With over 60% of the world’s population on social media, the fact is obvious that your brand needs a presence on these channels.
And with so many social channels to manage simultaneously, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.
This is where social media management tools come into play.
Whether you’re looking to grow your follower count, boost engagement, make money on Instagram, or even sell products on Facebook, you need software to help get you there.
In this guide, I’m reviewing and comparing two of the top choices: Hootsuite vs. Buffer.
Hootsuite vs. Buffer Overview
Both Buffer and Hootsuite have emerged as market-leading tools for managing social media accounts. These tools help small and medium businesses take care of their entire social presence from a single interface.
Though both are similar they cater to slightly different audiences. That’s why in the following, I’ll give you a clear idea of how each tool operates. But before that, let’s take a quick look at what these tools offer.
What is Hootsuite?
The Hootsuite social media management platform was created and launched in 2008 by Ryan Holmes. Its features cover most aspects of social media management, such as content curation and post scheduling. It even offers dedicated analytics features for ROI measurement.
The tool offers a clean interface, along with a single dashboard for accessing all social media campaign data. It includes team management and collaboration features and can even integrate with many third-party apps.
Some of the most prominent features of Hootsuite are:
- Hootsuite provides complete options for social scheduling and content management
- It offers detailed analytics features for tracking and improving social media ROI
- Hootsuite integrates with over 100 third-party apps, boosting its feature-set
What is Buffer?
Buffer is a clean and user-friendly tool that provides features for publishing content on social media channels. It’s easy to set up and start working with a Buffer account. The primary strength of the tool is its extreme ease-of-use.
Buffer provides many features for data analysis and report creation. It even provides strategic recommendations for increasing social reach and engagement. And it integrates with the latest social features like Instagram Stories.
Some of the most prominent features of Buffer are:
- It has dedicated apps for content publishing and analysis
- Using Buffer, you can visually plan your social media campaigns
- It also provides in-depth insights for measuring social media engagement
Both Hootsuite and Buffer work with most of the popular social channels, but I’ve found their primary focus to be different. Hootsuite is a dedicated social media management tool and lets you manage all your social channels from a single location.
Buffer focuses more on the content creation side of things. At its heart, it’s a tool for queuing and publishing content that integrates with social sites. Naturally, Hootsuite is a more comprehensive tool and provides more features than Buffer.
In the following sections, I’ll provide a feature comparison of the two tools so that social media marketers can their own decision on which is best.
Hootsuite vs. Buffer Pricing
Hootsuite Pricing
Hootsuite offers a limited Free plan with only one user account, 30 scheduled messages, and 3 social profiles.
Since that plan won’t be suitable for most businesses, it offers the following paid plans:
A. Professional Plan
The Professional Plan comes at $29 per month and is best suited for small businesses and individual entrepreneurs. It offers the following benefits:
- Up to 10 social profiles
- One user account
- Ability to schedule unlimited messages
- Real-time analytics features
- An unlimited number of RSS integrations
B. Team Plan
The Team plan is best suited for small marketing teams looking to scale up their social presence. It comes at $129 per month and offers the following features:
- Includes up to 20 social profiles
- Has support for up to 3 users
- Custom analytics
- 1 each of custom branded URLs and Social Media Certification
- Everything that comes with the Professional Plan
C. Business Plan
This plan is ideal for larger businesses and digital marketing agencies. Costing $599 per month, it includes all features of the above plans, along with the following:
- Up to 35 social profiles
- Up to 10 users
- Data export features
- Approval based publishing
- Integration with premium apps
- 24/7 support
- Special onboarding and training
D. Enterprise Plan
If you’re a large corporation with custom requirements and need to handle multiple teams, opt for the Enterprise plan.
This plan provides custom features such as:
- Tailor-made social media solutions
- Integrations with premium business apps such as Adobe and Talkwalker
- Developer APIs
- Curated training services
The price of this plan will vary according to the features you choose to go with
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