This implies shifting customer engagement experiences to a ‘Pull' model from a ‘Push' model for doing business where customers are able to pull services on-demand rather than having businesses push their services onto a customer.” Luckily, most enterprises already have the key resource that enables consumers to interact with them digitally and on demand: content. But unluckily, most enterprises don’t have what it takes to manage this key resource. That’s where modern CMS architecture comes in. What is Modern CMS Architecture? It all began with the traditional content management system (CMS), which is a software platform that combines content creation and management with control of the entire website experience. And these monolithic CMSs worked swimmingly… for a while. Today, the world is full of exciting new content distribution channels that legacy CMS platforms simply can’t accommodate (without disappointing and un-secure workarounds, that is). In other words, the traditional CMS and the organizations that use them are in dire need of transforming to modern CMS architecture: An agile, headless CMS built on MACH principles. MACH technology is based on microservices, connected via application programming interface (API) technology, stored and delivered via the cloud, and built on headless architecture. Then there’s headless CMS, which is called that because it removes the “head” or the presentation layer from the traditional CMS structure. This allows developers to build any experience they like with whatever language is best, and make whatever technical changes necessary without ever disrupting the presentation layer where consumers are interacting with the content. And at the same time, this modular structure empowers marketing users to easily create and publish content. In addition, the integrability of headless CMS means almost any content optimization tool, consumer data platform, etc. can be plugged in. That means content can be quickly and accurately reoptimized and republished to serve every channel, audience, and experience. It’s these principles and structure that make MACH, headless CMS platforms the key foundational element of modern CMS architecture. 7 Reasons Why Modern Enterprises Need Modern CMS Architecture If you need a little more convincing before diving into headless CMS, here are several reasons it's vital that your enterprise drops outdated content solutions and adopts modern, headless CMS architecture. 1. Efficiently Create and Manage the Content at the Core of the Digital Experiences Content is what powers all of your marketing efforts, from social media messaging to articles, localized websites, smartwatch application notifications, personalized emails, and beyond. That means it’s your content that provides the consistent, contextual, and effortless experiences with which consumers interact wherever and whenever they seek information or goods from your enterprise. This is what makes content the heart of the digital experience and therefore makes the CMS architecture you use to manage it integral to your success. 2. Enjoy Infinite Opportunities to Update the Customer Experience An inherent advantage of decoupling the front- and back-end with headless CMS architecture is that each can be changed without negatively affecting the other. This feature enables businesses to completely transform the content presentation—and therefore the customer’s experience—without limitations. At the same time, IT professionals are empowered to transform the underlying technology at any time, adopting the latest languages and distribution channels to keep consumers engaged. 3. Transform Your Business with Modern Content Architecture Content architecture is the process of naming all the little pieces that build great content — the text, the graphics, the links, and more. For enterprise businesses, it’s important to have a modern and effective content architecture process so that each carefully crafted content element can be tracked down and used to its fullest potential. Headless CMS architecture lends itself to building a great process because of its modular architecture that enables individual pieces of content to be stored, labeled, searched, and used over and over again. 4. Excel in the Marketplaces of Today and Tomorrow Developers who are restricted to maintaining traditional, legacy CMS software do just that: maintain. They aren’t empowered to explore and implement cutting-edge technology. This keeps enterprise companies from innovating and causes them to fall behind competitors in the marketplace. With decoupled CMS architecture, however, businesses are prepared not just for today’s marketplace but for whatever new consumer experiences and expectations tomorrow may bring. Headless CMS architecture helps organizations future-proof their tech stacks by connecting carefully planned decoupled components via API so that they can be moved or changed as needed. With your content tucked away in API-ready modules, you’re always ready to refresh your design, technology, and experience without having to re-implement your entire CMS. Need to spin up a new smartwatch app, plug in a different database, or update the underlying code base? Programmers that work within headless CMS architecture can do this and more without damaging the customer-facing experience. 5. Make Your Team More Productive As much as it’s hard to admit, those who work with content spend an obscene amount of time on completely non-productive work like tracking down the latest draft, reworking copy for each channel, and worst of all, toggling back and forth between various publishing platforms. No more. Headless CMS architecture presents content in a single, centralized, and often responsive platform. From here, all optimization, personalization, publishing, and other tasks can take place. And with many of today’s leading headless CMSs providing content management features like approval workflows, versioning, access controls, and more; content teams can become more productive through collaboration without the fear of over-writing or wasting time accidentally re-making vital marketing assets. 6. Make Iteration and Improvement Stress-Free for Marketing and IT With headless CMS architecture, development teams can iterate and improve upon existing technology without worrying they may take down the entire content experience at any time. Likewise, headless CMS enables marketing teams to launch messaging improvements and even try out new channels without laying a finger on existing campaigns that are working well. These features empower organizations to move much more swiftly to take advantage of new opportunities and keep up with changing consumer desires. 7. Answer Consumer Calls for Consistency and Personalization Today’s connected consumers want two things above all else: consistency and personalization. In fact, the majority of customers expect consistent levels of service across brand experiences, and 71% express frustration when their experience feels impersonal. Headless CMS meets these demands by allowing brands to optimize and distribute consistent messaging across channels and allowing marketers to plug in cutting-edge content personalization tools. Brands that create this flawless, personalized omnichannel experience for consumers can expect increased loyalty and advocacy in return. Are There Any Reasons My Enterprise Wouldn’t Need Cutting-Edge CMS Architecture? At this point, you can probably tell we’re major believers that adopting headless CMS architecture should be a pretty big priority for the modern enterprise. But we also realize that context is everything. These are a few circumstances in which going headless may be more trouble than it’s worth. You Aren’t Publishing to Multiple Platforms Anytime Soon It’s no secret that replatforming content is a pretty big undertaking. So, if you aren’t ever—and we mean ever—planning to publish beyond the singular, traditional website/publishing platform you’re already using; yours might be a case in which a headless CMS is overkill. Luckily, many traditional CMS platforms do allow the integration of APIs for simple “add ons.” You may find that these are enough if you’re truly focusing on a singular publishing channel. Just keep in mind that if you choose to stick with your traditional CMS, you will create “content debt” that will have to be paid if you ever do decide to adopt an omnichannel marketing strategy. You Don’t Have Access to Programming Talent The original headless CMS platforms typically didn’t come with presentation functionality. So if you were to work with one of these, you would have to find someone with front-end development chops to implement additional technology to display your content. Many headless CMS providers, however, are moving away from this “tradition” and offering a presentation layer that is still decoupled from the content layer but available if you want to use it. As pioneers in headless CMS architecture ourselves here at Contentstack, we’re loving and even taking part in this development. Check out how Contentstack perfectly conjoins the ease of use for which traditional CMS gained popularity with the flexibility for which headless CMS has become necessary. Modernize Your CMS Architecture (And Your Enterprise) Today With content at the center of the all-powerful digital experience, it just makes sense that the platform on which you manage it should be cutting-edge. Headless CMS has the ability to continuously transform the customer experience, centralize content management, future-proof businesses against the competition, meet the demand for consistency and personalization, and more. That’s why we believe headless CMS architecture is the perfect tool to manage content and top off any digital marketing initiative. For help shopping for the best headless CMS architecture for your organization, check out our guide “How to Choose an Enterprise CMS That’s Right for Your Firm.” And once you’ve learned all there is to know, the next step is to try it out for yourself! Go ahead and sign up for a free Contentstack trial or demo and start building out your own proof of concept today — no obligation required.

