Key Insights from SUGCON Europe 2025

The Sitecore community kicked off the second quarter of 2025 in style at SUGCON Europe in Antwerp, Belgium! The SaaS world is changing so rapidly; the insights shared at these conferences are becoming more valuable with each year. Here are my highlights from this SUGCON:

A new era for search & content

AI is elevating digital processes in countless ways, but I can’t help but be reminded of Newton’s law: “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Through all of the excitement of what AI can do for us, we have to consider ways it could affect our digital experiences, such as search and content.

This topic was touched on in both the keynote by Sitecore Chief Product Officer Roger Connolly and in a breakout on Sitecore Search by fellow Sitecore MVP David San Filippo. Roger had some impactful words to inspire the audience. He said that search is dying, and generative AI is turning content into a sea of sameness. DSF cautioned us about search with statistics, pointing out that most users don’t ever click on a result when performing a search and that SEO needs more care as a result.

So, what are we to do? Lean in, measure, learn, adapt. Roger Connolly urges us to be “brilliant and authentic" and to stand out in this age of generated content. DSF went through the features of Sitecore Search that allow marketers to gather data about search and content performance and adapt accordingly. He also had some good ideas for enhancing content to keep the user engaged, like placing popular content on the 404 page or even running a query for what was placed in the URL and showing the search results.

Multi-site design library

Sitecore’s XM Cloud Product Lead, Liz Nelson, was a star of the show at SUGCON. She delivered several high-impact presentations, including one with fellow Product Director Eirini Kalampogia about a design library that will support multi-site, multi-channel content. This is a huge development that will boost Horizontal’s digital factory model, which enables enterprise teams to create, manage, and scale websites and digital products.

This design library, currently in early access, will pull all components and variants (created using both code and no-code methods) into a single location and apply site styling and behavior. Team members will be able to see the full inventory of a single site or all sites in the portfolio. Implementation teams have created these libraries in the past, and ongoing updates were the client’s responsibility. Automation will now take care of it for you! This is a living, breathing library — you can search through the components, edit them in any screen size, and developers can view the associated code right there in an adjacent tab.

AI component generation is also coming as an exciting new feature of this design library. Both code and no-code components can be generated as part of the design library — all within the constraints of each brand’s design library and coding standards. This is marrying efficiency and guardrails.

Stream in XP

Speaking of component generation...let’s talk about Stream in the XP product. Sitecore’s Platform Product Manager, Vignesh Vishwanath, spoke about Stream in XP and treated us to a demo of what it looks like today. Stream is compatible with XP 10.2 and up and currently includes core features like brand kits and content creation.

Sitecore isn’t stopping with basic support in XP. The roadmap includes key features like component generation, personalization and A/B testing suggestions, language translations, and alt text generation.

Continuing to make new features compatible with XP, especially all the way back to version 10.2, is a great decision from Sitecore leadership. Not every organization is going to invest in SaaS, and Sitecore is not isolating those folks or making them feel like they have no choice but to migrate.

Onward & upward

Sitecore is working toward a big release on June 4 — so be on the lookout for the announcement and details about new features around that date. We’re also looking forward to another Symposium this year in Orlando, and the call for papers and Digital Impact Awards is now open. There are some new categories this year for both speaker sessions and customer awards.

Dave O’Flanagan, Sitecore’s CEO, said in his keynote, “those who evolve will thrive.” Wherever you feel like you are in your digital evolution journey — just starting out or continuing great momentum — let's evolve & thrive together.