Contentful enters DXP market with new AI features, partners

Contentful has unveiled new features and strategic partnerships to enhance its content management system, marking its entry into the Digital Experience Platform (DXP) space.

Contentful, known for providing digital solutions to over 4,200 brands, has integrated artificial intelligence to enable data-driven personalisation and content operations as part of its evolving platform. The company has decided to invest more in AI research, increasing its funding by over 20% annually to support this shift.

"Brands are frustrated by monolithic, bloated DXP solutions that aren't fit for purpose," said Contentful CEO Karthik Rau. "In this constantly evolving technology landscape, a flexible new approach is needed and today marks the beginning of that change."

The transition to DXP allows Contentful to offer capabilities tailored for both marketing and technical teams. This includes a core platform designed for scalability, content production and management efficiency enhancements through AI, and seamless integration with over 100 third-party tools.

The new platform features include AI Actions, which is designed to integrate AI into all stages of content creation, from conception to publishing. This aims to streamline processes like translation, localisation, and SEO optimisation, reducing the time and complexity associated with these tasks.

"Contentful is the heart of our health care professionals portal at Biogen," said Arthur Allard, Customer Solutions Manager at Biogen. "We were lucky enough to start testing AI Actions – specifically for translation – early, and this has been a small revolution within the revolution as we are now able to localise, clone, and translate a web page from one language to another in a matter of minutes versus days previously."

Contentful has also focused on governance with the introduction of Granular Roles and Permissions within its Taxonomy capabilities. This development aligns with enterprise requirements for security and compliance, aiming to ensure companies can control content creation and delivery effectively.

With new personalisation features added, Contentful allows customers to manage audiences and personalised experiences from a single interface within its platform, unlike legacy DXPs requiring multiple tools. This streamlined approach includes AI-powered variants and data connectors with systems such as Shopify and SAP Emarsys.

"The expectations for growth teams have changed with users expecting more relevant and engaging marketing experiences," said Michael Luzmore, Product Manager at Docusign. "To be successful, we needed to scale personalised experiences to global audiences. Contentful's flexible, extensible DXP allows us to build compelling digital experiences for varied personas and experiment with AI tools that expedite our processes."

Contentful's partnership with Shopify exemplifies its strategy of developing strategic alliances to enhance content and commerce integration. This collaboration includes a Contentful application for the Shopify Liquid Storefront, improving content creation and personalisation capabilities.

"This collaboration underscores the benefit of Contentful's agile DXP approach," said Dale Traxler, Director of Technology Partnerships at Shopify. "Our joint customers can connect, manage, and optimise all touchpoints of the consumer journey from both the Contentful and Shopify environments, simplifying workflows and accelerating conversion."

The expansion into DXP territory is aligned with market research predicting that the sector could surpass USD $41 billion by 2032. Contentful's push into this growing market is intended to meet the evolving needs of digital content management and personalized marketing strategies.

"We are looking at a future where brands must deliver more compelling experiences across all channels," said Rau. "By adopting the right technology now, brands can confidently prepare for a highly personalised, autonomous, and data-driven future. We are on a mission to help our customers succeed in this new reality."