DXP Features Explained

A DXP can provide the structure that helps brands deliver optimal customer experiences by leveraging a robust architectural foundation and DXP integrations. But that only scratches the surface of what a DXP is and the benefits it can provide for brands. Organizations also need to be aware of the features of a DXP and how it can boost customer orientation.

The customer experience gap can be closed relatively quickly if brands focus on the right areas. According to Forrester, “the perfect experience for your customers is the one that fulfills your brand promise in a way that’s meaningful to them.”

One way of fulfilling that brand promise is by delivering personalized content that helps build long term relationships with customers and leads to customer loyalty.

However, the gap between the customer experiences that brands have been able to provide and the experience that customers crave has continued to widen. In fact, one-third of organizations believe that their technology isn’t up to the required standard to deliver the customer experiences necessary today.

The good news is that DXPs can bridge the gap and help you deliver the experiences your users are looking for. In this article, we explain the features that compose a DXP and how you can benefit from them.

At its core, a DXP makes it easier for brands to create multichannel experiences for their audiences, by allowing them to effectively manage all of the content necessary to create those experiences and to capture and use data that augments the value of that content.

DXPs leverage the power of integration to deliver a cohesive experience for not only your customers but the members of your organization who use it every day. Unlike previous suite approaches that favored an all-in-one platform that handled everything, the MarTech space has evolved to a best of breed approach that makes adapting to changes easier.

The DXP is the centerpiece of that best of breed approach. Here are the main features of a DXP in our vision:

The DXP is simply the next evolution of the headless CMS, just as headless was the successor to the traditional CMS. For that reason content management remains one of the primary components of a digital experience platform today. The marketing team and other business users will find themselves leveraging the content management aspects of a DXP more than any other capability. In the digital world, content can be found in a multitude of forms. Written content, videos, images, gifs, audio and more combine to make up the content options brands have today.

Similarly to its CMS predecessors, like the headless CMS, a DXP contains a backend repository built to store and manage all of this content at scale. A content management hub allows marketers to aggregate, access and organize all of the businesses’ content in one place. This makes it easier to find specific internal assets as well as incorporate external assets and deploy them as part of marketing campaigns. Magnolia gives you complete control over your digital content and even allows you to customize business processes to suit your internal needs.

While legacy CMS platforms simply managed content for one platform, headless CMSs made it possible to deliver content to multiple frontend presentation layers. DXPs go a step further, supplying organizations with the ability to not only deliver content to multiple frontends but also create, edit and optimize it for each channel.

Experiences are more than just one size fits all, however, and a DXP can make the experience that much better for individuals through advanced personalization and contextualization. Also, marketers can rely on A/B testing to determine the highest converting content to display for each visitor. The components of an experience management hub help marketers to not just create experiences but focus on the personalized experiences that their customers want. With Magnolia, you can ensure that your customers receive consistent experiences no matter the channel where they choose to interact.

Integrations are what make a DXP click. With the help of REST APIs, digital experience platforms can integrate with multiple connectors that extend their capabilities. Other content management systems can sometimes struggle to connect the pieces of the MarTech stack together. In today’s environment, where many organizations tend to favor a best of breed philosophy rather than a suite approach, integrations become even more critical.

For brands that sell online products via eCommerce or rely on Marketing Automation to improve conversion rates transitioning to another content management system can bring tons of headache. With a best of breed DXP, however, a complete makeover isn’t required. Instead, connectors allow brands to connect their favorite software tools and view them natively in the same interface as their content.

A DXP helps brands take control of the entire technology stack, from digital asset management tools that store and organize all digital assets, to analytics tools that help to provide actionable insight. Magnolia offers a wide variety of Connector Packs that enable businesses to easily integrate with multiple tools that help to enhance the customer experience.

The driving force behind the transition from CMS to DXP has been the proliferation of new touchpoints and digital channels. DXPs are channel-agnostic and provide more flexibility for delivering content to new and emerging channels. A DXP can make development and deployment times much faster for IT departments, allowing them to build the features that help marketers get the most out of new channels.

Websites, mobile applications, digital kiosks, IoT devices and just about any customer touchpoint can become a delivery channel for marketers. Customers are becoming increasingly accustomed to switching between multiple devices as they go about their days and this is reflected during brand interactions and shopping journeys. The customer journey continues to evolve and is no longer limited to one or two touchpoints. Many of them are used several times before a final purchase is made. A digital experience platform means that brands can leverage these platforms to make the transition between channels seamless and deliver a true omnichannel experience.

A piece of the DXP foundation that is often overlooked is the need for trigger actions. Managing complete digital experiences takes more than just storing and delivering content and then providing a space for editing it. Brands need to be able to react to actions outside of their ecosystem and then respond quickly.

Besides APIs, DXPs can rely on webhooks to get data that can be leveraged to improve the customer experience. Actions taken in search bars, on social networks or via automated chats by customers can be used to deliver relevant information that moves customers further along in the journey. As the reliance on things like chatbots and voice assistants continue to grow, brands will need to make full use of these capabilities to provide customers with the experience they need.

Brands are continually looking for ways to bridge the gap between themselves and their customers, and many have found that providing relevant content is the way to do that.

However, to create content in this ever-changing digital landscape, a traditional or even a slim headless CMS won’t provide marketers and developers with the tools they need to delight customers.

Magnolia’s digital experience platform blends the best capabilities of a hybrid headless CMS with the DX architecture and flexibility that is required today to deliver the ultimate customer experience.