If you work in social media, the names Hootsuite and Sprout Social are no stranger to you. Hootsuite and Sprout Social are two of the most well-known social media management tools and can make a powerful impact on your social media prescence when used correctly. Managing all your social media channels in one place can help save your marketing team from the tedious task of updating social platforms one by one. To help guide your decision, we will compare several points between Hootsuite and Sprout Social.
Publishing
When choosing a social media management tool, it is important to consider what social channels you will be targeting and the frequency/volume of posts you will be posting every month.
Both Hootsuite and Sprout Social support Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. You are able to post immediately, or schedule posts on both platforms and previews your posts before publishing. If your company frequently posts on YouTube, you will likely lean towards Hootsuite as it the one platform Hootsuite has over Sprout Social.
Both enable the configuration of posts to increase exposure, such as tagging locations on Instagram and promoting posts to a defined audience on Linkedin and Facebook.
Both tools allow companies to shorten links, tag external companies, attach photos and automate posts. Sprout Social allows for a higher level of customization, giving businesses the option to change the thumbnail photo of links. Meanwhile, Hootsuite allows you to edit the size of your photo after you upload it onto Hootsuite to fit the specific dimensions of each channel.
Sprout social allows you to also schedule the first comment of a post along with the caption and image. This is useful when you want to include hashtags in your post but not include it in the caption as it can take attention away from the message of the post. Hashtags help attract an audience and drive engagement to your post
Team management
Social media management allows teams to collaborate and
Social engagement
Sprout Social – RSS Feeds to find content to share, Twitter feed retweet and share easily
Both have inboxes, sprout social includes mentions, comments, new followers and direct messages. Sprout social shows feed
Hootsuite: comments and private messages
Sprout social smart inbox
Analytics
Customize time ranges, look at followers, engagement (likes, comments), page clicks to help guide content marketing strategies.
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- Clicks
- Comments
- Reach
- Shares
- Video views
- Video reach
Cost
There is a significant price gap between Hootsuite and Sprout Social’s starting prices. Plans for Hootsuite start at $29/month, which gives one user access to 10 social profiles, unlimited scheduling, and the ability to directly publish to Instagram.
*Hootsuite’s free account does not allow you to directly publish to Instagram. Instead, it sends you push notifications to publish.
Summary of Hootsuite vs. Sprout Social
| Feature | Hootsuite | Sprout Social |
|---|---|---|
| Publishing | ✓ Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, Pinterest ✓ Automated scheduled posts ✓ Shorten links using Ow.ly ✓ Carousel posts not supported | ✓ Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest ✓ Automated scheduled posts ✓ Customizable thumbnails for links ✓ Shorten links using Bitly One image per post ✓ Carousel posts not supported |
| Content management | ✓ Multiple streams per feed | ✓ Unified stream (one column) |
| Social engagement | ||
| Analytics | ||
| Cost | Professional: $29/month • 10 social profiles Team: $129/month • 20 social profiles Business: $599/month • 35 social profiles | Standard: $99/month • 5social profiles Professional: $149/month • 10 social profiles Advanced: $249/month • 10 social profiles |
In conclusion, Hootsuite and Sprout Social both have their benefits and choosing which one your company selects depends on the importance of capabilities for your company.
