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artificial intelligence Article

Not All Heroes Wear Capes. Here's Why CMS Is Your 'Unsung Hero' in 2025

janus-boye

Siteimprove.ai Redefines Accessibility and Performance with Unified Agentic Content Intelligence Platform

matt-garrepy

<hr /> When I attended <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/machtales-voices-from-the-composable-conference-with-mokshika-sharma-of-sur-la-table">“The Composable Conference”</a> in April, the buzz around agentic AI was deafening. Way back in those days (and I do mean “way back,” because we measure tech history in days and weeks now), pioneering platforms were rolling out their first <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/a-new-game-for-interoperability-heres-why-the-mach-alliances-open-data-model-is-a-winner">MCP servers,</a> and the notion of serving bots with an “agent experience” was starting to catch fire.Fast-forward to today, and thousands of MCPs populate the landscape as agents swarm across our stacks and applications. Check out the registry at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://mcpservers.org/">mcpservers.org,</a> which is just one of the many growing libraries you can peruse. It is, as they say, a thing.Despite the overwhelming enthusiasm, navigating the AI pathways continues to present some sticky challenges. This is where composable enterprise architecture is proving to be a key determinant for successfully testing, deploying, and harnessing AI technologies and agentic strategies.At the same time, public debate (stirred in part by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://vtex.com/en-us/">VTEX’s public criticisms</a>) has raised questions concerning the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/the-composable-conference-2025-takes-shape-as-mach-alliance-announces-speakers-and-new-events">MACH Alliance's</a> rigid evangelism and the need for operators to have more agency in the agentic era. While some of the feedback feels reactionary, many of the observations have been salient.  One of my big feedback points during “The Composable Conference” was the need for more actionable resources to help support the evolution along the AI horizon. We’ve now seen that manifest with the introduction of the new <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/mach-alliance-launches-new-mach-ai-exchange-to-help-enterprises-streamline-ai-adoption">MACH AI Exchange</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/a-new-game-for-interoperability-heres-why-the-mach-alliances-open-data-model-is-a-winner">Open Data Model</a> (ODM), both of which I covered in <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/the-deep-dish-on-composable-6-tasty-takeaways-from-the-mach-alliances-2025-conference">my conference wrap.</a> You can also listen to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/critics/andrew">Andrew Kumar</a> of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/uniform">Uniform</a> discuss his initial feedback on the new ODM, as well as his overall perceptions of the conference. Great insight offered through the vendor's lens: <figure class="media"><div data-oembed-url="https://youtu.be/C3pSrxD87Fw"><div style="position:relative;padding-bottom:100%;height:0;padding-bottom:56.2493%"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/C3pSrxD87Fw" style="position:absolute;width:100%;height:100%;top:0;left:0" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe></div></div></figure> Initiatives like the ODM are great steps forward. But elevating end users to help lead what’s next could be a ray of light in an otherwise darkening sky of AI turbulence. It could further translate real-world value from the top down, and that’s exactly what the MACH Alliance is doing. Last week, the organization <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://machalliance.org/insights-hub/mach-alliance-advances-end-user-leadership-model-to-guide-enterprise-ai-architecture-evolution">announced a strategic evolution</a> of its leadership structure to further accelerate AI-powered transformation across commerce enterprises. According to its press release, the MACH Alliance will transition to what it calls an “end-user leadership model” by September of next year, building on the collaborative foundation of vendors, SIs, and end-users that comprise the MACH community. It's worth noting that this journey towards an end-user-focused model begins with a major shift in the existing leadership fabric: <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/casper-aagaard-rasmussen/">Alliance president Casper Rasmussen</a> will step down in September, marking a significant milestone in the organization’s evolution. What does this all mean for the future? Let’s unpack it. <h3 id="elevating-real-world-leadership-to-navigate-the-ai-era">Elevating real-world leadership to navigate the AI era</h3>It’s abundantly clear that agentic AI is disrupting everything in its path. Enterprises are leaning towards the right technology partnerships to help them harness AI successfully, and the MACH Alliance's unique ecosystem of composable vendors, system integrators, and end-users is providing a foundation for trusted, vendor-neutral guidance to answer this call. According to the Alliance, the mission of its end-user leadership model is to ensure a more collaborative environment grounded in real-world execution. Bolstered by experience and proven success, these end-users will have discrete knowledge, insight, and access to the innovation and expertise of technology providers and implementation partners within the MACH ecosystem.Since its founding in June of 2020, the organization has been headed by representatives across its founding partner quadrant, which reflects a mix of vendors and SIs. Moving to an end-user-led model marks a profound shift in the leadership composition, and one that reflects the rapid cycle of change driving the motion to an agentic landscape.<h3 id="a-strategic-evolution-–-and-a-big-leadership-change">A strategic evolution – and a big leadership change</h3>I’ve interviewed Casper Rasmussen many times (you can <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/the-future-is-composable-a-conversation-with-new-mach-alliance-president-casper-rasmussen">read my favorite one here</a>), and we knew each other long before ChatGPT was a twinkle in anyone’s eye. Casper’s contribution to the Alliance can’t be understated. He is, in many ways, at the heart of the composable movement, guiding the vision as its chief ambassador. In his “day job” as Group Chief Transformation Officer at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.valtech.com/">Valtech</a>, he continues to be a leading voice on the digital frontier, with a keen focus on AI's evolutionary impact.During his tenure as president, Casper has overseen significant growth of the Alliance’s membership community. Always a champion of education, he has also enriched its <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/mach-alliance-taps-dylan-valade-of-abbott-to-drive-expanding-ridemach-education-program">rideMACH program</a> to help shepherd the composable revolution to the larger addressable North American marketplace. As previously mentioned, Casper will step down as president on September 30th, after serving three years in his role. According to the press release, the Alliance will elect a new president from its membership at some point during the same month and transition to an appointed end-user president in September 2026. As part of this evolution, two end-user ambassadors will be appointed to the MACH Alliance Executive Board next month, alongside the nine elected member seats. As part of its annual election cycle, nominations are also now open for six board seats, all of which will be gleaned from the Alliance’s membership base. The goal is to help ensure end-user perspectives are integrated throughout the governance structure.With these strategies, the MACH Alliance aims to deliver the trust and clarity organizations need for AI re-invention while maintaining its role as the vendor-neutral authority for bridging innovation with practical deployment.<h3 id="activating-enterprise-ai-transformation">Activating enterprise AI transformation</h3>Along with the shift to an end-user leadership model, the MACH Alliance is doubling down on its commitment to helping enterprises navigate and embrace AI. This includes programs that help activate the potential via real-world tools, frameworks, and experiences. The first is the aforementioned MACH AI Exchange, which was announced at “The Composable Conference” earlier this year. The AI Exchange is effectively a peer network that connects technology providers, SIs, and brands through experiences like “MACHathons” and cross-vendor working groups. Led by member practitioners working at the edge of AI, the program enables businesses to build interoperable AI experiences while maintaining MACH flexibility and composability.The other is the aforementioned Open Data Model (ODM), which was unveiled in tandem at the same venue. The ODM serves as a semantic interoperability layer – a "Rosetta Stone" for understanding how to translate data between systems in hybrid commerce architectures.  <figure class="image image-style-align-center image_resized" style="width:87.82%"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/08/image-1754685225176.png" alt="A person standing in front of a large screen

