In Gartner’s latest Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms, Episerver’s (Optimizely) brand is mentioned three times. History provides context for the Gartner analyst’s commentary. The incredible pace of change at Episerver since 2002 has pushed the company further into the leader’s quadrant, but challenges remain with the branding.
Table of Contents
- 2002 to 2007: EPiServer
- 2010: European private equity firm IK Investment Partners acquires EPiServer
- 2012: Episerver Acquires Mediachase
- 2013: Episerver Acquires Euroling
- 2015: Episerver Digital Experience Cloud
- 2016: Peerius & Optivo
- 2016: F.R.A.P.P.I. Marketing
- 2018: Insight Partners Acquires Episerver
- 2019: Alexander Atzberger named CEO and Episerver Acquires Insight Software
- 2020: Episerver Acquires Optimizely
- 2021: Episerver Rebrands Under Optimizely Name
- 2021: Optimizely (formerly Episerver) Acquires Zaius Customer Data Platform or CDP and rebrands it Optimizely Data Platform or ODP
EPiServer 2002 to 2007
Episerver’s roots are in Stockholm, Sweden. Created by Elektropost Stockholm AB. When the software first launched in 2002, it was called the EPiServer CMS platform. By 2007 Elektropost rebranded to EPiServer AB. In 2010 the platform was owned by a group of investors led by Amadeus Capital, and by November 2010, the company was sold to IK Investment Partners.
Just four years later, in 2014, EPiServer AB was sold to private equity Accel-KKR, who at that time also owned Ektron. Insiders described the merger of Ektron and EPiServer as taking the marketing engine of Ektron to help EPiServer grow its brand recognition in North America. Conceivably, Ektron’s roots in Nashua, New Hampshire are why Episerver today is Nashua-based. Not too long after acquiring Ektron, EPiServer began retooling both brands. By 2015 EPiServer simplified its brand to simply Episerver (no camel casing) and allowed for simply using “Epi.”
Episerver Acquires Search Capabilities
In May 2013 Episerver acquires Euroling for its search capabilities. The acquisition brings stronger search capabilities to the platform that are later rebranded “Episerver Find” or “Epi Find.” Episerver Find provides analytics and a user interface to manage various aspects of elastic search including boosting, best bets, auto-completes, synonyms, and analytics.
Episerver Acquires Mediachase
The acquisition of Mediachase added robust eCommerce functionality to the existing content management functionality. This acquisition was a key investment in combining content and eCommerce functionality. The timing was right, and the acquisition solidified Episerver in the market. Competitors like Sitecore and Salesforce lagged in e-commerce for several years while Episerver strengthened its position. Mediachase was rebranded “Episerver Commerce” or “Epi Commerce.” Later repacked under the Episerver cloud offering as Episerver B2C Commerce Cloud.
Episerver DXC Introduced in 2015
In 2015, Epi leadership also began advancing Epi toward being more than a CMS and into the Digital Experience Platform quadrant. By 2015 Episerver was also marketing the “Episerver Digital Experience Cloud.” For many, this became synonymous with the “Epi DXC.” Flashing forward to 2019, “DXC” is often confused with the “DXP” or Digital Experience Platform. Epi was aggressively pushing into the cloud in 2015. The business model was shifting away from on-premise and perpetual licensing. The cloud and its updated licensing and business model became the clear focus of Episerver’s sales and marketing. In hindsight, this may have been an energetic push to increase the companies valuation ahead of an exit.
Epi Acquires Peerius & Optivo
In August 2016, Epi acquired product recommendation engine Peerius. Epi integrated Peerius under “EpiPersonalization.” Unfortunately, for the Epi brand, the name Peerius stuck with many. That same year Epi acquired Optivo to “Empower Marketers to Orchestrate, Execute and Optimize Immersive Experiences Across Channels.” Translation: Optivo became “Episerver Campaign.” Epi Campaign is more or less comparable to products like MailChimp for email marketing. Jumping ahead to 2020, Episerver formed a strategic partnership with Delivra for email marketing automation. Episerver no longer recommends Episerver Campaign with Optivo for new North American clients.
Episerver Brand Challenges Emerge in 2016 – F.R.A.P.P.I.
- F – Find
- R – Reach
- A – Advance
- P – Perform
- P – Personalized Find
- I – Insight
In 2016 Epi begins to rebrand the acquisitions of Peerius and Optivo and creates several new bundles, Episerver Perform, Advance, and Reach. For a period, Peerius was known as “Episerver Perform.” Episerver also promoted “Advance” as a content recommendation engine billed as machine learning content recommendations built by Episerver. As far as we know, “Advance” never actually came to fruition (Epi acquired Idio to fill this gap). Reach, a toolset powered by the Peerius extension provides various triggers combined with Episerver CMS tools and email marketing. For example, triggering an email for an abandoned cart. Reach today is called “Triggers.” Triggers are now marketed under the “Personalization” umbrella, while Peerius is now called “Web Product Recommendations.” Episerver “Personalized Find,” for example, combines tools from Peerius with Episerver’s elastic search tools. Today, Episerver Find is called “Search & Navigation,” and Personalized Find is now “Personalized Search & Navigation.“
Episerver Personalization
Thankfully the FRAPPI acronym is gone. But the brand and product confusion partially remains. Episerver had a lot of work to do to recalibrate the products into identifiable utility names. The updated naming conventions mostly follow a “jobs to be done” model. For the most part, the products are synonymous with what utility they provide an end-user. That said, there are still many relics of the old names throughout the Episerver user guides and developer documentation.
