Hootsuite Alternatives & Competitors

Hootsuite is a leading platform that is specifically designed to manage all aspects of social media marketing from a centralized location. Started as a tool to handle Twitter accounts, it has seen exponential growth as one of the most widely utilized social media management solutions in the industry. Hootsuite has tons of cutting-edge features that can help any business in creating and executing a reliable social media strategy.

Overview of Hootsuite Alternatives

Hootsuite is one of the most popular social media management tools, which allows you to manage Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube from its comprehensive dashboard. Instead of specifically logging into every network to share new posts, answer to comments, or check various metrics, you can easily handle everything from one single place. This tool empowers you to analyse multiple streams simultaneously and monitor your customer's social media activity. You can check real-time updates, track post engagement, view statistics, task management and do many more.

Hootsuite's unique expertise in managing social media handles, social insights, social customers and social insights makes it the preferred choice of many reputed brands like Allianz, Domino's, IKEA and more. It also acts as a social care solution, allowing brands to quickly resolve customer queries and provide a seamless client experience through hassle-free collaboration across multiple teams.

Although Hootsuite has several advantages, it also has some notable drawbacks. The first one is the steep learning curve, which means that the platform has several features and anyone new to this platform might need some time to get used to them effectively.

The next disadvantage is its pricing structure. Hootsuite’s pricing can be a cause of concern for startups or companies with tight budgets.

Why are People Looking for Hootsuite Competitors?

Some people prefer sites similar to Hootsuite because of its drawbacks such as limited customer service, crowded dashboards and limited engagement capabilities.

• Restricted URL shorten capability

The URL shortener feature allows users to shorten links and track clicks on their posts across different social media platforms. But, Hootsuite's URL shortener feature is very much limited. It only allows users to shorten URLs using their own custom domain - ow.ly. This means that all shortened URLs will have "ow.ly" in them, which can look unprofessional and potentially make users sceptical of clicking on them.

• Not a Beginner Friendly Software

The platform can be challenging to navigate, especially for beginners in social media management. It takes a lot of training and practice to become skilled in using Hootsuite effectively. This can be frustrating for users who prefer a simpler and more intuitive platform that doesn't require hours of learning.

• Unreliable and limited customer service

You can only contact Hootsuite's customer support during business hours. Plus, only the business and enterprise plan has specified customer service under their list of attributes. On the other hand, its competitor Social Pilot has clearly stated all the customer support options, including the real-time support, is available in every plan. The lack of 24/7 customer service seems like a big drawback of Hootsuite.

• Crowded Interface

Hootsuite's interface is beneficial for those who like to navigate everything from a single screen. But the crowded dashboard is confusing or difficult to access for people who prefer a segregated viewing experience. Additionally, there have been reports of several technical issues during peak-hour usage.

• Limited Engagement Capabilities

Although Hootsuite allows publishing and scheduling of social media posts, it has limited real time engagement abilities. Users experience delays in participating in live conversations or receiving notifications, which causes hindrance in highly interactive or time sensitive tasks.

• Limitation in Social Accounts

If you add more than 1000 accounts, or more than 50 accounts/team, you might experience slow product performance. Apart from that, if more than 5K members or more than 1K teams are added to the Hootsuite organization, it will again slow down.

• Analytics Limitation

On Instagram, the analytics data is only displayed for business accounts that have 100 or more followers. Up to 255 characters are allowed in Report titles and 100 characters in Tile titles.

• More Automation, Less Performance

When you set more automation rules per message type and social network, it takes more time to process messages.

• Post Related Limitation

You can only publish up to 25 reels or posts to the Business account on Instagram and within 24 hours via direct publishing. When you post many Facebook Pages simultaneously, Hootsuite can time out, technical glitches can occur, or even scheduled posts can fail. Also, for one post, only one account on Twitter can be used.

