Sitecore Identifies Three Key Trends that Will Impact Web Content Management in 2009

Growth of Web 2.0 capabilities, e-commerce and portals integrated with public websites enable enterprises to improve user interaction

San Francisco, January 27, 2009 - Sitecore, the leading provider of .NET Web Content Management System (CMS) and portal software, today announced that it has identified three key Web content management trends from its second annual customer survey. These trends are the “growth of e-commerce,” “portal and public website integration” and “increased integration of Web 2.0.” Sitecore notes that while these trends began to be seen in 2008, they will have a noticeable effect on the market in 2009 and all trends reflect the evolution of the Web into a strategic medium for enterprises that fosters and increases user interaction.

In the survey of 83 U.S. web content management customers, Sitecore found the number of organizations implementing Web 2.0 functionalities increased by over 250 percent. Enterprises are finding that it is important that they make it easier and quicker for people to share news, have discussions and get information via social networking tools. The ability of Sitecore’s Web CMS to effortlessly add applications such as wikis, forums, blogs and surveys has helped its customers meet their social computing goals. Although Web 2.0 has been a recurring topic in the press, Sitecore’s survey now indicates integration with websites is rapidly growing and expects that it will see continued strong growth in 2009.

Another growing trend is the integration of portals with public websites. The predominant type of portal being integrated with Sitecore’s public websites was Microsoft’s SharePoint, with a 100 percent growth rate in portal to public website integrations noted. While content sharing is a stated goal of many web projects, to see such a high growth rate of actual implementations indicates the trend is now established.

The final key trend was the use of web content management to integrate e-commerce tools into websites. The percent of such integrations increased 39% year to year, with the two most frequent e-commerce solutions used being Microsoft Commerce Server and InSite Commerce.

­“With our business doubling this past year, we were able to get input from almost twice the number of customers, giving us broader exposure to the trends,” said Paul Markun, VP Marketing at Sitecore. “This year, we are seeing that the trends focus more on meeting strategic initiatives. Sitecore will continue innovating to give organizations the tools to deliver truly exceptional, results-driven experiences that give them the ability to meet these goals.”  

The trends from the prior year included integration of Web CMS into the enterprise, growth of .NET Framework and adoption of mobile computing, and the survey indicated that they will continue to be strong this year. For example, nearly half of the survey respondents indicated that full compatibility with Microsoft .NET was one of their highest decision criteria.

About Sitecore

Sitecore’s Web Content Management System (CMS) and portal software solutions enable companies to deliver compelling web experiences. Sitecore’s award-winning CMS software makes it easy for businesses to create and keep up-to-date dynamic, full featured Web sites of all types. Sitecore’s industry leading flexibility and scalability allows companies to better leverage their content to improve customer experience and drive business growth.

Thousands of public and private organizations, including national governments and Fortune 500 companies utilize Sitecore solutions for their web sites. These organizations have created and now manage over 5000 dynamic web sites with Sitecore including Microsoft, IHI, Widex, ISS, Sara Lee, Siemens, Toshiba, Omni Hotels, Computer Associates, WebTrends and Atlanta Falcons.

Media Contacts:

Rob Adler for Sitecore
Vantage Communications
415-984-1970 x104
radler@pr-vantage.com