With Adobe announcing the End of Life for their Business Catalyst product, this presentation offers Adobe customers with CMS migration planning tools and tips.

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Indietech™ © 2018
TM
Indietech: the digital innovations and creative department at
Newpath WEB Pty Ltd
http://indietech.com.au
+61 3 8676 0762
Adobe Business Catalyst
End of Life announcement and
Migration Plan 2018 - 2020

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Announced on March 26th 2018,
Adobe is no longer supporting or
developing the platform and will
discontinue hosting as of March
26th 2020.

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This means all Adobe Business
Catalyst customer websites will be
shutdown on 26/3/2020.
All Adobe customers must migrate
to an alternative CMS platform.

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Businesses should commence this
migration process by late 2018 at
the latest to ensure completion
before the shut off date in 2020.

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We have built this migration plan
to answer questions and to provide
affected businesses with a
framework for effectively
transitioning to an alternative CMS
platform.

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Why can’t we download our
existing website and upload it to
another hosting provider?

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The short answer:
In some rare instances, it may be possible to download the
website file and media assets and simply upload to another
hosting provider IF no in-platform Business Catalyst
features have been integrated into the website code base.
This scenario is only likely for business that have purchased
the “Bronze” subscription.
In our experience, 95% of Adobe Business Catalyst websites
leverage a range of proprietary functions that create
significant dependencies on the core platform that cannot
be migrated into other systems. Thus, a considered
approach to migrating to an alternative and comparative
platform is required.

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Our recommendation:
If you are an Adobe Business Catalyst
customer, it is likely your website is due for
an upgrade anyway.
While replatforming your website to a more
capable Content Management System
(CMS), use this as an opportunity for
modernising your website’s design.

9. Warning!
While we have provided some feature comparisons
between Adobe Business Catalyst and alternative
modern CMS’s, do not select your new platform
based on like-for-like features.
It is likely that your business’s requirements have
changed since you first selected Business Catalyst as
a CMS of choice. We highly recommending taking
the time to rescope your online marketing needs.

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Why did we choose Business
Catalyst in the first place?
When reviewing alternative CMS platforms, it’s worth asking this question of
project stakeholders. The answer to this question will inform the selection of
an appropriate alternative CMS while also adding an important layer of
information to the project scope.
For many businesses, Business Catalyst’s all-in-one system allowed
marketers to manage all their online assets and communications in one
place.
However, it is worth noting that while BC has many features, few of them
were modernised inline with competitive products. Notably, the email
marketing module had become dated in 2014 in comparison to, say,
Mailchimp, Campaign Monitor or Infusionsoft.

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Do we need another all-in-one
CMS?
As digital marketing experts, we found many of the features within BC
limiting and inelegant. As a cost effective solution, this is typical of
proprietary all-in-one CMS platforms at the lower end of the market.
While all-in-one systems, such as Kentico, offer many off-the-shelf features
without the need for 3rd party plugins or extensions (which can decrease the
cost of ownership), the price tag is a little higher. With that said, Kentico is an
excellent option for businesses looking to upgrade to a very capable,
Microsoft-based, secure and well-supported platform.
However, if we’re talking about migrating to a comparative platform from
feature and cost perspectives, open source solutions such as Wordpress,
Magento, and Drupal are excellent alternatives. Wordpress is the most
widely used CMS in the world and offers excellent integration with
best-of-breed digital marketing tools.

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How do we choose a new Content
Management System?
We have done some of the work for you by mapping Adobe Business
Catalyst features to the feature sets available in three CMS platforms we
consider to be excellent alternatives:
● Wordpress
● Drupal
● Kentico
● Magento
WARNING: We strongly recommend that businesses consult a digital
marketing expert to assist in scoping your CMS migration requirements as
this is not simply a matter of choosing a feature set that best aligns with your
current requirements. Future needs, IT environments, and systems
integrations should be considered.

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CMS Comparison chart
Adobe Business Catalyst feature set analysis

14. Before you get started...
Please note that the following comparison chart only
lists the features present in Adobe Business Catalyst
(WebCommerce) and maps them to comparative
features in our selected alternative CMS platforms.
We make no attempt to rate the quality of each
available feature across the platforms. Nor do we list
the features available in the comparison platforms
that are not present in Adobe Business Catalyst.