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Aug 10, 2021

Omnichannel Experiences Are No Longer Science Fiction

“Both.” That’s what most consumers would tell you if you asked them whether they preferred to shop online or in-store. Yet, just 70% of retailers provide what they consider a “unified” commerce experience that enables customers to “start the sale anywhere, finish the sale anywhere.” While this is certainly a step in the right direction, it doesn’t exactly describe an all-encompassing (or “omni”) experience. Which raises the question: What really are these omnichannel experiences that everyone seems to be talking about? And is it actually possible to deliver them, or are they more science fiction than fact? Travel through space and time with us in this article as we attempt to answer both of these questions. Omnichannel Experiences: The Oversell of the Century Omnichannel experiences promise to provide cohesive and personalized consumer-brand interactions across channels and devices. The goal is to create seamless experiences that don’t just turn consumers into customers once but provide ongoing support that boosts retention and overall lifetime value. Omnichannel experiences sound great, right? Unfortunately, execution has been stalling out ever since the term “omnichannel experiences” became the buzzword of the century in marketing circles. Omnichannel experiences should be what every modern consumer is enjoying from the brands with which they interact. Yet, most companies have failed to deliver on the full promise of the omnichannel experience. There are several reasons why this continues to happen, many of which we’ll discuss in the next section. (By the way, if you stay tuned to the end of this article, we’ll also be covering how businesses can overcome these hardships and finally deliver omnichannel experiences consumers will love!) What Makes Omnichannel Experiences so Hard to Deliver? What are the hardships that keep omnichannel experiences more fiction than fact for many businesses? Let’s find out. Consumer Channels Have Exploded In 2020, the average household had 10 different internet-connected devices. All told, the number of these internet-enabled devices is expected to hit 46 billion globally in 2021. And do you know what people are doing with all these phones, watches, computers, tablets, and other devices? They’re interacting with brand social media channels, blogs, chat services, podcasts, ads, webinars, affiliate marketers, PR efforts, and more. With all these channels, today it takes a consumer an average of 8 “touches” or interactions before they complete their first conversion. The explosion of channels upon which consumers can have their omnichannel experiences has created a lot of ground for marketers to cover. The Time it Takes to Create Omnichannel Content is Mind-Boggling We’re sure you’ll agree that content lies at the heart of the omnichannel experience. It’s the first branded element with which consumers will interact, and it’s often the same element that will guide their entire relationship with your business. But this makes content both a blessing and a curse in modern marketing. It’s a time-consuming task to create content for all of the previously mentioned channels, devices, and other platforms. And that task becomes almost unfathomable when you’re creating fresh, high-quality, and even personalized content at such a scale. Creating the right quality and quantity of content to feed the omnichannel experience machine is nearly impossible when you don’t have a thoughtful system in place. Customer Information is Often Siloed Close to 40% of customer experience leaders say that fragmented or siloed customer data has hurt their efforts to develop true omnichannel experiences. Silos in the workplace are often a result of technological tools that aren’t able to effectively share data with each other. And this fragmentation of information is worsened by poor communication tools and habits. It’s a hard nut to crack, but the businesses that are able to update their tech (more on that later) as well as modernize their communication practices should also be able to overcome customer information silos. How Do You Manage All That Customer Data? If silos aren’t your problem and you actually do have a way to gather all that customer information in one place, that’s great! However, now there’s something else to worry about. How are you going to organize all that data, make sense of it, and actually apply what you’ve learned? With all the channels and platforms upon which customers interact and all the new tools on the market that enable you to gather data from these interactions, chances are you’re collecting a ton of data. It takes a custom combo of tools, complete with artificial intelligence (AI), to actually develop and apply your consumer data learnings. The good news is that, while we can’t walk you through the whole process in today’s article, we can help you get started with the foundational tech it takes to make your data work for you. Real-Time Personalization is a Full-Time Job Real-time decisioning (RTD) is the process of delivering the right experience to the right consumer at the right time—and on the right channel, of course. Serving this kind of quick personalization either takes a lot of time or a lot of tools, such as AI-powered customer data platforms (CDPs), predictive analytics systems, and more. That’s why, not so surprisingly, a measly 14% of marketers would call their experience with decisioning successful. To be part of the modern marketing departments raising that percentage, you have to be ready to put in a lot of time or invest in the right tools. Most Current Tech Simply Can’t Keep Up Chances are at least some of the marketing tech you’re using was created before many of the above developments (always-connected consumers, the personalization push, etc.) became the new norm. In fact, 66% of developers say maintaining legacy tech hinders productivity and 64% of IT decision-makers have already prioritized upgrading said outdated tech. And we probably don’t have to tell you that this old-school, legacy technology is holding you back from creating successful omnichannel experiences. If you’re stuck in the loop of expensive and time-consuming marketing tech that actually hinders your team from creating modern experiences for modern channels, here’s what you’ve been missing. What You Need to Build Future-Ready Omnichannel Experiences That once-empty promise that “Omnichannel is here!” doesn’t have to be a pipedream when you have the right foundation with which to integrate and implement modern marketing tech. The right foundation is a MACH, headless content management system (CMS). When it comes to marketing tech, MACH means tools that: Are built on lightweight apps called microservices Connect and communicate via application programming interface (API) Live in and are delivered via the cloud Employ headless architecture It’s this last characteristic—the headless architecture—that makes agile, headless CMS with MACH features a perfect cornerstone for omnichannel experiences. With a modern, headless CMS, content creation and content presentation exist separately. This structure makes it so that marketers can generate content-led experiences while designers and developers build out the perfect distribution channels that make those experiences omnichannel. And because of the modular, flexible infrastructure of headless CMS, it’s easy to integrate with all kinds of tools and services—like the aforementioned CDPs and predictive analytics systems as well as CRMs, ecommerce platforms, localization tools, and lots more—that make creating plenty of personalized content possible. Close the Book on Outdated Marketing Tech Today Science fiction is something that belongs on your bookshelf, not in your marketing program. To create real omnichannel experiences your consumers trust and a content creation process your employees believe in, you have to pull your tech out of the past. And the easiest way to get started is to upgrade the platform where most of your content creation tasks take place: Your CMS. To learn how to actually choose the best modern CMS, check out our guide “How to Choose an Enterprise CMS That’s Right for Your Firm.” And if you want to learn more about building a modern marketing strategy that will really make the most of your CMS investment, read “How to Nail Your Enterprise Marketing Strategy.”

