Sitecore Launches Sitecore(R) Experience Platform(TM) 8.1 to Deliver World-Class Context Marketing at Scale

SAUSALITO, Calif., Oct. 20, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Sitecore, the global leader in experience management software, today announced the full availability of Sitecore® Experience Platform™ (XP) 8.1, the next generation of its flagship product. Sitecore XP 8.1 enables marketers to turn every customer interaction into an extraordinary experience by offering customers relevant content in the appropriate context at the right time.

According to the Gartner Group, "89% of companies will compete almost entirely or entirely on the customer experience."* To remain competitive and provide truly personalized experiences, businesses must understand the context surrounding every customer at every interaction and then, in turn, deliver the exact piece of content or offer at precisely the right moment.

With powerful contextual intelligence, Sitecore XP 8.1 helps businesses analyze key customer attributes, like location and device, in real time and to integrate that with purchase history, demographic data, behavioral trends, and activity across touch-points. In one central platform, Sitecore XP 8.1 provides organizations with an easily understood 360-degree view of every customer, allowing brands to build deeper and longer-term relationships with those customers. 

"Marketers need three key elements to deliver relevant, personalized experiences," said Michael Seifert, CEO, Sitecore. "First, they must understand their customers -- who they are, what they care about, and what they're doing. Second, they need a single content management system that can share contextualized content across channels to customers. And third, they need to deliver communication automation--the ability to map profile and real-time behaviors with on-the-spot decision-making to customize the experience as it happens across touchpoints."

Key benefits of Sitecore XP 8.1 include:

• Enhanced Personalization: Marketers can now collect and analyze data in real time, based on customer location, device, and behavior, which will help shape personalized customer experiences at scale. This allows marketers to personalize every customer's experience in real time and automate activities across touch points to increase conversion, customer satisfaction, and lifetime value.
• Mobile Integration: With this new release, Sitecore now has device detection baked in: analytics, device adaptation, and personalization as well as real-time personalization based on historical behaviors.
• Powerful Context Marketing Capabilities: With Sitecore 8.1, marketers can offer customers unique, personalized experiences in the right context to ultimately build customers for life.
• Unified IT and Marketing: Sitecore's flexible, easy-to-use platform integrates seamlessly with existing technology, scaling to meet growing business needs and help IT and marketing teams overcome operational complexity.
• One Connected Platform: Customers have the advantage of one connected platform that delivers a fluid multi-channel experience to strategically engage with customers across their entire journey.
• Commerce and Experience are Fully Connected: Sitecore Commerce is fully integrated with Sitecore XP to facilitate ease of deployment and use. New features include the availability of commerce-specific interactions in the Sitecore Experience Profile; the ability to edit merchandise in bulk; ease of installation and configuration; and the option to deploy in Microsoft Azure.
• Flexible Pricing and Packaging: Sitecore has introduced a pricing and packaging model that enables customers to adopt the right package most closely aligned to their current or planned digital maturity and their preferred software deployment route.
• Flexible Deployment Options: Sitecore is extending its hosted service offerings to reduce the complexity and investment barriers that smaller organizations face in deploying and managing infrastructure to run their Sitecore sites.

"In this digital age, where consumers are constantly bombarded by information and choice, they expect greater personalization for their interactions with brands. They want to be treated like individuals not data points. That's our greatest challenge at FK Distribution A/S --engaging with customers in a way that feels authentic," stated Tom Jensen, Head of Development, FK Distribution A/S. "Sitecore solves this for us, enabling us to better understand our customers and in turn, create terrific experiences tailored to their individual interests and needs."

Availability
Sitecore XP 8.1 and Sitecore Commerce are now available to new and existing customers of the Sitecore Experience Platform. To learn more about Sitecore XP 8.1, visit siteco.re/Sitecore-XP. To learn more about Sitecore Commerce, visit siteco.re/SitecoreCommerce-Brochure. Please contact a Sitecore Account Manager for more details.

* Gartner, Inc., "Marketing Spending Shows the High Priority CMOs Put on Customer Experience", Mark Raskino, May 27, 2015.

About Sitecore
Sitecore is the global leader in experience management software. The Sitecore® Experience Platform™ manages content, supplies contextual intelligence, and automates communications, at scale. It empowers marketers to deliver content in context of how customers have engaged with their brand, across every channel, in real time. This context marketing is the only way to manage meaningful customer experiences that delight audiences, build loyalty, and drive revenue. More than 4,400 of the world's leading brands—including American Express, Carnival Cruise Lines, easyJet, and L'Oréal—trust Sitecore to help them deliver the personalized interactions that win loyal customers. For more information, visit www.sitecore.net.

Sitecore and Experience Platform are registered trademarks or trademarks of Sitecore Corporation A/S and/or its subsidiaries in the USA and other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders. Sitecore reserves the right to alter product and services offerings, and specifications and pricing at any time without notice.

© 2015 Sitecore Corporation A/S. All rights reserved.

Media Contact:

Ryan Donovan 
Sitecore  
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