New Trajectory for Portal Strategy

Author: Mike Anderson                             Date: September 15, 2011

Topic: User Experience and Portals        Research Note Number: 2011-15

Issue: What trends are affecting how information is presented to users?

Summary: User expectations for access, usability, and interaction coupled with exploding mobile and social computing capabilities create pressure on traditional portal strategies. As approaches, tools and user experience options proliferate, enterprises will need a new framework to match approaches and constituents.
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As mobility and social networking have become essential user priorities, the breadth and pace of expanding demands for mobile device support and social network integration has left traditional portal vendors struggling to keep up. Multiple approaches are emerging to provide essential portal functionality like single point of access, aggregation, personalization and support for content management and collaboration. Enterprises will need to develop a new framework to address these approaches alongside their existing portal strategy.

The original purpose of a portal was to display content in an organized and secure way, and to provide a single entry point for a user to access needed applications, information, and other services. Enterprise strategy focused on standardizing portal software, streamlining access, and expanding portal functionality to keep pace with changing demands and technologies. IT organizations were responsible for deploying and managing, portals, and making changes meant engaging a bureaucracy and procedure.

An expanding range of user options, particularly in the mobile domain, along with a growing amount of portal-like integration within other software environments, has fragmented portal strategies. The evolution of traditional portal products has been disrupted, with alternate architectures and approaches taking the lead. The entry points for customers, employees and business partners will differ, and will come from four portal implementation models:

  • Horizontal portals
  • Mobile platform as portal
  • Enterprise application environment as portal
  • Social software community as portal

Note: This is part of Aragon’s archived research. Please visit our Coverage Areas page to view our most recent content.

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