AI-generated content may be incorrect." /></figure>Mark Demeny of the MACH Alliance presenting the Open Data Model at CMS Connect 25. At the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25/program#wg">Boye &amp; Company CMS Connect 25 Conference</a> in Montreal this week, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/critics/mark">Mark Demeny</a>, who has worked closely on the project, gave us a first-hand tour of ODM. The solution provides canonical reference models and implementation guidance, enabling architects to design effective data integration across commerce platforms while preparing organizations for AI-powered ecosystems.Finally, the forthcoming MACH X Event in London this October aims to energize the “AI-ready enterprise.” Billed as the premier event for AI-powered composable architecture, it will bring together the full ecosystem to help accelerate adoption. Registration is <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://machalliance.org/events/mach-x-2025-london">now open</a>, but space is limited.<h3 id="why-it-matters">Why it matters</h3>The MACH Alliance has been a fierce custodian of modern composable principles. In the beginning, its evangelism surrounding MACH standards and frameworks provided an essential foundation for delivering composable architectures and ensuring successful outcomes. And while the concept of modularity has been around for quite some time, it provided a reference architecture that reflected real maturity.But it was more than technology. Within the Alliance, MACH has always been positioned as a mindset, a philosophical set of tenets for governing more than just platform architecture, but human collaboration and enterprise scalability.That said, AI is forcing a recomposition of composable. Compounded by global trade wars and economic tension, brands and businesses need to ship interoperable AI experiences faster, all while maintaining MACH flexibility and composability. Meanwhile, this core flexibility is being tested. Having proven end-users with AI experience shape the roadmap for MACH is a sage response to market realities and frequent criticisms. As a collection of member technologies, having the Alliance’s leadership cut from the practitioner’s cloth is a key asset – and should provide real-world perspective as AI continues to ripple across the roadmap.  The new AI Exchange and Open Data Model show significant promise, and align to more of the actionable tools and resources I’ve been wanting to see. With the ODM in particular, having a Git-based ecosystem will allow for greater contribution and evolution, providing richer use cases over time. If there’s one constant in the technology business, it’s change. And while the MACH Alliance has served as a stable foundation for navigating transformation, it too is experiencing its own evolution. By facing the future head-on through the leadership lens, it’s taking the right steps to maintain its critical relevance in the market landscape – and continue its heritage as an alliance for good.   <hr /><h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.44%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/08/cms-kickoff-2026-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-kickoff-2026"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmskickoff26">CMS Kickoff 2026</a></h4>January 13-14, 2026 – St. Petersburg, FloridaMeet industry leaders at our fourth annual CMS Kickoff – the industry's premier global CMS event. Similar to a traditional kickoff, we reflect on recent trends and share stories from the frontlines. Additionally, we will delve into the current happenings and shed light on the future. Prepare for an unparalleled in-person CMS conference experience that will equip you to move things forward. This is an exclusive event – space is limited, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmskickoff26">so secure your tickets today.</a>

MACH Alliance Aims to Evolve Enterprise AI Architecture with New End-User Leadership Model 

<h4 id="-"> </h4><h4 id="listen-to-the-full-episode-of-“the-critic's-corner”-podcast-&gt;"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://tinyurl.com/bdzj4t2d">Listen to the full episode of “The Critic's Corner” Podcast &gt;</a></h4> <hr /> Last year, a new word was added to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/">Merriam-Webster's</a> Dictionary called enshittification, a slang term used to criticize the degradation in the quality and experience of online platforms and experiences over time. Fun, right?Er… not so much.From a website or e-commerce perspective, enshittification typically manifests as an increase in things like ads, costs, or features, but the definition has been expanded to encompass any state of deterioration – even politics and culture.One might conclude that our world is in a current state of enshittification, but for the purposes of my latest episode of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/asteroids-and-dinosaurs-a-moment-in-time-on-ai/id1801794414?i=1000720435502">“The Critic's Corner” podcast,</a> we'll stick with the decay of modern digital experiences. Something we're all familiar with. On that note: my guest <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellygoetsch/">Kelly Goetsch</a> was enshittified upon, something he wrote about recently on LinkedIn. If you don't know Kelly, he's what you might call an industry luminary, someone who has been shaping and influencing the DX and commerce landscape for quite some time. He's currently the COO at an outfit called <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://pipe17.com/">Pipe17,</a> an OSM alternative that's make waves in its category.In our podcast conversation, Kelly shares more about his recent brush with "abysmal" CX during a retail TV purchase, exposing how online experiences have truly degraded in quality over time as the pursuit of profit takes over. He digs into the prevailing winds that brands face and how a lot of discovery and transacting is happening off-platform and off-site – and that's changing commerce pretty substantially.“A lot of e-commerce over the traditional web is very, very broken,” he said. “And generally, it's a lot harder to drive people to your brand.com website.”Maybe this abysmal reality is a sign of the times. Simultaneously, AI is dismantling the SaaS landscape before our very eyes. It's now possible to build apps faster than ever with less developer reliance, and there's a conscious move to consumption-based pricing. All this uncertainty is disrupting the roadmaps for software vendors and enterprises, and it's all accelerating at a breakneck pace. <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="-"> </h4><h4 style="text-align:center" id="“value-is-not-created-by-that-which-is-different,-but-that-which-is-unique.-that's-something-that-took-me-a-while-to-fully-understand,-but-it's-true.-there-are-a-lot-of-legacy-platforms,-or-even-newer-versions,-but-still-fundamentally-legacy-approaches.”">“Value is not created by that which is different, but that which is unique. That's something that took me a while to fully understand, but it's true. There are a lot of legacy platforms, or even newer versions, but still fundamentally legacy approaches.”</h4> <hr /> When I invited Kelly on “The Critic's Corner," I was hoping to catch up on our alignment within the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/the-deep-dish-on-composable-6-tasty-takeaways-from-the-mach-alliances-2025-conference">MACH Alliance.</a> We've been in each other's orbit for several years, and I've watched him drive success at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/commercetools">commercetools</a> while building a strong community of interest around composable architectures and practices. But our conversation took some intriguing twists and turns. During the episode, Kelly gets real about what’s at stake as consumers seek new and better ways to search and engage with brands – namely, AI-powered answer engines like <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://chatgpt.com/">ChatGPT</a>, where simplicity seems the norm (for now). No more combing through blue links or battling search ads to get a straight answer, and we can expect more ads and transactions to move there as well. Of course, this is resulting in a precipitous decline in classic search traffic, which is bad for marketers. He likened all this change to the moment an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs.Dark? Sure. But from the ashes rose new life, and he sees the same potential.At the same time, as revolutionary as ChatGPT is, Google isn't going anywhere tomorrow. Websites will continue to be relevant for a while as consumers adapt to this new digital reality. You can catch a two-minute snippet of Kelly's observation about “living in the future” right here: <figure class="media"><div data-oembed-url="https://youtu.be/fcaczDULJ-c"><div style="position:relative;padding-bottom:100%;height:0;padding-bottom:56.2493%"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fcaczDULJ-c" style="position:absolute;width:100%;height:100%;top:0;left:0" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe></div></div></figure> On the content and enterprise software side, we also discuss CMS and its own category challenges. He recently asked in another LinkedIn post if we really need another content management system in an already crowded and mature space. This isn't a problem that's exclusive to our industry, but with hundreds of choices battling it out, it's a common question. I ask Kelly how we navigate this commoditization, where platforms – particularly legacy players – are compositionally the same, and AI is shifting expectations. He's focused beyond the legacy “dinosaur” story and looking for real differentiation.“Value is not created by that which is different, but that which is unique,” he said. “That's something that took me a while to fully understand, but it's true. There are a lot of legacy platforms, or even newer versions, but still fundamentally legacy approaches.”Asteroids… dinosaurs... could this be the end as we know it? Maybe. But as Kelly maintains, this is where the opportunity lies. So things get a little dark, but there's some light at the end of the tunnel. I promise. I have mad respect for Kelly's thinking, and this podcast episode is chock-full of wisdom nuggets. We spend a little time talking about his “origin story,” which colors some of his perspective. That collective experience – and success – might also be why he's firmly grounded despite these seismic changes. So strap in, turn up the volume, and watch the skies for falling objects.<h3 id="listen-to-“the-critic’s-corner”-podcast-with-kelly-goetsch">Listen to “The Critic’s Corner” podcast with Kelly Goetsch</h3> <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://tinyurl.com/bdzj4t2d">Listen to the full episode </a>&gt;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://tinyurl.com/bdzj4t2d">Subscribe on Apple Podcasts</a> &gt; <figure class="image image-style-align-center image_resized" style="width:58.49%"><a href="https://tinyurl.com/bdzj4t2d" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/08/critics-corner-apple-podcast-kelly-goetsch.jpg" alt="" /></a></figure> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaSee Agility CMS at the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Asteroids and Dinosaurs: A Moment in Time on AI, Commerce, and CMS with Kelly Goetsch

