Impressive free plan

Overall, I'm satisfied with Hootsuite and will continue to use this platform to manage my social media accounts. With the ability to schedule up to 30 posts on the free plan, including scheduling Instagram posts, and viewing different social media accounts all on one dashboard, it beats other social media management platforms that require plan upgrades to access similar features.

Pros

As someone who uses Hootsuite's "Free" plan, I'm incredibly impressed by what Hootsuite offers in the plan. My favorite tool on Hootsuite is the "Streams." I can sort scheduled posts, past posts, mentions, and followers' posts by social media platform using "Streams" on my dashboard. This allows me to see responses or comments on my posts and engage with followers, without having to visit several social media sites. With the free version, I can also schedule more posts on social media than other social media management programs, and the free plan allows me to schedule posts on my business Instagram account.

Cons

"Free plan" users who are needing advanced features beyond basic analytics will need to upgrade and if they shorten links using TinyUrl or Bitly, there isn't a meaningful way to track engagement in the program. Also, users need to be aware that the connections between Hootsuite and social media networks frequently drop, and that the program's connection with Instagram is frequently buggy.

Hootsuit will help you grow your social media following

My overall experience with Hootsuit is great, already seeing my followers list grow both personally and for my business. I don’t think I could’ve been managing my social media any better than the job Hootsuit is doing. I’m satisfied.

Pros

What I love most about hootsuit is their free plan. Not many social media management platform gives so much to offer with their free plan. You can schedule both Twitter and Instagram post among others while using different social media all at once which they provide on one dashboard. I have a Twitter page and Instagram page for my business and hootsuit free plan allows me to schedule posts. What service I find best for me is how hootsuit analyzes the social media results in terms of tractions and interactions which shows the impact on my brand.

Cons

As much as this feature is helpful, it’s also at a disadvantage as well. The dashboard feature in terms of layout could be much better. Everything seems to be thrown together and clustered up.

Mediocre at best

Where is the competition in the social media management software space? There has to be a better option than this?

Pros

I run a modeling and acting agency and I was posting between SC, IG, FB, Twitter and YT on a daily basis. Making it very hard to be away from my phone and risk missing prime posting opportunities and viral trends. I was looking for something that would schedule pre-selected posts, videos, pictures and adds. The best option online seemed to be Hootsuite. It was well marketed and seemed very user-friendly... at first. It does indeed schedule your posts to various social media platforms, and it also allows for multiple streams of social media (i.e other business or personal accounts). That's a very handy feature!

Cons

The user interface is weak, it's not user-friendly nor is it practical or modern looking. It has a tendency to leg, it also isn't mobile friendly, they do have an app, but again it's not easy to navigate. Which is an absolute must when working on social media on the fly. When I created beautiful well-round posts and saved them to a posting schedule. I would check the posts after they had been released, via the online social media site, the posts would always turn out unformatted, with broken links and fuzzy low res images. I was overall very disappointed with this product. especially because it was so highly rated and not free. I felt like I kept putting in a lot of effort just to re-do all my work all the time.

Manage multiple social media accounts at reasonable prize, but analysis is over expensive

Pros

The dashboard is great to monitor multiple accounts at once, you can view different hashtags, words, mentions, brands or whatever you want at once in a single tab. Very easy to use and learn just the basics. Integration to web browsers and multi browsers. Automated reports sent to email.

Cons

You need to pay to assemble the different charts, tables, graphs and parts of analysis by each report. Not affordable if you want more team members. Advanced features take a lot of effort to learn. Targeting while posting is limited.

Hootsuite is a Treat

Good quality scheduler. I use to use Planoly and they were terrible.

Pros

Scheduling!!! I like being able to see my weeks of content planned out.

Cons

I hate that you have to have a public page in order to schedule content for Instagram. I’m sure it’s something to do with Instagram settings itself but it still pisses me off.

Great for Keeping up Across Social Platforms

Overall, it was very easy to use & navigate. It is laid out well and allows me to do everything straight on there without having to log in on each different tab to check notifications on IG/FB/LinkedIn. Gets the job done if you have multiple accounts to keep track with or want to schedule out posts.

Pros

I like the ease of use the most. In your dashboard, everything is laid out in a way where you can easily view each feed to see comments/shares/messages per platform. You can reply directly from this main dashboard so you don't have to click around a lot.

Cons

The thing I like least is that it does not have the ability to post/schedule multiple Instagram photos per post. So if I want to do a 'carousel' type post, I would have to manually do it from my phone and not through this software. Seems like that would now be a standard feature, but maybe I have to upgrade my plan to get that feature?

