Vodafone

Vodafone Group connects more than 650 million mobile and 19 million fixed-network customers worldwide. Vodafone Germany, Vodafone’s largest national subsidiary, provides internet, mobile communications, fixed network and television services to more than 50 million customers. In an ultra-competitive environment, Vodafone Germany must constantly adapt and deliver. The enterprise implemented OpenText™ Web Site Management close to the turn of the millennium for web creation and distribution and continues to use it to this day.

Vodafone Germany operates a large, integrated and self-managed web site management cluster in its own data center in Ratingen, near Düsseldorf. The enterprise relies on Web Site Management to develop and deliver all web content, including the latest material for two main sites. One is the company’s internet call center platform, a knowledge base serving 18,000 agents across Germany. The company also uses the solution to manage headless content for applications, special pages and integrations. For instance, flexible publishing supports the My Vodafone app for consumers, as well as an app for Vodafone door-to-door salesmen.

Before using Web Site Management, editors would write a ticket to initiate alterations. Now, they click a plug-in link, write a description in a dialog box and send it. Web Site Management gathers all necessary information, including data from the CRM and other enterprise or backend systems. “With Web Site Management we have a stable, flexible and recognized system,” said Thomas Pollinger, Senior Product Manager in the Digital Transformation Unit for Vodafone Germany. “You can start with it out of the box and integrate into your own business environment as you wish because you can extend it to your company workflows.”

Due to its approach grounded in configuration rather than development, Web Site Management supports quick alterations and additions, enhancing Vodafone market agility. “If we want to go online with a new web site, we can do it in a few weeks, not months,” remarked Pollinger.

Turnaround for small pages or updates often span only a couple days, while hotfixes are completed within 10 minutes. Changes can also be carried out within the production environment, if desired. Furthermore, Pollinger said the concept of separating system and project properties allows Vodafone users to add value to all projects by extending the system, while protecting against changes to the entire system, for a single project adaptation.

“With Web Site Management, we can quickly and easily adapt and deliver web content,” Pollinger said, referring to what he termed the “genius” content model. “We have integrated it so well that we are able to react quickly to requirements. This gives us the opportunity to make changes/corrections within a few minutes at any time during operation, without downtime, deployment or long development cycles.”

Web Site Management became an integral part of Vodafone Germany’s online platform when it was implemented two decades ago, although managers have compared it against other systems in the interim. During a period of ten years, Vodafone considered a change three times. Each time, Web Site Management “held its own” against competitors. The first failed to garner acceptance from site editors, the second proved too expensive in comparison to Web Site Management and the third could not support updates for new releases in a timely manner.

In comparison, Web Site Management serves as a cost-effective, fast and flexible platform for the development of web sites by Vodafone editors across many departments. It proved the right solution for the enterprise at the beginning and has grown with it since. “Web Site Management is a popular system at Vodafone,” Pollinger noted. “We would get in trouble with our editors if we tried to change it.” Vodafone estimates that the money and time saved with the increased productivity have helped the enterprise achieve ROI for Web Site Management many times over. OpenText covers all enterprise needs with the latest version of Web Site Management and garners confidence with ongoing security.

Vodafone Germany built a strong community and collaboration within its web content infrastructure, as well as with OpenText. “We would like to continue on this path successfully for many years to come... through the close cooperation between us, the product itself, but also through the continuous improvement of our working methods and possibilities,” Pollinger said.

In the future, Vodafone Germany plans to expand its use of Web Site Management to additional departments, deepen integration with third-party systems and increase automation. “We are constantly changing and Web Site Management helps us in a positive way,” Pollinger concluded.