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Well, it's been another action-packed month in the CMS and DXP worlds, and there's barely time to process the news.
Just as we finished breaking down <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/key-takeaways-from-gartners-2021-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms/">Gartner's 2021 Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms</a>, the 2021 Forrester Wave for Agile Content Management Systems was released. You can get a copy of the report <a href="https://www.forrester.com/report/The+Forrester+Wave+Agile+Content+Management+Systems+CMSes+Q1+2021/-/E-RES161667">here</a>.
There's a lot to unpack, but the main question is: how do you make sense of both the Gartner and Forrester reports when evaluating a solution? There are similarities and differences to be sure, but the comparisons reveal some bigger things happening across the experience management landscape. We'll have a detailed analysis next week.
<h3>Automattic's WordPress VIP Acquires Parse.ly</h3>
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WordPress VIP (<a href="https://wpvip.com/">WPVIP</a>), Automattic’s WordPress enterprise content management platform, has announced the acquisition of <a href="https://www.parse.ly/">Parse.ly</a> – a real-time content analytics platform designed for content management and e-commerce platforms. The goal is to provide enterprises with content analytics that integrate seamlessly across WPVIP’s commerce and content offerings.
Parse.ly is the first large enterprise software acquisition for Automattic, the parent company of WordPress, Tumblr, and other tech platforms that enable people to publish content to the open web.
Previously, Salesforce made a <a href="https://ma.tt/2019/09/series-d/">$300 million investment</a> in <a href="https://automattic.com/">Automattic</a>. In a post about the transaction, Matt Mullenweg – the founder and CEO of Automattic – said that Salesforce "helped open his eyes to the potential there is in the enterprise market for WordPress VIP."
While the Parse.ly purchase represents a larger enterprise strategy, Automattic is no stranger to acquisitions. One of their most notable, <a href="https://woocommerce.com/posts/woothemes-joins-automattic/">WooCommerce</a>, provided a critical pathway to e-commerce, and had become a well-known brand in the space. On the other side of the stack, they acquired the <a href="https://angel.co/today/stories/automattic-acquires-wordpress-plugin-zbs-crm-4292">ZBS CRM</a>, a customer relationship management plugin for WordPress that enables online retailers using WordPress and WooCommerce to keep track of their customers.
Through Parse.ly, Automattic is elevating the value of enterprise analytics for its customers. Parse.ly uses predictive analytics for content recommendations, driving engagement with personalized experiences for every visitor. It also provides both real-time and historical data.
“We’ve always had a deep admiration for WPVIP as the gold standard for enterprise content teams, and we’re thrilled to join together,” <a href="https://blog.parse.ly/post/9995/wpvip-acquisition/">said Sachin Kamdar</a>, the CEO of Parse.ly. “From the culture and people, to the product, market, and vision, we’re in lockstep to create more value for our customers. This powerful combination of content and intelligence will push the industry forward at an accelerated pace.”
With Parse.ly, WPVIP customers will get much more than basic analytics like page visits and views. Commerce brands will be able to see which content converts visitors into buyers and deliver content recommendations for top-performing products.
<h3>Oracle Announces Cloud Customer Experience Updates</h3>
Oracle <a href="https://www.oracle.com/news/announcement/oracle-cloud-cx-updates-021021.html">announced</a> that it's rolling out updates to its Cloud Customer Experience (CX) platform. The latest updates to the CX suite adds enhancements and capabilities to Oracle Sales, Oracle Service, and Oracle Marketing.
“Customers aren’t afraid to walk away after a single bad experience, and that reality means organizations have to empower their sales, marketing, and customer service teams with the data they need to make every customer interaction matter,” said Rob Tarkoff, executive vice president and general manager, Oracle Customer Experience.
The latest updates within Oracle Customer Experience (CX) include new B2B selling, service, and marketing capabilities.
