The global IT Operations and Service Management (ITOSM) market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.5% from 2022 to 2027. The driving force behind this shift is clear: the escalating adoption of cloud computing, AI, big data, and the ever-expanding Internet of Things (IoT). These technologies are fundamentally altering the landscape of IT operations and service management.

In this rapidly evolving world of digital operations, adaptability is not just an advantage – it's a necessity. Businesses require a versatile Marketing Technology infrastructure that keeps pace with the latest trends and has the foresight to anticipate and evolve alongside the changing landscape of the business and its customers.

So, the question arises- Is it time to elevate your IT operations and enhance your online presence through migration to a better Digital Experience Platform (DXP) like Acquia? Kentico may have served you well in the past, but as the customers continue to evolve, is it still serving the purpose of creating superior omnichannel experiences?

Kentico vs. Acquia

Kentico is a DXP that enables businesses to deliver multichannel digital experiences using a hybrid headless approach. Known for its ease of use, it offers a wide set of capabilities, including content management, e-commerce, and marketing automation. While both Acquia and Kentico are excellent digital experience platforms, Acquia has several advantages.

Acquia is an open-source digital experience company that empowers the world's most ambitious brands to embrace innovation and curate customer interactions that matter. With its cloud-native solutions, Acquia provides a platform for building, delivering, and optimizing digital products and services that engage customers, enhance conversions, and help businesses stand out. It is a trusted and reliable Drupal hosting and support provider for a wide range of organizations, including government agencies, educational institutions, media companies, ecommerce companies, and nonprofits such as NASA, Stanford University, and The New York Times.

Discover 5 Way Acquia Cloud helps organizations improve digital experience in 2024.

If you're considering the shift from Kentico to Acquia, it's important to understand the fundamental difference between these two Content Management Platforms.

Transitioning from Kentico to Acquia offers exciting new possibilities but can also present challenges if not done carefully. Nearly one-third (32.7%) of organizations reported that one hour of IT downtime costs them $1 million or more. The key to avoiding this is planning the migration in a methodical way to ensure no disruption in services.

Benefits of seamless Kentico to Acquia migration

By investing upfront in seamless migration, enterprises can prevent the challenges of implementing a new CMS in a disruptive way, and gain the following benefits:

• Minimizing downtime ensures external users, partners, and customers experience uninterrupted access to digital content.
• Smooth content and workflow transfer lets internal teams quickly resume normal productivity levels.
• Methodical planning and testing reduce the risk of issues arising later, preventing costly rework.
• Shorter time-to-value for Acquia deployment leads to a quicker realization of ROI.
• A seamless migration minimizes organizational change challenges, fostering employee receptiveness to the new solution and promoting innovation.

Key steps for successful Kentico to Acquia migration

Migrating from Kentico to Acquia while maintaining continuity of operations requires meticulous planning and orchestration across people, processes, content, and technology. Altudo recommends a phased approach:

Phase 1: Planning Kentico to Acquia migration

This phase serves as the foundational stage of your migration journey by ensuring that the subsequent migration process aligns with your organizational objectives and digital aspirations. Here’s what phase 1 includes:

• Audit existing Kentico implementation: Thoroughly review current Kentico configuration, customizations, workflows, integrations, and content architecture.
• Define Acquia requirements: Outline business, functional, and technical requirements for the new Acquia platform based on goals, user personas, and digital initiatives.
• Develop migration roadmap: Create a detailed roadmap for migrating modules, templates, workflows, content models, metadata, content items, and historical content.
• Establish governance: Define new roles, processes, policies, and guidelines for managing digital experiences with Acquia.
• Create transition plan: Develop communication, training, support, and change management plans to facilitate organizational adoption of Acquia.

Phase 2: Executing Kentico CMS Migration

The execution phase is where your CMS migration journey takes tangible shape. The following key steps will set the stage for the successful adoption of Acquia:

• Set up Acquia environment: Configure Acquia Cloud environment and Drupal based on requirements. This includes setting up server resources, choosing the appropriate PHP and database versions, and defining server locations.
• Migrate content and workflows: Methodically execute migration roadmap, moving content, metadata, taxonomy, templates, and workflows from Kentico into Drupal.
• Redevelop functionality: Reconfigure site functionality, modules, and customizations in Drupal based on new content architecture and requirements.
• Integrate systems: Connect Drupal with other systems for digital asset management, personalization, analytics, GA4, etc. based on Acquia architecture.
• Test extensively: Conduct extensive testing and Quality Assurance across various scenarios, content sets, and user groups and fix issues.
• Launch and iterate: Go live with Acquia to select internal users first. Monitor closely and tweak the launch plan if needed, before expanding access.

Expert tip: Make a list of the common pitfalls of CMS migration and double check with your technology architects to ensure smooth Kentico Acquia migration.

How can Altudo help with Kentico CMS Migration?

As a leading marketing and technology consulting company and certified Acquia partner, Altudo can provide invaluable guidance and support for enterprises migrating from Kentico to Acquia. We help you analyze your current Kentico implementation, define goals and requirements for Acquia, develop a transition roadmap, and execute the actual migration smoothly with our expertise:

• Robust processes: We bring proven processes for planning, executing, testing, and launching major IT initiatives based on PMI and Agile principles.
• Specialized skills: Our consultants possess deep skills in Kentico, Acquia, Drupal, personalization, cloud architecture, QA, data migration, and organizational change management.
• Holistic solution view: We consider the complete picture encompassing technology, content, workflows, human elements, and ongoing management.
• Migration best practices: We apply lessons learned from conducting past CMS migration projects to orchestrate and de-risk your Kentico to Acquia transition.
• Continuity focus: Our priority is maintaining continuity of your digital presence and operations throughout the migration, preventing downtime.
• Flexible support model: We provide end-to-end or modular support based on your needs, working as a strategic partner or augmenting your internal teams.

Conclusion

Migrating to Acquia from Kentico is not about just changing platforms; it’s about shaping a more agile, competitive, and innovative future for your digital operations. But migrating mission-critical IT systems like CMS involves considerable complexity.

With Altudo as your Kentico migration services partner, you gain access to world-class specialists along with proven methods, tools, and best practices, ensuring that your transition is as seamless as it is transformative. Schedule a free no-obligation consultation with our Acquia experts today to take the next step in your digital evolution and start your migration journey.