Optimizely CMS – for web development with .Net core

Optimizely CMS is a powerful content management system that allows you to easily create and manage content. Both for your website, as well as external services leveraging Optimizely's headless functionality. If you're considering using a CMS for your website, or if you're looking for a more effective way to manage your content, then Optimizely should be on your short list of CMS to consider.

What is Optimizely CMS?

Optimizely CMS is a content management system that allows you to create, manage, and optimize your website's content. It was originally founded in 2009 under the name "Episerver" and rebranded as "Optimizely" in 2021 after being acquired by Optimizely. Optimizely is designed to be user-friendly, flexible, and scalable, making it a popular choice for businesses of all sizes.

How does Optimizely CMS work?

Optimizely CMS works by allowing you to create and manage your website's content through a web-based interface. You can easily add and edit pages, create content blocks, and manage your website's navigation structure. One of the key features of Optimizely CMS is its drag-and-drop functionality, which makes it easy to create and rearrange content blocks on a page without needing any additional coding. Another key feature is on-page editing, which allows editors to edit content while seeing how that content would render on the live page.

In addition to its content management capabilities, Optimizely CMS also includes a range of features that can help you optimize your website's performance. These include:

1. Personalization: Optimizely CMS allows you to create personalized content for your website visitors based on their location, browsing history, and other criteria. You can even create custom visitor groups that allow you to personalize content based on custom rules.
2. A/B testing: You can use Optimizely CMS to create and run A/B tests on your website's content to determine which versions perform best.
3. Analytics: Optimizely CMS includes a range of analytics tools that allow you to track your website's performance and gain insights into your visitors' behavior.

Why should you consider using Optimizely CMS for your website?

There are many reasons why you should consider using Optimizely CMS for your website. Here are just a few:

1. User-friendly interface: Optimizely CMS is designed to be user-friendly and intuitive, making it easy for anyone to manage their website's content. We already spoke briefly about on-page editing and drag-and-drop content blocks.
2. Flexibility: Optimizely CMS is highly customizable, both from an editor and developer perspective. This allows you to create a website that reflects your brand's unique identity.
3. Scalability: Optimizely CMS is designed to be scalable, meaning that it can grow and evolve as your business does. With Optimizely's Digital Experience Platform, your site can scale with your customer base leveraging the cloud with Microsoft Azure.
4. Optimization features: Optimizely CMS includes a range of features that can help you optimize your website's performance, including personalization, A/B testing, and analytics.
5. Integration: Optimizely CMS integrates with a range of other tools and platforms, making it easy to connect your website to your other business systems. Additionally, Optimizely's robust APIs make it easy for development teams to create custom integrations to work with your unique business needs.

Optimizely Vs. WordPress?

Optimizely is an enterprise-level CMS platform. Organizations like Ford, Coca-Cola, and Starbucks use this software. It's a highly scalable system with features like multilingual support.

WordPress is a more user-friendly platform suitable for small to medium-sized businesses. But it’s not as scalable as Optimizely.

If you need a robust, scalable platform with enterprise-level features, Optimizely is a good choice. But if you're looking for something more user-friendly and cost-effective, WordPress may be the better option.

WordPress:

1. Market Share: Dominates the CMS space with a large market share due to its open-source approach and user-friendly design, making it a popular choice for many websites.
2. Learning Curve: Quick setup facilitated by numerous themes and plugins. However, simplicity may hinder customizability and performance, posing challenges for top enterprises.
3. Content Authoring: Boasts impressive content authoring capabilities, including user-friendly features like drag-and-drop functionality, templates, editing, and audit trails.
4. Scalability and Extensibility: Provides numerous plugins for extra functionality. However, these plugins may lack the capabilities needed for business scalability and extension, potentially impacting performance.
5. Security: Open-source nature relies on plugins for extensibility, requiring constant updates to avoid vulnerabilities, particularly concerning a high number of plugins and features.

