Week 14: Social Media Management Tools
Most small business owners are constantly on the go. Keeping this in mind, I would seek out social media management software that offers a mobile app. The six social media management software platforms from Investopedia's article that offer a mobile app are: Sprout Social, Hootsuite, Zoho, Sendible, Buffer, and Social Pilot.
Another important consideration is the cost to maintain the software. Sprout Social has a 30 day free offer with the lowest paid subscription at $89.00 a month. Hootsuite has a 30 day free offer with its lowest paid subscription at $49.00 a month. Zoho has a 15 day free offer with its lowest paid monthly subscription at $10.00 a month. Sendible has a 14 day free offer with its lowest monthly subscription starting at $29.00 a month. Buffer has a 14 day free offer followed by a free plan that accommodates three channels or a $5.00 per channel monthly plan. Social Pilot has a 14 day free offer with its lowest plan being $30.00 a month. Setting my social media management budget at $20.00 a month narrowed my choices to Zoho and Buffer.
My third criteria is to see what features are available within each software subscription plan in my budget. I'm primarily interested in features for Instagram, Facebook, and Google My Business. While Zoho's standard subscription gives you access to seven channels that include Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google My Business, it does not contain features like messages, reviews, visitor posts, hashtag searches, and analytic reports. The Buffer subscription gives access to messages, Instagram tagging, hashtag manager, stories scheduling, Facebook page mentions, post analytics, hashtag performance, audience demographics, machine learning insights, and Google analytics integration.
After analyzing all of the features for Zoho and Buffer, I would probably subscribe to Buffer for one year at $60.00 for an Instagram channel. If that investment proved to be profitable, I would than add a Facebook channel for an additional $60.00 a year.
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