15. Module Feature
Adobe
Business
Catalyst
Wordpress Drupal Kentico Magento
Dashboard Basic website analytics Yes 3rd party plugin 3rd party plugin No No
Notifications feed Yes 3rd party plugin Yes Yes Yes
Site Manager Live page edit Yes 3rd party plugin No Yes No
WYSIWYG page editor Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Web parts / shortcodes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Rollback page versions Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template management Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Page optimisation (SEO) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Module customisation Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Content holders (widgets) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Menu management Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Click to download the full comparison table

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Migration preparation
Adobe Business Catalyst migration planning and
preparation checklist

17. Preparing for migration
In order to prepare for migration to a new website platform,
it will be necessary for you to provide your web designer or
digital agency with two important pieces of information:
1. Your marketing plan or business strategy (in many
cases, this may be delivered as a part of the verbal brief)
2. Access to your Adobe Business Catalyst platform for
auditing
However, if you wish to take matters into your own hands,
we have provided a migration checklist on the following
slide.

18. Click to download the full migration checklist
Adobe Business Catalyst Migration Checklist
This checklist provides a guideline for Adobe Business Catalyst
website admins to prepare for migration to a new CMS platform.
The items listed below should be compiled into a document as a
reference for web designer and development teams.
Phase Task Status Estimated start date Estimated days
Website audit Document admin user login credentials Not started 01/01/2019 2
Count and list all active web pages Not started
Count and list all active web page templates Not started
List active 301 page redirects Not started
Document Analytics account details (ie Google) Not started
Create sitemap and document sitemap.xml URL Not started

19. Migration caveats
1. Not all historical data can be exported from Adobe Business Catalyst
2. Web administration functionality will differ across CMS platforms and
may impact business processes
3. Integrated native Business Catalyst modules may require development
teams to create significantly customised software to match legacy
functionality
4. Low cost migration solutions may require multiple open source or
vendor platforms to replace your Adobe CMS
5. Significant DNS updates may be required causing some downtime
during migration
6. If Adobe’s hosted email solution is in use, businesses will need to
migrate to a new hosted email solution (such as Google Apps or
Microsoft 365)
7. If Secure Zones have been deployed where website contacts have
account credentials, a migration will require users to re-register with
the new CMS platform.

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Indietech™ © 2018
Typical* migration
project timeline
*All websites are different and your digital
partner will need to estimate the project
timeline based on their assessment.

21. BUSINESS
DISCOVERY
TECH
AUDIT
TECHNICAL
& DESIGN
SPEC
WEBSITE
DEVELOPMENT
DATA
/EMAIL
MIGRATION
WEBSITE
UX/UI
REDESIGN
UAT
+ FINAL
DATA
MIGRATION
LAUNCH
Estimated migration project timeline: 3 - 9 months

22. Final tips & comments
● Depending on the overall migration plan agreed upon with your digital
agency or web developer, the project can be broken up into segments.
For instance, you may decide to migrate email hosting and marketing
automation components (including web forms and email campaigns)
as a separate phase before the website migration phase.
● While choosing a new CMS is important, it shouldn’t be the primary
driving factor on which digital partner you choose to manage your
migration project. Instead, approach the project from a business-first
perspective.
● Don’t leave the migration to the last moment. Your digital partner will
need sufficient time to perform the migration. As this issue affects all
Adobe Business Catalyst customers, your digital partner may need to
schedule your project inline with other customer projects.

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Next steps...

24. Our team at Indietech are ready and available to
help you migrate from Adobe Business Catalyst to a
new platform of your choice.
Our boutique creative team is backed by 250+ developers within
our fully-integrated parent company Newpath Web. Together, we
are focused on delivering online solutions that works for your
business.
Talk to a team that is process driven, creative and has a decade of
expertise in digital projects.

25. DIGITAL BRAND & MARKETING STRATEGY
BRAND COMMUNICATIONS & IDENTITY
DESIGN
WEB DESIGN
USER EXPERIENCE RESEARCH & DESIGN
DIGITAL ANALYTICS
LEAD CONVERSION
COPYWRITING & CONTENT MANAGEMENT
MARKETING AUTOMATION
Creative
Expertise

26. Digital
Expertise
WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT
COMPLEX WEB APP DEVELOPMENT
MOBILE APP DEVELOPMENT
APPLICATION INTEGRATION
LARGE-SCALE DIGITAL PROJECTS
DIGITAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT
DIGITAL STRATEGY
SEM/SEO
HOSTING SERVICES

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Indietech™ © 2018
Nice one.
Ben Dexter
Creative Director
INDIETECH
http://indietech.com.au
+61 3 8676 0762
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brand.