What is the best social media management tool on the market? This is a question that most social media marketers and entrepreneurs ask themselves – after all, finding the best tool can help with both productivity and efficiency, and it helps you make sure you get the most out of your social media marketing campaigns.
There are countless social media management tools on the market right now, and many of them have some extra features that would benefit different types of businesses. Some of them, everyone has heard about – the likes of Hootsuite, or Sprout Social – while others are perhaps lesser-known, but just as good, if not better than the most popular tools.
Ian Anderson Gray of the Seriously Social blog, has partnered up with G2Crowd to create an infographic on the top five rated social media management tools of the year. The results come from hundreds of detailed customer reviews, and are quite revealing – the winning tool might just surprise you.
You can check out the exact results for yourself in the infographic below and use them to hopefully find the perfect social media management tool for you:
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Who Needs Social Media Management Tools – And Why
If you are a digital marketer, or are using social media to promote your business, then you would benefit from using a social media management tool, as simple as that. Even if you’re only managing a couple of social media accounts, it would still help you get more results, and faster.
Here’s why you need a management tool to sort your social media:
- Save time: having everything in one place, in one dashboard, can help you save a lot of valuable time. A social media management tool allows you to manage multiple accounts, even from different social networks. That means no more logging in and out every time you need to post something new from a different account, not to mention you will have all of the engagement you need to respond to in one place.
- Never miss an update: A good tool will make sure you never miss any social mentions, questions, or opportunities for engagement. You’ll know exactly what needs responding to, in real time.
- Analytics: Most social media management tools also have built-in analytics that you can check out in real time. Checking your analytics regularly is very important, as it helps you improve your social media strategy as you go along, and helps you make sure you don’t make the same mistakes over and over again. With the built-in analytics, there’s also no need to get another tool specifically for this (that will also probably cost you).
- Scheduling updates: Many of the tools on the market allow for scheduling updates. This is another great time saver, and a tool that helps you make sure you never miss an opportunity to post updates, even for when you won’t have access to the internet.
- More engagement, better engagement: A good social media management tool is designed in such a way to help you increase your engagement, and to find engagement opportunities faster. You can create tabs for various keyword or hashtag searches, particular users or current trends, so you can see in real time what people are saying about a particular subject, and easily start and jump in conversations. As I mentioned earlier, it will also make sure you never miss any updates or questions addressed to you, so you can promptly respond.
- Team collaboration: If you have several people in your team contributing to the social media marketing campaigns, then a social media management tool can help with that. It also makes your team members’ jobs easier, as they can get specific tasks assigned to them, and they can all login to the same dashboard, and not have to go to each individual social account.
Which Tool Should You Use?
Every business is different – and has different needs that require addressing. The G2Crowd infographic provides a great overview of the top five rated social media management tools out right now, and each tool is assessed based on six different criteria:
- The overall user satisfaction
- Product direction, meaning how well the five tools are keeping up with new social media trends and features
- Ease of use/maintenance, or how easy the software is to setup and use
- Customer service support
- Usability – is the tool improving your productivity?
- Meeting business requirements
The results of the infographic are very revealing – Agorapulse is the clear winner in almost all categories considered, tying in only one category – usability – with Sprout Social. Right after Agorapulse comes Buffer as a close second, and in the last two places come Sendible and Hootsuite, although they still have decent scores in most categories. (Here’s my full Agorapulse Review.)
If you still have questions about which of these social media management tools is best for you and your business, please leave a comment below!