<ul>
<li>B2B Selling Capabilities: Improve efficiency and accelerate sales cycles by providing a more prescriptive sales experience and removing tedious data entry tasks.</li>
<li>Voice Capabilities: A new digital assistant allows sellers to talk to their CRM system and use voice commands on a mobile device to create follow-up tasks, add an attachment to an account, record an update to an account, and more.</li>
<li>Streamlined Quoting: Sellers now have the ability to search, view, and manage complex quotes on one screen via desktop or a mobile device, eliminating the need to toggle between data and screens.</li>
<li>Communications Industry: A new Buy application in Digital Experience for Communications helps service providers give customers more relevant offers to increase conversion rates. This includes making it easier for customers to buy services via their preferred channels.</li>
<li>Actionable User Interface: Data-driven recommendations help sellers save time and focus their efforts on the strongest opportunities.</li>
<li>Smart Lists: Help guide sellers on what action to take next by automatically displaying relevant information based on past behavior.</li>
<li>Infolets: Enable sellers to quickly accept leads, qualify prospects, rank deals, and create tasks from the home page of their CRM system.</li>
<li>Advanced Search Capabilities: Help sellers quickly and easily locate information related to a sales opportunity, territory, account, and quotes. In addition, Favorites allows users to mark records to save for later.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Siteimprove Releases Upgraded Accessibility Module to Empower Organizations to Meet Increased Digital Experience Expectations</h3>
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Siteimprove, the cloud-based Digital Presence Optimization (DPO) platform, <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210212005296/en/Siteimprove-Releases-Upgraded-Accessibility-Product-to-Empower-Organizations-to-Meet-Increased-Digital-Experience-Expectations">announced</a> the release of the new and improved Siteimprove Accessibility module. The new feature was created <a href="https://www.w3.org/WAI/about/projects/wai-tools/">in partnership with the EU Commission and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)</a>.
One of the biggest challenges when it comes to identifying and fixing accessibility issues is the wide array of rules that are constantly changing. Siteimprove solves this problem by actively integrating the new <a href="https://act-rules.github.io/pages/about/">Accessibility Conformance Testing (ACT) rules</a> into their Accessibility module on an ongoing basis.
ACT rules are a growing set of test rules that aim to harmonize the interpretation of W3C accessibility standards, such as Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 and Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
Since WCAG 2.1 requirements can be vague and difficult to read, they are open to interpretation. This makes it challenging for organizations to know whether they have met the legal requirements or not. With the latest approved and confirmed ACT rules at the core of Siteimprove’s Accessibility module, users can expect consistent results and a better understanding of how to work towards meeting the recognized accessibility standards.
The features and benefits that come with the Siteimprove Accessibility module include:
<ul>
<li>Setting site targets to track progress: With the module, you can set a custom target to work towards a specific compliance goal such as Level A, AA, or AAA accessibility compliance. The module also provides an Accessibility Digital Certainty Index (DCI) score, which measures your site’s accessibility compared to other companies in your industry.</li>
</ul>
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<ul>
<li>Identify and prioritize issues: By filtering your site’s issues by the page section they are found in – header, footer, metadata, or all other content– you can more easily prioritize the issues that need to be remediated.</li>
<li>Fix issues with easy-to-follow instructions: Quickly review potential accessibility issues using an assisted review flow.</li>
</ul>
You can find out more about Siteimprove’s Accessibility module <a href="https://siteimprove.com/en/accessibility/">here</a>.
<h3>Twilio Segment Releases 2021 CDP Report: A Look at How Pandemic-Driven Digital Acceleration Ushered the Industry into a New Era</h3>
Segment – which was <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/">purchased by Twilio in November of 2020</a> – released their second annual <a href="https://learn.segment.com/customer-data-platform-report-2021/">Customer Data Platform Report</a> (CDP), and it further reinforces the pivotal role of customer data in the future of digital experiences.
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been an enormous amount of digital transformation at a frenzied pace. Segment's comprehensive report was put together from anonymized usage data from Segment’s 20,000+ customers, portraying the pandemic's impact in staggering numbers.
