7 Reasons Why You SHOULD Use Hootsuite
By 
Hoostuite Review
A while back, I posted a rather controversial article that ended up being one of the most visited posts on my blog- 7 Reasons why you should NOT use Hootsuite. It even prompted the Vice President of Community at Hootsuite to respond in the comments.
Although I tried my very best to give a balanced view and to list the positives, it was, at the end of the day, more of a negative Hootsuite Review- a list of the problems that I had encountered with Hootsuite. Since then I've wanted to list some of the positives and reasons why some people and businesses should use Hootsuite. Despite the issues that I brought up in the original post, Hootsuite remains one of the most comprehensive social media management tools out there and I still recommend it to businesses today in certain situations.
What is Hootsuite and what does it Do?
Hootsuite is one of many tools referred to as a "Social Media Management System" or tool. It helps you keep track and manage your many social network channels. It can enable you to monitor what people are saying about your brand and help you respond instantly. You can view streams from multiple networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+ and post updates or reply directly. With so many networks for businesses to manage, it's no doubt Social Media Management tools have become so popular and relied upon by many companies today.
If you manage the updates for your business' social networks, it's highly likely that you will have heard of Hootsuite. In a survey from monitoring tool Pingdom, Hootsuite came up as the top Social Media Management System, with over 20% of companies using it to manage their social media empires. TweetDeck was second and SocialEngage third. To see more details, see the original Pingdom post on the survey.
Hootsuite was launched back in 2008 by Invoke Media and since then has accrued an impressive array of features.
Here are my 7 reasons why you may want to consider using Hootsuite to manage your social network channels...
1) Monitor Multiple Streams in One Place
Probably one of the most compelling reasons to use Hootsuite is the fact that it allows you to manage so many different social networks. Hootsuite currenty allows you to manage:
- Facebook Pages
- LinkedIn Profiles & Pages
- WordPress blogs
- Vimeo, tumblr, evernote, flickr, mailchimp, slideshare, storify (via 3rd party apps)
- Many more!
You can even add more than one of the same network. This can be useful if you manage multiple Twitter channels, or Facebook pages. You can even post to multiple channels at the same time. However do be careful here- think of the type of audience you have on each network. Your Facebook fans will be different to your Twitter followers. Also, Twitter only allows 140 characters where as Facebook allows much longer and richer posts with photos and videos.
2) You Have a Team Managing Your Social Media Empire
If you have more than one person managing your business' social networks or you share the load with an outside social media management business, you may have encountered a number of issues in trying to keep on top of things.
Firstly there is security- allowing other people to manage your Twitter account will mean sharing your Twitter password. Never a good thing!
Secondly, how do you properly share the management of the various networks within a team? How do you know if a team member has already responded or in the process of responding to a message or status?
The main reason I would recommend Hootsuite to a business will be Hootsuite's team management facility. Hootsuite allows you to delegate responses to different team members. For example if you receive 20 mentions in one day, the administrator can delegate each one to a different team member. When a team member is logged in, they'll see which tasks have been allocated to them and not make the mistake of responding to a status that has already been replied to.
Another useful tool is Hootsuite's messaging feature which allows team members to send private messages to each other. This is particularly useful if your team members are located outside of the office (for example they work from home)
Be aware that multiple team members can get expensive in Hootsuite. For medium to large businesses with a good marketing budget, this shouldn't be an issue, but smaller businesses may struggle. Firstly you need to have a Pro account which costs $9.99 per month. With a pro account, you get two team members. Each extra team member gets more expensive, and when you want to have more than 10 you'll need to get an Enterprise account. Hootsuite don't publish the prices of the Enterprise account but it is probably around the $1,500 per month mark. Here is a table that outlines how the pricing structure for teams works (taken from an earlier post)
(Updated May 2013 with new prices)
| Total Users | Description | Cost/mth | Cost/yr (If paying mthly) | Cost/yr (If paying yrly) |
| 1 | Included in Free Plan | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| 2 | Included in Pro Plan | $9.99 | $119.88 | $107.88 |
| 3 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 extra user at $9.99/mth | $19.99 | $239.88 | $215.88 |
| 4 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 extra user at $9.99/mth + 1 user at $14.99/mth | $34.99 | $419.88 | $377.88 |
| 5 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 2 users at $14.99/mth | $49.99 | $599.88 | $539.88 |
| 6 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 3 users at $14.99/mth | $64.99 | $779.88 | $701.88 |
| 7 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 4 users at $15/mth | $79.99 | $959.88 | $863.88 |
| 8 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 5 users at $14.99/mth | $94.99 | $1139.88 | $1025.88 |
| 9 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 6 users at $14.99/mth | $109.99 | $1319.88 | $1187.88 |
| 10 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at $9.99/mth + 7 users at $14.99/mth | $124.99 | $1499.88 | $1349.88 |
| 11+ | The maximum number of users in Hoostuite Pro is 10, to add more users you will need a Hootsuite Enterprise account. Hootsuite don't publish the prices for Enterprises, so this is the last known price. Hopefully it should be cheaper than this. | $1499 (?) | $17,988 | $17,988 (?) |
UK Prices in dollars
Hootsuite now offer prices in a few other currencies. If you live in the UK for example you will be given prices in pounds. Unfortunately the prices are quite a bit more expensive in other currencies.