“Episerver (Optimizely) has improved its overall marketing effectiveness with messaging and prescriptive guidance that resonates with the aspirations of its target audiences.”
Gartner
Insight Partners Acquires Episerver
By September of 2018, Episerver’s growth leads to Insight Venture Partners acquiring Episerver for $1.16B. Insight Partners introduced a significant brand experience to Epi. Insight Partners portfolio includes Shopify, Shutterstock, Sisense, Cvent, Docker, Campaign Monitor. Since Insight Partners acquired Episerver, the rate of change has sharply increased.
In late 2019 Epi acquired Idio, and key members of the Idio leadership team came on board at Epi. By July 2020, Idio was completely merged into Episerver under the Episerver brand. Idio’s utilities became “Episerver Content Intelligence” under the more extensive “Intelligence Cloud” umbrella.
In December 2019, Alexander Atzberger, a CX executive at SAP, joined Episerver as CEO. The very same month, Episerver acquired B2B commerce-focused Insite Software. The B2B e-commerce platform serves the manufacturing and distribution space with out-of-box commerce tools. Of course, Insite Software was quickly rebranded to become Episerver B2B Commerce Cloud, not to be confused with Epi’s previously existing “Commerce Cloud,” which is the rebranded name of what was once known as Episerver Commerce or Epi Commerce.
“Episerver (Optimizely) is not often considered for B2B use cases, even when it could be a good choice. This is due to confusing product marketing and messaging.”
Gartner
With leadership changes at Epi, we expected more than staff changes. Episerver in late 2019 begins to pivot the previous leadership’s brand and marketing strategies. Epi introduced a new go-to-market strategy, including renaming most of the core products. The brand continues to present challenges in keeping up to speed on the latest changes. An intuitive way to explain the brand today is to take a step back and look at the bigger picture.
Episerver Product Ecosystem
This diagram clearly illustrates the majority of the Episerver ecosystem. Of course, this diagram is now obsolete as it does not indicate where Optimizely services and utilities live. Episerver acquired Optimizely in late 2020 and announced in early 2021 that Episerver would be rebranded under the Optimizely name. From a brand strategy point of view, this move makes a lot of sense. “Epi” and “Server” were always problematic keywords as the word epi is frequently confused with epi as in epi-pens. We’ve heard prospective clients call it “epicenter.”
“Epi” and “Server” Problematic Brand Associations
Simultaneously, the word server is very much rooted in archaic hardware and web hosting references. Today with just about everything in the cloud, there’s less talk about servers and more talk about applications and instances. On the other hand, the Optimizely mark has established brand recognition within Fortune 500 brands and Silicon Valley digital businesses. The Optimizely brand allows for a more expansive brand vision.
“Episerver acquired Optimizely in October 2020. In early 2021, the vendor announced plans to rebrand from Episerver to Optimizely.”
Gartner
Episerver has announced a September 2021 roadmap for the brands to merge under the Optimizely name fully. To sum up, we are excited to see the movement at Optimizely and looking forward to seeing the brand evolve. As Gartner points out, while challenges remain, the company is experiencing tremendous growth. It is now in its most vital position to date within Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms. Significantly, Episerver is currently ranked higher than Sitecore in the Leaders Quadrant. All in all, there is much to be excited about happening at Episerver (Optimizely).
Update May 2021
The Optimizely rebrand is under full swing with a new brand identity, swag, and brand name shuffling. Optimizely acquired Zaius, a customer data platform in March 2021. Zaius effectively replaces Episerver’s homegrown CDP formerly known as the Insight Platform. Zaius was rebranded “Optimizely Data Platform” or ODP. Zaius is actively being rolled out to existing customers with a free data migration offer.
Update August 2021
In Q3 2021, the Optimizely brand completely replaced Episerver brands. While Episerver brands still exist within developer documentation, all marketing materials now reflect the Optimizely brand. Below is a quick guide to the new Optmizely brand names.
- Episerver CMS is now Content Cloud under the larger Digital Experience Platform brand
- Episerver Commerce is now Commerce Cloud, Commerce Cloud now includes both former Episerver Commerce and Insight Software as Optimizely B2C Commerce, and Optmizely B2B Commerce
- Advance, and Perform, are now under Intelligence Cloud (formerly Peerius, and Idio)
- Episerver Campaign is now Optimizely Campaign (formerly Optivo)
- Optimizely also promotes a partnership with Delivra for marketing automation solutions
- Episerver Insight is now Optimizely Data Platform or ODP (formerly Zaius)
- Episerver Reach (formerly Peerius) is now Optimizely Triggers
- Episerver Find is now Optimizely Search and Navigation, while Episerver Personalized Find became Optimizely Personalized Search and Navigation (formerly Peerius)
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