You know the importance of social media marketing, but all of the different aspects to successfully running social media accounts for your brand can seem overwhelming – especially if you’re wearing more than one hat in your business.
Thankfully there are many different social media management tools to help you set, meet, and track your goals and growth. Social media management platforms are software suites or app programs that allow you to manage multiple social media accounts from one account or dashboard.
Typically they will allow you to do things like schedule content, reply to comments on your posts, etc. These tools allow you to manage your social media marketing more efficiently. We’ve built a comparison guide for you to help you decide which one is right for you and your business. There are a ton of options out there, and we’ve chosen to compare the most popular, common options.
Blitz Software Solutions
Blitz Software Solutions is a fantastic social media management platform for businesses of all levels. It has everything you need depending on your membership level. One of the best known social media management platforms out there, this one is trusted by the Captevrix team and our clients. BSS really does it all and allows users to not only manage marketing and sales leads, but also includes an email and blog management system as well.
Blitz Software Solutions is not strictly a social media management tool. It integrates all of your inbound marketing all into one, convenient portal. It allows you to connect your sales CRM and your marketing in a way that creates a seamless, user-friendly platform.
Even if it is not technically just a social media tool, it has all the functions any other tool offers. You can track traffic, engagement, clicks, and more:
It of course tracks your followers. It also compares your social media platforms so you can pinpoint where most of your audience is at:
And there’s a plethora of other analytics to dive into and dissect:
You can post daily or schedule your posts ahead of time. It supports video – with a new video editing portal – and allows you to attach social publishing to your blogs, so when you publish a blog, your social media platforms post about it to let your followers know there’s something new to read by you.
Their multiple service tiers allow companies to grow with them, as they expand their offerings as your needs grow. BSS is also perfect for businesses who want to streamline their online presence. It allows for in-depth analysis of traffic and engagement. Overall, BSS is a great tool for those who want to attack inbound marketing from every angle.
Highlights – Email management, lead generation and management, multiple languages available, excellent customer service, streamlined process, great interface, blog management
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, Google Plus
Social Report
If you’re looking for a social media management company that truly does it all, look no further than Social Report. This platform has been around for a while, making it tried and true, and offers their customers the complete experience when it comes to managing your social media presence. Social Report is especially great for those who have larger teams or rely heavily on collaboration between various members.
It also offers the most comprehensive list of supported social media platforms on this list and is used by the Captevrix team and our clients. Social report is a great choice for the businesses who want the most out of their social media management platforms.
The great thing about this platform is that it makes the client approval process very easy. You create your post one time, then make small changes depending on the platform. As you can see here, you create one message that is simultaneously published across any channel you choose:
You add your media (gifs, video, photos, etc) and toggle through the customizations to make sure you can add your relevant hashtags for Twitter and Instagram.
Once your post is made it will pop up on your calendar. You can plan the whole month out in advanced, but none will go live until the client logs in and approves each post. With their own approval login, you can make the process of getting your client on board super easy!
All in all, Social Report is a good social media management tool. Keep in mind, however, that it only tracks social media. It isn’t as comprehensive as HubSpot.
Highlights – Comprehensive list of supported platforms, easy to use, team management, unlimited reports, influencer identification, social listening reports, brand tracking, quick responses to social media interactions
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, LinkedIn, YouTube, Reddit, Tumblr, Pinterest, WordPress, Vimeo, TripAdvisor, Yelp, Bitly
AgoraPulse
AgoraPulse is a social media management platform that lets you manage multiple accounts across platforms. Not only does this one let you create and schedule content and give you reports, but it also gives you the ability to run social media contests – something that sets it apart from its competitors. This platform is excellent especially for those wanting to focus on post scheduling and analytics.
Highlights – Multiple platforms, allows user to create contests, excellent analytic reports, recycles posts, easy interface, allows multiple team member accounts
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, LinkedIn, YouTube
Cost – Free – $299 / mo
Hootsuite
Arguably one of the most well-known social media management platforms, Hootsuite offers the most bang for your buck for their free offerings. This platform allows you to create and manage multiple profiles on multiple platforms.