Based on the metrics detailed in the report, 2020 saw exponential growth in customer data. The volume, velocity, and variety of data being tracked across organizations nearly doubled – and by the end of the year, Segment was processing over 1 trillion API calls a month.
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With the increased adoption of digital channels, 73% of companies report that a CDP will be critical to their customer experience reports.
Segment has been at the forefront of CDP innovation, working to unify customer data from fragmented, isolated silos. As a rule of thumb, data has always been collected and organized in the channel where it was created – and locked away across inaccessible databases.
That all changed in 2020 as Covid-19 shifted consumer behavior. People began jumping across channels as they embraced curbside pickup and telehealth. Remote work also exploded, surfacing the operational inefficiencies of having data spread across disparate systems within an organization.
With Segment, organizations can track event data from a wide range of applications and trigger a multitude of actions. The main types of data flowing through Segment's CDP are coming from four types of sources: Web (Javascript), Mobile (iOS, Android), Server (HTTP API, Node.js, etc.), and Cloud (Stripe, Sendgrid, etc.).
The data from Segment's report illustrates how the customer journey spans across multiple channels, generating millions of events. The insights gleaned from these datapoints and trends are worth their weight in gold – and underscore the value of a CDP as a core component in the modern enterprise stack.
<a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/">Twilio’s acquisition of Segment</a> ushers in a new era for CDPs, as the market shifts from pure-play data platforms towards integrated customer engagement platforms. We can expect more platforms like Twilio to address their own CDP gap through partnerships or acquisitions as the year unfolds.
You can access Segment's full report <a href="https://learn.segment.com/customer-data-platform-report-2021/">here</a>.

CMS Monthly Recap: WordPress VIP Acquires Parse.ly, Siteimprove Releases Upgrade, Segment's 2021 CDP Report, and More

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A few weeks ago, over 2 billion WhatsApp users had a rude awakening.
The popular instant messaging service – which was <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2014/10/06/facebook-closes-19-billion-whatsapp-deal/?sh=29c286f55c66">acquired by Facebook</a> in 2014 for a whopping $19 billion – pushed out a change to its privacy terms.
If you read the message on the app’s home screen, it doesn’t say much:
<img style="max-width:400px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/02/whatsapp-privacy-policy-572x1024.png" alt="Screenshot of WhatsApp privacy policy" />
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But dig a little deeper and you’ll find a daunting 4000-word <a href="https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/updates/privacy-policy/?lang=en">privacy policy</a> that essentially gives WhatsApp the right to share user data with Facebook and Facebook-owned platforms like Instagram. This includes phone numbers, IP addresses, and other personal identifiers outlined within the terms.
The update was initially scheduled to go into effect on February 8th, after which users must agree to the new terms – or be cut off from the app. After receiving a preponderance of media coverage and consumer pushback, WhatsApp decided to delay the cutoff to May 15th.
"We’re now moving back the date on which people will be asked to review and accept the terms," said WhatsApp on a <a href="https://blog.whatsapp.com/giving-more-time-for-our-recent-update">blog post</a>. "No one will have their account suspended or deleted on February 8th. We're also going to do a lot more to clear up the misinformation around how privacy and security works on WhatsApp. We’ll then go to people gradually to review the policy at their own pace before new business options are available on May 15th."
To suggest that these changes are controversial would be an understatement. And yet, this is par for the course for Facebook, which has struggled to win back trust after its <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/mar/17/the-cambridge-analytica-scandal-changed-the-world-but-it-didnt-change-facebook">widely publicized scandal with Cambridge Analytica</a>. Despite a tarnished reputation, it continues to be the largest social media platform in the world with over 2.5 billion monthly users. Still, the awareness around Facebook’s mishandling of personal data has drawn the ire and scorn of many users.
<h3>From WhatsApp to… where?</h3>
When news spread about WhatsApp and their proposed policy changes, users started jumping ship in droves.
While the social messaging market is relatively mature, only a handful of platforms have elevated their brand awareness to the level of WhatsApp. More importantly, just a few have touted their emphasis on securing personal data while remaining open and accessible.
