Hey Kentico fam - Kentico Xperience just dropped its February 2026 refresh, and it's a gamechanger for us CMS devs. I'm talking to native AIRA agents - agentic AI right in the admin that autonomously handles content strategy, tone audits, and optimizations. No more hours tweaking pages manually.
In this post, I'll walk you through building your first AIRA-powered content agent live in under 5 minutes. We'll use the new Content Strategist agent (part of the AIRA suite), extend it with a tiny C# SDK snippet, and benchmark the speedup. As a Kentico expert at Dotstark and AWS Community Builder, I've tested this on real client sites - 10x faster content workflows, period.
Let's dive in.
The Problem: Manual Content Ops Are Killing Productivity
Picture this: You're migrating a site to Xperience. You need to audit 50 pages for brand voice, optimize SEO titles, and schedule A/B tests. Pre-AIRA Agents? That's 2-3 hours of copy-pasting into ChatGPT, cross-checking guidelines, and praying nothing breaks.
Enter agentic AI - not just chatbots, but autonomous agents that plan, reason, and act. Kentico's Feb 23 refresh baked this into Xperience v31.1+ with AIRA: the Content Strategist agent evaluates pages against your custom tone profile, suggests rewrites, and even publishes via API. I clocked a 100-page audit at 4 minutes flat.
What Makes AIRA Different
Unlike generic AI tools, AIRA agents are platform-native. They ingest your entire Xperience ecosystem - content libraries, Page Builder widgets, reusable content items - for context-aware decisions. The Content Strategist isn't guessing; it's analyzing against your actual Content Strategy document (uploaded as governance artifact) with:
Style compliance checks – Flags terminology mismatches, grammar issues, capitalization errors with severity levels (Critical, Major, Minor)
Tone evaluation – Ensures content matches audience expectations (tutorial vs. product page tone)
Voice alignment – Rates brand voice attributes (Friendly, Clear, Helpful) as Strong/Adequate/Weak with evidence
This is an agentic workflow at its finest—governed, logged, transparent, with admin-configured guardrails.
Step 1: Fire Up Xperience (2 Minutes Setup)
If you don't have an Xperience instance:
Head to kentico.com/trial → Spin up Cloud edition (free 30 days)
Log in → AIRA tab (left nav, new in v31)
Enable Content Strategist agent in Feature Settings
- Upload your Content Strategy document (PDF/DOCX with voice, tone, style rules)
Pro tip: Link your Azure OpenAI key in AIRA Config for custom models. I use GPT-4o for speed. Commercial data protection is built-in—no data logging, no model training on your content
Step 2: Your First Agent Run (90 Seconds)
Navigate to Pages app → Pick a sample page (or create: "About Us")
Click AIRA chat icon → Type natural language prompt
Example prompt: "Run Content Strategist on this page. Target persona: enterprise CTOs. Content type: product page. Evaluate against Dotstark brand voice."
Boom — agent responds in seconds with structured findings:
Table 1: Sample Content Strategist output with severity-prioritized findings
Agent provides:
Exact text quotes for each issue
Suggested rewrites aligned to your Content Strategy
Quick-fix buttons for common refinements (shorten, improve grammar)
This isn't generic feedback - it's your brand guidelines enforced at scale.
Step 3: Go Dev Mode - SDK Extension (2 Minutes Code)
For automation at scale, hook agents into .NET workflows. While AIRA's C# SDK for direct agent invocation is still in preview, you can integrate with AIRA features programmatically using existing APIs.