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Jul 19, 2021

No More Random Acts of Content [Infographic]

According to “The State of Personalization 2021” by customer data management platform Twilio Segment, personalized experiences are in high demand. No surprises there, right? But what’s truly shocking is the fact that there’s still a big gap between consumer expectations and the reality that brands are delivering.  While a massive 85% of businesses included in Twilio Segment’s survey said they offered personalized experiences, only 60% of consumers reported feeling that their experiences were actually personalized.    The brands who are able to fill this personalization gap with valuable, unique experiences—at scale—will be prepared for whatever the future of consumers and business throws at them. Read on to learn how to say goodbye to random content and say hello to modern technology that makes personalized, content-driven experiences not just effective but affordable and repeatable.  No More Random Acts of Content: Master Personalization with This Modern Technology  Why does personalization all start with content? Because content is typically how customers first interact with your brand (and sometimes it’s the only way they ever interact with it).  From advertising campaigns that bring new consumers to your business to the informative content that convinces them to make a purchase to the personalized emails that help retain them long-term—content is a huge tool in your experience-creation toolbox. So, the content they encounter shouldn’t be sent at random with no regard for individual needs and preferences.  But we all know that’s much easier said than done for businesses with lots of consumers, lots of offerings, or lots of moving parts in the marketing department. For you, we created the world’s best MACH-powered, agile, headless CMS.  Start Marketing at MACH Speed with Headless CMS  Let’s start with headless CMS. Just like any good content management system (CMS), a headless CMS is a central “hub” where your content assets and activities live.  What makes headless CMS different from traditional CMS is its modular architecture, which separates content creation and management from how it’s eventually published. This separation between the content and the code empowers marketing teams to create content while technology and design teams use modern tools to build cross-platform experiences that bring that content to life. This modular architecture works together thanks to application programming interface (API) technology and makes it so that content is easy to optimize, publish, and even republish to websites, mobile apps, social channels, chatbots, and more. One step above the standard headless CMS is the MACH headless CMS. MACH is a classification for technology that is built on microservices, connected via API technology, native to the cloud, and headless from the ground up. These features give a MACH headless CMS infinite scalability, the agility to adapt to every modern consumer trend, and the power to integrate with other cutting-edge platforms to build a well-rounded marketing program.  And that brings us to Contentstack—an agile, headless CMS that’s built on MACH principles, bringing all the best modern CMS features together under one roof. And Contentstack doesn’t just employ MACH principles, the company is even a founding member of the MACH Alliance!  Coupled with complementary MACH technologies like personalization provider Uniform and MACH-methodology implementation agencies such as EPAM, personalization suddenly starts to become a whole lot more manageable than the old-school, rules-based suites many marketers know and probably don’t love.  How Headless Tech Powers Your Personalization Plan Here are just a few ways taking a more measured and less random approach to content with the help of a headless CMS can greatly boost the power of your personalization efforts.  Customize Individual Experiences Without a PhD in Rules Rigid, complex webs of rules used to be the only way to deliver content that was somewhat “personalized” for different consumer groups. However, marketers who have kept up with the times know that, today, uniqueness is celebrated and the brands who are willing to do the work to recognize each customer’s preferences are rewarded. Today, content must be personalized for each consumer based on context. Historically, this has been a practically impossible task to pull off at any kind of scale. But with a modern, headless CMS that has intuitive tagging tools and can also integrate with agile and highly performant personalization platforms, businesses can finally leave rules in the dust and develop more effective personalized content. Finally Flex Your Creativity and Start Innovating  Creativity is an important element of every marketer’s toolkit. Unfortunately, marketers often don’t have enough time to put their creativity to use on innovative campaigns. Why? Because they’re stifled by the repetitive processes that come with working in an outdated, legacy content management system.  With an agile, headless CMS like Contentstack that believes in the democratization of content, marketers are free to create, manage, and publish creative campaigns without waiting for help from tech teams — who are often already immersed in their own world of tasks. Integrate Best-in-Class Tech and Elevate Your Brand Experiences  Content management isn’t the only technology that has evolved from tedious, complicated processes toward user-friendly and agile alternatives. A headless CMS can integrate with best-in-class modern personalization technology to create a workflow in which your team can quickly and seamlessly create personalized experiences from within a single user interface.  See Personalization In Action: “Project CUE” by Contentstack, Uniform, and EPAM   With MACH technology and an agile mindset, personalization can be spun up in a matter of weeks. To prove it, Contentstack, Uniform, and EPAM teamed up for “Project CUE” — a real-life demonstration of agile personalization in action, conceptualized as a journey of planning an imaginary trip to Las Vegas. In less than one business quarter, the team identified a use case, developed a content model in Contentstack, added personalization with Uniform, and debuted the omnichannel experience live. Keep scrolling to see the infographic that details how modern CMS combines with modern personalization technology to create content experiences that are anything but “random”.

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Jun 04, 2021

Conversational Marketing is the Future (and the Future is Now)

Making marketing feel more like a one-on-one sales conversation (rather than a generic broadcast) has long been the “holy grail” for marketers. If each marketing interaction, message, and call to action could be precisely tailored to the prospect’s needs, informed by their past actions, and served up in the right context; then it should all add up to more effective marketing. And in fact, the data points in this direction. Studies on the effects of personalization show clear benefits: 91% of consumers are more likely to shop with brands that provide offers specific and relevant to them 80% of customers are more likely to purchase products or services from brands that provide personalized experiences 79% of consumers are only likely to engage with a brand’s offer if that offer has been personalized to reflect previous interactions that the consumer has had with the brand The quest to provide personalization has driven many of the biggest shifts in marketing over the last several years. It has led to the emergence of a new type of marketing strategy focused on building personal relationships that act more as dialogue than as broadcast. Welcome to the era of conversational marketing. A Brief History of Conversational Marketing Not too long ago, websites were simple HTML and CSS. Before the age of interactive websites and advanced JavaScript frameworks, browsing the web was more like flipping through a catalog than being treated to a great shopping experience. But websites now offer interactive, immersive experiences. And, in many cases, there is someone or something to guide you to the content or information that you need with just a single click. Website chat, in particular, has become a nearly ubiquitous part of the marketing stack. Companies like Intercom and Drift pioneered the live-chat-on-every-website trend, offering a real-time opportunity for website visitors to connect with a person or bot on any page. This trend has been further accelerated by the growing sophistication of chatbots that are able to instantly ingest, analyze, and act on troves of customer data. This makes it possible for firms to deploy always-on conversational marketing powered by bots rather than humans. All in all, the U.S. chatbot market is expected to grow by roughly 3x between 2020 and 2025. Interestingly, many B2B companies have lagged behind on chatbot trends. A 2018 study from Boomtown found that fewer than 1% of B2B companies implemented chatbots on their website. This trend will likely shift in the coming years as chatbots come to replace traditional, human-powered chat options. One way that this will come to fruition is the increasing sophistication of said chatbots. Most notably, deep integrations between chatbots and customer data, structured content, and AI/machine learning are giving rise to a new breed of chatbots that can far outperform human agents, even in the art of conversation. Getting Smarter: Modern Conversational Marketing Since the advent of live chat functionality, the technology has grown smarter and more versatile. And this evolution has given way to modern chat software, available on many of your favorite websites. These always-on chat widgets—often paired with AI-powered chatbots—have ushered in a new paradigm. While this technology functions similarly to earlier chat options, having an always-on chat option introduced a significant and important dimension that has transformed more generic live chat into something greater. That new dimension is context. By making chat functionality ever-present, companies gain insight into the context in which a website visitor is initiating conversation. Combine that with the ability to track and incorporate historical browsing behavior, past purchases, and even personal customer histories and you have the ingredients for a transformational customer experience with conversational marketing. Having evolved from the most basic building blocks of live chat and website tracking, conversational marketing allows marketers to deliver deeply personalized experiences that teeter on true one-to-one marketing. As live chat has evolved into the use of chatbots, the marriage between AI and data has furthered the advancement of conversational marketing. But many firms are likely to hit roadblocks in the pursuit of sophisticated personalization. Not the least of which is the legacy CMS, which often doesn’t integrate well with modern tools and frameworks to serve up the personalized content needed to fuel conversation. Here, too, a new generation of tools has enabled innovation. The headless CMS has presented a new, API-first approach to content and the emergence of the content as a service (CaaS) technology framework. Not only is this a boon to content strategy and marketing teams, but it unlocks content across all contexts, channels, and interactions. Headless CMS: The Conversational Marketing Command Center The core of your conversational marketing strategy is content. Without content, your chatbot (or human agents, for that matter) have no material from which to draw answers, form responses, or deliver personalized experiences. A headless CMS serves as the central content hub that links together various inputs and technology layers to first understand the context of a customer conversation, and then to select and deliver the correct content. The new breed of headless CMS goes way beyond the capabilities of legacy software. No longer is the CMS built to just churn out templatized pages for dynamic websites. Now, the CMS is a truly universal tool for creating, managing, and deploying content in an omnichannel world. Where legacy systems have added an API to “extend” what is, essentially, a blogging platform, a truly API-first solution is built from the ground up to power innovative marketing strategies. At the core of the headless CMS is a modular content architecture, which allows teams to create and deploy content that’s context and channel agnostic. This creates a nearly infinite array of content personalization options, which can be connected to AI integrations like IBM’s Watson, Salesforce Einstein, or MonkeyLearn to combine individual customer data and deliver personalized experiences on the fly. This modern content infrastructure allows teams to orchestrate automated one-to-one marketing personalization that would have seemed like science fiction just a few short years ago. A Roadmap to Conversational Marketing and Personalized Customer Journeys Ready to kickstart your conversational marketing strategy? Download a free copy of Gartner’s report, Elevate Your Horizontal Portal to a Digital Experience Platform. Inside, you’ll learn how the modern digital experience platform is built on a new type of technology stack where headless, API-first, and cloud-native tools unlock a microservices architecture that will usher in a new era of personalized marketing and 1-to-1 conversations at scale. And if you want to learn more about how you can build evolution and agility into your organization’s mindset, watch “The Keys to Moving Faster in a Digital Economy: Adopting a Product Mindset for You and Your Technology Partners.” This fireside chat with 3Pillar provides insights on leadership, product development, and innovation.