One popular destination for the WhatsApp exodus was <a href="https://telegram.org/">Telegram</a> – a cloud-based mobile and desktop messaging app with a focus on security and speed. Their CEO reported <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/business/business-news/telegram-chief-reports-25-million-new-users-in-three-days-938314.html">25 million new users in three days</a>, which was a groundswell of activations for the company. It's worth noting that Telegram has refused to hand over encryption keys in several countries to protect user data, demonstrating their commitment to data privacy.
While Telegram and other niche platforms like Discord and Tox were beneficiaries, the real gold rush came after tech mogul <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-bytes/another-signal-gains-after-elon-musks-tweet/articleshow/80234425.cms?from=mdr">Elon Musk tweeted only two words</a>:
“Use Signal.”
By the end of the day, <a href="https://www.howtogeek.com/708916/what-is-signal-and-why-is-everyone-using-it/">Signal</a> – a free privacy-focused messaging and voice app – experienced a massive surge of more than 42 million new users.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/02/elon-musk-use-signal-tweet.jpg" alt="Screenshot of Elon Musk's Tweet about Signal" />
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<h3>A strong Signal for messaging</h3>
Once a lesser-known contender in the messaging market, Signal became the hottest app on the planet – and the preferred alternative to WhatsApp.
First tweeted about in 2015 by Edward Snowden, Signal is a secure platform with rich features like one-to-one messaging, groups, stickers, photos, file transfers, voice calls, and even video calls. Millions of people use Signal every day to instantaneously send and receive high-fidelity messages for a wide variety of personal and business needs – and as stated, it’s free.
Like WhatsApp, communications on Signal are end-to-end encrypted – meaning only the people in a direct conversation can see the content of their messages. Like Telegram, Signal is so committed to securing user messages that some countries have <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signal_(software)#:~:text=As%20of%20October%202017%2C%20Signal's,Signal%20was%20blocked%20in%20Iran.">banned it</a>.
<h3>Tapping Twilio for phone numbers</h3>
While Signal offers an alternative to the WhatsApp privacy conundrum, users can further secure their transactions on any messaging platform with some simple strategies.
Like WhatsApp, registering for Signal requires a phone number. But it doesn’t have to be your own phone number – it simply needs to be an active number for receiving a verification code via text message during the account registration process.
<a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a>, a cloud-based communications platform, allows you to receive phone calls and SMS messages using their dynamic <a href="https://www.twilio.com/phone-numbers">phone number service</a>. In fact, Twilio powers the new-user verifications for Signal and manages new-user authentication and password resets for WhatsApp – making it an incredibly useful solution for messaging apps and services.
You can purchase a <a href="https://www.twilio.com/phone-numbers">phone number</a> from Twilio to use for Signal for as little as $1/month by creating a Twilio account <a href="https://www.twilio.com/try-twilio">here</a>.
<h3>What’s next for WhatsApp?</h3>
While Facebook still rules the social kingdom, it has clearly plateaued – and continues to bleed existing users. WhatsApp may struggle to find its footing in a fragmented landscape of multi-channel messaging options, especially as remote platforms like <a href="https://www.voxer.com/">Voxer</a> blur the lines between personal and business communications.
Still, it’s too early to tell, and Facebook has billions of dollars – and billions of users – to support more innovation. In a post-Zuckerberg regime, it may very well adapt and evolve, and bring WhatsApp along for the ride.
Twilio has been on a roll lately with multiple <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/">acquisitions</a>. While it may see lower user activity on WhatsApp, the spike in Signal downloads might offset that lost usage revenue. Regardless, they appear to have positioned themselves as an indispensable part of the social messaging landscape and the foundation for digital communications in 2021 and beyond.
<h3>About Signal</h3>
Privacy is possible. Signal Messenger makes it easy. At <a href="https://signal.org/">Signal</a>, the goal is to develop open-source privacy technology that protects privacy rights, promotes free expression, and enables secure global communication. Signal believes that private messaging should be simple and ubiquitous, combining state-of-the-art security and end-to-end encryption with the features that users expect in a modern messaging application. Millions of people use Signal every day to speak freely, and a growing list of organizations have integrated the open-source Signal Protocol into messaging platforms that support billions of users.