<hr /> <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/contentsquare">Contentsquare</a> has never fit into a round hole. The leading digital experience analytics vendor has been innovating along a very clear horizon, building a robust ecosystem around meaningful insights across the customer journey. This includes the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.crunchbase.com/acquisition/content-square-acquires-hotjar--df2a8f88">acquisition of HotJar</a> in 2021, an analytics tool that gives website owners greater clarity around user behavior via heatmaps and session recordings. I’ve long been a fan of this product, and I thought this was a shrewd move at the time.<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.cooley.com/news/coverage/2023/2023-09-28-contentsquare-agrees-to-acquire-heap">Heap followed two years later</a>, representing Contentsquare’s largest acquisition to date. This tool really injected the customer journey layer to the overall analytics composition, giving Contentsquare a complete vision – and stronger market position against competitors like <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/replay-it-again-sam-amplitudes-session-replay-everywhere-rocks-with-analytics-visualizations">Amplitude</a>, which we’ve followed extensively over the years. Now, Contentsquare has signed a definitive agreement to acquire <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://loris.ai/">Loris AI</a>, a leading conversation intelligence platform. This acquisition brings together two innovative companies with one shared goal: to give business leaders a deeper, more accurate view of the full customer journey, from click to conversation. “Customer experience is shifting fast, and conversations are becoming an essential part of how people interact with businesses,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathancherki/">Jonathan Cherki</a>, CEO &amp; Founder of Contentsquare. “With Loris, we’re giving our customers the capabilities they need to lead this transformation – to understand and optimize conversations, and connect them to the broader digital journey. It’s not just about improving support: it’s about giving brands the competitive edge in a world where conversations are the next frontier of customer experience.”<h3 id="ai-powered-insight-at-the-conversational-layer">AI-powered insight at the conversational layer</h3>The Loris acquisition comes at a time when AI-powered interactions are becoming essential to the customer journey. According to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2025-02-10-traditional-customer-service-channels-are-losing-ground-to-mobile-and-ai-innovations#:~:text=As%20GenAI%20becomes%20further%20embedded,built%20into%20their%20mobile%20devices.">Gartner</a>, by 2028, 70% of customer interactions will begin and end within conversational, third-party assistants. It’s abundantly clear that conversations are fast becoming the new interface of brand engagement. That said, most companies still lack visibility into these critical exchanges. Loris fills that gap by analyzing 100% of interactions to help improve both AI and human agent performance, reduce friction, and deliver more seamless, personalized experiences at scale. “That’s the most exciting aspect about combining Loris and Contentsquare, the ability to connect digital interactions, AI responses, and customer conversations seamlessly with real business outcomes like satisfaction, retention, and lifetime value," said Etie Hertz, CEO of Loris AI. This predictive intelligence can transform how businesses understand and optimize their customer experience.” <figure class="image image_resized" style="width:27.42%"><img src="https://images.ctfassets.net/gwbpo1m641r7/581Hcwj5BmBYmgohc5xGk2/0c182bde334595fc1539fc3edb794886/1706497479673.jpeg?w=1920&amp;q=100&amp;fit=fill&amp;fm=avif" alt="Etie Hertz - CEO - Loris.ai" srcset="//images.ctfassets.net/gwbpo1m641r7/581Hcwj5BmBYmgohc5xGk2/0c182bde334595fc1539fc3edb794886/1706497479673.jpeg?w=828&amp;q=100&amp;fit=fill&amp;fm=avif 1x, //images.ctfassets.net/gwbpo1m641r7/581Hcwj5BmBYmgohc5xGk2/0c182bde334595fc1539fc3edb794886/1706497479673.jpeg?w=1920&amp;q=100&amp;fit=fill&amp;fm=avif 2x" width="800" /></figure>Etie Hertz, CEO, Loris.ai Loris combines proprietary AI models and large language models to surface sentiment, intent, and quality signals that generic tools miss. It was designed specifically for analyzing customer engagement across conversation-based interactions, giving CX, product, tech, and support teams a deeper view into every conversation. Armed with this visibility and automation, Loris enables users to more easily spot performance patterns, catch emerging issues early, predict trends, and make smarter decisions across the customer journey. <h3 id="why-it-matters">Why it matters</h3>AI is driving almost every technology decision across the stack. While Contentsquare has been steadily investing in AI innovation to drive insights for over 1.3 million websites and 3,700 customers, the addition of Loris brings an added dimension of functionality that reflects the consumer’s behavioral shift to conversational engagements.Customer feedback and support interactions are gold. By capturing insights from these rich sources – fueled by the power and scale of AI – Loris adds a critical new intelligence layer to Contentsquare’s digital analytics suite, bridging traditional web journeys and human and AI-powered conversations.Contentsquare already enjoys a top spot in the analytics landscape, serving large-scale global customers like Toyota, Visa, and Bose. Its experience analytics, voice of the customer, and product analytics panels are all dynamite and rich with features. From a usability perspective, it sports an intuitive UX and easy-to-harness capabilities that can juice any team at almost any stage in their lifecycle. It's hard to predict how Loris' features might be integrated or if it will maintain its own sub-brand identity (like HotJar and Heap). We'll also be looking for guidance on pricing. It’s worth noting that Contentsquare offers a free starter plan, all the way up to an enterprise package for large-scale organizations, and its other products provide independent pricing. <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-contentsquare?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Contentsquare? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaSee Agility CMS at the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Contentsquare ‘Squares Up’ to Acquire Loris AI, Expanding AI Agent Analytics and Conversational Intelligence 