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May 25, 2021

How to Elevate the Customer Experience to Drive Loyalty and Revenue

Customer loyalty isn't what it used to be. Gone are the days when points programs or even product quality were enough to attract and keep a customer. In a marketplace where all the rules are changing, digital managers have a critical role to play in earning the business of all customers—potential and existing—with a consistent, high-quality customer experience (CX). And the numbers show that putting effort into CX is well worth it. Accenture predicts that a digital wave is underway that could bring a cumulative $2.95 trillion in value to the retail industry by 2025—all powered by digital connections to consumers. With the right mindset and the right tools, brands have an incredible opportunity to level up their CX approach and earn more market share. Already, leading companies are getting on board with the experience-driven customer journey. According to the 2020 Digital Marketing Trends Report by Econsultancy and Adobe, customer experience ranked number one as the most exciting business opportunity today. Here’s what customer experience means today and how businesses can ensure that all stages of the customer journey are united by a thread of outstanding CX. What Does Modern Customer Experience Mean? The customer experience is the sum of the interactions that a person has with your brand, from their first impression to their most recent contact, including everything you would expect: Convenience, quality, attitude, and more. What the modern customer experience adds to this is that so many of these interactions can now take place digitally. This vastly increases the channels, devices, and platforms upon which customers can interact with your brand, as well as how often. In a digital world where customers have many ways to engage with your brand, there are more opportunities to get CX right—or to get it really, really wrong. A global CX study by Oracle found that rising customer expectations (59%) and the impact of social media on customers’ ability to broadcast good and bad experiences (37%) are the top two drivers for organizations’ focus on customer experience. Research shows that it costs five times as much to attract a new customer than to keep an existing one. That alone could be reason enough to focus on CX, but there’s even more compelling data to demonstrate why you should invest in CX for all of your customers. Let’s look closer at how important CX really is. Why is Customer Experience So Important Today? According to research by Forrester, how an experience makes customers feel has a bigger influence on their brand loyalty than the ease or effectiveness of the experience. And a survey conducted by PwC makes an incredibly strong case for a laser focus on CX: 73% of people point to customer experience as an important factor in their purchasing decisions 65% find a positive experience with a brand to be more influential than great advertising 42% would pay more for a friendly, welcoming experience 32% of customers say they will walk away from a brand they love after just one bad experience What’s even more compelling? Customers that give companies a high CX score spend 140% more and remain loyal for up to six years. As technology progresses, customers have come to expect a no-fuss, seamless experience that’s optimized for their needs, regardless of where they are in their buying journey. Here’s how to answer their demands. How to Bring Modern Customer Experiences to the Customer Journey The entire customer journey—from the moment a customer becomes aware of a need to every decision they make after that—is full of opportunities to deliver exceptional CX that translates into loyalty that you simply can’t buy. Let’s look closer at the foundation of a modern customer journey and find where you can put digital tools to work to improve your CX along the way. Stage 1: Awareness The awareness phase is when your potential customer first becomes aware that they want something or have a problem to solve. In this phase, they’re simply looking for information, so that’s what you want to deliver. The best way to elevate CX in this phase is by providing a seamless experience that allows your prospects to get the information they want, when they want it, and in a context that’s relevant to them at the time. You achieve that by executing an omnichannel strategy that meets your prospects on their terms. A headless content management system (CMS)—the latest development in a long and rich history of content management—separates content creation from how it’s designed, stored, optimized, and displayed. This means content can be quickly found, re-optimized, and re-published to cater to the right audience, on the right channel, at the right time. Stage 2: Consideration The consideration phase is where a prospective customer assesses how interested they are in the experience they’re receiving from your brand. This is where their preferences come into play, and it’s where they do research to evaluate if there’s a better alternative out there. Competing on this playing field is all about personalization — a growing trend that’s been called the “holy grail” of marketing. Personalization is all about tailoring an experience based on information that has been collected about an individual, and there’s solid data proving that it works: According to KPMG, personalization drives loyalty in 18 out of 20 markets Research by McKinsey shows that leaders in personalization have increased revenue by up to 15% and improved the efficiency of their marketing spend by up to 30% A study by Accenture found that 91% of consumers are more likely to shop with brands who recognize, remember, and provide relevant offers and recommendations Using advanced tools like augmented analytics, which uses real-time data from the web and social media, you can get to know your audience better and faster. That allows you to deliver personalized content that tips their decision-making in your favor. Together with predictive analytics, which automate the task of assessing customer behavior to determine what they’re likely to do or want next, you can deliver the personalized experience that leads increasingly expect. Stage 3: Decision-Making In the decision-making phase, consumers are working out those last few questions before deciding between their top options. For digital managers, the goal is to build a deep relationship and provide value that would be hard for the consumer to leave behind. How can companies do this in an age where there are so many leads to keep up with across so many channels? They can integrate modern customer relationship and customer data platforms that are purpose-built to help win in the decision showdown. A customer relationship management (CRM) platform like HubSpot CRM, Zendesk, or Intercom helps you keep track of all the interactions a consumer has had across your business. A customer data platform (CDP) like Evergage or Exponea layers consumer data on top of this relationship information so you can create a complete, personalized profile of the lead at hand — enabling you to build a personal, decision-worthy relationship. Stage 4: Retention The customer journey doesn’t end once a product is shipped or a service is delivered. Even after a transaction has been completed, CX is as important as ever. A good experience leads to retention, which is the most significant driver of revenue for businesses. After all, the success rate of selling to a new customer is only 5-20% while the success rate of selling to an existing customer is a whopping 60 to 70%! While there’s no doubt that the retention stage is vital to the customer journey, the question is how can a single team keep up with providing a great customer experience across various channels at all times of the day? Artificial intelligence-powered chatbots are the always-on and always-informed customer service “agents” that can document requests, answer customer questions, and even provide the resources consumers need to help themselves around the clock. As long as your chatbots are combined with business processes that ensure no important complaints, requests, or conversations fall through the cracks, automation can help you provide a customer experience that keeps them coming back for more. Where Will the Modern Customer Experience Take You? Great CX is a long-term goal, but it’s worth an investment right now. Having a modern marketing technology stack powered by a headless content management system will streamline your content delivery, break down information silos, and integrate your MarTech tools—like your customer relationship management platform, chatbots, and more—to provide a seamless thread of excellence and ease throughout the customer journey and beyond. For more details on how to level up your company’s performance, download our free ebook Going Beyond ROI with Return on Experience and learn why forward-thinking organizations are shifting their thinking from ROI to return on the modern customer experience.

