Need Help Managing Social Media Posts?
With so many content marketing tools available today it can be hard to know which one is most suitable for you and your business. For any business hoping to create a successful content marketing strategy, having the right social media management tool to automate post scheduling across all social media platforms is essential.
We’ve selected and tested two of the most popular tools for content marketing planning, Hootsuite and Buffer so you don’t have to. We’ll be comparing these two social media management platforms in regards to some key features, including;
- The ability to schedule and post content with ease.
- Monitor mentions, tags, comments and other forms of content engagement in one central location.
- Comprehensive analytics and reporting.
- Social listening abilities.
- Third-party tools each platform is able to integrate with.
Our Review
Multiple Platforms
Posting across multiple social media platforms is important for businesses. It can elevate your brand’s online visibility and increase efficiency. You can utilise the unique functionality and design of different social media platforms to help maximise the impact of your posts and create varied and captivating content. Whilst both incorporate most social media platforms, let’s take a look at where they differ…
Hootsuite
Hootsuite currently integrates with these social media platforms:
- Instagram (Meta)
- Facebook (Meta)
- YouTube
- TikTok
You can even have multiple social media accounts for each of these integrations.
Buffer
Buffer currently integrates with the same platforms as Hootsuite, except it integrates with Google+ instead of YouTube:
- Instagram (Meta)
- Facebook (Meta)
- Google+
- TikTok
Whilst both sites allow post-scheduling to the main social media sites, we at Digital Willow favour the selection of Hootsuite, as we believe YouTube is a far greater source of generating business interest over the less-established Google+.
Content Calendar
We believe that your content calendar should be a key source to understand at a glance what topics and opinions your business is choosing to discuss as part of its online presence. You should be able to identify how frequently you have been posting and what content is in the pipeline (and if you need to start creating more). This way, you are able to guarantee consistency in your content strategy which will help build trust and engagement with your followers. Planning content in advance can ensure a business is able to keep its posting aligned with particular marketing goals and objectives. Furthermore, an easily accessible and navigatable content calendar allows different members of a team to easily collaborate and contribute different ideas to optimise and maximise content output.
Hootsuite
Like any tool, Hootsuite’s content calendar has its advantages and disadvantages.
One of the best things about Hootsuite’s content calendar is that it is highly customisable; content can be neatly organised by campaign, content type or topic. As aforementioned, collaboration on content between team members is easy due to the simple layout of the calendar.
Whilst Hootsuite’s site is overall intuitive, it can take a little while for some users to get to grips with how the content calendar works.
Buffer
In terms of the advantages of Buffer’s content calendar, it shares many of the same positive attributes as Hootsuite; it is easy to view and allows for collaboration. Moreover, Buffer’s content calendar is designed to be simple and easy to use, making it a great option for beginners and those who want a straightforward tool for social media management.
However, there are a few drawbacks. Buffer’s content calendar offers limited customisation options compared to other social media management tools, which may be a drawback for some users. While Buffer offers some basic image editing tools, it may not be the best option for users who rely heavily on visual content creation. You are able to collaborate and approve workflows, but team management is fairly limited beyond this, meaning it may not be suitable for an entire content marketing team or more complex social media workflows.
Social Listening
Social listening is the process of monitoring and analysing online conversations and mentions related to a particular brand, product, or topic. It involves tracking and analysing social media content, such as posts, comments, mentions, and hashtags, to gain insights into what people are saying about a particular topic or brand, and how they feel about it.
The goal of social listening is to better understand your audience, identify trends and patterns in social media conversations, and gain insights into what your customers are saying about your brand or products. By listening to social media conversations, businesses can identify potential opportunities and challenges, monitor their brand reputation, and make data-driven decisions about their marketing and business strategies.
To do this, content marketing tools use advanced algorithms and machine learning techniques to analyse large volumes of social media data and extract insights that can inform business decisions.
Hootsuite
Hootsuite allows you to monitor mentions of your brand or keywords on social media. You can create a “Mentions” stream to track all mentions of your brand, keywords, or specific hashtags you are using. You can also specify which social media profiles you want to monitor. Once you’ve set up your “Mentions” stream, Hootsuite will start tracking all mentions of your brand or keywords on social media. You can analyse the results in real time and respond to any mentions or comments from within the Hootsuite dashboard, including responding to customer inquiries.
Monitoring mentions on social media is an important part of social media management, and Hootsuite’s “Mentions” stream makes it easy to keep track of all the conversations happening around your brand, in one place.
