Migrating from WordPress for security and functionality

Dubber built their first website eight years ago on WordPress. As the business gained traction, it became clear WordPress was not a viable, secure long-term solution, and they needed to find an alternative that could scale with them. 

The Client: Dubber

Dubber is a cloud-based call capture and conversational AI company — ASX listed and headquartered in Melbourne but operating throughout Asia-Pacific, Europe, and the Americas. The company is experiencing exponential growth, helping service and solution providers (network operators and VoIP platforms) address margin erosion and customer attrition by providing value-added services they can sell to customers.

The Challenge: Increased security and an easy-edit front end

Like many high-growth tech companies, Dubber's initial public website was built using WordPress. And while their WordPress site served them well for a period, it was not a viable long-term solution. Inherent performance and functional limitations slowed the team down, and WordPress did not meet the stringent security standards frequently audited by Dubber's customers and technology partners.

As they grew, Dubber identified the need to move away from a monolithic CMS, instead looking to API-first Headless CMS vendors, including Storyblok and Contentful. Open-source options like Strapi and Ghost early due to a lack of specific vendor support and incomplete feature sets.

While Contentful provided the security and ability to scale to match Dubber's rapid growth, they were concerned about their ability to edit and maintain the site's front end. This is the challenge for any organization considering implementing a headless CMS — a headless CMS does not, by definition, have a 'head' in the traditional sense. While this gives you unlimited scope to create world-class content experiences, producing an easily editable and flexible front end without reliance on developers or an agency becomes challenging. Dubber was sensitive to this and required a solution that would allow them to easily maintain the front end of their website through low code/no code tools that their marketing team could use.

Why Dubber chose Octana and Contentful

Security

• Octana + Contentful provided a highly scalable and secure platform that met the standards of the third-party security audits Dubber is frequently subject to.

• Easy integration with Dubber's existing identity platform to provide resellers and partners secure access to certain content.

Technology requirements

• The site is professionally supported and hosted in the cloud.

• Contentful + Octana integrate seamlessly with Salesforce + Pardot (Dubber’s MarTech solution).

• The site is SEO friendly and allowed the Dubber team to continue their growth through organic discovery.

• Content can be easily localized for global markets.

Marketing-friendly tools

• Octana allows the Dubber team to deliver responsive web pages quickly and efficiently without developer input or agency support.

• Octana’s customizable UI Kit provided everything the Dubber marketing team needed to create beautiful web pages without coding.

• Multiple users can author content quickly and easily at scale without incurring any publishing delay.

In particular, the strength of the Contentful + Octana security offering and the marketing-friendly tools provided by Octana were the deciding factors for Dubber. They did not want to invest large amounts of developer resources in building and maintaining a website instead of developing their own product.

"The performance, security, and user experience we've achieved working with Octana are second to none. Our global clients and technology partners have the highest expectations in this regard, and we are regularly subjected to rigorous third-party audits without incident. We would not pass such scrutiny if we were still using WordPress or had taken another monolithic, CMS-lead approach."

Successful outcomes

• The new site surpasses the security standards of the frequent third-party audits by Dubber's customers and technology partners.

• 16 content creators across the globe can easily create and edit content simultaneously.  The marketing team has control over the site's front end without requiring developer input.

• The migration from WordPress came in under budget, with a total cost of at least 40% less than the cost of building a complete custom front-end from scratch.

• Ongoing support and maintenance are carried out within a fixed, predictable budget. Dubber ranks on page 1 on Google for their key search terms.

• The new site meets its PageSpeed Insights performance targets (99%), helping to increase online engagement. 

In just 16 weeks, Dubber was able to finalize their migration from WordPress to Contentful + Octana. The Octana team took Dubber from an initial workshop to a fully functional, live site meeting all the stringent security requirements. Moving forwards, the Dubber marketing team has been able to take the reins, editing, updating, and authoring content themselves without developer input. 

Marketing has the control it wants, IT has the oversight it needs, and the site delivers the experience Dubber's customers demand.