| Total Users | Description | Cost/mth (in £ on UK Hootsuite) | Cost/mth (converted to $ from UK Hootsuite) | Cost/mth) (in $ for US users on US Hootsuite) |
| 1 | Included in Free Plan | £0 | $0 | $0 |
| 2 | Included in Pro Plan | £7.99 | $12.38 | $9.99 |
| 3 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 extra user at £7.99/mth | £15.98 | $24.77 | $19.99 |
| 4 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 extra user at £7.99/mth + 1 user at £11.99/mth | £27.97 | $43.35 | $34.99 |
| 5 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 2 users at £11.99/mth | £39.96 | $61.94 | $49.99 |
| 6 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 3 users at £11.99/mth | £51.95 | $80.52 | $64.99 |
| 7 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 4 users at £11.99/mth | £63.94 | $99.11 | $79.99 |
| 8 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 5 users at £11.99/mth | £75.93 | $117.69 | $94.99 |
| 9 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 6 users at £11.99/mth | £87.92 | $136.28 | $109.99 |
| 10 | 2 are included in Pro Plan + 1 at £7.99/mth + 7 users at £11.99/mth | £99.91 | $154.86 | $124.99 |
3) Managing Customer Service on Twitter
Whether or not you should use Hootsuite to manage your social networks depends on the type of business you have as well as the reasons you have a social network presence in the first place. If your primary reason for a social presence is for managing customer service on Twitter, then Hootsuite probably will be the best tool for you. Mobile networks or Utility companies love Hootsuite as it allows them to delegate customer messages to different team members and these can be managed overall by an administrator. Another useful feature is that Hootsuite allows you to store draft messages that you can post when you receive a frequently asked question for example open hours or directions to your business.
4) You Want to Cross Post to Your Google+ Page
Google's own social layer, Google+ is finally being seen as an important network for businesses to be using. Not only does it help with SEO and the authorship of your website or blog, but it has some amazing features that could help you reach your customers such as Communities and Hangouts.
Currently the only way to post to your Google+ profile is by using the Google+ website or mobile app. When it comes to updating and managing your Google+ business page you have a bit more choice- and Hootsuite is a big winner here! The Google+ API is very limited in that it currently only supports pages and not personal profiles. Full access to the page API has only been given to a few partners, of which Hootsuite is one.
Google+ management used to be available only in the $1500+ per month Hootsuite Enterprise plan. The good news is that it's now available to all, including free users.
Pretty much all the Google+ features you'd expect are available, including posting to your circles, location, links and scheduling. If you add the update manually in Hootsuite it will also generate the full summary and thumbnail of the link. This is very important as it is will be more visible and will resilt in more click-throughs. Despite me not being a fan of the ow.ly url shortener, the resulting post won't show the ow.ly link in an obvious way, although it does say that the post was made via Hootsuite. Be careful though, if you bulk upload or connect an RSS feed to your Google+ page- you won't get the thumbnail or summary- just the text. With that in mind, I'd avoid automatically posting to your Google+ page via Hootsuite completely or only in special circumstances.
5) Completely Cross Platform
I'm a great believer in making things cross-platform, although I do realise it's not always easy to achieve This is one advantage in making Hootsuite a web app- it's easy to make it work on Mac OSX, Windows, Linux and mobile platforms. Hootsuite indeed works on all modern browsers (of course you need an internet connection!), and it has a plethora of dedicated mobile apps to help you on the move. The only omission currently is an app for Windows Mobile since there are apps for the iPhone, iPad, Android and Blackberry.