<hr /> Traditional internet search, by many accounts, is circling the drain.Blame AI, they say.I can’t argue that SEO is getting pummeled. But not all metrics (depending on your vector) are bellicose. In fact, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/google-cloud-platform">Google’s </a>own figures – which are surely unbiased – indicate that search as we knew it is adapting and evolving, and the net impact of its own <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://search.google/ways-to-search/ai-overviews/">AI Overviews</a> has resulted in a higher volume of queries.The tech giant also <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-search-revenue-grows-14-in-q2-2024/522922/">reported a 14% increase</a> in its year-over-year revenue from search. For investors, that might soften some of the blow from its recent <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-prevails-landmark-antitrust-case-against-google">antitrust fallout </a>– a kerfuffle that should have us all questioning Google’s transparency and trustworthiness (stay tuned for an upcoming podcast on that subject).I wouldn't count Google out, but let’s face facts: <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://aws.amazon.com/ai/generative-ai/">Generative AI engines</a> are stealing the search thunder, and they continue to eat a precipitous share of the Big G’s lunch. <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2024-02-19-gartner-predicts-search-engine-volume-will-drop-25-percent-by-2026-due-to-ai-chatbots-and-other-virtual-agents">According to Gartner,</a> traditional search engine volume will drop 25% by next year, which is faster than previous prognostications.By the numbers, Google Search is still <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://searchengineland.com/google-search-bigger-chatgpt-search-453142">373 times bigger</a> than ChatGPT. But that margin is getting smaller and smaller. For marketers, this is creating a blind spot in the SERP soup, and SEO technologies are hustling to provide the needed visibility to address these gaps.I first wrote about products like <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/as-ai-generated-search-grows-otterly-is-utterly-awesome-for-marketers-heres-why">Otterly.ai</a> at the beginning of this year, which offered a new breed of tool for the emerging field of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://searchengineland.com/what-is-generative-engine-optimization-geo-444418">Generative and Answer Engine Optimization</a> (GEO and AEO, respectively, because we need more acronyms). Most recently, I spoke to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/conductor-ai-revs-up-brand-discoverability-in-generative-ai-answer-engines">Conductor</a> about its platform's evolution for brand discoverability across AI answer engines.The tools are getting better at this AI visibility stuff because they have to. As a larger share of search activity shifts to bots, marketers are adapting to the impact of zero-click searches. The big challenge now is ensuring your brand is discoverable and not invisible. So how do you enable your website – and its content – to be found by answer engines? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/optimizely">Optimizely</a> might just have the solution, and one that’s baked into its core <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.optimizely.com/products/content-management/">CMS</a>. The market-leading DXP just introduced some innovative features designed to help increase discovery in the AI era, positioning its powerhouse content management system as a “GEO-Ready” CMS. With these enhancements, users can effectively transform their websites from content warehouses into visibility engines built for AI discovery – and do it all in one place.Optimizely has been rolling out new AI capabilities across its product ecosystem for some time, and with pretty solid results. I just connected with <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/optimizely-opal-gets-supercharged-for-agentic-ai-powering-infinite-use-cases-for-marketers">CEO Alex Atzberger</a> for a first-hand demo of Optimizely’s new <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.optimizely.com/ai/">Opal AI</a> features, where he showed me how the product is empowering his internal teams and his own day-to-day work.“We’re transforming how marketing works,” he said during our chat. “That's the big part. That's what really matters." And now, they're expanding on that mission by addressing a compelling need for AEO and GEO features at the CMS level. <h3 id="from-invisibility-to-ai-visibility">From invisibility to AI visibility</h3>With all the motion towards generative engine search, websites owners must adapt their traditional SEO practices and embrace new strategies that serve AI bots and engines. This means structuring content so it can be surfaced, summarized, and selected by AI agents. “Your website isn’t broken – it’s just invisible,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/shafqat/">Shafqat Islam,</a> President of Optimizely. “The entire business model of the web is being upended, and how marketers generate demand or sell products is being transformed. Marketers need to make sure their websites serve two audiences: humans who demand speed and clarity, and machines that extract and summarize the content."According to Optimizely, a website’s content must be trustworthy, machine-readable, and strategically structured to compete in this new model of answer engine mechanics. Optimizely’s CMS – combined with Opal – makes the journey from invisibility to AI visibility easier by providing the onboard tooling to make your content discoverable.“If your CMS isn’t structured for AI discoverability, your content won’t be found,” Islam continued. “With the combination of our new CMS features and power of Optimizely Opal, we help brands move faster, create content smarter, and scale for a world where machines, not just people, are consuming your content.” <h3 id="being-“geo-ready”-from-optimization-to-analytics">Being “GEO-Ready” from optimization to analytics</h3>So how do these new GEO-centric features work? In a nutshell, the suite of functionality allows Optimizely’s CMS to become a sort of “visibility engine,” providing enhanced capabilities across three core areas: page optimization, site-wide optimization, and GEO analytics. Some of these structural concepts will feel very familiar to SEO experts, with a few critical differences that tap into AI agent mechanics. Here’s a breakdown of each component area: <h4 id="page-optimization-">Page Optimization </h4>As previously mentioned, showing up in AI summaries requires content to be well-structured, trustworthy, and machine-readable. To get there, Optimizely delivers enhanced page optimization with Q&amp;A field generation, which auto-generates question and answer pairs based on page content.It also provides GEO-specific metadata that populates titles, descriptions, and EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) elements for generative engines, as well as markdown summary generation, which injects page-level summaries for improved AI scanning and indexing.  <h4 id="site-optimization">Site Optimization</h4>At the global level, AI agents don’t browse. They scan. And having a top-down site structure ensures your content gets indexed, summarized, and surfaced. Optimizely simplifies this site-wide optimization with llms.txt auto-generation, which automatically signals which pages should be indexed by LLMs and bots.Optimizely also leverages GEO topic templates to generate topic-specific pages designed to rank in AI-generated summaries and bulk metadata population to add GEO metadata in bulk, including to existing content. <h4 id="geo-analytics">GEO Analytics</h4>Site performance tracking is a whole new ball game in the age of AI. Much of it has been obscured for brands and marketers, and that “black box” has been difficult to break through. When agents read content, they often do it without triggering a click, but Optimizely is bringing visibility to this hidden layer with a GEO health index that scores pages against AEO and GEO best practices.There’s also a crawl-to-refer ratio that helps measure how often AI bots crawl a brand’s site versus refer to your site, and a crawl rate by model score that indicates which LLMs are hitting a brand’s site most frequently. Taken together, marketers now have better intelligence around their site performance relative to bot activity.<h3 id="the-verdict">The verdict</h3>Optimizely’s new “GEO-Ready” features attempt to backfill the gaping hole left by AI search. By adding these features natively to its CMS, they're overcoming one of the historically persistent challenges with SEO management: a lack of prioritization. It's true. Content operations and marketing teams have long struggled with institutionalizing strong SEO practices (hence why we still have cottage agency SEO services). Leveraging automated tools within content management systems has helped improve outcomes, but Optimizely is proactively addressing this for AEO and GEO – and that’s a potentially huge benefit. In this rapidly evolving era of AI and zero-click searches, marketers need to be more intentional about their content strategies. That includes the foundational approach to AI structure. Having a CMS that helps you establish a stronger position – and to be “GEO-Ready” – could help simplify and accelerate success. This is definitely a feature set worthy of a demo. And while I expect other CMS platforms to adopt similar tools and strategies, Optimizely continues to reinforce its position as a leader with an integrated ecosystem that will benefit from these innovative steps.  <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-optimizely?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Optimizely? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaSee Agility CMS at the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Welcome to the ‘GEO-Ready’ CMS: Optimizely adds new features to enhance AI-powered search

<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/critics/jurgita-lap">Jurgita Lapienytė</a><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/critics/dan-drapeau"> </a>is Editor-in-Chief at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cybernews.com/">Cybernews</a> and a CMS Critic contributor. <hr /> The <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cybernews.com/news/grok-posts-praise-hitler/">latest Grok debacle</a> reads like a case study in how not to launch an AI chatbot. Elon Musk’s xAI, fresh off the hype cycle for Grok 4.0, found itself in damage-control mode after the bot spewed antisemitic tropes, praised Hitler, and doubled down with the kind of “truth-seeking” rhetoric that’s become a dog whistle for “anything goes.” The company’s response was to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jul/09/grok-ai-praised-hitler-antisemitism-x-ntwnfb">delete</a> the posts, apologize, and promise that next time, the filters will work, while Musk <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/grok-elon-musks-ai-chatbot-antisemitic-comments/">blamed</a> manipulative prompt injections by users.<h3 id="grok’s-security-failures-–-not-so-uncommon-">Grok’s Security Failures – Not So Uncommon </h3>First, the core vulnerability here is Grok’s very design. Marketed as a “truth-seeking” alternative to more tightly controlled chatbots, Grok was engineered with fewer guardrails and a willingness to echo the rawest edges of online discourse. It seems to function very much like X after Musk’s takeover of the company.That design philosophy, paired with the model’s notorious “compliance” to user prompts, created a perfect storm for prompt injection attacks. Prompt injection is an extremely dangerous attack vector, as threat actors, if asking the right questions, can <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cybernews.com/security/universal-ai-jailbreak-discovered/">trick chatbots</a> into giving instructions on how to enrich uranium or make methamphetamine at home.When the training data is laced with extremist rhetoric, and the guardrails are weak or hastily implemented, it’s only a matter of time before the worst of humanity bubbles up through the code. This isn’t unique to Grok as TikTok, X, Instagram, and YouTube also have been infested with racist content, often slipping past moderators who are overwhelmed, under-resourced, or simply indifferent.A few months back, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cybernews.com/tech/hitler-glorifying-surges-on-tiktok-x/">we called out</a> AI platforms for translating Hitler’s speeches and giving them new digital life. The backlash was immediate: accusations of censorship, attacks on free speech, and the usual internet pile-on. The Grok case shows how chatbots could be weaponized to amplify hate speech, spread conspiracy theories, and even praise genocidal figures, all under the banner of “free expression.”<h3 id="xai’s-response-could-have-been-better">xAI’s Response Could Have Been Better</h3>What’s most worrying from a cybersecurity perspective is the lack of proactive defense. xAI’s action was a textbook incident response (not that it ever works well for the culprits): scrub the posts, patch the prompts, abruptly apologize, and hope for the best. But in the world of modern infosec, that’s not enough. Proper security requires adversarial red-teaming before launch, not after the damage is done. It demands layered controls – robust input validation, output monitoring, anomaly detection, and the ability to quarantine or roll back models when they go off the rails. Grok’s rollout, timed with the launch of version 4.0, suggests that the model was pushed live without sufficient penetration testing or ethical red-teaming, exposing millions to risk in real time.<h3 id="guidance-for-web-and-digital-experience-builders">Guidance for Web and Digital Experience Builders</h3>The Grok 4.0 chatbot controversy is a front-row lesson for anyone shaping modern digital experiences. When AI-powered chatbots go off script – spitting out offensive, dangerous, or extremist content – the fallout can hit hard and fast: legal headaches, brand damage, user backlash, and regulatory scrutiny. For web and digital experience builders, the new norm is recognizing that generative AI is an unpredictable extension of your content platform. The right lessons, drawn now, can mean the difference between successful innovation and the next tech lesson.To prevent failures, make sure to take at least these essential steps: <ol><li>Treat AI chatbots like core content: Run every AI or chatbot-generated output through editorial moderation, just as you would user-generated content. Also, use your CMS workflows to enforce pre-publication reviews for sensitive or high-risk content segments.</li><li>Demand transparency from vendors: You should insist on clear documentation from AI vendors. How is training data sourced? How quickly are filters updated? What triggers moderation? And definitely avoid integrations where the provider gives vague or buzzword-heavy answers.</li><li>Monitor for red flags in real time: Set up dashboards and alerts for spikes in controversial or sensitive queries. Make sure to flag sudden shifts in chatbot tone or recurring attempts to bypass guardrails. Audit bot sessions for toxic or extremist phrases, and require review for flagged cases.</li><li>Build in robust safeguards: Don’t rely solely on post-incident apologies or deletions. </li><li>Assign ownership and enable fast escalation: Designate a point person or team for bot oversight, empowered with a “kill switch” to disable misbehaving chatbots immediately.</li><li>Understand the regulatory landscape: Track where your digital experiences intersect with regions governed by strict AI or content laws (e.g., EU’s Digital Services Act). Ensure you have compliance evidence for content moderation, output logging, and quick takedown response.</li><li>Reinforce your AI guardrails: Treat AI guardrails as a living part of your digital stack, not a one-time fix. Iterate and improve with each update, launch, or training data change.</li></ol>The truth is, every new chatbot or AI feature is a potential attack surface that demands active, informed governance. For digital architects, these steps are the new non-negotiables.<h3 id="regulators-aren’t-impressed">Regulators Aren’t Impressed</h3>The regulatory consequences of irresponsible chatbot development are already unfolding. Turkey has <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.politico.eu/article/turkey-ban-elon-musk-grok-recep-tayyip-erdogan-insult/">banned</a> Grok over Erdoğan insults, and Poland intends to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/poland-report-musks-chatbot-grok-eu-offensive-comments-2025-07-09/">report</a> the chatbot to the EU for offending Polish politicians. These are signals that the era of “move fast and break things” might be over for AI. Under the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age/digital-services-act_en">EU’s Digital Services Act</a> and similar laws, platforms are now on the hook for algorithmic harms, with the threat of massive fines and operational restrictions. The cost of insecure AI is measured in court orders, compliance audits, and the erosion of public trust.Perhaps the most insidious risk is how generative AI like Grok can supercharge existing threats and amplify biases. In the wrong hands, a chatbot is a megaphone. Coordinated adversaries could use such systems for influence operations, harassment campaigns, or even sophisticated phishing and social engineering attacks, all at unprecedented scale and speed. Every flaw, every missed filter, becomes instantly weaponizable.To protect our societies, we have to realize that generative AI is a living, evolving attack surface that demands new strategies, new transparency, and relentless vigilance. If companies keep treating these failures as isolated glitches, they’ll find themselves not just outpaced by attackers, but outflanked by regulators and abandoned by users.  <hr /><h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaWe are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Grok's Meltdown: What Web and Digital Experience Builders Must Learn

