Composability in the Great Content Collapse

The digital content landscape has shifted under our feet. And you’ve probably noticed. 

Nearly half of all Google searches now feature AI Overviews. Those AI-generated results are siphoning views from organic search to the point that searches featuring AI Overviews have been hit with a 34.5% drop in click-through rates. That trend is squeezing once free-flowing top-of-funnel streams to a trickle. And in that environment, marketing budgets are shrinking, content teams are having to do more with less, and everyone is scrambling for a way to push their brands back into the spotlight.

Don’t panic. The good news is there are ways to manage the effects of the “Great Content Collapse,” and making the jump to a composable, future-proof digital experience platform (DXP) like Contentful is one of the most attractive options for thousands of organizations around the world. 

But that kind of change — transformation from a legacy content solution to a composable one — isn’t a journey to be undertaken lightly, especially if your brand has been soldiering through with an outdated platform for years or even decades. It requires deep consideration and understanding, and a willingness to effect organizational change. 

Most of all, it needs to align marketing ambition, technical feasibility, and executive accountability around measurable business outcomes. 

In this post, we’re going to explore that challenge — in other words, make sure that you’re ready for the moment you find yourself in an elevator, face-to-face with an exec, with the chance to make your case for composability.
Composability and the content collapse
Let’s clarify the challenge that your case for composability faces. At some point, it’s going to come up against a financial stakeholder, likely in the C-suite in today’s economic climate, who is understandably concerned about the current upheaval in the digital marketing landscape. They’re going to need to be convinced that your proposal will deliver return on investment (ROI). 

However, with top-of-funnel traffic disappearing, many brands are seeing the investment they’ve put into organic search disappear with it. That’s especially the case if they’re working with slow, inflexible monolithic content management systems (CMSes) or digital experience platforms (DXPs) that aren’t helping them adapt. Not only are marketing budgets shrinking as a result, but some brands are engaging in a race to the bottom to make up the shortfall with cheap, AI-generated content that lowers the bar for quality, undermines marketers’ creativity, and erodes customer trust.

The better way to handle the content collapse is to work smarter — by adopting a composable DXP. Where legacy CMSes or DXPs are slow to respond to the shifting landscape, composable platforms provide agility, speed, and control over the entire marketing tech stack. They let brands swap new tools in and out, integrate AI strategically, experiment efficiently, and tighten governance. 

For technical decision-makers, that flexibility is architectural as much as it is operational. Composability reduces long-term vendor lock-in, supports modern frontend frameworks, and allows teams to work independently without destabilizing core systems. And instead of having to build toward periodic, high-risk overhauls, the content platform itself becomes continuously adaptable.  

We’ve talked about the advantages of composability over monolithic content management many times before, so we won’t go too deep here. The bigger point to make is this: Once you’re in the elevator with an interested exec, your case for composability will need to take that context into account, and address those financial concerns.  

Managing organizational change
Even if you’ve identified a composable DXP as a solution to your search challenges, there’s another obstacle you’re going to have to navigate: the move to composable isn’t a mere technology upgrade, or a lift and shift of existing digital assets; it’s a fundamental organizational change. 

This change will likely involve teams rethinking content workflows, adapting to new tools and new ways of working, and managing potential disruption — all of which translates to risk. 

With the financial pressure on, C-suite stakeholders will be keenly aware of that risk, and will be on the lookout for ways to mitigate it (which we’ll get into below). Once again, without wanting to go too deep, Contentful is here to help you navigate the transition: We’ve got plenty of resources, insight, and advice on how to make your composable migration as smooth as possible, and a vast partner ecosystem to maximize the value of your digital products. 

And, if you think that maybe because you’re not making your case directly to someone in the C-suite you don’t need to worry about having that kind of information available, or that the move to a composable DXP isn’t a financial decision for your company — think again. 

Ultimately, it’s your C-suite that will evaluate whether the investment aligns with their business priorities and the company’s bottom line. They’ll want to avoid tech investments with no clear financial payoff or measurable results, and they’ll be tired of greenlighting expensive, internal “science projects” that don’t deliver ROI and that lack clear accountability. 

Selling to your C-suite: Metrics and value 
It should be clear that however you’re putting the case for composability together, and whoever you’re putting it together for, you should always factor your C-suite’s priorities (and the context we set out) into the argument — at least, if you’re serious about wanting to make the change happen. 