<h3>About Twilio</h3>
<a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a> is a cloud communication company that powers the future of business communications, enabling phones, VoIP, and messaging to be embedded into web, desktop, and mobile software. They take care of the messy telecom hardware and expose a globally available cloud API that developers can interact with to build intelligent &amp; complex communications systems. As your app’s usage scales up or down, Twilio automatically scales with you. You only pay for what you use - no contracts, no shenanigans.

Signal Gains 42 Million Users Fleeing WhatsApp, Facebook Over Privacy Policy

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Image of the Signal app interface on a mobile phone

Communication has always been at the heart of <a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a>'s mission, and this week’s acquisition of <a href="https://segment.com/">Segment</a> – a leading vendor in the red-hot Customer Data Platform (CDP) space – sent a clear signal to the market.
With this latest addition to the cloud communication provider’s portfolio, Twilio is doubling down on the digital world’s unquenchable thirst for data. Segment’s ability to process events at scale (roughly 500 billion a month) amplifies Twilio’s focus on customer engagement, helping developers connect with customer data across multiple sources.
This move also demonstrates the impact of accelerated digital transformation in a COVID-19 world, where organizations require more access to data-driven tools to grow and compete. Both Twilio and Segment have seen greater opportunity as businesses shift to a digital-first model in the wake of the pandemic – and that shows no sign of slowing down.
While Twilio’s cloud communication platform enables developers to build integrated solutions with text, email, telephony, chatbots, and more, it lacked direct access to customer data – which is where Segment excels. The combination of their API-driven platforms could lead to even greater innovation around purpose-built apps that enhance the digital customer experience.
The deal, first <a href="https://investors.twilio.com/news/news-details/2020/Twilio-to-Acquire-Segment-the-Market-leading-Customer-Data-Platform/default.aspx">announced</a> on October 12, was closed earlier this week – and Segment had been valued at $1.5 billion according to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-02/startup-segment-is-worth-1-5-billion-thanks-to-companies-troves-of-customer-data?sref=ctSjKj2N">The Wall Street Journal</a>. The $3.2 billion price tag is only the latest in a long line of strategic acquisitions for Twilio – and a “hair” more than the $3 billion they paid for transactional email platform <a href="https://www.twilio.com/press/releases/twilio-completes-acquisition-sendgrid">SendGrid</a> in 2018.
<h3>Customer data meets customer engagement</h3>
Twilio is on a mission to become the leading customer engagement platform. While they have the infrastructure in place, they needed the essential data layer to provide a more complete view of the customer. For developers, this means more access to data intelligence, allowing them to build more unique and purposeful applications with Twilio’s APIs.
“The one thing that’s always been missing from Twilio as we’ve been building up this customer engagement platform is understanding of the end-users themselves,” said Twilio co-founder and CEO Jeff Lawson. “We power the communications, but we don’t actually know who the customers are.”
While the applications have yet to be written, it's all but certain that Twilio will add Segment's core capabilities to their cloud communications platform to enhance a wide variety of channels including SMS messaging, voice, video, e-mail, the Internet of Things (IoT) and more.
<h3>Unifying data sources with Segment</h3>
As the leading customer data platform, Segment enables developers to unify customer data from every customer touchpoint, and empowers marketing, sales, and customer service leaders with the insights they need to design and build relevant, data-driven customer engagement.
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Armed with these data optics, Twilio’s developers will now have the ability to craft apps and experiences based on a more holistic view of the customer. Segment unifies a wide range of data from multiple sources like Facebook, Salesforce CRM, websites powered by CMS, eCommerce platforms and more.
“Exceptional customer engagement requires not only high-quality data, but the infrastructure to activate those insights across every channel and customer interaction,” said Peter Reinhardt, co-founder and CEO of Segment. “By bringing Twilio and Segment together, we will help businesses build a foundation of actionable insights critical to engaging with customers based on their needs and preferences to deliver a positive, seamless and effective customer experience.”