jurgita-lap

Weglot - The easiest way to translate a website

The easiest way to translate a website

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<hr /> <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/sitecore">Sitecore’s</a> annual SKO landed squarely in the summer heat of Orlando, Florida, this week – a fitting backdrop for a tempest of hot announcements. Under the hypnotic sway of palm trees and the predictable torrid of July showers, the digital experience leader continues to turn up the heat on AI innovation.To that end, the company just announced a strategic partnership with <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradial.com/">Gradial</a>, an AI agent platform designed to accelerate the content supply chain for enterprises. The collaboration aims to speed up and simplify how marketers deliver personalized campaigns at scale while monetizing engagement – all at a fraction of the current cost. Armed with Gradial’s capabilities, Sitecore aims to evolve agents beyond baseline recommendations and suggestions, enabling them to act autonomously on the marketer’s behalf to achieve new levels of productivity. According to Sitecore, the Gradial partnership is another milestone in its innovation horizon for agentic AI, which is explored in detail at the new <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.sitecore.ai/">Sitecore.ai</a> (we <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/accelerating-the-agentic-future-sitecoreai-gives-marketers-an-inspiring-roadmap-for-their-ai-journey">covered the launch</a> at the end of June). More than a website, this center of excellence illustrates how content, data, and intelligence can be synthesized to power the next era of digital engagement, and agentic AI is at the center of it.“Gradial brings a unique blend of engineering precision and marketing empathy,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/sitecore-taps-veteran-eric-stine-as-ceo-to-lead-next-phase-of-growth-and-innovation">Eric Stine,</a> CEO of Sitecore. “Their AI-powered orchestration capabilities enhance Sitecore’s composable digital experience platform by automating the execution layer marketers need most to deliver the kinds of personal, predictive experiences that drive leads and revenue growth, but which historically have been costly and laborious. Together, we’re helping marketers move faster and smarter, using AI to transform delivery and stay anchored in creativity and brand purpose.”<h3 id="empowering-marketers-with-ai">Empowering marketers with AI</h3>It goes without saying that today’s marketing teams are overwhelmed. Data is fragmented and siloed, and tools are often disconnected – making the rigors of campaign management difficult under the best of circumstances. To cope with these challenges, marketers resort to extraneous apps and complicated workflows to help design, launch, deliver, and optimize campaigns. The whole rigmarole slows everything down and diverts attention from strategic initiatives and compromises time to market.According to Sitecore, the partnership with Gradial is effectively “reinventing” marketing operations. Gradial’s AI-powered orchestration platform integrates with Sitecore’s DXP to automate the execution layer, turning marketing briefs into live campaigns without the handoffs, tickets, or delays.“At Gradial, we see content operations as a systems challenge – complex, dynamic, and in need of intelligent automation,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/doug-tallmadge-14166075/">Doug Tallmadge,</a> CEO of Gradial. “Sitecore’s vision for agentic AI aligns perfectly with our mission: to build adaptive systems that do the heavy lifting, so marketers can lead with insight, not infrastructure. Together, we’re enabling a new era of marketing execution that is precise, scalable, and deeply human.”Gradial has already achieved a strong reputation as an agentic platform for the enterprise. As marketing teams struggle to deliver on-point omnichannel experiences, Gradial’s unique model automates content operations, from authoring to production – enabling organizations to leverage agents to govern site health, brand compliance, and even QA and accessibility concerns. Gradial’s agents are also being positioned as activators for enabling CX optimization and automating a host of functions that have traditionally created friction within content operations. <h3 id="new-chapter,-new-leadership">New chapter, new leadership</h3>Since assuming command in May, I’ve spoken with Sitecore CEO Eric Stine a few times. In our calls, he’s been exceedingly clear about the company’s focus on AI, and much of that vision has been crystallized in the new Sitecore.ai website.  To match the pace of change in an AI marketplace, Stine is tapping a newly appointed executive team with deep expertise in AI, cloud, and CX – all with the goal of empowering marketers to deliver the future of digital experiences. <img style="width:26.96%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/image-1752583805404.png" /><h4 id="michael-bannon-–-president-and-chief-administrative-officer"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-bannon-077a296/">Michael Bannon – President and Chief Administrative Officer</a></h4>Bannon has been with Sitecore for less than a year, moving swiftly from CFO to the President’s chair to lead strategy, people, finance, legal, and enterprise technology. Bannon’s career spans high-growth technology companies, private equity, and investment banking with firms like Accel Starter. Previously, Bannon ran Typeform as President and CFO. With his leadership experience within high-growth environments and innovation-led organizations, he will support Sitecore’s next phase of growth. <img style="width:28.86%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/image-1752583843497.png" /><h4 id="michelle-boockoff-bajdek-–-chief-marketing-officer"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellebb/">Michelle Boockoff-Bajdek – Chief Marketing Officer</a></h4>Boockoff-Bajdek is a transformational CMO, digital storyteller, and undisputed trailblazer in AI-powered marketing. As CMO of IBM Watson, she oversaw the Watson brand, helping to translate the value of AI. As CMO at IDC, she reimagined marketing as a “strategic growth engine,” launching a new brand identity, leading the firm’s first GenAI initiatives, and aligning brand, demand, and strategy to drive global impact. A frequent speaker on marketing leadership and purpose-led growth, Michelle will advance how Sitecore communicates the transformative power of AI in marketing. <img style="width:30.04%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/image-1752583889763.png" /><h4 id="dave-tilbury-–-chief-operating-officer"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/davetilbury/">Dave Tilbury – Chief Operating Officer</a></h4>Tilbury brings more than 20 years of global business experience and a proven track record of driving growth, transforming commercial outcomes, and elevating customer impact. Most recently, as EVP and Chief Sales Officer at Capgemini, he led the sales, marketing, and product teams. At Sitecore, he will oversee all customer-facing functions, including sales, pre-sales, revenue operations, unified customer support, and customer value realization.<h3 id="why-it-matters">Why it matters</h3>The Gradial partnership will undoubtedly provide a more robust content marketing experience for Sitecore’s customers, giving teams more power and automation to execute campaigns faster and with more precision and insight. It’s a clear win – and a force multiplier that will enable Sitecore to compete more effectively with similar offerings. Seeing how users engage with the features will be telling, but it’s a step in the right direction.The new leadership team is a cabal of heavy hitters, each bringing a solid background of experience and forward-thinking potential. We always anticipate change when new leadership enters the top of the C-Suite, but it’s clear that Stine has been thoughtful in his selections – particularly with AI talent that will help shape the next steps in the agentic race. More will likely be revealed at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://symposium.sitecore.com/">Sitecore Symposium</a> – the company’s showcase of innovation and insight – taking place this November in Orlando. Stay tuned. <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-sitecore?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Sitecore? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaWe are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Sitecore Sharpens AI Focus with Strategic Partnership and New Leadership Appointments