I must admit, I don't particularly enjoy using the Hootsuite mobile apps (at least the Android one which I've tried) but if you are managing your social networks as part of a team, you will be relying on the Hootsuite mobile apps, particularly for managing Twitter. The mobile Facebook app allows you to manage Facebook pages if you are an administrator without having to share any passwords. Unfortunately, Twitter doesn't have any administrative features, and so the only way to allow multiple people to manage a Twitter account is by sharing the password.That's not great from a security point of view and could potentially open up your Twitter account to abuse, especially if one of your team members were to leave the company. If your team members use one of the Hootsuite apps to manage your business' social networks, you no longer have to share any passwords for your social networks, since each member will be using their own Hootsuite account.
6) Get Free Reports by Email
If you solely or mainly use Hootsuite to manage your Social networks, then you will find the weekly analytics report very useful. Each week, Hootsuite sends you an email with a pdf attachment of your click summaries. Hootsuite gives you graphs showing:
- Number of clicks per day
- Geographical information on the people clicking through
- Top referrers
- Most popular links
The good news is that this is free for all users, and can be useful to give you a brief overview as to how you are doing on a weekly basis.
Unfortunately the report will only work for you if you always use Hootsuite to manage your networks. This is because it tracks the click-throughs using Hootsuite's very own ow.ly url shortener. If you use other apps such as the Twitter or Facebook websites or mobile apps, Buffer, IFTTT or TweetDeck, any click throughs will not be shown. Since I rarely use Hootsuite, my report was completely blank!
7) You Want to Connect Lots of Services Together
One of the things that really appeals to me about Hootsuite is the sheer number of networks and apps that it supports. Although I advise against posting to multiple networks at once on a regular basis, it can work and can be a real time saver for small businesses. Hootsuite allows you to post a quick update (for example) to multiple Twitter accounts, Facebook profile and page, Google+ page, LinkedIn profile, company page and groups and more! This can be incredibly useful if you need to get a message out to your customers in an emergency. The scheduling features (using the new Hootlet feature) can be a very welcome time saver, and these also allow you to post to multiple networks at once.
Find Out More
If you want to find out more then the best thing is to sign up for a free Hootsuite account. there are also plenty of tutorials and help as part of the Hootsuite website itself and on other blogs. Here are a few to get you started:
- HootSuite Tutorial Video (Basic Blog Tips)
- Hootsuite Review (PC Mag)
- HootSuite Review – 5 Reasons to Use HootSuite as Your Social Media Dashboard (Adam Troudart)
- 7 Reasons why you should NOT use Hootsuite
I'm also very happy to answer any questions you have, so please ask away in the comments!
Summary
So there you have it, 7 valid reasons why you SHOULD use Hootsuite. What are your thoughts? Do you use Hootsuite regularly? What are the features you like the most? What don't you like? Don't forget to have a read of my 7 reasons why you should NOT use Hootsuite and you should be in a better position to make a decision on whether or not you should be using Hootsuite.
As ever, please let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
About Ian Anderson Gray
Ian is a Confident Live Marketing Coach and founder of Seriously Social. He’s an international speaker, trainer, teacher, web developer and consultant. He has a passion for making the techno-babble of live video and social media marketing easy to understand. Ian is co-founder of Select Performers – a family run web agency. As well as being a geek, husband, and dad to two kids, Ian is also a professional singer and lives near Manchester in the UK. Find out more
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What do you think? Join the fun & Let me know below...
Thanks for the article! I’m an indie author looking to drive readers to my Amazon page. Would Hootsuite be the right tool for that? I also run a proofreading business I’m looking to promote.
Ugh. I have to say that Hootsuite is one of the worst companies I’ve ever worked with. Their customer service is atrocious, it takes them at minimum three emails to respond to questions. Plus their autorenewal policy is sneaky. We’re trying get out of our contract, but because we didn’t provide notice 60 days before the autorenewal, we’re unable to. And they just won’t budge. They won’t even let us downgrade our account since we have seats we’re no longer using. You’d think since they have this autorenewal clause, that they’d reach out 90 days before the renewal to make… Read more »
This article needs to be updated! Google Plus+ is gone, Facebook has stopped allowing scheduled posts to profiles…..
Thanks, Janet. Very true. Quite a few things have changed. While Google+ isn’t going until next year it is basically dead. The good news is that I plan on doing a complete update to this article very soon. I really appreciate you commenting. Ian
Your simple and clear narrative met my need …thank you
Thanks, Niki. My pleasure to help!