<h3>Destroying the data silos</h3>
Getting the data is only half the battle. The real challenge lies within an organization's <a href="https://www.talend.com/resources/what-are-data-silos/">data silos</a>: isolated sources of data that prevent access from users, groups or applications. Breaking down these silos has become a critical objective for data-driven organizations, and the Twilio/Segment union promises to "bring down the walls" so organizations can realize true data integration.
<blockquote>Data silos destroy great customer experiences.
Segment lets developers and companies break down those silos and build a complete picture of their customer. Combined with Twilio's Customer Engagement Platform, we can create more personalized, timely and impactful engagement across customer service, marketing, analytics, product and sales.
- Jeff Lawson</blockquote>
Attacking the data silo problem takes time. By leveraging their flexible APIs, Twilio and Segment will be able to accelerate the process by connecting developers with a more diverse ecosystem of data sources – such as web apps and analytics tools – all without having to write new code. This will eliminate countless development hours building custom integrations.
<h3>Why the Acquisition Makes Sense</h3>
When Twilio acquired SendGrid, they already offered a broad range of communications services through a set of APIs, allowing developers to integrate custom phone numbers, manage services such as SMS and voice, and tap messaging channels like Facebook, WhatsApp and Google Home. But e-mail was a missing link – and SendGrid closed this gap.
Twilio and Segment are a good fit for many reasons. They’re both API-first products, they’re both developer-centric, and they already offer an <a href="https://segment.com/sources/twilio/">integration</a>.
While it’s still early days, it’s clear that the market sees significant value from this match. CDP continues to be a growth space, so investing in Segment can certainly provide more wind in Twilio’s sails. But their unique focus on powering developers with more access to data aligns perfectly with Segment’s mission, and gives the platform greater reach and appeal.
With a proven infrastructure for handling billions of customer-generated events, Twilio now appears to have everything a developer or organization needs to build data-driven apps – and improve the end-to-end customer experience at every touchpoint. In effect, it will create a single, unified view of the customer journey – making it a holistic customer engagement platform that could rival Salesforce and Adobe.
The real question is: what will Twilio buy next?
<h3>About Twilio</h3>
<a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a> is a cloud communication company that powers the future of business communications, enabling phones, VoIP, and messaging to be embedded into web, desktop, and mobile software. They take care of the messy telecom hardware and expose a globally available cloud API that developers can interact with to build intelligent &amp; complex communications systems. As your app’s usage scales up or down, Twilio automatically scales with you. You only pay for what you use - no contracts, no shenanigans.
<h3>About Segment</h3>
<a href="https://segment.com/">Segment</a> is a customer data platform that democratizes access to reliable data for all teams and offers a complete toolkit to standardize data collection, unify user records, and route customer data into any system where it’s needed.
Segment collects user events from every customer touch point (your website, web and mobile apps, tools) and provides a complete data toolkit to every team in your org. They take care of the redundant and repetitive work that comes with integrating new tools, maintaining data pipelines, and managing data quality.
Today, over 20,000 companies across 70+ countries use Segment, from fast-growing businesses like Instacart, Peloton, and Bonobos to some of the world’s largest organizations like Levi’s, Intuit, and FOX. With Segment, companies can connect and activate reliable first-party data across 300+ marketing, analytics, and data warehousing tools.

Twilio Acquires Segment for $3.2B, Adds Market-leading CDP for Building Data-Driven Apps

It would be impossible to cover any news this month without acknowledging <a href="https://www.economist.com/ukraine-crisis" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the crisis in Ukraine</a>. 
As many CMS and DXP vendors rely on the incredible talent and resources of the people in this region, the events of the last few weeks have hit especially close to home. Even as we publish our February recap, things continue to unfold – and our hearts go out to the people of this magnificent country.