<hr /> Online video is exploding at an unimaginable rate. Globally, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://siteefy.com/video-marketing-statistics/">over 90% of internet users</a> watch online videos at least once a month, and more than 50% of video marketers are now using AI tools to create or edit their videos. As you might predict, this combination will translate into more videos, more viewers, and faster delivery – especially as AI continues to disrupt production capacity. With so much content being created, brands need better tools and easier ways to glean insights from their videos. This is where AI can be a transformative resource.   To that end, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://aws.amazon.com/what-is/ai-agents/">AI agents</a> are becoming commonplace in every corner of the digital stack, bringing a host of possibilities to the table. There is, of course, a lot of hype associated with generative AI features, but there are layers where the agentic promise is tangible – and the platform investment might be paying off in a big way. That’s certainly the case when it comes to scalable automation in tools that amplify the reach of human users and teams. <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/wowza">Wowza</a> is the latest to join the agentic revolution. A trusted name in video streaming infrastructure for mission-critical applications, the platform provider is bringing intelligent, agent-based capabilities to the forefront with the recent acquisition of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://avaintellect.com/">AVA Intellect,</a> an AI-native startup specializing in intelligent and embedded agent technology for video platforms.I’ve been tracking Wowza for a while now (having used it extensively in customer solutions with web and CMS applications), and this acquisition aligns firmly with the company’s commitment to embed AI across the entire video lifecycle – starting with capabilities that drive immediate value for customers. According to the company’s press release, this move positions Wowza as the first established video infrastructure software company to introduce intelligent agent technology at the point of configuration and support, providing valuable innovation in a well-established market. Building on Wowza’s industry recognition as a reliable infrastructure streaming partner for mission-critical applications at scale, the acquisition of AVA also reinforces its continuous commitment to innovation. This investment will potentially be felt across its customer ecosystem – which includes broadcasters like Astral, higher ed institutions like the University of Maine, globally recognized brands like Macy's, and government agencies like NASA.  <figure class="image image-style-align-center image_resized" style="width:33.59%"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/image-1752534146288.png" /></figure>Krish Kumar, CEO of Wowza “AVA joins Wowza at a pivotal time as we accelerate innovation on the foundation that has made Wowza such a reliable streaming infrastructure partner for so many mission-critical applications,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/kumarkrish/">Krish Kumar,</a> CEO of Wowza. “We’re integrating AVA Intellect’s agent framework into our platform to deliver video insights and real-time configuration support that adapts to customer needs. It’s a practical step forward in making video delivery more intelligent and responsive."<h3 id="evolving-video-streaming-capabilities-with-agentic-ai">Evolving video streaming capabilities with Agentic AI</h3>Prior to the acquisition, AVA Intellect positioned itself as an AI platform for seamless enterprise collaboration, combining AI, voice, video, and automation. It offered what it called AI-powered “virtual teammates,” or agents designed to collaborate like real colleagues in a workspace – something we've seen take off recently in the banking and financial industries.  <figure class="image image-style-align-center image_resized" style="width:89.52%"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/ava-intellect.png" /></figure>AVA Intellect dashboard. Source: AVA Intellect website. With the integration of AVA Intellect, Wowza is trumpeting two major product innovations that could be game changers. First, AVA’s stream intelligence will detect key markers and pull real-time insights directly from video. This could prove decisive from a productivity standpoint, making it even easier to process and manage video content at scale. Second, AVA’s AI technology will be leveraged to unlock agent-powered experiences, enhancing every stage of the user journey and bringing more intelligence and automation to Wowza’s video infrastructure. This new agent resource is designed to help Wowza’s customers realize greater value by accelerating their work and exploring solutions more intuitively. Taken together, these resources could enhance usability, reduce friction, boost productivity, and elevate the overall streaming experience. Users can even access personalized support on demand, providing an added layer of confidence for enterprise customers. <h3 id="bringing-ai-leadership-into-the-fold--">Bringing AI leadership into the fold  </h3>As part of the acquisition, AVA’s co-founder <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeljohnvitale/">Mike Vitale</a> joins Wowza as Head of Intelligence, accelerating Wowza’s shift toward an AI-first product strategy. With over twenty years of experience that encompasses enterprise streaming, cloud-native architecture, and AI product development, Vitale brings deep domain experience and a track record of innovation at the intersection of media and machine intelligence. <figure class="image image-style-align-center image_resized" style="width:31.83%"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/07/image-1752534011953.png" /></figure>Mike Vitale, co-founder of AVA Intellect and new Head of Intelligence at Wowza “What drew me to Wowza was the chance to pair next-gen AI with a platform that already powers some of the most demanding video infrastructure in the world,” said Vitale. “We’re building on that foundation with new intelligence that’s embeddable and aligned with how developers and product teams want to work today - across industries, use cases, and environments.”<h3 id="why-it-matters">Why it matters</h3>In the niche layer of enterprise video infrastructure providers, Wowza has a lot going for it. As a streaming engine, it’s super adaptable and feature-rich. From a performance perspective, it consistently delivers high-quality live and on-demand video (VOD) experiences for a broad range of customers across industries, including media, public safety, healthcare, IoT, and more. It also powers content delivery networks (CDNs), hosting and streaming providers, ISPs, and other service providers with licensed options. In my own experiences deploying Wowza, I can tell you that it’s reliable and flexible, making it a solid choice for powering your video workloads. It also sports a bench of developer-centric tools, allowing organizations to build and scale custom video infrastructure based on their needs. This could be anything from live government agency meetings to dedicated brand-focused streaming channels. AI is transforming every tool in the digital stack, and we’ve seen a concerted effort by enterprise vendors to weave AI and agentic capabilities throughout their ecosystems. As I said, there’s been a lot of hype with generative AI features, but there are bright spots worth pursuing. That’s certainly been the case for data-focused automation in places like DAMs, CDPs, and other tools where automation and insights can really benefit from the force multiplication of AI and the promise of agent-based functions.Wowza’s acquisition of AVA is a smart move, and signals the next step in its platform evolution. By injecting AI deeper into the streaming experience, Wowza is investing in a more intelligent and responsive infrastructure that can help customers be more agile while accelerating the deliver of better video experiences – all at scale.I recommend keeping an eye on these features as they roll out.  <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-wowza?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Wowza? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaWe are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Wowza Acquires AVA Intellect, Bringing AI and Agent-Based Automation to its Streaming Video Platform