Hootsuite has a cool feature called ‘Conversations’. You can use Hootsuite Conversations right from your dashboard to collaborate with members of your team instead of having to open other software – it allows you to centralize your social media planning, making it easier for your team to be on the same page.
Hootsuite monitors and analyzes the important things – traffic, engagement, mentions, reviews, etc. It also has a cool feature that helps you break down the demographics of your audience and those who interact with you. This can help you sharpen your buyer personas.
This platform is great for those working in teams or who have a large work load spaced across multiple clients. It allows you to delegate tasks to certain team members if it all becomes too much for one person. You can have certain clients’ social media accounts tasked to certain people. Say you have someone who is a wiz at Instagram – you can assign them all your client’s Instagram accounts while others manage their Twitter or Facebook accounts.
They have a free version available that will let you manage up to 5 profiles. The pro version allows you to juggle up to 50, and gives you tons more functionality and more in-depth analysis.
Highlights – Post scheduling, category scheduling, great user interface, analytics, posting video and multiple images, fantastic value
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest
Cost – Free – $100 / mo
Sendible
Sendible is a platform that is geared towards much larger clients and business with much larger audiences, as evidenced by both their offerings and their pricing. Not only do they manage multiple social media accounts, but they are able to integrate word processing platforms like Dropbox, Google Drive, and WordPress. This social media management platform is going to be a great fit for larger businesses or brands that rely heavily on written content and have a large staff.
Highlights – Content integration across platforms, team collaboration, great user interface, post scheduling and analytics.
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn
Cost – $59 -$499 / mo
EClincher
EClincher’s best feature by far is the fact that they gather all of your messages and notifications from multiple social media platforms into one place. They’re an intuitive platform that’s supported in many different social media platforms and they let you schedule and recycle content.
Highlights – Unified inbox, post scheduling, analytics, recycling and managing content
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest
Cost – starts at $49 / mo
MavSocial
If you have an international market or team that works overseas, MavSocial is for you! This platform supports Chinese, Russian, and Arabic – including some of the major Chinese social networking sites. It also has its own stock image library and allows you to edit photos before posting them to your accounts.
Highlights – Content creation and scheduling, unified inbox, multiple languages, excellent photo and video content support
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, Tumblr
Cost – Free or $59 / mo per user. Some of the plans are paid based on negotiation and business needs.
Sprout Social
Another clear leader among the social media management platforms, Sprout Social is particularly adept at analytics and keyword suggestions. They’re a company particularly well suited for larger businesses who need more in-depth analytics with a broad reach. They also allow a broad reach and the appropriate tools for larger teams and collaboration.
Highlights – Unified inbox, post scheduling, an app called ViralPost that indicates which shows you optimal timing for posts, team management
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Google+
Cost – Their pricing is based on numbers of users a company has. Prices range from $59 / mo to $1500 / mo
Buffer
Buffer is a great platform for you and your brand to grow with. The free feature is hearty enough for most who are starting out and solidly covers the basic aspects of social media marketing. But Buffer gives you the options to incrementally increase membership prices that unlock varying levels of features.
The prices are reasonable for each level. The interface of this platform is intuitive. Buffer is one of the oldest social media management platforms and offers a wide variety of options and features for your brand’s needs.
Highlights – Content creation and scheduling, excellent analytics, video posting, great at optimizing content schedule, team collaboration
Supported Platforms – Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest
Cost – Free or prices ranging from $10 / mo to $399 / mo
Kontentino
This platform is a particularly great choice for freelancers, small businesses, or teams that rely heavily on collaboration and shared content creation. One of Kontentino’s most unique features is called “Post Inspirations.” This is a feature that allows you keep track of ideas and inspirations for future content.
Highlights – Intuitive design, content creation and scheduling, analytics, inspiration and idea tracking
Supported Platforms – Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Google+
Cost – Free or $7.50 / mo to $105 / mo
Wrapping it up
There are many different social media management tools available. When deciding on what to use, remember to have clearly defined goals and know what your business needs. Most of the platforms listed above offer free trials, which is especially helpful if you’re deciding between two options or are unsure how much you would use a particular feature. Hopefully this guide helps you narrow down your options and find a social media management tool that will help streamline your social media accounts and boost your marketing.
