Pantheon Front-End Sites Delivers Next Generation Web Development in a Single Platform

SAN FRANCISCO (June 5, 2023) – Pantheon, the SaaS-based website operations (WebOps) platform for developers, designers, and marketers, today announced its Front-End Sites product is now enhanced with advanced content cache coordination, eliminating the conflict between serving visitors at large scale and being able to update content in real-time. The release is the latest improvement to Front-End Sites, which is now widely available to any organization interested in a decoupled architecture. Pantheon team members will demonstrate the technology this week at DrupalCon 2023, held June 5-8 in Pittsburgh. 

Pantheon brings JavaScript frameworks and Open Source CMS together

With Front-End Sites, Pantheon removes the complexity from decoupled architecture projects and delivers the technical infrastructure, WebOps tools, scalability and resilience digital teams need to develop and easily manage more innovative, content-rich digital experiences. Pantheon brings together the modern front-end frameworks developers want and the premier Open Source CMS platforms content creators love into a single, trusted platform. Teams are empowered to create next-level, omnichannel user experiences that deliver performance and results, while boosting cross-functional collaboration and simplifying site management. 

The delivery of advanced content cache coordination is the most recent in a series of consistent Front-End Sites enhancements, eliminating significant headaches and trade-offs when it comes to choosing a rendering strategy for a modern JavaScript front-end. Customers can now get the best of both worlds between static site generation and server side rendering, without any additional complexity or overhead for developers, delivering massively scalable web experiences that can also be updated with new content in seconds. 

The case for decoupling

Customer expectations for fast, interactive brand experiences across channels and devices continue to rise. Delivering on these expectations is quickly becoming a differentiator; however, the traditional monolithic CMS often lacks the speed, agility, and capabilities digital teams need to execute, especially as more brands shift to interactive web pages, mobile apps and complex web applications built with advanced JavaScript frameworks. This has organizations turning to decoupled architectures, which provide an efficient structure for those writing code and those managing content to work in parallel and deliver modern, omnichannel experiences. 

The emerging approach of decoupling breaks with tradition by making the end-user facing component a separate application, usually built with one of several modern JavaScript frameworks. The CMS is still there, but it is now “headless,” serving content only via API. It allows multiple front-ends – like a website, native app, and even digital signage or other business system – to all be powered by the same source of truth for content. This significantly boosts efficiency for web teams and enables frequent digital experience testing and iteration.

“Decoupled architectures are the future of web development,” said Meredith Brown, Pantheon chief product officer. “Pantheon’s Front-End Sites product gives brands the perfect balance of creative front-end features with secure, stable CMS functionality to craft exceptional user experiences that generate real business impact.”

For Front-End Sites users, the technology has leveled up the site experiences they are able to deliver to their audiences. Molly Duggan, Founder and CEO of Molly Duggan Associates, credits the technology with bridging the gap between development and marketing for her agency's clients. According to Duggan, decoupled architectures unlock better user experiences and ultimately build brand trust, which research shows is the single biggest motivator for consumers to share first-party data. As marketers adapt, evolve and build their engagement strategies for a cookieless world, frictionless digital experiences will be crucial to customer loyalty and business performance.

“I work directly with clients to iterate the brand experience and drive growth across all brand touchpoints. For nearly all of our clients, that includes turning their website into their most sophisticated business application,” said Duggan. “Front-End Sites brings the back-end CMS and the front-end framework under one umbrella, equipping teams with the necessary tools to integrate and work faster and more efficiently.”

Pantheon at DrupalCon 2023

Attendees at DrupalCon 2023 can see Front-End Sites in action at the Pantheon booth. Pantheon Chief Strategy Officer Josh Koenig also will provide more insight into the impact JavaScript may have on the future of Drupal during his session, held Tuesday, June 6 at 11:30 a.m. ET. 

To learn more about Front-End Sites, visit pantheon.io/features/decoupled-cms.