There was a time when companies had only a handful of content management systems (CMS) to choose from—primarily TYPO3, WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla in Germany. Fast forward to today, and the CMS landscape has exploded with options. Amongst the countless competitors, the headless CMS Storyblok, launched in 2017, has emerged as a remarkable player.
Now trusted by global brands, Storyblok has garnered attention for all the right reasons. It understands what editors and developers truly need from a CMS, delivering standout usability and flexibility.
In this blog post, we’ll explore five key reasons why Storyblok has earned its place in the CMS market, from its headless advantages and modular structure to its collaborative tools and asset management capabilities.
Pro Tip: Join us on December 11th at 10:00 AM for a LinkedIn Live session showcasing a real-world use case with Storyblok. Register here.
Content
What is Storyblok?
Let’s start with the basics. Founded in Austria in 2017, Storyblok is now a global company, serving renowned clients like Adidas, Netflix, and Tesla. Designed for mid-sized and large enterprises, The CMS operates as a SaaS solution and leverages AWS CloudFront for hosting. Clients can choose server locations in Europe, Canada, Australia, or the U.S., ensuring tailored data management.
Its standout feature? A headless architecture, which sets it apart from traditional CMS platforms.
What makes a Headless CMS different?
In traditional CMSs like WordPress, the backend and frontend are tightly coupled. This means your content is tied to a specific display channel, like a website. In contrast, a headless CMS like Storyblok separates the content backend from the frontend, allowing you to distribute content across any digital channel via APIs – Storyblok supports both REST and GraphQL.
How Storyblok simplifies content management
1. Omnichannel, simple integration and more – Storyblok offers the advantages of a headless CMS
As a headless CMS, Storyblok offers all the benefits associated with this type of content management system. Its modern architecture (see MACH architecture) makes it exceptionally flexible. Here’s what that means for you:
- Manage content centrally and publish across channels
Storyblok enables seamless connection to any frontend—websites, apps, online stores, customer portals, and even smartwatches. You can manage all your content, like text, images, and videos, in one centralized system and publish it across multiple channels at the push of a button. This eliminates the need to maintain content separately for each platform, saving time and reducing errors. - Integrate easily or expand with new features
With powerful APIs, Storyblok is highly adaptable. You can effortlessly connect it to other systems like CRMs, PIMs, or e-commerce platforms to optimize your workflows. Additionally, it’s easy to extend with new features, enabling you to quickly respond to emerging trends. For instance, you can upgrade your online presence with an intelligent AI assistant, integrate advanced search functionality like Elasticsearch, and much more. - Develop User Interfaces with your preferred technology
With no dependence on a specific frontend, developers can work with their favorite tools and frameworks—whether it’s Next.js, Nuxt, React, or Vue. This allows your team to design UI and UX using the tech stack they are most comfortable with, rather than having to adapt to a new system.
Figure 1: An overview of the benefits of a headless CMS
You can find a comprehensive overview of headless CMS, including its advantages, disadvantages, use cases, and more, in our whitepaper.
2. Customize content step by step with a modular structure
Storyblok’s name was chosen for a reason:
- Editors create Stories in the CMS, which are individual content pieces like landing pages, product pages, and more.
- These stories are built from various Blocks, Storyblok’s term for individual modules such as Hero Images, Sliders, Contact Forms, and many others.
This modular structure gives you maximum freedom to design content tailored to your specific needs.
Built by Developers
The variety and design of available Blocks are entirely up to you. Your web development team assembles the different Blocks using a rich library of tools. They also define which content types can use which Blocks, ensuring a landing page is built with different modules than a product page.
Used by Editors
Editors can then leverage these Blocks to quickly and easily create engaging content. For recurring elements—like company profiles—a single Block can be created and reused across multiple pages. Updating this Block automatically reflects the changes across all pages where it is used. This streamlines content maintenance and ensures your data stays up to date.
Figure 2: Modulare structure of stories composed of various blocks
3. Track content changes live with the Visual Editor
One of Storyblok’s most praised features is its visual editor, which allows editors to see live how their content changes will appear on the frontend.
This is a major plus for ease of use and a rarity among headless CMS platforms. In fact, Storyblok was the first headless CMS to introduce a visual editor. Most other decoupled systems only offer a preview in a separate window, which needs to be updated manually.