Of course, this tragedy is evolving just as many countries are emerging from the worst of the <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/healthcare-systems-and-services/our-insights/when-will-the-covid-19-pandemic-end" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Covid-19 pandemic</a>, with many businesses poised for a return to normalcy (what that looks like still remains to be seen). Still, the lasting impact of the omnichannel revolution is being felt across all digital transformation strategies, giving way to more headless, composable, API-driven solutions as companies plan for a more digital future.
When it comes to movers and shakers, 2022 is starting much the same way as 2021: with big investments.
<a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/bloomreach-reaches-2-2-billion-valuation-following-175-million-investment-from-goldman-sachs/">Bloomreach</a>, a leading content and search platform focused on commerce, announced a $175 million round of funding – exploding its valuation to $2.2 billion. <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/elastic-path-secures-60m-in-funding-for-composable-commerce-growth/">Elastic Path</a> also made waves by securing $60 million in financing to grow its composable commerce solutions. We also saw <a href="https://www.pymnts.com/acquisitions/2022/ecommerce-platform-bigcommerce-acquires-software-firm-b2b-ninja/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">BigCommerce</a> purchase B2B Ninja, an e-commerce platform, in an effort to energize quoting and other commerce services in their ecosystem. (Hint: we have more investment news below...)
As always, we try to recap some of the news you might have missed this month. There's a lot happening across our industry, and on a brighter note, we'll be announcing the winners of the CMS Critic Awards next week – both the People's Choice and Editor's Choice categories. We had a lot of great engagement over the last month across our social channels, and we're looking forward to sharing the results. 
<h2>Twilio Segment releases its 2022 CDP Report, finds CDPs booming as businesses look beyond cookies</h2>
We're all asking the same question: what happens to data in a post-cookie world?
Segment – a leading customer data platform (CDP) purchased by Twilio<a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> in November of 2020</a> – is helping to shed some light on that query with the release of its third annual <a href="https://segment.com/the-cdp-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Customer Data Platform Report </a>(CDP).
Based on anonymized platform usage data of Segment's 25,000+ customers between 11/1/2020 to 11/1/2021, the report finds aggressive adoption of CDPs over the past year as businesses build digital-first customer engagement strategies and reduce their reliance on third-party data. 
Covid-19 shifted consumer behavior on a number of levels. In response, organizations changed how they interacted with their customers. As more digital engagements ensued, so too did the amount of data being generated. This spurred an explosive demand for CDP layers, particularly as it related to the broader CMS and DXP ecosystems.
Along with the unimaginable growth in data, the volume of API calls has also skyrocketed. <a href="https://www.postman.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Postman</a> – a leading application platform for API testing – conducted a <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/postman-releases-2021-state-of-the-api-report-shows-global-trend-towards-api-first-digital-era/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">survey</a> last year that showed the world is moving to an "API-first era" as integrations and endpoints expand exponentially. As an example, the API calls through Segment have been growing steadily year-over-year since 2017, but 2020-2021 was an inflection point – with API calls in their system reaching over 1 trillion per month. 
Another reason CDP popularity has rapidly exploded is the impending "death" of third-party data. With increasing privacy regulations and the shift to a cookieless future across apps and browsers, businesses are embracing first-party data as a focal point. 
Segment's findings validate that customer data has become an integral part of how organizations are powering their digital experiences. The report also lists 2021's fastest-growing apps. For more details, you can access the full report at: <a href="https://segment.com/the-cdp-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://segment.com/the-cdp-report</a>.
<h2>Headless commerce provider fabric announces $140 Million Series C funding led by SoftBank</h2>
<a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-headless-commerce-platforms/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fabric</a>, the fast-growing headless commerce platform, announced the closing of a Series C funding round of $140M led by Softbank, with participation from Forerunner Ventures, Glynn Capital, and existing investors Redpoint Ventures Norwest Ventures, and Stripes. 
This latest round of funding closes a mere 219 days after its Series B – and now positions fabric's value at approximately $1.5B.