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Apr 28, 2021

How to Manage Content Easier with Modern CMS [Infographic]

Today’s always-on, always-connected world requires your business to focus more than ever on creating seamless digital experiences. And because content is the core of the digital experience, that means creating more engaging content and publishing it to more channels and platforms than ever before. Unfortunately, if your business is still using traditional tools to handle all this content, it probably also means more hassle for your busy team. But with a modern content management system (CMS), your marketing team can create and manage more content, your developers can spend more time on their most important tasks, and your business can reap more benefits from both teams. What is Modern CMS? Headless CMS is built using modular architecture. This structure separates the backend (the “body”) where content is created and stored from the content presentation layer (the “head”), where content is designed for delivery. A headless CMS employs an application programming interface (API) technology to let the frontend and backend communicate and work together to publish content. The most powerful headless CMS platforms are built on modern MACH principles. MACH is a newly-coined acronym for technology that is constructed from modular Microservices, uses APIs to maintain connectivity, is hosted in and delivered via the Cloud, and is built from the ground up with decoupled and Headless functionality. 6 Ways Modern CMS Makes Content Management Easier With a modern, headless CMS, you can enjoy content management the way it’s supposed to be. Here we cover some of the ways a modern, MACH-based headless CMS makes content management a breeze for your business. 1. Streamline Content Processes with Smart Workflows Tracking a piece of content from ideation to publication is hard enough without having to constantly hound members of your team. With a modern CMS that prioritizes features for busy marketers, you can take some of the manual follow-up tasks off your plate by building out a well-defined workflow that gets all your tasks moving in the right direction. 2. Enjoy Painless Content Launches Most developers don’t want to spend their time on content updates, and most marketers don’t want to have to rely on outside help just to do their jobs. But that’s what outdated, traditional content management platforms put their users through. With headless CMS, however, developers can take back their time and marketers can take back their power, easily scheduling releases, launching campaigns, and making most content updates on their terms. 3. Resolve Content Reviews Faster While you certainly want to streamline and speed up the process of reviewing, approving, and publishing content, you also don’t want to sacrifice quality. That’s why a good headless CMS will include secure permissions to make sure the right people are able to review the right content at the right time. This enables content teams to move through the content review stage quickly and easily without losing quality. 4. Power Your Omnichannel Efforts with Modular Content Inside a modern CMS, content is created and stored in independent modules. Because these modules aren’t permanently attached to any kind of styling or code, they can be re-optimized and re-published over and over again across different channels, platforms, and devices. With new channels and content opportunities emerging all the time, businesses absolutely must prioritize omnichannel distribution. Learn more about today’s most important omnichannel trends here. 5. Ensure Consistency with Powerful Previews For marketing users, one of the biggest downfalls of some headless CMSs is that they aren’t equipped to give an accurate preview of what content is going to look like once it’s published. That’s why it’s important that you choose a headless CMS that prioritizes painless previewing. No more “what you see is what you might get.” With the right CMS, you can instantly ensure that your content looks great, every time and everywhere. 6. Integrate Endless Functionality Perhaps one of the coolest ways modern CMS makes content management easier is through integrations. With a flexible, microservices-based architecture that’s connected via API, it’s easy to integrate other cutting-edge tools into your headless CMS to create a platform with practically endless functionality Next Your CMS to Make Content Management Easier for Your Team Content management can be fast — even easy — when you choose the right modern, headless CMS. Stop letting your own content management technology hold you back — next your CMS and enjoy life with the most modern solution on the block. Learn how to choose an enterprise CMS or see a real-life headless CMS in action by signing up for Contentstack’s free trial or demonstration.

