MarkLogic Partner 67 Bricks Named a Key Platform Provider by Outsell

Those of us in the Customer Success Team at MarkLogic hear some very common themes from our customers. Media and Publishing customers, for example, want to move beyond simple indexing and publishing of content, to find more innovative ways of maximising the value in their content and encouraging their readers to spend more time on their platform.

Consumers’ expectations are marching onwards all the time; a simple search box, whilst effective, is not providing the stickiness to keep readers returning, even if they have loyalty to a brand. Responsive UI, seamless recommendation engines – and for the STM market, author reputation management and flexible ways to chunk and purchase content – are driving engagement.

Here at MarkLogic our powerful platform is already providing many leading publishers with the content store and search engine to power their customer-facing platforms. And, our internal consultancy teams and our wonderful partners are helping customers make even greater use of the technology and their content. Recently one of our key partners, 67 Bricks, were named among the key science, technology, and medical (STM) platform providers in research company Outsell’s latest industry report.

We couldn’t be more thrilled for them! Anybody that attended our recent International Publishers Day event (we just managed to squeeze in a face to face before the lockdown took hold!) would have seen 67 Bricks discuss their approach to partnering with publishers, and heard about some of their recent successes.

Their recent accolades include being ALPSP finalists for the BMJ Best Practise platform and the OpenAthens ‘Best user experience award’ for Emerald Insight – which we are proud to say are both built upon MarkLogic!

Personally I took two key messages from their Publishers Day presentation:

The hybrid approach

Many industries have struggled with the buy or build dilemma; do you buy off the shelf software and work within the constraints that provides, or do you build a custom application exactly tailored to your needs? The hybrid approach recommended by 67 Bricks looks to take the best of both worlds, using off the shelf products and services where appropriate but then augmenting it with custom developments to help meet unique business drivers.

This hybrid approach helps organisations make optimal use of their budgets: investing development in the areas that provide competitive advantage or meeting the unique challenges of a business, whilst using standard products and frameworks from teams whose sole focus is driving those products forward (like authoring tools, or our very own Data Hub).

A critical friend

I think this is an area that is often overlooked, but is the basis of a great partnership with a truly knowledgeable systems integrator. A top-class partner should listen carefully to the issues and objectives of their client, but use their industry knowledge to challenge those assumptions and provide insights from their experiences implementing projects for many clients. A critical friend helps guide you from making the mistakes of others and that is invaluable when investing your company’s time and budget on a new project.

Everyone here at MarkLogic would like to congratulate 67 Bricks on their latest award, and we look forward to our next project together.

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