Is Umbraco or Sitecore Right for You?

In today's business landscape, content management system is driving innovation along with promises of content insights, agile operations and flexibility across multiple channels. Choosing a content management system (CMS) is often a tough choice between Umbraco vs Sitecore technology leaders. There are a lot of functionality and features to think about while selecting between these two CMS. A thorough understanding of both the platforms along with technical guidance and long-term planning can make a major difference in the decision-making process.

This blog post outlines Umbraco and Sitecore's best features that help achieve successful business outcomes.

Umbraco vs Sitecore: Where They Started

When it comes to premier web content management systems, both Sitecore and Umbraco have a prominent position in the industry.

Sitecore, an industry leader in content management and digital experience, started in 2001 in Denmark. With their offerings, Sitecore has served several Fortune 500 clients over the years. It is a one-stop platform to handle any type of personalized content delivery across multiple channels and at scale. This multilingual content management system is capable of creating content at once and display it anywhere.

In the late 90's, the revolution in web content management started with Drupal being the first and oldest one to be released in 2001. After two years later, Umbraco CMS was launched COM (Component Object Model) Object and Classic ASP (Active Server Page) in .NET web services. Umbraco started in 2005 in Denmark as .NET opensource CMS platform. Their intention was to provide an affordable and user-friendly CMS platform to everyone.

Umbraco vs Sitecore: Measuring the Business Impact

Today’s leading brands need to pair great content with an impeccable experience if they want to drive customer loyalty amidst growing competition in 2020. Over the years, both the Umbraco and Sitecore have become popular among users, especially since they are cloud-based CMS.

Here is a breakdown of the important factors to consider when evaluating Umbraco and Sitecore.

Simple Day-to-Day Use

Umbraco is a straightforward CMS for authors to use. Umbraco, known as one of the fastest growing CMS, is flexible and equips users with the freedom to create website or apps. It is designed to handle individual websites or apps, whereas Sitecore is known for handling websites for large enterprise with robust content needs.

However, if you are looking for a CMS to manage all the enterprise content to all different business aspects, then it would be difficult to achieve in Umbraco. Sitecore is much more sophisticated with features, such as testing, optimization, page editor with drag & drop options. Sitecore's capabilities would be much more effective in handling a vast enterprise setting as it allows a seamless integration while Umbraco would need additional 3rd party plugins.

Easy Installation

Installing Umbraco is easy and once it is installed, it is ready to use. The entire process of installation is simple enough to be completed in a few minutes as it comes in a single installer. There are plenty of tutorials and documentation available to produce content templates and rendering layouts to quickly set up a simple website. Brands can create content templates quicker with Umbraco.

Installing Sitecore takes a little more effort. Previously, one needed to get the Sitecore Installation Manager with Sitecore Installation Framework to organize everything before starting the process of installation. But in November 2019, Sitecore announced a brand-new version, known as Sitecore Experience Platform (XP). This version had an upgrade called SIA which is known as Sitecore Install Assistant. It helps in making it easy to install and setup the Sitecore, by asking the user to enter several parameters such as website name, SOLR configuration information, and SQL Admin Credentials. After inputting the information, the process initializes on the user's machine.

Personalization Capabilities

CMS combined with personalization has changed the digital landscape forever. This powerful combo has provided market differentiation through its ability to create stunning digital experiences at scale. Sitecore's personalization makes it easy to create personalization to cater your business website. Using it, one can easily create and set up numerous pages to provide unique content for a more impactful experience to each individual visitor. Being the Digital Experience Platform, Sitecore has all the essential tools to provide enterprise solutions that meets the different needs of their customers.

Umbraco does not have much personalization to offer, but it enables personalization to be built or added. Unlike Sitecore, any user can integrate the Umbraco platform with a MAP by using custom-built integration. Umbraco has a few pre-built extensions available for personalization.

Marketing Features to Drive Growth

An ideal CMS must have the necessary marketing features to enable marketers to deliver meaningful experiences. With Umbraco's all-in-one marketing suite, marketers can make the most of functionalities like 360 degrees profiling, web analytics, personalization, and A/B testing. There are several sections in Umbraco's marketing suite, such as Digital Analytics, Profiles, Marketing Automation and much more. The Analytics section helps in gathering the visitor's data to decide which A/B test will work best for the website. With the help of Profile, a complete customer profile can be created to understand their journey with your brand.

Sitecore's marketing features can enable enterprises to turbo-charge their marketing efforts. There are three incredible marketing features in Sitecore 8.1, known as - Experience Explorer, Sitecore Path Analyser, and Federated Experience Manager. Each of them can drive businesses towards increased impact by delivering unmatched digital experience. With Experience Explorer, marketers can create, test, and confirm personalization strategies. Sitecore Path Analyser assists brands to elaborate user experience to increase the conversions of customers. Additionally, Sitecore’s Federated Experience Manager is essential for bringing analytics from several media, content, customer data, in one place.

Seamless Workflow for Web Experience Management

Sitecore has an offering of fully customizable workflow engine for that enterprise companies look for. Workflow enables the brand to have complete control over the process of content approval and publishing, making sure that only content that has been approved is being published. Sitecore's Workflow consists a series of predefined states to reflect the work processes and procedures for creating web content. Having a Workflow means the potential to improve the efficiency of your brand.

Umbraco doesn't have a particular workflow engine. However, it has a few 3rd party community-built solutions available for workflow. For example, Plumber is a 3rd party app that integrates with Umbraco to enable the creation of flexible, multi-stage approval workflows.

License & Support to Help You Succeed

Umbraco provides free official support as it is open source. In case you need dedicated support, Umbraco also has a commercial pass option with support for a reasonable monthly fee.

Sitecore is an enterprise-level product which needs licensing of all sorts, such as perpetual and consumption-based licensing. This means the expense is on the higher side than the free open-source CMS. However, it is well-priced according to its host of features and value. Compared to Umbraco, the benefits received with Sitecore is often cited as immense value for money.

Umbraco vs Sitecore: Finding the Right Choice

For businesses that don't require a lot of extensive features but wish to have a simple digital presence, Umbraco has the perfect solution to make it happen. Brands that are looking for dynamic features to introduce their new service or products without a complete redesign, Sitecore is better suited for them as it is a fully scalable platform. It is great for brands that have a sophisticated system integration or functionality to cater.

When you are ready to decide if you could benefit from any of these CMS platforms, connect with an expert to discuss about the best solution.