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Apr 19, 2021

How to Transition from Outdated CMS Software to Modern SaaS CMS

Originally known as the “time-sharing system,” what we call now software-as-a-service (SaaS) dates back more than 50 years. For instance, the IBM 7090 that NASA used to control space flights in the 1960s was rented for $500,000 per month (in today’s money). What started as a solution for companies that didn’t have the space or the resources to purchase their own computers turned out to be an ideal arrangement for many other reasons. Whether you’re responsible for purchasing and maintaining your organization’s technology or for improving the content features to which your marketing team has access, SaaS is typically a smart choice. It’s generally easier to use and maintain, more affordable, more powerful, and simply more modern than its traditional on-site counterpart. Interested in learning more about SaaS for content management and how you can start making the transition from legacy, on-premise software to SaaS? Then you’ve come to the right place. No $500,000 monthly rent required. What Separates SaaS CMS From Traditional CMS? Instead of being downloaded to your company’s computers and maintained by your IT team, software-as-a-service is hosted in the cloud and delivered to customers via the internet by a vendor, who maintains the software on their end. Typically, the most maintenance that you should have to do with software delivered as a service is keep paying the subscription. When it comes to a content management system (CMS), the “traditional” way to work with CMS software is to purchase a license and use your own server space to host the files that make up the CMS. Traditional CMS users may also pay a hosting company to store their CMS files off-site. Maintenance with a traditional CMS requires updating the software on a regular basis to keep functionality and security up to snuff, as well as installing any plug-ins needed to increase its capabilities. Then there’s the modern SaaS CMS, which is widely considered easier to manage than traditional CMS. SaaS CMS vendors maintain and host the software they sell. That means your team doesn't have to spend any time or server space on hosting and very little, if any, on CMS upkeep and maintenance. As times and trends change, the cloud-native content management provider is the one best equipped to add and subtract features—simply delivering them to clients via the cloud in the next update. Benefits of SaaS CMS Over Traditional CMS Let’s explore some of the key advantages that differentiate today’s modern SaaS CMS from the traditional CMS platforms of old. Composable Features Make for Increased Functionality With a traditional CMS, the problem is not finding a solution that meets your needs. The problem is that you’ll never find one that can evolve and be rearranged the way a SaaS CMS can when your needs inevitably change. SaaS CMS providers understand that a major benefit of cloud-native content management software is that updates are handled on their end. So now that the technology is available, these providers have built their SaaS tools on modern composable platforms so that content features are easy to add, remove, update, and deliver to the buyer as trends and technology change. Flexible Content Management Capabilities What do highly-composable features mean when it comes to cloud-native content management? Modern, flexible content management capabilities that empower modern, flexible marketing campaigns. Today’s marketing users need rich content controls that enable smooth content creation and collaborative workflows and integrations with the other tools (think CRMs, analytics platforms, and more) that make your marketing program tick. Together, these features make omnichannel distribution as easy as the click of a button. Thanks to their composable nature, modern SaaS CMS can deliver on all your current content channels and adapt to drive new channels and opportunities that will emerge. On-Demand Scalability Most large businesses and marketing departments want to grow. That’s a given. What isn’t so obvious is how to be ready for that growth. Before cloud-native content management software, traditional CMS users had two options: Consistently overpay for the features and bandwidth you hope you’ll eventually need—or be caught unprepared to scale when the pivotal moment of growth arrives. We’ve all seen the latter happen to businesses after a popular commercial or media mention drives unforeseen traffic and crashes a website. With a SaaS CMS, the vendor manages all hosting and storage needs. That means they can see when a wave is coming and scale up your server space accordingly before it hits. Sure, you’ll have to pay for your increased server usage, but you only pay for exactly what you need when you’re actively using it. If traffic scales back down for any reason, your cost does as well. Dependable Uptime and Availability By nature, SaaS CMS vendors are one part content management feature builders and one part hosting pros. This is because they know that a key reason marketing technology buyers purchase their product is so that they can access their CMS anywhere in the world and at any time. In fact, one LinkedIn study found that the most “essential” characteristic of SaaS technology is availability. Being able to promise dependable uptime and therefore availability is a major differentiator for cloud-native content management software. Reliable Backup Off-site hosting means your files and data will be safe and sound if anything should happen to your on-site premises or technology. Natural disaster? You won’t have to worry about local events impacting your SaaS CMS when your files and data are all stored safely in the cloud. And if something like a security breach does knock out your CMS momentarily, you can get back online quickly thanks to the reliable digital backup that a cloud-native content management system provides. Lower Cost Than Traditional CMS Software The cost savings abound when it comes to SaaS CMS. First, there are the more obvious cost reductions compared to traditional CMS—no on-site servers or other hardware, no development time spent on building or upgrading features, etc. Then there are the unseen savings, such as on the opportunity costs that come with a lack of scalability, the downtime during updates, security and service breaches, and other issues tied to traditional CMS. Faster Collaboration and Time to Market What do flexible content management features, dependable scalability, and wide-spread availability have in common? They enable marketing teams to use SaaS CMS to collaborate more effectively, no matter what device they’re using or where they’re working. Now that COVID-19 has made remote work likely to become a lasting reality for many organizations, this benefit will have more impact than ever. This level of collaboration means those marketing campaigns your team is working so hard to create can get to market more quickly—giving you yet another way to get a leg up on the competition. Make the Most of Your Switch to SaaS CMS by Going Headless While SaaS CMS is a modem upgrade when compared to traditional CMS software across the board, not all cloud-native content management systems are created equal. To make your switch to SaaS CMS a success, we recommend you select a headless CMS solution. What is headless CMS? Headless content management systems rely on modular architecture to disentangle content creation and management from the design and development that goes into publishing it on various channels and devices. This decoupling process means marketers can publish their content campaigns to various platforms while designers create engaging content displays and IT pushes technology updates. A headless CMS enables every team in the content publishing process to work independently yet in sync. And why headless CMS instead of another type of SaaS CMS? Because the right headless CMS solution will be MACH-powered. MACH is a term for modern composable technology that’s enabled by a unique combination of features: Microservices are single-purpose applications that can be maintained and scaled independently, providing infinite content management capabilities. Application programming interface (API) technology enables composable architecture by connecting all of these microservices together. Cloud-nativity means your SaaS CMS is delivered by a vendor who takes care of all the hosting and upgrades, as we mentioned earlier. Headless architecture is the final piece of the puzzle, decoupling the content presentation layer from the database for limitless integrations and omnichannel content delivery. MACH makes for a modern, headless CMS that is quick and easy to scale, update, and integrate with so your marketing team can keep delivering on quickly-changing digital experiences. To keep learning more about the exciting new world of MACH marketing technology, check out our infographic “MACH to the Rescue”. And to see how your team can benefit from working within a headless, MACH-powered, SaaS CMS —click here to request a detailed demo today.

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Apr 12, 2021

Create content faster with a headless CMS

Is your content management system helping you create great content? Or, is it yet another piece of laggy, legacy enterprise tech that only creates discontent? Hopefully it’s the former, because great content is the core of effective digital business strategies. But if it is the latter, here’s what you need to know about generating great content with great speed. We’ll cover why creating content faster is so important today and how to next your CMS to create modern content experiences. Why creating content faster matters While many businesses were already in the process of digital transformation, 2020’s COVID-19 pandemic drastically accelerated that transformation. In fact, 70% of retailers that relied on local business introduced new digital channels or boosted existing ones in the wake of the pandemic. And there’s no going back to the old way now. We live in a digital environment in which consumers connect the most with the brands that can provide an instant and seamless content-powered experience — no matter the time of day or the device. What’s more, content is essential to just about every part of your customer’s experience, from the marketing funnel to customer support messaging to interactions with your software or physical products.  The need for content has never been greater, and your team has to create, optimize, and distribute it all. But trying to create this much content at the speed customers demand is almost impossible when your team is dragged down by slow, siloed content management solutions. You can do it all the old way and risk your workers becoming overworked and burned out and your business becoming irrelevant and outpaced by competitors. Or, you can adopt the best technology for enabling your business to keep up with your grand content vision. How a headless CMS puts content in the fast lane A headless content management system (CMS) makes content creation fast and keeps content from being tied to any one specific channel or consumer — so it’s ready to be customized and re-used at any time. Headless CMS is called “headless” because it’s built on modular architecture that separates the backend (the “body”) of the CMS where content is created and stored from the content presentation layer (the “head”), where content is designed for delivery. Application programming interface (API) technology enables the frontend and backend to work together. Thanks to this modularity, the content within a headless CMS only needs to be created once. From there, it can be quickly re-optimized and re-published over and over again on any device or channel. Headless CMS is flexible yet powerful because it’s built on MACH principles. MACH is an acronym that describes technology that is constructed of lean microservices, employs API connectivity, lives in the cloud, and whose features are decoupled and headless. MACH solutions like headless CMS enable businesses to quickly take advantage of the latest technologies, shift content operations to keep up with new trends and scale rapidly without undertaking an expensive and time-consuming replatforming project. Marketers create better content more quickly Headless CMS empowers marketing teams to create and store content in flexible, reusable modules. This means content only has to be created once and can then be quickly repurposed and published — no developer ticket required. Finally, content can move at the speed of business. In addition, the right headless CMS will prioritize content creation features like multiple content environments, instant and accurate page previews, easy-to-use page editors, customizable page templates, detailed permissions settings, and smart publishing workflows. This means marketers can enjoy freedom, flexibility, and fearlessness when it comes to executing content quickly, no matter the scale. Developers focus on building great experiences Because the functionality within a headless CMS is decoupled, developers can actually work within the CMS at the same time that marketers are creating and publishing content. When developers can use their language of choice to build the best front-end experience for content without waiting for that content to be finalized, you can launch content much faster. This enables you to serve consumers the right content at the right time and get in on trends before your competitors. On top of that, the API-powered connectivity and microservices-based architecture within a headless CMS make it easy to integrate seamlessly with other modern tools and services. These tools help developers deliver increased functionality without wasting time dealing with outdated widgets and plug-ins that always seem to be buggy or broken. Never settle: Next your CMS with Contentstack Do you have a singular platform that enables you to easily and quickly manage content throughout its entire lifecycle? Or are you settling when it comes to your CMS? Today, businesses don’t have to settle or sacrifice speed. MACH-based headless CMS solutions like Contentstack are the faster, more affordable, more flexible and longer-lasting option when it comes to marketing content technology. Learn more about choosing the best headless CMS for your organization or dive right in with a free two-week trial or personalized demo of Contentstack today.

