Migrating a SKU-Heavy B2B Dealer Portal from Kentico 13 to Xperience by Kentico
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Project goals
Migrate a Kentico 13 dealer portal serving 350+ distributors across 18 countries to Xperience by Kentico without rebuilding from scratch. Preserve 12,000+ SKUs, 700+ content pages, all URLs, and all ERP/Salesforce integrations. Eliminate the developer dependency that was blocking partner campaign launches for 10–12 weeks.
Result
Cutover completed in a single weekend with zero Sev-1 incidents and no measurable organic traffic loss in the first 60 days. Catalog page load time dropped from ~3.1s to ~2.0s. Partner campaign launch cycles shortened by 35%. Logged-in dealer sessions increased 45%. Manual ERP/CRM reconciliation reduced by ~50%.
Key Results
12,000+ SKUs migrated · 700+ pages · 350+ dealers across 18 countries
35% faster partner campaign launch cycles (10–12 weeks → 6–8 weeks)
45% increase in logged-in dealer sessions
~50% reduction in manual ERP/CRM reconciliation effort
~35% faster catalog page loads (3.1s → 2.0s)
Zero Sev-1 incidents and zero organic traffic loss in first 60 days post-cutover
About the client
A global B2B building-materials manufacturer selling exclusively through a dealer and distributor network across 18 countries. The catalog contains 12,000+ SKUs with region-specific assortments and per-dealer pricing tiers.
The Kentico 13 portal was the primary channel for product discovery, digital asset downloads, pricing lookups, and order placement for 350+ dealers. It ran on .NET Framework and had accumulated 40+ custom page types and 80+ custom widgets over several years of active development.
Business challenge
The portal's architecture had reached the point where new development was becoming risky and slow.
Upgrade risk from accumulated customization. 40+ page types and 80+ custom widgets created deep interdependencies. Any platform change required regression testing across the full content and widget inventory. Upgrades were deferred because the cost of breaking something was too high.
ERP and CRM data out of sync. Pricing and inventory sync between the custom ERP, Salesforce, and the portal was handled via custom code and manual spreadsheet imports. Dealers regularly encountered stale prices or incorrect stock levels.
10–12 week campaign launch cycle. Launching a new dealer campaign or product line required multiple development sprints. Marketing and product teams had no self-service capability — every content change went through the dev team.
Fragmented dealer identity. Dealers authenticated separately on the portal, in Salesforce, and in the ERP. There was no unified dealer profile, which limited personalization and made it impossible to connect portal behavior to sales pipeline data.
The client needed to modernize the platform without a greenfield rebuild — preserving all content, all SEO equity, and all integrations while moving to a maintainable, extensible architecture.
Why Bits Orchestra
The client selected Bits Orchestra based on certified Kentico partnership status and prior experience migrating complex Kentico 13 instances with active ERP integrations.
Bits Orchestra's team had direct experience with Kentico's official migration tooling, including multi-run rehearsal migrations used to validate content fidelity and redirect integrity before production cutover.
Solution
Migration approach
The migration used Kentico's official Migration Tool alongside a custom content migration script for non-standard content types. Three full rehearsal migrations were run on a non-production environment before cutover — each validating item counts, redirect mappings, widget configurations, and custom page type translations.
Pre-migration audit: Full inventory of the Kentico 13 instance — 12,000+ SKUs, 700+ content pages, 80+ custom widgets, SKU hierarchies, dealer tier configuration, and all ERP/Salesforce integration touchpoints.
Content migration: Kentico Migration Tool for structured content and page builder content. Custom migration script for URL/relationship mapping and content model updates required by Xperience's revised content architecture.
3 rehearsal runs on non-production to validate item counts, redirects, and custom page type mappings before cutover.
ASP.NET Core frontend with clean separation of domain logic, integration code, and presentation layer — eliminating the tight coupling that made the Kentico 13 codebase fragile.
CI/CD setup for content objects using Kentico's continuous integration support for content model versioning.
Xperience Content Hub configured with taxonomies for product families, regional assortments, and dealer segments, powering personalization and region-specific catalog views.