Ian
Thanks for the post – enjoyed both posts on the topic and really cool that you have been updating the detail too – thanks Ian.
[…] 22.30 Check out Hootsuite for your social media needs […]
[…] short, it is almost a necessary marketing tool for SMEs and startups in this digital […]
Old but useful until now. Thanks
This post made me to change my mind about Hootsuite, I know the benefits now.
Thanks so much, so glad that the article helped you! Ian
My heart skipped a beat when I saw 7 Reasons Why You Should NOT use Hootsuite. I went through the article and read this too. Thank you for your insightful perspective. I’m a new user to Hootsuite and I’m using the free plan. I post through Hootsuite to keep my facebook account active daily. I hope to maximize when engagement peaks with my country and friends but I’m still experimenting.
Hi Ian I’m checking this page one in a while and recently Hootsuite changed its pricing, again. Do you have any numbers on enterprise pricing ? Thanks
Hi, Efe. I’ve just updated the pricing for Hootsuite Pro. Unfortunately, I don’t have any updates on Enterprise. It’s very hard to receive any information. I am fairly sure that nothing major has changed with Enterprise pricing, though. It’s clear that Hootsuite is focussing away from their free customers and to make pro plan customers profitable for them. Their focus is on increasing profit and sustainability as a company.
Just read both of your articles, have been trying to decide if HootSuite or similar is right for me. I was initially suggested by a friend to use CinchShare, but I see you don’t mention it. Anyway, have been looking around to see if this would be useful for MLM sales and promotion. I regularly post my own content, but the ability to schedule posts sounds helpful for days when I’m particularly busy, or for the ability to manage multiple online Facebook parties at once – even scheduling all the posts ahead of time. What are your thoughts?
Hi Meagan, There are hundreds of social media tools out there – in fact last time I did an audit, I found thousands. Many of these offer scheduling features and all of them at varying prices. I mention the main alternatives, but I can’t mention all of them. I have heard of CinchShare, but not spent a huge amount of time on it. For just basic scheduling you really can’t go wrong with Buffer. The awesome plan costs $10/mth and it allows you to schedule with up to 10 social profiles. If you want a tool that does everything, then… Read more »
Thanks for the post..!! I also use hootsuite..!! This is wonder tool for social media scheduling.
Great stuff! Glad it is working for you. Ian
Could you tell me which social media management tool you’d recommend for small businesses or non profits, who don’t have a large budget?
Sorry for being late in responding. I’m a big Agora Pulse fan, but you might find their prices a bit on the pricey side for now. Still good to check though! https://agorapulse.com/ Other than that, there are a few alternatives. Firstly, there is MavSocial which has a powerful free option – http://mavsocial.com/ Secondly, check out Muster Point – http://musterpoint.co.uk/ – I have added a quick review in this sister article (in the alternatives to Hootsuite section) – https://iag.me/socialmedia/reviews/7-reasons-not-to-use-hootsuite/ Thirdly, check out ContentCalendr – http://www.contentcal.io/ – it is a very new tool and I am fairly sure they’re free for non-profits.… Read more »
Hey Ian:
I have read the 7 whys and the 7 why nots…still confuses. I am a poet and will soon be launching my work more aggressively via social media. I may for example take one poem and post it as a meme on Instagram or twitter…post it as a short video YouTube and FB or just straight text somewhere else. I am also lauching a blog is kind of the central hub of material.
Do U think Hootsuite is a good choice under those circumstances?
thanks in advance… Ian
Hi Ian, yes Hootsuite would work for you. But I would do a comparison with other tools just to be sure you’re going for the one that works for you. Hootsuite is still fairly inexpensive for individual users, but it sounds like Buffer might be a good tool for you – in that it schedules to all the social networks you mention (except YouTube). Do check out my recent mega article which compares prices and features of the top social media management tools – https://iag.me/socialmedia/the-hidden-pricing-of-social-media-tools-revealed/ You might find this helpful.