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Apr 05, 2021

Leaning Away from Legacy Tools: Modernize Your Tech Stack with MACH

Inertia is a tough force to overcome, especially when it comes to upgrading your technology stack. Even if your team is struggling under the weight of clunky and outdated tools, deciding how to get unstuck can quickly lead to analysis paralysis as you try to figure out how to modernize your tools without creating chaos. If this sounds familiar, you’re in good company. A report by Infosys found that legacy systems are one of the biggest barriers to digital transformation — alongside aversion to risk. This powerful pairing can make transformation even more challenging. In this post, we help technology leaders diagnose the obstacles of legacy tech and provide a recommendation for the infrastructure upon which to build a lean, modern, and future-proof tech stack. Why Leaving a Legacy Isn’t Always Good In the technology business, legacy is a loaded word. It can reflect an expensive capital investment that took years of careful financial planning, or it can represent a barrier to adopting a modern and efficient way of doing business. Or it can be both. Legacy systems may have been cutting-edge in their heyday, when technical tasks were centralized and computers belonged on desks, but today they have become expensive and difficult to maintain. And they don’t integrate well — if at all — with modern tools. They are, however, still frustratingly difficult to lean away from because organizations have built whole business processes and cultures around them, and changing those can feel like trying to turn the Titanic. While the term legacy is often associated with last generation or end-of-life components, a tool or process doesn’t need to be that old to be considered legacy. If any of these apply to your organization, it’s time to think about how to lean away from the legacy: You rely on technology that has become unstable and hard to repair since support has been discontinued or hardware components are no longer available. Lack of support makes data reporting unreliable and cumbersome, especially if your data is stored on physical servers instead of in the cloud, leaving you vulnerable to data loss. You use tools that won’t integrate with modern solutions and it’s keeping you from reaching your business goals. Lack of integration and scalability means that your growth plans get stalled or you have to layer on additional piecemeal solutions to fill the gaps, which creates more data silos and negatively impacts data analytics. You run proprietary systems that are hard to learn, making it increasingly challenging to retain internal expertise to maintain them. You might spend more time managing tools than contributing to business outcomes. At best, legacy tools are ones that can’t help you move forward. At worst, they threaten your organization’s growth and security. The good news is that you don’t need to stay stuck. How to Lean Away From Legacy Tools The best strategy for making smart decisions about legacy systems is to focus on your current needs, not on the tools you adopted to meet your past needs. While it’s hard to forget how expensive and ingrained some of your tech systems might be, that train of thought goes backward, not forward. Your business has evolved and the pace of digital innovation has skyrocketed since those early investments. It’s only natural that your technology stack needs an upgrade. All you need is the right strategy to refresh your legacy tools and get out ahead of the competition. 1. Articulate Your Business Goals As digital tools have transformed the business landscape, your company’s strategies have no doubt changed since you first bought into your existing tech stack. For example, the shift to online shopping has altered priorities for retailers that started as brick-and-mortar storefronts, and the anything-as-a-service model has created whole new business lines across sectors, from FinTech to publishing. Take the time to understand what your company’s business goals are today, as well as where your company expects to grow in the next three to five years. In parallel, take stock of the tools that will drive that growth. What do you have? What does your organization need? Resist the urge to align your needs with specific products. Instead, name the function you need to perform. 2. Set Your Business Priorities To get the most from your tech budget, choose a small number of priorities that will help you address your biggest pain points and drive your business forward. Whether you need to tear down data silos or completely update your ecommerce strategy, identify the areas that would benefit the most from a tech refresh — both today and in the future. As you do this, be sure to engage stakeholders and leadership throughout your organization. Change is hard for everyone, but you’re less likely to face resistance if your decisions take everyone’s needs into consideration. 3. Assess Your Technology Options Leaning away from some old tools gives you the chance to lean toward some new ones. It’s unrealistic that you’ll be able to overhaul everything at once, so instead go in planning to rework your technology using a spectrum of options, including: Retain what you have Retire old tools you can live without Rehost your apps and services in the cloud Repurchase new tools to perform existing functions Replatform your system with new cloud-based tools Chances are high that your various systems and solutions will require several of the above actions. It’s important to remember when evaluating your legacy tools that technology as a whole is moving away from monolithic enterprise systems where applications are dependent on the underlying infrastructure and toward more nimble options that were designed to meet today’s fast-evolving environment. What to Lean Toward: MACH Technology The MACH approach to tech architecture is fast becoming the preferred course by modern organizations who want to future-proof their tech investments. MACH technology solutions are Microservices-based, API-first, Cloud-native, and Headless. But it’s not as complex as it sounds. To put it simply, the MACH approach provides agility, scalability, and efficiency through ease of integration. Here’s how each feature of MACH technology can help you eliminate and consolidate the disparate tools that are currently holding you back: Microservices Optimize Functionality With Best-of-Breed Solutions Microservices are individual pieces of business functionality that are designed to expertly perform one specific task. Because they’re small and focused, they can be deployed and updated quickly. Choosing microservices allows you to select the best-of-breed tools to meet your needs instead of having to settle for what’s available in an enterprise suite. API-First Means Seamless Integrations Using an application programming interface (API) allows data to flow between multiple applications or services, helping you eliminate data silos and level up your data analytics. Well-designed APIs increase your flexibility, simplify development, and accelerate your time-to-market. Cloud-Native Systems Deliver Scalability at Speed When your apps and tools are developed and delivered in the cloud, you have built-in scalability that boosts performance when you need it. Headless Architecture Accelerates Omnichannel Delivery Headless architecture separates front-end presentation and back-end logic. This enables you to use APIs to bring together your microservices of choice without disrupting the flow of business. For example, a headless content management system (CMS) allows you to connect your content repository on the backend to a wide variety of front-end channels; such as websites, mobile apps, or Internet of Things devices. And it does this while giving designers and developers the freedom to shape the front-end without the constraints of rigid templates. In today’s marketplace, where end-user expectations are constantly changing, going headless is a critical part of business success. To learn more about how your tech team can spend less time patching your legacy content systems and more time building things that matter, dive into the details of Contentstack — a MACH-enabled headless CMS. And to learn more about MACH tools and how they can help you future-proof your tech stack, download a free copy of our eBook: Break the Replatform Cycle with MACH Enterprise Architecture and hear from digital leaders and their lessons on how to align company culture, evaluate solutions, and gain momentum with early technology wins.

