Sitecore Helps Marketers Build and Connect Social Communities to Increase Customer Engagement and Retention

London, UK – October 23, 2012 – Today at its customer and partner conference, Sitecore Symposium North America, Sitecore, a leading web content management and customer experience management software company, introduced two new products that blend traditional website content management with social networks and community building. Sitecore’s new product offerings help marketers leverage social networks to increase customer acquisition and brand recognition while building trust with existing customers.

“Customers and prospects expect social capabilities that help them collaborate and connect with meaningful, relevant information”, said Darren Guarnaccia, SVP, Product Marketing, Sitecore. “Building trust and connecting with customers across all community and social network interaction points provides a more satisfying customer experience. Today, we’re introducing product offerings to build a branded community while also connecting and personalising content on the social networks where customers live – helping marketers build lifetime customers and drive more revenue.”

Build Branded Communities

Available today, the Social Starter Kit powered by Telligent, combines Sitecore’s web content management and customer experience management software with Telligent’s social community software. The Social Starter Kit makes adding social media engagement quick and easy. It offers a complete online community suite for social networking and engagement plus turn-key functionality to launch corporate branded blogs, discussion forums and media galleries within Sitecore-powered websites that optimise customer experiences. The Social Starter Kit creates opportunities for marketers to:

• Understand the needs and wants of audiences
• Increase brand awareness
• Discover who brand advocates are and leverage word of mouth
• Drive sales by educating customers and helping them make informed purchasing decisions
• Leverage customer feedback for improved product development
• Provide community collaborative support and voice of the customer listening environments

“Because social is the new normal, marketers have a unique opportunity to engage customers at every step of the customer life cycle,” said Patrick Brandt, CEO, Telligent. “The combination of Sitecore and Telligent gives marketers the tools they need to help customers discover, explore, buy from and engage with brands online. The ultimate result is a multi-channel customer experience that drives revenue and helps companies meet real business objectives.”

Connect with Customers Across All Social Networks

The Sitecore Social Connected Module, a free add-on, improves the social engagement of corporate websites by allowing website visitors to use social networks for an even more personalised online experience.

Sitecore’s Social Connected Module, combined with Sitecore’s Digital Marketing System, provides the ability to use social network attributes to personalise web, mobile, email and print interactions. Furthermore, marketers can gauge the effectiveness of social efforts (including published content and site activity such as “likes” and “tweets”) using Sitecore’s analytics dashboard.

The Sitecore Social Connected Module has support for Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+ out-of-the-box and is extensible to allow customers and partners to plug into all social networks. Posting and syndicating content to social networks can be done directly from within Sitecore.

Follow @Sitecore on Twitter to join the conversation on community and social media engagement.

Learn more about creating a social branded community that drives engagement.

About Sitecore

Sitecore is a global software company that creates products to deliver the most relevant experience and content to customers at any moment of interaction and via any communications channel – the web, email, mobile, social and offline. Our customer experience management platform combines proven web content management with customer intelligence to create a single view of a customer that drives meaningful interactions, increases conversions and builds lifetime customers. Brands, including ASOS, British Red Cross, Brother, Cadbury, DVLA, Dyson, easyJet, E.ON, The FA, Heineken,  Kia Motors, Lloyds of London, Manchester United FC, Oxfam, Play.com, Virgin Active and Visa Europe rely on Sitecore to get and keep loyal customers who engage more and drive revenue growth.

Media Contact:
Kim Pegnato, Sitecore

+ (1) 781-620-1729

kmp@sitecore.net