Ektron? Good Grief.
Updated August 22, 2015

Ektron? Good Grief.

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Software Version

Ektron Web CMS

Modules Used

  • Aloha Editor

Overall Satisfaction with Optimizely Content Cloud (formerly Episerver Content Cloud)

Ektron is used as the platform to manage and deliver all our web communications and content via the diocese's main website.
  • Forms are relatively easy to use and set up within Ektron, but by easier, I mean, easier than coding them by hand.
  • Ektron's user interface could use a complete overhaul, beginning with the odd logical separation between "Library" items and "Content." From an end-user perspective these distinctions are completely irrelevant and only serve to confuse everyone.
  • The way Ektron reads html in the code editor is unfathomable. White space is dealt with in a completely unconventional and error prone way and the text editor often inserts immense amounts of unnecessary markup that often causes problems and bugs.
  • Ektron contains so many bugs its almost impossible to list them all. As the main editor of the website, my standard answer to any standard functionality requests is "no" because Ektron charges inordinate sums of money for those functions and even if we do custom manage our own solution, it would likely cause the entire system to crash.
  • Ektron is very very slow.
  • Ektron requires a seperate module for mobile/web-friendly websites. You can't just code it yourself. You have to buy their's.
  • Ektron has cost our non-profit huge sums of money with little to no return. Most of our web initiatives have been put on complete hold as we have begun to outsource most of our work to third parties as our website is a mishmash of technologies and patchwork fixes.
  • Ektron has slowed down workflows considerably and all of our content editors refuse to produce content they do not absolutely have to, resulting in the web content manager (me) taking on most tasks or retraining people on a continuous basis.
Content Author / Administrator
  • Adobe Contribute,Wordpress,Concrete5,Acquia Drupal,Drupal
I did not select Ektron. Ektron was selected by executives at our company prior to my arrival here and they refused to heed my warnings.
Our website was more functional and received regular updates using HAND-WRITTEN code on an Apache server with an FTP connection prior to Ektron and it was better in every way than what we deal with now.


From what I have heard, Ektron is great for security (forms).

I would still recommend looking at any other CMS over Ektron. It is by far the worst I have ever used and, unfortunately, continue to use. If you have a large team of well-trained content editors, each in charge of small portions of a website, I could see Ektron being useful. If you are a small business or don't have unlimited funds to waste on a poorly made product, use Wordpress, Drupal, or Concrete. If you would like something that works well and comes with few 'undocumented features,' use the aforementioned as well.

Optimizely Content Management System Feature Ratings

WYSIWYG editor
5
Code quality / cleanliness
1
Admin section
1
Page templates
3
Library of website themes
Not Rated
Mobile optimization / responsive design
1
Publishing workflow
2
Form generator
9
Content taxonomy
1
SEO support
1
Bulk management
1
Availability / breadth of extensions
Not Rated
Community / comment management
3
API
1
Internationalization / multi-language
1
Role-based user permissions
8

Using Optimizely Content Cloud (formerly Episerver Content Cloud)

25 - Content editors, administrators, and IT support.