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Aug 28, 2020

Contentstack Partners with CS YOU to Expand Access to Customer Success Jobs

With the proliferation of new technologies and tools, there is a huge demand for customer success professionals. The role of the Customer Success Manager (CSM) has become one of the hottest careers in technology, but not all jobseekers are reaping the benefits. Only about eight percent of CSMs are Black or LatinX, reports customer success company Gainsight. That’s why Gainsight and SV Academy, the employer-driven online vocational school, recently launched CS YOU, a new program that offers training and placement in entry-level Customer Success Associate roles for members of groups underrepresented in the tech field. Contentstack is honored to be a Charter Partner in CS YOU. With our fanatical focus on customer success and interest in using technology to break down barriers, this training and development program is a perfect fit for Contentstack. Spanning 15 months, the CS YOU program includes training, a paid internship, and up to 12 months of coaching for customer success associates and their managers when they achieve full-time employment. The program provides access to the CS network, professional education, and mentorship, empowering associates to develop social capital and increase their wages. By supporting jobseekers with ongoing guidance and professional development, CS YOU will provide a pathway for long-term career success. ScaleUp investor Insight Partners helped drive the program’s sponsorship strategy, helping to bring 25 Charter Partners, who will fund the tuition and placement of CS YOU’s first group of jobseekers. Charter Partners including Contentstack, Hootsuite, and Udemy have committed more than $600,000 to the program. Contentstack’s long-term vision is to use technology to break down barriers for better human connection and greater equality. Along with being a Charter Partner in CS YOU, we’ve supported Black Girls Code and offered coding camps for kids. Recently, our co-founder and CEO Neha Sampat was chosen as one of the Best CEOs for Women and Best CEOs for Diversity by Comparably, an organizational culture and compensation evaluation platform. We strive not only to provide a best-in-class product, but to create a more inclusive and equitable tech sector. At Contentstack, we pride ourselves on providing outstanding support through our amazing customer success team. We know that having the right support in your corner is key to accomplishing your goals, whether they include launching a new product or launching a new career.

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Jul 24, 2020

Comparably Recognizes Contentstack for Leadership, Diversity, and Professional Development

Out of tens of thousands of companies, Contentstack was chosen for four different awards by Comparably, an organizational culture and compensation evaluation platform. Contentstack’s CEO and co-founder Neha Sampat was recognized as one of the best CEOs for women and for diversity, while the leadership team as a whole also made the Best Leadership Teams list, alongside companies such as Microsoft, Zoom, and Drift. Separating companies into two categories, large and small/medium, Comparably’s awards were based on employee ratings over the past year, including recent months as companies have faced the challenges of the pandemic. Best Leadership Teams In the smaller firms category (companies with fewer than 500 employees), Contentstack was 10th on the list of Best Leadership Teams. Although Comparably listed the top 50 for each category, the awards included ratings of 60,000 U.S. organizations. Best CEOs for Diversity With more and more firms recognizing the importance of a diverse and inclusive workforce, Comparably reviewed the ratings by employees who are people of color to identify CEOs who create an inclusive work culture. Contentstack’s Neha Sampat was honored as one of the top 25 CEOs of small and mid-size companies, one of only two female CEOs on the list. Best CEOs for Women Neha Sampat was also recognized as one of the Best CEOs for Women, based on the ratings of female employees. At number three, she was the highest-rated female CEO on the list. Noting the continued gender pay gap and scarcity of female CEOs, Comparably stated, “It’s more important than ever to know who women deem as the best leaders to work for that also inspire a positive workplace culture for all.” Best Companies for Professional Development Last but not least, Contentstack was chosen as one of the Best Companies for Professional Development. One employee said, “We are able to pursue the projects that we find personally interesting or important, and have our managers' support to experiment and freedom to fail." Whether promoting from within or developing interns into full-time employees, we strive to empower the people that make us who we are. From our executive leadership to our people team to the 180+ employees bringing their best every day, Contentstack is proud to be a leader in our industry and beyond. Our company has grown massively in the last couple of years, and awards like these tell us that our passion and positive culture have only grown with us.

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May 22, 2020

Contentstack Wins Second Consecutive Gold Stevie Award for Best Content Management Platform

Contentstack was recognized by the 18th Annual American Business Awards®. Each year, the American Business Awards (also known as the Stevies) honor leading businesses and organizations for their excellence in a variety of industries. The winners are determined by the average scores of more than 230 professionals worldwide over a three-month judging process. For the second year running, Contentstack was chosen as a Gold Winner in the Content Management Solution category. Contentstack is the pioneering API-first enterprise SaaS platform at the intersection of content management and digital experiences. The first headless CMS to enable business and IT to easily collaborate, Contentstack removes silos between business units and enables organizations to provide unparalleled customer experiences. In the past year, Contentstack has tripled business and announced $31.5 million in Series A funding led by Insight Partners. The Stevies judges are executives from all over the United States, and they scored organizations on qualities such as innovation, integrity, effectiveness, creativity, and growth. Some of the judges’ comments on Contentstack were: “Delivers best in class integrations and easy access to business users to the key capabilities and drive content delivery across different channels and devices.” “A great option to provide more opportunities for business owners to spread their valuable messages in a more efficient and effective way.” “Delivering a unique digital content experience!” This second Golden Stevie award comes on the heels of Contentstack’s recognition as a G2 Crowd favorite. Contentstack’s founder and CEO Neha Sampat was also honored with a Tech Trailblazer Award. Although we at Contentstack are thrilled and humbled by these accolades, our greatest measure of success is how we empower customers, who trust us with their content management needs. Awards like these are meaningful because they are built on these relationships. Although Contentstack has grown by leaps and bounds over the past year, we have worked hard to provide outstanding service to customers new and old. Contentstack is also in the running for the People’s Choice Stevie® Awards for Favorite New Products. Voting is now open to the general public, and you can vote for Contentstack until July 15, 2020. About the Stevie Awards Stevie Awards are conferred in seven programs: the Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards, the German Stevie Awards, The American Business Awards®, The International Business Awards®, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, the Stevie Awards for Great Employers, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Stevie Awards competitions receive more than 12,000 entries each year from organizations in more than 70 nations. Honoring organizations of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about the Stevie Awards at www.StevieAwards.com.

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