Must-Have Features in Any Tools Similar to Hootsuite

• Platform Integration: Ensure that the social media management software that you are looking for enables you to manage all your social media platforms from a centralized dashboard.
• Content Calendar: Always look for the content calendar feature while buying any social media marketing & management software. This will help you plan your posts and campaigns for social media for a week/month/year. This will also enable you to track the performance of your posts and bring consistency in your posting.
• Scheduling: Ensure that your social media software allows you to automatically schedule all your posts at once. This will save you from the hassle of posting one by one and save you time.
• Post Optimization: Find a social media management system that allows you to share the content at the right time when your target audience is most active. This will help you to attain maximum reach.
• Analytics and Reporting: Ensure that you buy software that helps you provide in-depth analytics and reporting in order to determine what strategies are actually working and what are not.
• Keyword Monitoring: Your social media management solution should have a keyword monitoring feature to enable you to identify all the posts and conversations wherever your brand name has been mentioned.

What to Consider When Looking for Applications Like Hootsuite?

While buying any Hootsuite similar social media management system, one must look for:

• Content Management

Managing the posts and content of different social media accounts is the main feature of Hootsuite. With this platform, you can see all social media accounts on a central dashboard. You just need to press a button to publish simultaneously across various channels or schedule any post for later. Similarly, the platforms like Hootsuite should also come with a content management feature.

• Ads Management

This feature allows users to boost their posts on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. Plus, it assists them to managing their marketing efforts. Thanks to its add management feature, you can see your total amount spent and the budget for each add. Therefore, all websites like Hootsuite must provide you the facility to check the performance of your ads, so that you can divert the budget from underperforming posts to high-performing ones.

• Audience Engagement

All websites similar to Hootsuite must come with this unique feature that helps in strengthening the brand identity. This audience engagement feature lets you measure your customer's reaction to your posts and your team's response to their comments. When you respond to comments, your customers feel that they're listened to and it instils brand loyalty, hence it is important to track each interaction properly.

• Social Listening

Another useful attribute of Hootsuite is the ability to get deeper insights into your target audience to understand their sentiments. It allows you to look at various demographical aspects of your audience, including age, gender and location. With the help of other tools like Hootsuite, you should be able to understand the demographics and sentiments of your audience which can help you modify your marketing efforts for best results.

• Analytics

Social media management is incomplete without analytics. Hootsuite has a robust analytics function that lets you analyze the performance of your social media efforts. You can check the number of people who saw your content, impressions, comments, and the total number of clicks. Besides analysing the post-performance, you can also check the response time of your team and followers’ growth. Therefore, it's important that all programs like Hootsuite should be loaded with analytics capability.

Comparison of best Hootsuite alternatives

Here is a comparison of Hootsuite competitors in terms of supported platforms, social media scheduling, social listening, analytics & reporting, team collaboration and more.

What Type of Businesses are Looking for Alternative of Hootsuite?

There are numerous startups, e-commerce companies, large scale organizations and marketing agencies that often search for apps similar to Hootsuite.

• Startups: Small businesses and startups often seek cost effective Hootsuite equivalent that comes with basic social media management functionalities and attributes.
• Marketing agencies: Social media managers and marketing agencies might need Hootsuite similar apps that provide advanced analytics, scalability and team collaboration features to handle multiple accounts simultaneously.
• Large scale organizations: Large companies often need a robust social media management platform that can easily handle the large volume of content and provide advanced analytics & reporting functionalities. They also need Hootsuite similar platforms that offer scalability and integration with other CRM or marketing systems.
• E-commerce companies: Online retailers need software like Hootsuite that comes with specifically designed features such as product tagging, conversion tracking, promotion scheduling and more.

Techjockey’s Verdict

Hootsuite is a popular social media management platform that enables businesses to streamline their social media marketing activities. The software offers a range of tools and features to schedule posts, manage multiple accounts, monitor engagement and analyze performance. It is a perfect tool for organizations and individuals looking to maintain an active presence across various platforms and gain valuable insights about their social media performance.

However, there are other social media tools like Hootsuite with noteworthy advantages and functionalities. Hence, it is important that you consider your requirements and budget while searching for similar websites. It is also recommended that you read user reviews and make a careful comparison of different alternatives to make a well-informed decision.