Here's my battle-tested pattern for automated content refinement:
`using Kentico.Xperience.Admin.Base;
using Kentico.Xperience.Admin.Base.FormAnnotations;
// Enable AIRA refinements in custom Page Builder widget
public class ContentOptimizationWidgetProperties : IWidgetProperties
{
[RichTextEditorComponent]
[FormComponentConfiguration(typeof(AiraTextRefinementConfigurator))]
public string PageContent { get; set; }
// AIRA automatically applies refinements when content is saved
// Integrate with workflow events for audit logging
}
// Trigger via Xperience event system
public class ContentAuditHandler : IEventHandler
{
public async Task HandleAsync(PageUpdateEvent eventData)
{
// Custom logic: if page saves with AIRA suggestions pending,
// log to CloudWatch, notify content team via SNS
var auditLog = new AuditEntry
{
PageId = eventData.PageId,
Timestamp = DateTime.UtcNow,
AiraFindingsCount = eventData.PendingSuggestions.Count
};
await _logger.LogToCloudWatchAsync(auditLog);
}
} `
Real-world pattern: Deploy to AWS Lambda triggered by Xperience webhooks. Page saves → Lambda checks for AIRA suggestions → Auto-applies approved refinements → Publishes optimized version.
Real Speed Benchmarks (I Timed It)
Tested on 100 legacy pages migrated from Umbraco to Xperience:
Table 2: Real-world performance comparison showing AIRA agent acceleration
Numbers don't lie—agents chain tasks autonomously (audit → evaluate → suggest → refine). The Content Strategist handles discrete workflows with full transparency and logging.
Scaling for Enterprise: AWS + Xperience Architecture
Serverless deployment – Wrap AIRA workflows in Lambda functions, trigger via Xperience webhooks
Secure access – IAM roles + Xperience API keys (rotate via Secrets Manager)
Monitoring – AIRA audit logs in Xperience Insights + CloudWatch metrics
Content governance – Upload brand guidelines as Content Strategy docs, version-controlled in S3
Multi-region – Xperience Cloud + AWS edge for global content delivery
I've deployed this for 3 clients—content teams now focus on strategy, not grunt work. One SaaS client saw 25% engagement boost after localizing for APAC markets with consistent AIRA-enforced voice.
Beyond Content Strategist: What's Coming
Kentico's AIRA Agentic Marketing Suite is expanding with additional agents in preview:
Customer Journey Optimizer – Flags progression leaks, surfaces bottlenecks
Campaign Execution Agent – Auto-setup campaigns, surface performance insights
Analytics Agent – Convert insights to actionable recommendations
All orchestrated via AIRA's conversational hub, with headless architecture ensuring seamless delivery across channels.
Image Processing Bonus Features
While testing Content Strategist, I discovered AIRA's image automation—massively underrated:
Auto focal point selection – AI picks optimal crop for image variants (max 20MB, 50x50px min)
SEO descriptions – Generates alt text during mass upload in current language
Smart tagging – Assigns taxonomy tags based on image content analysis
Combined with content agents, you're automating 80% of routine CMS tasks.
Practical Implementation Tips
From my production deployments:
Start with Content Strategy – Upload comprehensive brand guidelines (voice, tone, terminology, style rules). Agent quality depends on this foundation.
Use persona + content type – Always specify when evaluating pages. "Tutorial for developers" gets different tone analysis than "product page for executives".
Integrate with workflows – Connect AIRA events to your CI/CD pipeline. My setup: page save → Lambda audit → Slack notification if Critical findings.
Monitor credit usage – Check AIRA dashboard for credit balance. Each agent run consumes credits based on complexity.
Iterate on prompts – Natural language works, but specific prompts yield better results. "Evaluate against Section 3.2 of brand guidelines" > "check tone".
The Technical Foundation
AIRA agents run on Azure OpenAI with commercial data protection guarantees:
- No customer data stored or logged
- Prompts/responses discarded after interaction
- Not used for model training
- Enterprise-grade privacy compliance
For developers, AIRA features integrate via:
- FormComponentConfiguration attributes for widget properties
- ExcludeFromAiraTranslation attribute for Page Builder components
- Event system for workflow automation
- Global config in appsettings.json (CMSEnableAira toggle)
Wrapping Up: Your Move
AIRA agents aren't future tech—they're shipping today in Xperience v31.1+. The Content Strategist alone cuts content ops time by 80%, and it's just the first agent in the suite.
*Action steps: *
- Spin up Xperience trial (kentico.com/trial)
- Enable Content Strategist in AIRA settings
- Upload your brand guidelines as Content Strategy
- Run your first evaluation on existing pages
- Integrate with your AWS Lambda deployment for scale
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