With Storyblok’s visual editor, editors can:
- Add modules and rearrange them using drag-and-drop functionality.
- Create multi-column layouts.
- Populate modules with text, images, videos, and other media.
- Embed external content like YouTube videos.
- Easily manage content in multiple languages.
- Restore previous versions of content.
- Schedule publications.
- And much more—all while tracking changes in real-time through the live preview.
Figure 3: Text, images, and styling can be adjusted in the Visual Editor while tracking changes live
Figure 4: New modules can be added with just a few clicks
4. Seamless team collaboration with comprehensive features
Another strength of Storyblok is its seamless collaboration capabilities, offering more advanced features than many other CMS platforms. Key functionalities include:
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Extensive role and permission management:
Storyblok allows you to set up multiple users with distinct roles and permissions. You can go into as much detail as needed—for example, in addition to standard roles like Admin, Editor, and Viewer, you can precisely define who can edit specific content or use certain features. This ensures your content remains secure from accidental changes, deletions, or publications. -
Real-time collaboration:
A standout feature of Storyblok is the ability for team members to work on the same content simultaneously. Plus, you can see your colleagues' changes live as they make them. By comparison, many other systems lock users out when someone else is editing the same document. With real-time collaboration, Storyblok makes teamwork much smoother and more efficient. - Custom workflows:
Storyblok enables you to define customized workflows, such as content stages like “Editing,” “Translation,” “Review,” and “Ready for Publication.” You can automatically assign content to specific users based on its status and prevent accidental publication of content still in progress (e.g., during the review phase).
Figure 5: Stories can be easily assigned to different workflow steps, and responsible individuals notified via email.
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Comments and feedback:
Storyblok allows you to add comments directly within a specific story. You can leave general comments that apply to the entire piece or assign annotations to specific areas, such as the header image, introduction, and more. Users relevant to the feedback can be easily tagged and notified. This commenting feature eliminates the need for separate approval processes in tools like Google Docs and similar platforms.
Figure 6: Modules can be easily selected, commented on, and responsible individuals tagged.
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Collaborative brainstorming in the ideation room
The Ideation Room is a new feature in Storyblok, set to launch in 2024, that enhances the platform's existing feedback capabilities. Essentially, it functions as an integrated text editor, similar to tools like Google Docs. It allows users to collaboratively draft, edit, and comment on new texts. A standout feature is the integration of AI tools, which can automatically adjust the tone and length of text. Once finalized, content can seamlessly be imported into a Story and assigned to the appropriate module.This new feature eliminates the need to switch between multiple tools. From brainstorming to publication, Storyblok covers the entire content process in one unified platform.
5. Centrally manage and edit Media with Storyblok’s Asset Manager
The Asset Manager in Storyblok allows businesses to centrally store, edit, and manage media content like images and videos for use across various stories.
Storyblok supports developers in optimizing images for different devices and faster loading times. Features like lazy loading and the delivery of images in the space-saving WebP format ensure better performance, especially for international audiences, as media is distributed via a Content Delivery Network (CDN).
A standout feature of the Asset Manager is Storyblok’s Image Editor, which empowers editors to make minor image adjustments directly within the platform—no need to involve graphic designers. The Image Editor allows users to:
- Crop images,
- Rotate and flip them,
- Adjust contrast and brightness,
- Apply filters,
- Add stickers and emojis,
- Change the focal point, and more.
The interface is intuitive and feels much like the image editing tools you’re familiar with on smartphones.
Figure 8: Images can be cropped in the image editor...
Conclusion
Compared to other headless CMS platforms, Storyblok stands out for its exceptional user-friendliness. It simplifies the process for both developers and editors, enabling faster content creation and publication. To summarize, the key strengths of Storyblok as a headless CMS include:
- Centralized content management and seamless multi-channel publishing.
- A modular structure that allows for the reuse of components across multiple pages.
- A visual editor that simplifies content updates and maintenance.
- Collaborative features, such as real-time editing by team members.
- A powerful Asset Manager with built-in image optimization capabilities.
Do you need support with Storyblok or have questions about headless CMS solutions? Contact us today for a no-obligation consultation. Our experts are excited to help!
Pro Tip: Join us on December 11th at 10:00 AM for a LinkedIn Livestream showcasing a real-world use case with Storyblok. Register here.
