SDL Connect

PALO ALTO, Calif. — The right digital experience is increasingly becoming a global one. And to achieve that, business leaders need better controls over the entire content lifecycle.

SDL is rolling out its Global Digital Experience Solution, a new effort that aims to address that need. It’s one of many new initiatives at SDL Connect here this week, which will also features several other announcements and insights from SDL’s leadership.

Local Relevance, Global Reach

According to Peggy Chen the chief marketing officer for SDL, moving to a global scale can be a significant challenge for organizations no matter their size.

“Distributed budgets and disconnects between global and local teams cause serious issues for enterprises that have a need to go global while remaining locally relevant. Many organizations aren’t set up for this today and it can be disastrous for those who are looking to go global but remain locally relevant,” told CMSWire.

SDL also commissioned a Forrester study on the subject, which includes insights about some of the difficulties in creating a digital marketing plan.

For example, the majority of companies surveyed have five or more content repositories. Others have even more, which can make it difficult to find what you’re looking for and may bog down the wheels of productivity. Additionally, very few CMS systems integrate some type of language translation tool. While Google Translate and other services are tremendously useful, a deeper integration can make a dramatic difference, Chen said. This matters for many companies that find themselves with a growing international audience.

“This new research comes as the industry faces a significant shift. The Information Age focused on availability of information – businesses have access to more data than ever before and customers have information at their fingertips, across various digital channels,” said Adolfo Hernandez, CEO, SDL. “Now, we are now entering the Age of Understanding, where information availability is no longer enough. The explosion of global content must be tailored to reflect language, culture, and context, catering to individuals’ needs.”

Merging Conflicting Priorities

Taking the long, international view doesn’t mean that a company can assume that the local content is easily taken care of. It’s easy to fall into this trap, since 48 percent of business and IT professionals are preparing a move to a global content operating model in the next 24 months, according to the Forrester report. The global role is important, but it shouldn’t let one get distracted about the core business that may have come from domestic customers.

With 48 percent of business and IT professionals planning to move to a global content operating model within the next 24 months, it is clear that organizations today recognize the role global content plays in driving superior experiences across web, mobile and other digital channels.

“When it comes to producing content, the creation, localization, production and delivery all need to be part of the workflow,” she said. “However, most content management systems today tackle the content creation and delivery challenges without taking localization into account – forcing businesses to shoehorn it into the process. All this leads to increased complexity in managing the entire process and the problem only amplifies with more content and more languages to localize into.”

SDL Connect begins today, with keynotes from CEO Hernandez and other members of the company’s leadership team.