With that in mind, let’s go back to the elevator. 

Corporate ROI focus is built around a series of value drivers: revenue, cost, and risk. A credible, convincing case for composability will have to perform in each of those buckets if it’s going to be successful. 

That means you need to know the headline metrics for each in order to demonstrate the viability of your proposal. 

Revenue 
With top-of-funnel traffic declining and competition for attention intensifying, revenue growth doesn’t necessarily depend on greater content volume, but on maximizing content impact — in other words, turning demand into purchases, generating more leads, creating and deepening engagement, and doing all of that with new and existing audiences across different markets and locations.

A solution built on composable architecture makes it easier for content teams to optimize content performance in order to achieve those goals. In Contentful, for example, marketers can test and personalize content autonomously, and publish without waiting for developer tickets. That translates to faster content creation and campaign launches, and shorter time-to-market.

For CMOs, in particular, this is about more than incremental optimization; it’s an opportunity to build a growth engine that can continuously test, personalize, and scale across markets without having to depend on developer availability. 

Contentful revenue-impact examples
KFC: 43% increase in digital sales. 
Bang & Olufsen: 27% increase in average order value.
Pets Deli: 51% increase in conversion rate.
Cost
Operational efficiency — cutting costs — is a significant value driver when it happens at the same time as growth, which is why execs prioritize opportunities to eliminate anything that wastes time, employee effort, and budget. 

A composable DXP supports cost and efficiency because it streamlines content operations, removing manual friction from creation and publication workflows, automating cycle times and handoffs, and empowering marketers and creators to work autonomously.  

Contentful cost-impact examples
Shiseido: 50% reduction in content development costs.
Audible: 80% reduction in content production time.
Docusign: Weeks to minutes acceleration in content update times.
Risk 
Risk can derail digital transformations even when the benefits of change feel certain. With workflows evolving, responsibilities shifting, and teams adjusting, your case should raise the useful possibilities but also deal with all the ways the project could go wrong. 

Composability mitigates risk by distributing control appropriately across marketing and engineering teams, strengthening governance, and making it easier to evolve systems without introducing instability. Meanwhile, 24/7 system uptime and scalable capacity means that brands can maintain their customers’ experiences and protect revenue even during usage surges and high-traffic periods. 

Contentful risk impact examples
Telus: Multiple legacy content platforms consolidated.
Ruggable: Zero Black Friday performance issues.
Black Friday 2025: Contentful handles 4.6 billion API requests.
Bottom line
The Great Content Collapse is not the end of the road for content marketing, but it is a new horizon — over which audiences will discover and engage with brands differently. While the industry adjusts to that new normal, the margin for wasted effort, workflow inefficiency, and low-reward experimentation will continue to shrink. 

The message here is not to panic, but it’s also not to sit still with your outdated content solution. As a motivated marketer or content expert, now is the time to make your case for composability ironclad. Or, more specifically, craft it in a way that addresses legacy limitations and demonstrates that it will deliver on the bottom line: repeatable ROI across revenue, cost, and risk.

Taking your case to the top (floor)
And that’s the point you need to keep in mind in the elevator: It’s easy to focus on the big-ticket possibilities of digital transformation, but when you’re pitching it to upstream stakeholders, you’re not just proposing a new platform; you’re defining the way that marketing, technology, and data will operate together to drive measurable growth in a landscape increasingly shaped by AI.  

That’s where the content platform that you choose can make the difference. 

A composable DXP like Contentful helps you take on the turbulence and uncertainty of the market by transforming content workflows from the ground floor up (pardon the pun). 

It can help you establish a center of excellence at the heart of your organization: A point at which technical capabilities and marketing expertise converge and synergize. 

And, with that alignment, your DXP becomes more than infrastructure. It becomes a foundation for faster experimentation, stronger governance, and ongoing competitive advantage that turns what might once have been regarded as a “science project” into a durable, cross-functional operating model that delivers value long into the future. 

If you’re ready to see the Contentful platform in action, we’re ready to guide you. You can check out our latest releases here or reach out to the sales team to discuss your next steps. 

To find out more go to www.contentful.com/resources/the-great-content-collapse/