Optimizely Opal Gets Supercharged for Agentic AI, Powering Infinite Use Cases for Marketers

<hr /> <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_Day_(1996_film)">Independence Day</a> destroyed the box office in the summer of 1996. It was a bona fide Hollywood blockbuster, ushering in a decades-long fascination with large-scale disaster and sci-fi films.I was there when it opened. I remember sitting in a chilled theater, a sticky layer of Coke-infused popcorn crunching beneath my feet, holding my breath as mile-long flying saucers cast long shadows across entire cities. What happened next was the stuff of VFX legend: Manhattan melted under a massive laser. F-14 Tomcats picked dogfights with alien spaceships. There were heroes and sacrifices. It was all visually glorious. If you haven’t seen this masterpiece, there’s a big spoiler ahead. The film reaches its climax on the morning of July Fourth, just as Earth’s ransacked military is launching a final assault against these technologically advanced invaders. As he’s rallying the troops for a final speech, President Whitmore (played by the ever-gruff <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Pullman">Bill Pullman</a>) says:“We will not go quietly into the night. We will not vanish without a fight…”Man. I still get goosebumps. <figure class="media"><div data-oembed-url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V16tMmTezFQ"><div style="position:relative;padding-bottom:100%;height:0;padding-bottom:56.2493%"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/V16tMmTezFQ" style="position:absolute;width:100%;height:100%;top:0;left:0" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe></div></div></figure> Appropriating this iconic holiday was a clever plot mechanism, but it also illustrated how a crisis can unify people around a common cause. In the movie, mankind is on the line, and “Independence Day” transcends its American roots, symbolizing a victory for the entire planet. It feels like our world could use a dose of that unifying spirit right now, but I digress. Digital publishers have also been experiencing an “invasion” by advanced technology. For the last few years, AI crawlers have been infesting the web, harvesting content and repurposing it for answer engines like <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://chatgpt.com/">ChatGPT</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.perplexity.ai/">Perplexity</a>. According to one study, more than <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.fastcompany.com/91361611/ai-chatbots-are-breaking-the-web-and-forcing-a-404-makeover">half of Americans use one of these chatbots</a> to search and navigate the web. As people continue to shift their preferences to these tools, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/conductor-ai-revs-up-brand-discoverability-in-generative-ai-answer-engines">zero-click searches</a> are destroying traffic and, consequently, punishing content creators. To understand why this is happening, we have to go back to the dawn of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/google-cloud-platform">Google</a>, when it established not only its dominance in search, but also the business model for the web. By allowing the “Big G” to crawl and index your site, you effectively traded content for eyeballs. Search generated traffic, which publishers could value against the sale of digital ads, subscriptions, and other merchandise. You get the rest.The entire model is changing, and Google is partly to blame. Setting aside its nefarious ad practices that resulted in an <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-prevails-landmark-antitrust-case-against-google">antitrust lawsuit</a>, Google’s infamous <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://blog.google/products/search/generative-ai-google-search-may-2024/">AI Overview</a> has cannibalized organic search traffic from websites by answering queries directly. At the same time, the total number of Google searches is declining, and last year, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://searchengineland.com/google-search-zero-click-study-2024-443869">60% of them ended without a click</a>. In 2025, we could be looking at some dystopian-level declines.  Where does this leave content creators? If there’s no traffic, how can they translate the value of their website and the experiences they produce? And If AI crawlers continue to invade, pillage, and assimilate their content, where’s the incentive to keep producing the quality work that powers the web?<h3 id="cloudflare-declares-‘content-independence-day’-">Cloudflare declares ‘Content Independence Day’ </h3>When deconstructing this AI conundrum, fighting an advanced alien technology might not be the perfect analogy, but it rings some truth. To be fair, AI is astonishing, and it’s having a profound and often positive impact on the way we work. It’s also helping to solve some of the biggest problems we face, from fully unlocking our genomes to accelerating a cure for cancer.But for the creator and knowledge economies – where generative AI and co-pilots have evolved beyond automating tasks to outright deprecating jobs – it’s been a double-edged sword.Now, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/cloudflare">Cloudflare</a> is attempting to fight back with what it calls “Content Independence Day.” The cloud infrastructure provider just announced that it’s changing its default setting to block AI crawlers unless they agree to pay creators for their content. This, of course, requires the employment of Cloudflare as a CDN, but it's a “full stop” moment.As co-founder and CEO Matthew Prince <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://blog.cloudflare.com/content-independence-day-no-ai-crawl-without-compensation/">wrote in his announcement</a> on July 1, content is the “fuel” that powers AI engines. In his mind, it's only fair that content creators are compensated directly for it.This move has a lot of weight behind it. As one of the largest networks on the planet, Cloudflare serves roughly 20% of the web with its cloud infrastructure services, which include content delivery, DDoS protection, load balancing, bot management, and more. In the announcement, the company suggested that it was being joined by a “majority of leading publishers and AI companies." This likely includes media outlets like The New York Times, which has been publicly embroiled in lawsuits with <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/27/business/media/new-york-times-open-ai-microsoft-lawsuit.html">OpenAI and Microsoft</a> over content copyright infringement. It’s also worth noting that many large publishers like The Atlantic and Vox have <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.axios.com/2024/05/29/atlantic-vox-media-openai-licensing-deal">already struck deals with AI companies</a> to license their content for AI model training.This news isn’t exactly shocking. Cloudflare has been laying the groundwork over the last year, giving publishers <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/03/cloudflare-launches-a-tool-to-combat-ai-bots/">an array of tools</a> for battling the onslaught of AI crawlers. But the path is leading to what Prince describes as a “marketplace” where publishers can choose to provide access to AI bots and be compensated for it.This week, Cloudflare took the first step in launching its new <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/01/cloudflare-launches-a-marketplace-that-lets-websites-charge-ai-bots-for-scraping/">“Pay per Crawl”</a> vision, which is in the experimental phases. It works just like it sounds: A website owner can choose to allow individual AI crawlers to index their content for an agreed-upon rate. Alternatively, websites can allow free access or block bots altogether. According to Cloudflare, its customers will have enhanced visibility into how a specific bot is using their content for things like model training.There’s no word yet on what that pricing model will look like, but Cloudflare is endeavoring to put choice fully in the hands of content creators and publishers. It’s asserting what Seth Godin might call a “permission-based methodology,” where the actions are transparent, the intentions are in the sunlight, and the user has the power. Overall, that sounds healthy. In his blog post, Prince also discussed the shift to a new paradigm for scoring and valuing content. Since the beginning of Google, we’ve been hyper-focused on traffic as the end-all, be-all of analytics. As he proposes, this could be a tipping point – a new “golden age” of high-value content creation that bridges the knowledge gap for AI engines and improves results. Is he right? I’m honestly not sure. Cloudflare is working with experts and economists to map this new marketplace and provide some guidance. There’s already been a swell of positive support for this move, so I’m betting we’ll see traction and adoption over the coming months.The real question is: How will the AI providers adapt? Will they all board the mothership?<h3 id="what-this-could-mean-for-the-cms-industry">What this could mean for the CMS industry</h3>Independence Day painted a terrifying picture of how advanced alien technology could wreak havoc on our planet. But it also demonstrated how human ingenuity – and a mastery of our own tools and technologies – could help us turn the tide. As the engines for content publishing, content management systems are at the foundation of this fight. Nearly every commercial and open source CMS vendor is deploying with a CDN or offers native content delivery controls. That’s even true on the managed open source side (think about how easy it is to flip on a CDN in <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/wp-engine">WP Engine</a>). If Pay per Crawl catches on, there could be a shift of preference towards Cloudflare. Likewise, other CDNs that offer bot management (<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/akamai">Akamai</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/fastly">Fastly</a> come to mind) might also introduce default AI blocking. To that end, we can expect increased scrutiny on CDN partnerships and edge technologies.It’s too early to know how this will all play out, but CMS vendors, customers, and practitioners should keep a weather eye on this storm. In the same manner that regulation has galvanized the rights of website users regarding data privacy, this could result in a free-market solution that insulates content creators from the yoke of AI crawlers and provides fair compensation. As the New York Times said, it’s like a toll road, and bots finally have to pay the piper. As a publisher, they've been vocal and audacious about fortifying their content domain, because the leap to digital hasn't exactly been an easy or profitable transition. AI is just the latest threat to their content-driven model. At the same time, brands don't want to be left out of the answer engines. This is a critical point that can't be overstated. Policing bot activity is coming a little too late in the program; they're not going anywhere, and companies want to ensure their presence on ChatGPT and Perplexity. As Cloudflare suggested, this could ultimately coalesce in a new marketplace, one where the crawler economy collides with the agentic. <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/01/cloudflare-launches-a-marketplace-that-lets-websites-charge-ai-bots-for-scraping/">As the they outlined,</a> agents could be given “budgets” to hunt down the best and most relevant content – and even leverage an industry-specific stablecoin or token system to transact with. CMSes could become key instruments in this, providing control planes and vectors for how bots can engage with content. If website owners have visibility into the kinds of bots hitting their pages, they can be strategically selective and use permission-based methodologies to allow access. The CDN layer might be the core control point, but the CMS could help simplify that. Via analytics, content creators could also identify which pages are higher-value targets, and thus worth more to a bot.Headless CMSes and composable DXPs might be better positioned to adapt to this new marketplace by leveraging APIs for fine-tuning crawl exposure. We could see the injection of native crawl budgeting or cost-governance tools, as well as dashboards that monitor a variety of dimensions and dynamic indexing based on analytics. This is all pie-in-the-sky, but the potential is ripe for innovation.At the center of this is content strategy, which will likely continue a shift towards “value per crawl.” It’s still all about optimization, but we should expect even smarter tools to help improve site structure and schema – and in this sense, the fundamentals are still sound.There’s a lot more I could speculate on, but it doesn’t change the simple fact that AI needs content, and websites need traffic. Maybe it’s time that there’s a fair transaction between the two. This move is attempting to marry performance with transparency and financial accountability, and CMSes that offer more control could have an advantage.We don’t need to blow up the world to solve this problem, but declaring an “Independence Day” might be a good start. And Cloudflare might be in the best position to help content creators "not go quietly into the AI night.'" <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-cloudflare?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Cloudflare? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaWe are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