Hi Ian, Great article. My question is this: I created a product and a company, it is just me for now. I consider myself a pre-start-up. I have putting all the pieces together right now and saw an add for Needls. I saw what they did and Googled it and found that Hootsuite is much more popular. What I essentially want to do is: Whenever anyone on any of the social network platforms say keywords, I want my product to appear in their newsfeed. Needls said that they do this. Does Hootsuite do the same or similar thing? I can’t… Read more »
Hi Elias, Hootsuite and similar social media management tools don’t really help with creating ads. You need to start by creating the ad or promoted post on Facebook or Twitter directly. Your product or ad can appear in the news feeds of people – you can choose what criteria you want. For example you might want to show it to people of a certain age range, living in a particular country, who like certain things. It is quite powerful, but a tool such as Hootsuite won’t help. Ian
Problem with Uploading a Story on Hootsuite Hi everyone, While posting(publishing/scheduling) through Hootsuite, there are certain situations when the URL was shortened without creating the link preview i.e. without attaching or adding news story with the post. The Hootsuite help agent from twitter customer support team was very helpful and he had run the URL using the Facebook debugger tool (tool used to scrape a link preview/story preview), He suggested reaching out to my web master to correct some coding for this site and then we could try running that link again once fixed. My question is how often have… Read more »
Thanks, Amna. I responded to your comment on the other post. Ian
Hello, i was going through searching new social networking sites and i came across this one at (http://www.sochialtyme.com). UI is great and its pretty simple to use. I hope you guys will give it a try. Thanks.
Thanks. It’s difficult to know what Social Tyme does from the website. Could you give more information on it? It appears to be iOS only for now.
Thanks for the post – enjoyed both posts on the topic and really cool that you have been updating the detail too – thanks Ian.
Thanks, William. Glad it was helpful.
I am just reviewing the prospects of Hootsuits and wondering if I can use it for more than one twiiter accounts in one go. I am a blogger and a social media manger and very new to Hootsuite
Hi Sneha. It is worth looking at this review and my “7 Reasons NOT to use Hootsuite” article so that you get a balanced view of the pros and cons.
You can definitely add more than one Twitter account. The free version of Hootsuite allows you to add up to 3 accounts. The pro plan allows up to 50.
I’d also take a look at all the alternatives listed below.
Ian
Great post. I have not started using hootsuite yet. After reading both your article on ‘why not’ and ‘why’ use Hootsuite, i have a lot of reservations.
My brand is still very new and acquiring new and more customers is very important at this stage. Do you think signing up for Hootsuite a good idea?
Thanks
I couldnt help but chip in here and reply to your question. Personally I love Hootsuite! It’s hands down the number 1 best social media management tool there is! You say that your brand is still very new. What does that have to do with anything? I don’t even have customers and I simply use Hootsuite to manage my social media profiles in one centralized place without having to separately log in and out and in and out of each social media platform. Its a question of efficiency and whether you want something to manage your social media, new brand… Read more »
Thanks for that, Jade. Great to hear from someone who is an avid Hootsuite user and who is a big fan! As you’ll know I’ve written about the reasons why and why not you can use Hootsuite. I believe Hootsuite is a very powerful tool and can be perfect for many businesses to manage their social media. Is it the number 1 social media management tool? That’s a more difficult question to answer because it is so subjective. It can be the perfect tool for some people, but it’s certainly not perfect. I wrote an article on the top social… Read more »
Hi Adey, Glad you found my articles helpful. I’d agree that the best way would be to try Hootsuite and see how you get on. However also try a few other tools. I’ve written a few other articles that might help including the Top 4 Social Media Management Tools for 2015 – https://iag.me/socialmedia/top-4-rated-social-media-management-tools-of-2015/ I’ve also put together a video on how to choose your social media management tool – https://iag.me/socialmedia/how-to-choose-your-ideal-social-media-management-tool/ There is no perfect tool, however you may find a tool that helps with your top priorities. Then you could use another tool or two to help with smaller things.… Read more »
Nice article! I just started hootsuite this week, mostly to help me post to twitter without having to sit at the computer all day. I feel that it has taken over my life, when actually, I need to spend more time writing for my blog. I comb the news each morning for articles that relate to my blog and set up tweets that post every couple of hours or so. I mix my blog posts in there, too. I might choose three blog posts and tweet them twice each in a day. The news articles seldom repeat. The purpose of… Read more »
Hi Laura, apologies for not getting back to you sooner- I’ve been away at a conference. Thanks for your comment and I am glad you found my article helpful. I assume you read both Hootsuite articles – giving the reasons why and why not Hootsuite? You’re not alone in feeling overwhelmed and that all your time is sucked up with social media usage! I spoke at a conference last week on this very topic. I asked the audience how they felt about Twitter- did it make them feel full of joy or did they feel frustrated. Most felt frustrated I’m… Read more »
Ian, thank you for such a thoughtful response. I do use feedly and evernote in addition to hootsuite. I will check out your other suggestions,too, and again, I appreciate your lengthy, helpful reply.
