Late last year, we took a look at the release of Sitecore 9.1 and its raft of new features, as it promised to be the most complete Sitecore version to date.
In this post, we're going to look a little deeper, highlighting the business benefits of running your website on version 9.1 via the three pillars of Sitecore 9.1.
1. Powerful innovation
Headless has always been one of Sitecore's strengths and Sitecore 9.1 is no different.
By separating content from presentation and introducing the powerful JavaScript Service (JSS), developers have greater flexibility to build, deploy and integrate decoupled solutions (via Sitecore Host), which makes for a more faster and streamlined development process.
This headless approach makes light work of serving, not only regular content, but also personalised experiences to a multitude of devices like mobiles, tablets, and smart devices.
This separation of content from presentation means omni-channel content distribution derives from a single content item in Sitecore.
These innovations, coupled with the latest Helix infrastructure, make for a robust, insightful and flexible digital experience system.
2. Faster time to market
Getting content out at the right time, on the right channel, to the right people, can be the difference between a good outcome and a great outcome.
The Sitecore Experience Accelerator (SXA) can deliver a WCAG 2.0 compliant website that requires no CMS development.
That’s because SXA uses reusable templates, layouts and components that developers, designers (using Creative Exchange), content authors, and marketers can collaboratively work with, so that a new Sitecore website is up and running in no time - saving time, and more importantly money!
3. Marketing enhancements
Sitecore 9.1's new login screen (with a Federated Authentication service), which uses Single Sign-On (SSO), takes the user to the Horizon UI.
Billed as ‘the next generation experience for content editors’, the Horizon UI provides a vastly improved editing experience with visibility in different device layouts so content authors and marketers can preview content in various view-ports. This includes the ability to see projected improvements on conversions which is great for marketers as it gives them actionable insights so they can, for instance, adjust user journeys to get maximum engagement and conversions.
Marketers can gain great insights from the entire website and quickly navigate to the pages that need the most attention.
The extended marketing toolbox that provides simplification of creating campaigns, personalisation, and audiences, as well as the ability to assign goals to click actions, enables marketers to get content to market even quicker than before.
There's also a useful calendar listing ‘live’ and 'due to end' campaigns, so marketers can really keep on top of all their activity.
Sitecore analytics too has been enhanced. Sitecore Cortex, the machine learning engine adds another dimension to visitor insights by suggesting areas of the website that need personalising. The Rule Set Editor reflects this with new rules based around the probability of users taking action. SEO can be improved, too, as Sitecore Cortex takes care automating content tagging for both internal and external search.
Other enhancements include:
- Universal Tracker that tracks all events on all devices
- Five key business themes added to the Marketing Automation application, making it easier for marketers to design an effective automation campaign
Sitecore 9.1 is equipped with clever developing, authoring and insightful marketing tools, all of which make this latest release the most powerful yet - delivering business benefits with a punch.
Want to see Sitecore 9 in action?
We've been working on Sitecore 9 websites for our customers all year, and even our own website is built on it, and on Azure PaaS no less.
With mainstream support for Sitecore 8.1 having ended last December, we’d be happy to show you around Sitecore 9.x, what's new, and talk about why you should consider an upgrade, and how you can simplify your architecture and deployment procedures.