We will not go quietly into the AI night: What Cloudflare’s ‘AI Independence Day’ could mean for CMS

<hr /> It’s a data swamp out there, and brands are trudging through it. With customer data sprawled across a multitude of devices, platforms, and identities, enterprises are struggling to unify the chaos, glean meaningful insights, and create more personalized experiences.As people engage via a widening channel of digital touchpoints, unifying disjointed customer records has become a huge blocker. While features in CDPs and data warehouses have provided a salve, the use of <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://hightouch.com/blog/identity-resolution-tools">identity resolution tools</a> – software solutions that link customer data points across different systems – has become an essential resource for keeping the mud off your boots.But when the data picture is incomplete, things get fuzzy. This is where <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/products/hightouch">Hightouch</a> is sharpening the details with precision and giving marketers more reliable insight. The composable CDP and AI decisioning platform just introduced probabilistic Identity Resolution, an adaptive feature of Hightouch’s powerful warehouse-native customer data platform that combines AI with deterministic logic to fill in the gaps of fragmented profiles. This new capability introduces what Hightouch calls “multi-zone” identity resolution, which enables businesses to jump between high-confidence deterministic matching and higher-reach probabilistic matching within a single project setup. In this sense, it combines the best of both worlds in one unified solution within the CDP.“Most identity resolution tools are either rigid or opaque,” said <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/tejasmanohar/">Tejas Manohar</a>, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Hightouch. “We’ve built something entirely new, a multi-zone identity engine that lets customers toggle between high-confidence deterministic graphs and higher-reach probabilistic graphs, without sacrificing transparency or control.”<h3 id="determining-the-probabilities-with-ai">Determining the probabilities with AI</h3>We live in an ever-expanding world of digital touchpoints, and consumers are engaging across a litany of devices and channels. With so much data in so many places, brands are struggling to capture clean and accurate customer data from a disjointed mountain of customer records, which is eroding the effectiveness of marketing and personalization.While identity resolution helps cut through the chaos, it has inherent challenges relative to the use case. Transactional emails, for example, perform best with high-confidence deterministic matching. Meanwhile, things like ad targeting work best with high-reach probabilistic matching. With Hightouch, you can use the right method for the right use case. Toggle to deterministic identity resolution to leverage exact matches with identical email addresses or phone numbers. Jump to probabilistic identity resolution and utilize machine learning models to infer connections between similar (but not identical) records. This can include linking a nickname and personal email to a business identity to help fill a gap.<h3 id="powerful-identity-resolution-features">Powerful identity resolution features</h3>While other platforms offer probabilistic matching, Hightouch is the first to make both probabilistic and deterministic resolution fully configurable, transparent, and warehouse-native. This enables brands to control their identity resolution logic, optimize for different downstream use cases, and preserve data ownership at every step. Features of Hightouch's adaptive Identity Resolution include its noted multi-zone matching, which enables users to adjust confidence levels up for precision or down for reach. Now you can shift your deterministic and probabilistic resolution in parallel depending on your use case. It's also highly configurable and transparent, allowing you to fine-tune your matching logic, inspect machine learning decisions, and customize golden record logic without code.Hightouch's warehouse-native architecture also allows users to perform identity resolution on their complete data, directly in the data warehouse. No need to move data into a separate CDP or black box – it's all handled in one place, and it's all configurable and transparent. With Hightouch's real-time activation, you can put merged profiles to work instantly across ads, email, customer success, and more through its deep integration ecosystem. As Hightouch contends, this isn’t a “one-size-fits-all algorithm” they’re applying, but an intelligent, transparent framework that evolves with your business needs. And with AI inside the warehouse, identity resolution steps up from being just a hygiene task to a strategic advantage.<h3 id="the-verdict">The verdict</h3>Identity resolution tools have been around for a while at both a warehouse-native and black box level, providing options that are native and outside an organization’s data stack. Proximity aside, there are implicit limitations that are exacerbated by the growing number of data sources and disjointed customer records. Hightouch is endeavoring to solve this problem with its novel multi-zone identity engine. What’s key is that customers have more power to switch between deterministic and probabilistic graphs to achieve a more complete picture and attain greater confidence. There's more control over use cases for high confidence or high reach, and this could deliver more value to marketing teams as they focus more on personalization.The artificial intelligence piece is also pivotal, unlocking more scale and potential as the lakes of data continue to grow. But this investment in AI-powered solution is precisely what’s putting this platform on the map. Hightouch is still “riding high” as it innovates along its AI decisioning capabilities, which earned it an <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/u-cant-touch-this-cdp-hightouch-nails-80m-series-c-to-power-its-ai-decisioning">$80 million Series C last February.</a>Earlier this year, I spoke with Hightouch’s <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/hightouch-taps-adam-greco-as-product-evangelist-strengthening-its-leadership-in-composable-cdps">Product Evangelist, Adam Greco,</a> about the evolution of the company’s composable CDP and how it’s challenging the category. As I observed at the time, Hightouch is plotting a unique course, and this latest foray into native, AI-powered identity resolution is further evidence of that.  <hr /><h4 style="text-align:center" id="looking-for-guidance-on-hightouch?-talk-to-an-expert.">Looking for guidance on Hightouch? <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://cmscritic.com/contact">Talk to an expert.</a></h4><hr /> <h3 id="upcoming-events">Upcoming Events</h3> <img style="width:31.83%" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2025/01/cms-connect-2025-logo.png" alt="" /><h4 id="cms-connect-25"><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">CMS Connect 25</a></h4>August 5-6, 2025 – Montreal, CanadaWe are delighted to present the second annual summer edition of our signature global conference dedicated to the content management community! CMS Connect will be held again in beautiful Montreal, Canada, and feature a unique blend of masterclasses, insightful talks, interactive discussions, impactful learning sessions, and authentic networking opportunities. Join vendors, agencies, and customers from across our industry as we engage and collaborate around the future of content management – and hear from the top thought leaders at the only vendor-neutral, in-person conference exclusively focused on CMS. Space is limited for this event, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.boye-co.com/conferences/cmsconnect25">so book your seats today.</a>

Hightouch Adds New AI-Powered Adaptive Identity Resolution to its CDP

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