Optimizely:

1. Market Share: This holds a smaller percentage of the market share compared to WordPress but is the preferred choice for high-traffic sites, offering tailored solutions for enterprise needs.
2. Learning Curve: Users may need specific training to navigate the platform's numerous features. Still, ready-made templates and built-in functionalities are available to ease the learning process.
3. Content Authoring: Takes the lead in content authoring, especially for high-performing companies. Offers strong personalization features, A/B testing, marketing automation, optimization, and approval workflows for collaborative content creation.
4. Scalability and Extensibility: A cloud-based platform designed for high-ranking companies seeking significant growth and scalability across multiple markets. The API-first approach enables seamless integration with various services, including e-commerce platforms, ERP systems, personalization, and email automation.
5. Security: As a proprietary platform, Optimizely is designed to be highly secure and reliable, specifically tailored for the security needs of top enterprises.

Technology Stack?

Optimizely Content Management System (CMS) is based on Microsoft technology and uses ASP.NET Core as a web development platform. Optimizely uses the SQL Server relational database. On top of that, Optimizely has a framework API used by products in the Optimizely platform.

The .NET framework

Optimizely is based on the ASP.NET Core, providing the following advantages:

• Easier for developers to implement solutions using rich IDEs like Visual Studio or Visual Studio Code.
• High-performance platform
• An open and agnostic tool that can be used with any JavaScript framework and API you want.
• Cross-platform means developing and hosting applications on many platforms, such as Windows and Linux.

In Optimizely, the .NET API is implemented following Microsoft guidelines. Because .NET is a language-independent architecture, developers have a wide choice of development methods for their solutions. Optimizely CMS is written in C#, but developers can use other programming languages such as VB.NET or F#. Optimizely CMS development in .NET is fully object-oriented. From CMS 12, the platform is built on ASP.NET Core.

System Overview

The base CMS Framework provides built-in editorial and administrative functions like version management, content preview, approval workflows, multi-language support, and access rights. Data is stored in an SQL database. The customized solution is built on top of this platform. Optimizely can run as an on-premises installation or in the cloud.

Customized solution

A customized solution typically contains these parts:

• Graphical profile for the site as style sheets (CSS format). These include predefined colors and fonts used on the site.
• Responsive design is often applied to support multi-channel displays.
• Functions to support content creation, for example, specific pages or block types.
• Systems integration as required for the site, for example, connection to an article database.
• Access rights are configured for users and user groups to control content structure and publishing access. It may involve integration with external membership providers.
• Content is created by editors and stored in the database.
• Assets such as images and documents used on the site.

Database

Optimizely uses Microsoft SQL Server to store content and other information created in the system. Database editions, including SQL Azure, are supported. A database with the Optimizely schema is automatically created when creating sites from the Visual Studio integration. Each version of the database schema targets a specific version of Optimizely.

Web server

On-premises Optimizely sites in production typically use Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS), a flexible, general-purpose web server that runs on Windows operating systems to serve requested HTML pages or files. When developing locally, you can use Kestrel or IIS Express, which is included with Visual Studio, and then move to the full IIS when it is ready to go live.

Development environment

Optimizely solutions are conveniently developed using SQL Server and Visual Studio or Visual Studio Code from Microsoft. Optimizely also provides a set of dotnet templates to speed up website development.

CMS supports building templates using server-side-rendered templates such as MVC and Razor Pages and using a client-side framework.

Developing for the cloud

An Optimizely solution can be hosted in the cloud or on-premises. Cloud-based solutions are a cost-efficient way to manage websites, as these will dynamically scale out and in again depending on traffic volume. The cost is based on usage and number of running instances. You can manage your cloud-based solutions yourself or use the Optimizely Digital Experience Platform (DXP).

Techup Soft Solutions Proficiency in Optimizely CMS

At Techup Soft Solution, we have expertise using Optimizely CMS to make websites. Our team has proficiency in leveraging the Optimizely tool to develop web applications using various .NET technologies.

Our team understands Optimizely's features, such as being open and working on different platforms like Windows and Linux.

We know how to build on top of Optimizely to create websites that look good and do what you need. Whether you want your website to run on your own computers or in the cloud, we've got you covered.