Headless commerce via Shopify Plus integrated through Xperience's official connectors — cart, checkout, and dealer discount logic handled by Shopify, with orders fed back into the ERP and Salesforce.
Custom ERP integration via REST APIs and scheduled tasks for contract pricing, live stock levels, and order statuses — replacing the manual spreadsheet sync.
Salesforce + Azure AD B2C SSO for unified dealer identity: a single authenticated dealer session connects portal behavior, quotes, and usage data to the Salesforce opportunity pipeline.
AIRA enabled for the client's editorial team — Kentico's native AI agent, exclusive to Xperience by Kentico, covering content drafting, bulk image tagging, and multilingual translation directly in the CMS admin; not available on Kentico 13.
Architecture: Before vs. After
Area | Kentico 13 | Xperience by Kentico |
Stack | .NET Framework monolith | ASP.NET Core (.NET 8), modular |
CMS role | Content, logic, and integrations coupled | Experience layer + content hub; integrations decoupled |
Commerce | Built-in, tightly coupled | Headless via Shopify Plus |
Product catalog | WYSIWYG + custom widgets | Structured content types with taxonomies |
ERP sync | Manual, spreadsheet-based | Automated via REST APIs + scheduled tasks |
Dealer identity | Fragmented per system | Unified SSO via Azure AD B2C |
Editor experience | Developer-dependent for layouts and widgets | Component-based builder + AIRA AI assistance |
Performance | ~3.1s page loads | ~2.0s, ~35% faster |
Team
The project was delivered by a Bits Orchestra cross-functional team:
Kentico technical lead/architect: migration planning, content model design, widget inventory, CI setup, integration architecture
Backend developer (.NET): ERP REST API integration, Salesforce connector, Azure AD B2C SSO, scheduled sync tasks
Full-stack .NET developer: ASP.NET Core component architecture, dealer portal UI, Xperience page builder components
QA engineer: rehearsal migration validation, regression testing across all 80+ widget types, redirect verification, dealer-tier pricing test scenarios
Results
The production cutover ran over a single weekend. The Kentico 13 instance was kept live in read-only mode for 48 hours post-cutover as a fallback.
Zero Sev-1 incidents during or after cutover. No measurable organic traffic loss in the first 60 days — URL structure was fully preserved and all redirects validated across 3 rehearsal runs.
Catalog page load time: ~3.1s → ~2.0s on typical dealer connections — a result of removing the monolithic rendering layer and replacing it with clean ASP.NET Core components.
Partner campaign launch cycles shortened by 35% — from 10–12 weeks to 6–8 weeks — enabling 2–3 additional campaigns per year without increasing headcount.
Logged-in dealer sessions up 45%, with a measurable shift from email/phone order placement to self-service portal orders.
Manual reconciliation effort reduced by ~50% between web orders, ERP, and Salesforce — freeing finance and ops team capacity that had been absorbed by spreadsheet-based data correction.
Content editors operate independently on the new platform using Xperience's component-based page builder and AIRA for content drafting, image tagging, and multilingual copy — without developer involvement for standard publishing tasks.
Is this for you?
This migration pattern is relevant if:
You're on Kentico 12/13 or another legacy .NET CMS powering a B2B manufacturing or building-materials portal
You manage 5,000+ SKUs with region-specific assortments and dealer pricing tiers
Your pricing and inventory are ERP-driven and currently synced via spreadsheets or manual imports
You sell through dealers or distributors and need a true authenticated dealer portal, not a product brochure site
Your partner campaign or product launch cycles currently take 6+ weeks due to developer dependency
If two or more of these apply, your situation matches the pattern this project addressed.
Planning a move from Kentico 13?
For Kentico 13 dealer portals, Bits Orchestra offers a focused Migration Audit:
- Content model and architecture review
- Inventory of all custom page types, widgets, and ERP/CRM touchpoints
- Risk and dependency map
- Migration plan with timeline and effort estimate
Deliverable: a shareable migration path document in 1–2 weeks.
About the project
Company type:
Enterprise
Country:
USA
Timeline:
05/2025 — 12/2025
Industry:
Solution:
Services:
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