Do you need help in managing your social media posts for your handmade business?
You might be interested to check Hootsuite.
So, before I delve into this review of the social media marketing features that Hootsuite offers, let’s first have a very brief look at the background of the company.
Hootsuite’s popularity has reached momentous heights by having the ability to serve over 10 million users in over 175 countries.
Their headquarters are located in Vancouver, Canada, and they also have offices located in eight different countries AND offer support for the languages of all the countries – pretty impressive, right?
Social Media has risen in the most spectacular fashion over the last few years. These days it is commonplace for both businesses and individuals to have social media presence (social media profile) on numerous social networking sites.
Whether for personal profiles, business profiles or celebrity profiles, the objective of social media is having more followers and likes. In order to achieve this as well as being able to have the capability of managing several social media profiles, there is an ever-growing need for that one-stop tool or platform.
This is where Hootsuite come in to play.
But the question is….
Is Hootsuite effective for the purpose of social media management?
Can it honestly help you in organizing social media posts, analytics, and updates?
What usually happens is that people go ahead and create several social media accounts and then find that they don’t have the time to keep all their profiles updated on all the sites because Hootsuite logs into a single dashboard, it can handle multiple social media site accounts with considerable ease.
But to be entirely certain and to learn much more about this hugely popular social media management tool, I am going to provide a detailed review of what features are offered by Hootsuite and share my experience of using it and will then weigh up the pros and the cons.
My objective is to provide you with all the information you need to be able to make that informed decision if Hootsuite is the social media manager for you and to stop you from making the same mistakes I did.
Pros:
- As Hootsuite is a web-based tool, there is no need to download it,
- As well as a free plan there is also a 30-day free trial period for the Hootsuite Pro plan, which allows a taster of how it works and all the features that are available.
- Hootsuite offers mobile apps for both Android and iOS.
- You are given access to a vast app library (from the app directory) that allows social media marketing and management prowess to be significantly improved.
- It is in the minority of social media marketing tools that support the management of several YouTube accounts via the dashboard, together with the capability of scheduling video posts to your social networking profiles.
- Hootsuite offers free online courses for social media management and marketing complete with certification.
- Messages can be composed and posted to any social media profile, from any tab or page on the Hootsuite dashboard.
- The option is available to add your blogs RSS feed together with the auto-sharing of the latest blog posts.
- By adding Hootlet (a free Chrome add-on), content can be posted to social networks from anyway within the web.
- When there is no content to post, the tool will suggest recommendations to read to create relevant posts.
Cons:
- Under Hootsuite’s free plan only three social media profiles can be managed. In order to manage more, their paid or premium plan would need to be purchased (beginning with the Pro account).
- For those just starting out, the appearance of Hootsuite’s dashboard may come across as intimidating and confusing.
- There are only a limited amount of URL shorteners that Hootsuite supports for adding links to messages, which are: ow.ly, owl.li, ht.ly or htl.li for adding links to your messages.
- It can prove to be expensive if more users need to be added to access Hootsuite than is permitted.
Effectiveness
Flexibility of Hootsuite is second to none and is a powerhouse in the social media network integration world.
Price
OK value for money, however, there are a lot of extra charges.
Usability
Hootsuite’s desktop interface couldn’t be more straightforward to use, however, their mobile app isn’t as great.
Support
Great range of support options available including a dedicated Twitter account.
So, now that I have outlined the Pros and Cons that Hootsuite has to offer, the million-dollar question still remains – Who is it suited to?
Small Business Marketers
As a standalone social media monitor, Hootsuite does stand its ground well. For those on a budget in the handmade business world an added bonus of Hootsuite is that it offers a free version, HOWEVER, the features included are quite limited and don’t include analytics – prices vary for detailed analytics from as low as $50 to as high as $500 per report.
That said, Hootsuite is an excellent tool for small businesses who are just starting out and getting going, who need help in keeping up and on top of all their networks and who don’t have the budget available to pay for something more advanced.
Beginners
Hootsuite is a very robust social media software but can seem totally overwhelming (especially the dashboard) for those who aren’t computer savvy. It does, however, provide a lot of help and support to help newbies to get started – especially with setting up the dashboard.
For less than $10 per month, those starting out can upgrade to the Pro version which will provide loads more options, including more social profiles, reporting, bulk message scheduling, and access to premium Apps.
High-Level Marketers
For high-level marketers that spend loads of time on social media and wish they didn’t have to, then Hootsuite is a good choice. It can save loads of valuable time, but in order to make it a profitable investment, the user must be committed to using it. There are loads of useful extra apps that can be installed – albeit at a price.
The dashboard itself has a very similar layout to TweetDeck’s column layout, but, the difference with Hootsuite is that for every social media account that is managed, streams can be created. For someone who has the money to spend, then Hootsuite does offer loads of features and tools that can make social media marketing a lot easier.
You can see a glimpse of how HootSuite works here:
My Thoughts
So, what is the verdict – what did I think of Hootsuite?
Well, as I demonstrated in this article, Hootsuite does offer many features and benefits that can be used to effectively manage all of your social networking profiles and accounts. It has the added benefit of flexible plans and does allow the user to try out the features for free with the option of being able to upgrade at any time.
BUT,
The main problem for me is the price. There are better Hootsuite Alternatives available, such as Sendible that offer the same things, plus extra and innovative functionality – all at a much lower price.
Now, over to you…..
Now I’d love to hear from you:
Are you going to purchase Hootsuite or are you already using it?
Perhaps you started reading this review with the intention to buy, and maybe now you’re not so sure!
Feel free to leave a comment below and we can see if I can help.
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