SGEN in 90 seconds
SGEN is a CMS platform — one operating system with five product surfaces. It replaces the WordPress-plus-builder-plus-plugin stack with first-party components that update together, fail together, and ship together.
Read this page first. Everything else assumes you know the shape.
Overview
The platform has five surfaces. Each one owns a distinct slice of work. They share one data layer.
The split matters because every other doc points to one of those names. When the Forms reference says "the form posts into an SG-Core page record," you already know what each side owns.
| Surface | What it owns | Where it lives |
|---|---|---|
| SG-Dashboard | accounts · multi-site rollup · billing · backups | dashboard.sgen.com |
| SG-Admin | single-site settings · publishing · environment | /sg-admin on your site |
| SG-Builder | page layout · components · breakpoints | inside the admin → edit page |
| SG-Core | pages · users · media · custom fields · templates | platform layer |
| SG-Modules | forms · SEO · ecommerce · redirects · popups · more | platform layer |
What is this for?
This page exists so a new reader can hold the whole platform in one breath before opening any feature page. If you can name the five surfaces and what each one owns, you can find the answer to almost any question by jumping straight to the right section.
It's also the short answer when a teammate asks you "what is SGEN?" — send them this link instead of a paragraph.
Scope
The page covers:
- The five product surfaces and what each one is responsible for.
- The stack mapping — what SGEN replaces in a typical WordPress build.
- The reading path through the rest of these docs.
- A short vocabulary list of the names you'll see on every page.
- Specific feature behavior — that's on each feature page.
- Pricing and tier comparisons — those live at
sgen.com/pricing. - Migration walkthroughs — those live in Operations → Migration & Import.
- The full architectural reasoning — that's in Why SGEN Exists and the Architecture section.
Examples
The shortest possible elevator pitch
SGEN is a CMS platform built around five surfaces — SG-Core, SG-Modules, SG-Dashboard, SG-Admin, and SG-Builder. It replaces the WordPress-plus-builder-plus-plugin stack with first-party components that ship and update together.
The 90-second read-aloud
SGEN is one platform with five surfaces. SG-Core is the foundation — pages, users, media, custom fields, templates. SG-Modules is the capability layer — forms, SEO, ecommerce, redirects, the features you'd normally add as plugins. SG-Dashboard is the account view — every site you operate, billing, backups. SG-Admin is the single-site shell — settings, publishing, environment control. SG-Builder is visual page composition. The five surfaces share one data layer. Layout edited in SG-Builder writes to an SG-Core page record. Forms configured in SG-Modules submit into the same underlying data store. There's no plugin marketplace and no extension boundary to manage.
A surface routing example
You're trying to add a contact form to a page. Which surface owns each step?
One feature, five surface touches — but each surface owns a clean, distinct part of the work.
Stack replacement at a glance
The structural mapping for teams migrating from a WordPress-style stack:
| Old layer | SGEN surface |
|---|---|
| WordPress core | SG-Core |
| Elementor / Divi / other builders | SG-Builder |
| Plugin pile (forms / SEO / popups / etc.) | SG-Modules |
| Multi-site management plugins | SG-Dashboard |
| WP-Admin | SG-Admin |
| WP Rocket / W3 Total Cache | platform-owned caching |
| UpdraftPlus / BackupBuddy | platform-owned backups |
Vocabulary
The five surface names are stable across every customer surface. They're written exactly as shown here. If you see a different spelling somewhere, this page is the source of truth.
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| SG-Core | The structural foundation. Pages, users, media, custom objects, custom fields, templates, menus. Every SGEN site runs on SG-Core. |
| SG-Modules | The capability layer. First-party modules that replace the typical plugin stack — forms, SEO, ecommerce, redirects, popups, attributions, tracking consent, and more. List grows quarterly. |
| SG-Dashboard | The multi-site command view. Account-level rollup, billing, generated reports, backups, support widget. Lives at dashboard.sgen.com. |
| SG-Admin | The single-site operating shell. Where one site's settings, publishing, environment, and module configuration live. Reached at |
| SG-Builder | The visual page composition surface. Drag-and-drop layout with publish-ready output. Sits inside the admin. |
| .sgen | The portable site backup format. Full state of a site in one file — restorable into the admin on another site. |
| Module | A first-party capability shipped inside the platform (forms, SEO, ecommerce,...). Not a plugin. Not third-party. |
| Surface | A named operator-facing layer of the platform. The platform has five — listed above. |
| Custom Codes | The escape hatch for behavior outside what modules cover. Per-site, scoped, governed. |
| Custom CSS | The styling escape hatch. Page-scoped or site-scoped. |
One sentence per surface, for quick recall
- SG-Core owns the structural records.
- SG-Modules owns the features.
- SG-Dashboard owns the account view.
- SG-Admin owns the single-site shell.
- SG-Builder owns the page layout.
Surface-by-surface, in one line
| Surface | Read this if you want to | Skip this if you only want to |
|---|---|---|
| SG-Core | understand the data structure | publish a page (use SG-Admin) |
| SG-Modules | add a capability | configure account-level billing |
| SG-Dashboard | see every site at once | edit one specific page |
| SG-Admin | run a single site day to day | compare across sites |
| SG-Builder | drag-drop page layout | manage users or settings |
What the operator path usually looks like
A typical day on SGEN crosses three surfaces. The order is consistent:
Single-site operators skip step 1 and 5. Multi-site operators live in step 1 most of the day and dip into 2-4 per site.
Common confusion in the first hour
A few boundaries trip up almost every new reader. Worth knowing up front.
"Is SG-Admin the same thing as SG-Dashboard?"
No. SG-Dashboard is account-level — every site in your account, billing, portfolio rollup. SG-Admin is site-level — one specific site's settings, content, publishing. The same person uses both. Multi-site operators move between them all day; single-site operators mostly live in the admin.
"Where exactly is SG-Builder?"
SG-Builder is the visual editor that opens when you edit a page or template inside the admin. It's not a separate app or a separate URL. You reach it from the page or post record — click into a page, then open the builder.
"Are forms part of SG-Core?"
No. Forms are a module — part of SG-Modules. SG-Core owns the page the form is embedded into; SG-Modules owns the form itself. Same pattern for SEO, ecommerce, popups, redirects, and every other capability that would have been a plugin in a WordPress build.
"What's the difference between SG-Modules and Custom Codes?"
SG-Modules ships first-party capability — supported, updated, governed. Custom Codes is the escape hatch for behavior modules don't cover yet. Reach for a module first; reach for Custom Codes when you've confirmed no module fits.
Where to find it
The platform lives in three places:
The docs you're reading now live at docs.sgen.com. The marketing surface (for evaluation and pricing) lives at sgen.com.
If you've signed up but haven't picked your first site yet, start at dashboard.sgen.com. The first-time landing routes you into onboarding.
See also
Five short reads to follow this one, in order:
- What is SGEN — the longer-form platform definition, with per-surface detail.
- Why SGEN Exists — the problem statement behind the platform's shape.
- How This Documentation Works — the difference between guides, reference, what's new, and the rest.
- Documentation Map — the full information architecture, so you can find any page.
- For Your Role — the per-role reading path: agency, founder, in-house marketer, developer.
Bookmark this page. New teammates joining the platform get sent here first.
The 90-second framing isn't a stylistic choice — it's a working test. If a new reader can absorb this page in a real minute and a half and then describe SGEN back to a colleague in plain language, the page has done its job. Send revisions if it fails that test for you.