Market analytics leader Gartner has unveiled its much-anticipated 2022 Magic Quadrant report for digital experience platforms (DXP).
Such platforms are growing in demand, as maximizing online experiences becomes crucial to engage with modern, digital-first, autonomous customers.
Yet, many DXP providers offer numerous capabilities, from journey mapping to data management tools. Amongst this competition, deciphering the best match for a brand is challenging.
Fortunately, Gartner isolates the strengths and cautions of many prominent platforms, identifying market leaders and informing businesses ready to embark on a digital transformation program.
This year, the market analyst assessed the DXP offerings of 16 worldwide vendors, identifying four market leaders in the process.
The Definition of Digital Experience Platforms
Gartner defines a DXP as a “well-integrated and cohesive” technology suite that enables the creation, management, and advancement of digital customer experiences across various industries.
As such, these platforms enable digital journey orchestration, combining capabilities from many applications to create seamless experiences for customers.
These applications – either built natively into the platform or available as integrations – are plentiful. Gartner suggests that core capabilities include analytics, data management, journey mapping, personalization, knowledge sharing, and many more tools.
Offering such functionality, DXP vendors are often difficult to differentiate. Yet, the 2022 Magic Quadrant report for DXP divides providers into four segments: Leaders, Challengers, Visionaries, and Niche Players. Here, we review them all.
Leaders
Leaders in the Magic Quadrant pave the way forwards for the future of DXPs. Exhibiting a proven ability to execute and a polished vision, they excel across numerous criteria, including overall viability, platform/service features, and market understanding. This year’s leaders are:
- Adobe
- Acquia
- Optimizely
- Sitecore
Adobe
Widely implemented and highly recognizable, Abobe Experience Cloud provides a proven mature DXP solution, according to Gartner. The market analyst also lauds its wide array of functionalities – across the digital experience - which includes content management, analytics, and personalization features. The vendor also offers an ecosystem of creative, marketing, and advertising agencies, which will support efforts to enhance online customer journeys.
Acquia
While suited to B2B and B2C use cases similar to the Adobe offering, Acquia also provides an Employee Experience solution to enhance the experience of the people who create and manage digital customer journeys. Such a capability is a differentiator, yet Gartner also praises the vendor for its open-source capacity and low-/no-code experience builder, Site Studio.
Optimizely
Having acquired Zaius in 2021, Optimizely expanded its capability to map customer journeys, uncover critical customer insights, and deliver personalized, targeted digital experiences. Gartner highlights this as a positive step forwards for the brand while applauding its digital experience optimization and multivariate testing approach.
Sitecore
Making several SaaS acquisitions that enhance customer data management, market resource management, and personalization strategies, Sitecore is piecing together an exciting vision. Harnessing new AI and data functionalities, the provider caters for a range of “CX-centric scenarios” and B2B use cases. Gartner also highlights its global network of alliances as a particular positive, offering significant support to clients embarking on a digital transformation journey.
Challengers
Challengers in the Magic Quadrant demonstrate an ability to implement DXPs that deliver successful outcomes and meet current client demands. Yet, they seemingly lack the perception of Leaders and Visionaries, perhaps hindering their potential capability to cater for future requirements. This year’s leaders are:
- Salesforce
- Liferay
- OpenText
- Oracle
- HCL Software
Salesforce
A global leader in CRM technologies, the provider also offers the Salesforce Experience Cloud, which aims to provide the “connective tissue” across its wide-ranging portfolio. This portfolio is a significant strength, enabling Salesforce to achieve substantial market penetration. Its partnership network, developer community, and App Exchange marketplace also receive acclaim from Gartner.
Liferay
Liferay focuses on empowering IT teams with the tools to develop the best digital experiences. Enterprise IT buyers often choose Liferay for this reason, alongside its selection of integrations, customizations, and advanced support features. Although, Gartner pinpoints its Java heritage – which is still visible – as a slight concern.