Buffer
You can also monitor mentions of your brand or keywords in Buffer. However, Buffer doesn’t offer this feature as part of its core platform. Instead, you’ll need to integrate a third-party tool like Mention or Brand24 with Buffer in order to monitor mentions.
To use these third-party tools, you’ll need to sign up and create an account. Once you’ve connected one of these integrations with Buffer, you can start setting up your mentions. In a tool such as Mention, you can create alerts for specific keywords or phrases related to your brand that you want to monitor. You can also specify which social media platforms you want to monitor. Once you’ve set up your alerts, you can analyse the results in real time and respond to any mentions or comments from within the Mention dashboard.
Analytics
Hootsuite and Buffer both offer robust analytics capabilities, but the right choice depends on your specific needs and priorities.
At Digital Willow, one of our most favoured features in Hootsuite is its analytics. With analytics and reporting, businesses can track the performance of their content marketing efforts, which can be helpful for measuring the success of social media campaigns.
Whilst Buffer does offer analytics, reporting, integrations, collaboration, and customisation, all of these are fairly limited, there are certain data analysis programmes that users are unable to sync with and analysis may not be as in-depth as required.
Let’s take a closer look:
Hootsuite offers more detailed analytics reports, including customisable reports and the ability to track metrics such as engagement rates, follower growth, and post-performance. It also provides real-time analytics, allowing you to track social media conversations as they happen, as well as a range of integrations with other analytics tools, such as Google Analytics and Adobe Analytics.
Buffer provides detailed analytics on post-performance, including engagement rates and clicks. It offers a built-in link shortener that tracks click-through rates and other metrics. It allows you to track the performance of your content over time, and compare your performance to industry benchmarks.
Overall, both Hootsuite and Buffer offer powerful analytics capabilities, but the right choice depends on your specific needs and priorities. If you need more detailed analytics and real-time monitoring, Hootsuite may be the better choice. However, if you prioritise ease of use and a focus on post-performance metrics, Buffer may be the better choice.
Pricing
Depending on the size of your business, pricing can be the deciding factor, especially when choosing between two very evenly matched social media management platforms, each with similarities as well as some unique standout features.
For those businesses on a tighter budget or who are perhaps new to scheduling social media posts and just want to experiment with these sites as part of their content marketing strategy, Buffer offers a free version of its programming. It has limited users, collaboration and analytics but can be sufficient for smaller businesses. Up until recently, Hootsuite also had a free version of their programme. Now, however, their ‘Professional’ plan is the cheapest available at $89 per month.
Hootsuite offers a variety of pricing plans to suit different business needs.
- Professional Plan: This plan starts at $89/month.
- Team Plan: This plan starts at $249/month.
- Business Plan: This plan starts at $660/month.
- Enterprise Plan: This plan is custom-priced and offers customized solutions for businesses with complex social media needs.
Hootsuite currently offers a 30-day free trial for its Professional plan.
Buffer offers a variety of pricing plans to suit different business needs. Here’s an overview of Buffer’s pricing plans:
- Free Plan: This plan is free and allows you to manage up to 3 social media profiles, schedule up to 10 posts per profile, and access basic analytics.
- Essentials Plan: This plan starts at $6/month for 1 channel.
- Team Plan: This plan starts at $12/month for 1 channel
When considering both Hootsuite and Buffer, it is important to note that these prices are subject to change and may vary depending on your specific business needs.
Conclusion
Whilst Hootsuite and Buffer offer similar capabilities, we at Digital Willow settle in favour of Hootsuite. In its current state, we think that Hootsuite’s social media channel offering just outcompetes that of Buffer. Similarly, the content calendar capabilities of Hootsuite far surpass Buffer. Though it is harder to initially get to grips with, this is quickly overcome and immensely rewarding. Buffer’s calendar may be easy to use but its limitations mean it pales in comparison to Hootsuite. Whilst both tools essentially support the same functionality regarding social listening, Buffer requires the use of third-party integration to access the same features that Hootsuite provides as standard. When it comes to analytics, Hootsuite offers better, more in-depth analysis capabilities. Perhaps the only area in which some may see Buffer more favourably is in terms of pricing. That being said, the extra money one would spend on Hootsuite goes straight towards vastly superior functionality, and therefore makes Hootsuite the choice of recommendation for Digital Willow.
For more advice or to find out how we can help manage your social media activity and lead you to content marketing success, don’t hesitate to contact the Digital Willow team today.