Hi Laura, glad you found my article helpful. I am a big fan of Evernote and Feedly as well! Ian
Your article(s) were very helpful. My school is looking into a social media management system. We are a very small public school for students with special needs. We are newbies in this area of social media but we do have Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts as well as a You Tube channel. We are hoping that Hootsuite will help us manage these accounts. As of now we would have two administers assigned to the site. At this time we are looking at the free version. So far everything I have read about Hootsuite is connected with commercial enterprises, do you… Read more »
Hi Kathy, Sorry for the delay- just got back from a conference. Hootsuite may be the best tool for you, but it really depends on your needs. You’ve read this article, but also have a look at my 7 Reasons NOT to use Hootsuite article and make a balanced judgement – https://iag.me/socialmedia/reviews/7-reasons-not-to-use-hootsuite/ If you have 2 admins, you’ll need the pro account which gives you two team members for the same price. Hootsuite works well with Facebook and Twitter and has a workaround for Instagram. I’ve not tried YouTube with Hootsuite so I’m not sure how that works. Hootsuite makes… Read more »
Hi Ian..i was having an assignment about social media platforms used to communicate and i fount this one interesting…im interested on knowing more about hootsuit since my husband is a business man.thanks alot about this article it really helps
Thanks, Annah. Glad this helped.
Ian
[…] has analytics. Just click and you can see your analytics. According to Iag.me, Hootsuite sends you your analytics once a week, but they are often inaccurate. Buffer’s […]
It helped me learn more about Hootsuit quickly.
Nice post
I am using buzzbundle and only wire could you give me an idea how this is better than them? And how many social sharing i can do i $10 account of hootsuit?
Hi Omkar. I’ve not used Buzzbundle to be honest. It really depends on what you’re looking for. Make a list of your top priorities and then look at the different social media management tools out there to see what fits the bill- Sprout Social, Agora Pulse, Sendible, Hootsuite, buzzbundle etc
[…] HootsuiteHootsuite is a social media management system also referred to as a social relationship platform that helps brands track and manage its social network channels. A survey from the monitoring tool Pingdom reported that Hootsuite is the top social media management system, and over 20 percent of companies are using it to manage its social media empires [1]. […]
Hello,
Thanks for the great post, nice article. I am personally using this tool brilliant tool. Please keep sharing this type of articles.
Thanks,
Varun.
Thanks Ian for both articles listing the reasons not to use and the reasons to use Hootsuite. If I were to write an article today about the social media tools that I use, I would definitely say that Hootsuite is my #1 ”can’t live without” tool – despite its shortcomings in certain areas – just because no other tool seems to offer as much as Hootsuite does. It’s not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but I do love how many social media profiles I can monitor from one single interface. With that being said, I really dislike how… Read more »
Thanks Jade. There’s no perfect tool unfortunately. I always recommend that people do their own research or hire a consultant to find the best tool or set of tools for their situation together with a good system and strategy. If Hootsuite works for you then that is great. Hootsuite definitely integrates with a huge number of networks and offers other features such as reports, team access and more. Since I wrote the article many of Hootsuite’s competitors have upped their games. I’ve updated the Alternatives sections accordingly. Sprout Social and Agora Pulse really do compete very well indeed. However, it… Read more »
Does anyone in the community or newsletter here have experience with Social Owl vs Hootsuite ?
A number of people have mentioned SocialOwl, but I’ve not investigated it.
There are so many tools- but it is on my list!
Ian
Thanks Ian,
Do let us know when you do review it.
hi Ian
Have you heard about Social Owl’s social media management tool. Its offering seems costlier than Hootsuite but not being a techie / social media savvy, can’t tell beyond this if am comparing apples with apples…if you know what I mean. Any thoughts?
Rgds
Larry
I have seen other articles that say it costs money every time you print an analytic report from hootsuite. Is that true? Are there any other “hidden” fees with hootsuite pro besides the monthly fee and the user fee?
Hi Terry. So sorry that I missed your comment from last year. You get one free report each month, but you can view it or print it as many times as you like. You need to pay for extra reports and there are some reports only available to enterprise users.
Hope that helps.
Ian
Hootsuite offers some real good services. However, the pricing of hootsuite is higher compared to few of the competitors. It offers some real good tools to help improve your social media presence.