"Retailers need to meet modern consumers wherever they are – whether online, offline, mobile, social, or any future entry point. This means merchants of all sizes, and especially mid-market and enterprise, need the right commerce platform to keep pace with evolving trends," said Robert Kaplan, Investment Director at SoftBank Investment Advisers. "We believe that fabric has built the industry's best API-first modular commerce platform and accompanying commerce applications to give merchants unrivaled power and flexibility, all in a manner that reduces the pain of migrating over from legacy, outdated commerce platforms."
Funds from the Series C round will be utilized for accelerating product development largely through automation and intelligence and geographic expansion. 
<h2>Netlify announces Netlify Graph: A faster way for teams to develop web apps with APIs</h2>
Netlify, a Git-powered static site generator and headless CMS that's all the rage in the <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-jamstack-static-site-generators-for-2021/">Jamstack</a> community, has <a href="https://www.netlify.com/blog/announcing-netlify-graph-a-faster-way-for-teams-to-develop-web-apps-with-apis" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced Netlify Graph:</a> a GraphQL-powered experience designed to help developers build interactive and connected web applications faster.
The shift to API-first development has created an ecosystem where apps are modular and reusable. While the API-first approach is developer-friendly, it has also introduced new complexities such as discovering, securing, learning, and governing APIs. Netlify's Graph is designed to make this experience easier for developers, allowing them to use APIs without writing undifferentiated glue code, learning every API's unique structure, or composing endless amounts of endpoints to get data from various APIs into your app.
Netlify Graph is in public beta and available globally. It starts with a catalog that includes some of the most frequently requested APIs that development teams use, such as GitHub, Stripe, and Salesforce. The company plans to add more in the coming months. The Netlify Graph beta is available to all Netlify users and can be accessed from your <a href="https://app.netlify.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Netlify team dashboard</a>. Once logged in, simply select "Graph" from your Netlify site dashboard menu.
To learn more, head over to the <a href="https://github.com/netlify/labs/tree/main/features/graph/documentation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Netlify Graph docs.</a>
<h2>BigCommerce acquires B2B Ninja to make online selling easier for B2B merchants</h2>
<a href="https://www.bigcommerce.com/?utm_source=Business+Wire&amp;utm_medium=press+release&amp;utm_campaign=BigCommerce+Invests+in+Becoming+World%E2%80%99s+Most+Powerful+B2B+Ecommerce+Platform+with+Acquisition+of+B2B+Ninja" target="_blank" rel="noopener">BigCommerce</a>, a leading cloud e-commerce platform, <a href="https://www.bigcommerce.com/press/releases/bigcommerce-invests-in-becoming-worlds-most-powerful-b2b-ecommerce-platform-with-acquisition-of-b2b-ninja/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced</a> the acquisition of <a href="https://www.b2bninja.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">B2B Ninja</a> (formerly Quote Ninja) – an enterprise software solution that provides leading business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce capabilities for merchants of all sizes.
<a href="https://www.forrester.com/playbook/The+B2B+eCommerce+Playbook+For+2018/-/E-PLA370" target="_blank" rel="noopener">According to Forrester</a>, U.S. B2B e-commerce transactions are expected to reach $1.8 trillion by 2023. This is creating a groundswell of opportunity for e-commerce platform providers to deliver focused solutions to this segment of the market. A longtime BigCommerce partner, B2B Ninja brings its best-in-class quoting solution to help streamline transactions by delivering powerful e-commerce functionality to B2B merchants.
"B2B Ninja is an excellent addition to our already strong B2B capabilities," said Brent Bellm, CEO of BigCommerce. "Complementing our recent launch of B2B Edition, this is the next big step in providing a platform that is easier to use and faster than legacy B2B solutions and more flexible and powerful than other SaaS platforms. We continue to invest in ways that make BigCommerce the best platform for merchants of all sizes regardless of who or where their customers are or where merchants are selling."
B2B Ninja is available to any BigCommerce merchant on any plan to enhance the customer experience and easily manage quotes online.

CMS Monthly Recap: Big Investment News, Segment Releases 2022 CDP Report, Netlify Graph Launches and More

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