Hey there Ian! I read both of the posts. A little insight on the Enterprise pricing: There is a one time $1000 set up fee for an Enterprise account, and then a $100/client monthly fee. If you commit to several clients, and you ask, they’ll give you a discount per client. For agencies that manage several clients/accounts, it is definitely worth it. For us, as we have interns working on social media and like the team management/approval options and we like giving our clients access to view the scheduled posts, it is a lifesaver. We pay about $375 a month… Read more »
Thanks so much for this. It’s rare to hear anything factual about Enterprise pricing. Since I wrote the article I think Hootsuite’s Enterprise pricing model has changed a few times. It may have been a set “one price fits all” monthly fee, but now I think they have a different charging structure for each type of business. In your case, since you are using as an agency, it makes sense to be charged per client. However if there is a medium to large business using it, they’d have to have a different structure. Do you get charged per team user… Read more »
We actually used to use Sprout Social. It wasn’t as robust as we wanted it to be, but maybe we just weren’t looking close enough.
It allows three logins per client I believe, and we allot one for our client to access and two to use internally.
I will check out Agora Pulse, as those three are our priority mediums and Jollor too. We are bringing on a new social person and we certainly don’t mind changing things up. You’re a true gem Ian!
[…] many people assigned to work on social media, Hootsuite keeps confusion at a minimum because the administrator can delegate customer inquiries to different members of the social media team. That way, no two […]
what a detailed post on hootsuite. really impresive
Glad you found it useful. Ian
Good info. My question is more about design work. I am not too tech savy and am challenged at producing eye-catching posts on Linkedin for example. Getting my posts to be sized correctly is a problem.
Will hootsuite help with this?
I am a non-fiction author trying to promote a title and therefore my budget is low but I can handle $10/mo. if it will assist with making sure posts fit properly into LI;FB;T etc.
Good article. By publishing the costs of Hootsuite you have convinced me NOT to use it. The jump between Free and Pro is too big for (very) small businesses or content providers to be spending £7.99 a month. And charging significantly more in sterling than in dollars for a web-based service is an insult to us Brits. Until Hootsuit addresses those two issues I’ll be looking elsewhere.
Thanks, Jamie. I do hate when businesses charge more in other countries. It seems that us in the UK always get a bad deal. I pay a lot more for my Adobe Creative Cloud subscription for example. I suppose they have to add VAT, but still, it seems a lot more. However, I don’t think £7.99 per month is too much for Hootsuite Pro. At the end of the day, it costs a huge amount of money to build and maintain an app like Hootsuite. They have employees to pay, and an infrastructure to maintain. The issue I have with… Read more »
Thanks for the review, dude. I cant make a decision between Hootsuite or Buffer. I like the fact that Buffer will let me post to Pinterest with their pro version. I dont think Hootsuite does at this time, but fingers crossed they will in the future!
No problem! Buffer an Hootsuite are very different tools, and I know a few people that use both at the same time. Hootsuite is a full social media management tool that allows you to monitor and engage- Buffer doesn’t do that. However, Buffer does a great job at scheduling your posts and I love the Pinterest integration too.
[…] 2https://iag.me/socialmedia/reviews/7-reasons-why-you-should-use-hootsuite/ […]
Hey Ian. Thanks for both articles. They are really comprehensive. Great job! I am going to go over your articles and comments with a fine tooth comb so I can make the best decision possible for all of my social media needs. Keep it up!
Hi Anoni, thanks for your comment. I do try and make my articles comprehensive. Let me know if I can help any further. Ian
Thanks for this articles – Very Helpful !
I’ve started using Hootsuite Pro for my company website http://www.emarkable.ie to share on more social media sites, and also clients. I find the Auto schedule function great!
That’s great to hear, Damien. Hootsuite is a good all rounder. I personally prefer to use Buffer for scheduling, but I can see why keeping everything within one tool is really convenient and helpful.
Ian
Hey Ian Anderson Gray,
How do you use Hootsuite and Buffer? Since Hoosuite uses ow.ly and buffer bit.ly, does this mess with your reports in Hootsuite since it won’t track bit.ly. I’d love to use both Hootsuite and buffer but I’m thinking about buffer and social sprout since it may be a bit more user-friendly. Thoughts?
Ian,
Thank you for both the articles.
I have been using Hootsuite on the free plan for a few websites to post to Facebook, Twitter and Google+ and I like the way it works.
I am thinking about moving to the pro plan for my business website http://lblinternetmarketing.com/ to share on more social media sites.
Your articles are really helpful in helping me decide whether to use Houtsuite or not.
I will sign up for the 30 day free trail of the pro plan.
Do you think that the “university” they offer is a good addition to the plan?
Thank for sharing and have a great day
Eddie
Hi Eddie. It’s certainly worth giving Hootsuite Pro a go. Do have a look at the sister article to this one – 7 Reasons NOT to use Hootsuite so that you can see both sides. Hootsuite Pro is good value for money if there is only one of you, but you might want to consider SproutSocial or AgoraPulse which are more expensive but are incredibly powerful social media tools. I signed up to the university and the tutorials were really good in order to get the best from Hootsuite. You might only want to sign up for a month or… Read more »
[…] Hootsuite you will have access to many social networks. The main advantage of using Hootsuite is that it is able to connect to more social networks. With Hootsuite you will be connect to the […]
Hi, If I set up a Hootsuite Pro account and connect with it through FB, do I have to share my password with others?
I’m so sorry, I completely missed your comment. No, you don’t need to share your Facebook password. Each team member will have their own log in details. Ian
[…] (Source: iag.me seriosly social – https://iag.me/socialmedia/reviews/7-reasons-why-you-should-use-hootsuite/) […]
Hi Ian. Thaks for this. But is HootSuite good at improving SEO? I was thinking about contributing (by truly adding value, not just spamming) on some forums to help me develop better SEO. But then I saw this article.
I am still not certain – does HootSuite help you improve SEO quite a bit?
Aaron
Creator of Royalty Free Music Market
Aaron, Hootsuite is a social media management tool, so it doesn’t help with SEO- at least not in the traditional sense. Search Engine Optimisation is all to do with making sure your website is accessible for search engines such as Google. It’s also to do with making sure you are using the right keywords to be listed for certain keyphrases when your audience search. Link building is also part of SEO, and perhaps this is what you are talking about. Personally, I wouldn’t use a tool like Hootsuite for this. I would first start on doing some research in finding… Read more »
I am going to agree with Ian but then disagree as well… Here is why: Your page rank will not go up by posting on facebook or google+ but you can garner exposure! More exposure with quality content is an incredibly powerful tool for SEO. Example using a friend of mine who is a photographer: She did a shoot about mothers having being beautiful bodies after giving birth. She then posted in on the different social media outlets. Because it was such high quality content, it spread like wild fire and was picked up by every media outlet under the… Read more »
Yes, definitely agree with that. I just meant that using a tool such as Hootsuite won’t help in the traditional sense of SEO. Social is definitely a factor in search engine ranking now, particularly since Google uses metrics from Google+ and now has access to Twitter’s data. There’s also the personalised factor where Google shows you pages that have been shared by your friends and connections on social.
I am a lifestyle blogger and am beginning to use twitter, facebook groups, instagram, pinterest, google+ and other places to share my blog posts. http://www.radiantraven.com I am having a really hard time figuring out which social media management tool to use and your article was very helpful. For a lifestyle blogger what would you recommend using? I also will be offering coaching packages soon and possibly a book down the road or other products. It seems like I am going to have to pay for hootsuite, but not sure. What is IFTTT and why do you like it so much?… Read more »
Sorry for not getting back to you until now. It depends on whether you want to use “one tool to rule them all” or whether you would be comfortable in using a number of tools to help you manage your network. For me, I’ve found that the big social media management tools that try and do everything are less than helpful. That’s why I use a combination of tools- AgoraPulse, Buffer, TweetDeck, IFTTT and more. A lot of people (myself included) recommend you use Facebook itself to manage Facebook and there are very few tools that manage LinkedIn or Google+… Read more »
Can you use HootSuite to post to multiple groups? Only HootSuite Pro or basic will allow you to do this?
You can post to multiple groups on the free version of Hootsuite, but you only add up to 3 social profiles with the free version. The pro version allows you to add up to 50 social networks (and you can pay to extend this to 100). The problem is, that Hootsuite will post an update to multiple groups all at the same time. You could schedule the postings, but that is going to be time consuming to set up. If posting to multiple groups is a must for you, and you want to do it effectively without spamming everyone, then… Read more »
Just an update. Hootsuite (and in fact all 3rd party apps) will no longer be able to post to LinkedIn or Facebook groups. LinkedIn and Facebook are dropping this functionality from the API.