Great for Nonprofits

Overall, we liked Hootsuite and it was simple to use.

Pros

I appreciate Hootsuite's commitment to supporting nonprofits in offering discounts that make it affordable for us to use with our team. We have several contributors to our social media platforms and this made it easier for us to calendar and plan posts amongst different groups.

Cons

An approval feature would be helpful since we have several contributors who need approval on their content before they can post.

Good software for the price

Overall I am happy with Hootsuite and my social media couldn't function without a software package like this. I would like to see better reporting and more profiles for the price I'm paying but in general I get good value compared to similar packages.

Pros

I like the features I get for the price. Hootsuite is fairly easy to use and set up. Teams are a nice feature that allows me to oversee what the team is working on.

Cons

I feel like it is lacking some features. In particular, the reporting features leave a lot to be desired.

Good centralized tool for managing social media

Satisfied with what I am using it for in my social media marketing and engagement.

Pros

Convenient for centralizing all my social media platforms into one spot. Makes them easier to manage and post “platform specific” content.

Cons

There are services that are less expensive so if you are budget conscious this may not be the one to use.

Great management software for small businesses

Great software for scheduling, keeping contacts and designing impactful e-newsletters

Pros

The email templates are very well designed and easy to use.

Cons

Some integration problems from time to time.

Getting Better with Time

Overall, Hootsuite provides a single place to monitor multiple social media platforms, create branded and consistent marketing campaigns, schedule content in advance with easy oversight, and get insights into content performance.

Pros

Hootsuite is a great way to set up a multi channel dashboard to have greater oversight of your social media channels. I appreciate that it covers all the major platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Cons

At this point in time, users can't directly publish content to the Facebook and Instagram stories, which are major marketing tools. Where as you can pre schedule traditional posts, it's not an option for stories.

A Good Option for Social Publishing and Monitoring

At my previous job I was using Hootsuite to start my day. I would sign on and schedule and publish posts for the duration of the day, or over the weekend or what have you. More recently, I've been using Hootsuite's free version to manage my personal online presence, scheduling posts related to my podcast or video channels. I find that more recently, the native Twitter app has been better for just scrolling through Twitter, but as far as posting goes, I prefer to use Hootsuite.

Pros

One of my favorite things about Hootsuite is the ability to 'autoschedule' posts based on the time that you're likely to receive the most engagement. This takes a lot of the guesswork out of the job of a social media manager, as you can tend to labor over the details like whether or not something is emergent enough to post right now or whether you should wait to schedule it in the future. I find Hootsuite's customizable streams can be helpful in mitigating a lot of the noise that comes along with social media, but constant algoritm and UI updates to platforms like Twitter can make streams obsolete quickly. The platform is super simple to get set up and running with, and the free version (which I'm currently using for my personal accounts/projects) is perfectly serviceable for teams with 3 social accounts or fewer. I've never had to reach out to support, but Hootsuite's online presence is great and they're constantly providing materials that are helpful to social media managers.

Cons

I find their integration with Instagram somewhat lacking. During my time with Hootsuite, I have scheduled countless Instagram posts, but the way the marriage between Instagram and Hootsuite Works means that you can schedule the post, but you need to open the app on your phone and hit send when the time comes to actually publish your post. I have missed so many Instagram posts because of this, and the fact that I only appear to get a notification when It's time to post on Instagram about half the time. I realize that this isn't necessarily all Hootsuite's fault, but this is a real downer, and leaves me wishing that the integration was better

One of the Original Content Schedulers and Management Systems!!!

Hootsuite is a great tool. I find it useful in scheduling large batches of content. For example, for a few clients I can plan out and schedule my entire 3 months worth of content. It's a great tool for an agency who may focus on one type of client, be able to "recycle" and reword similar posts and upload the content across multiple clients simultaneously through an excel upload! I personally like to use Hootsuite as my blueprint. I know I will get my content posts uploaded and out there. I still like to log onto individual social networks and post on there in real time . I like Hootsuite for managing and responding to comments and DMs as I prefer using a computer and typing and checking spelling. Don't use Hootsuite as your only tool. You really need to go into networks and manually update them as well. Hootsuite hasn't cracked down on LIVE yet either and live video is a great tool!

Pros

I was one of the early adapters using Hootsuite. Originally all the options blew me away! Awesome to have on one dashboard all my social networks with multiple tabs in front of me. I also love that I could schedule the same posts and click off on multiple social networks. It's really good for marketers who can re-use content across multiple clients accounts, for example if I run a social media marketing agency and can use similar food content across all the food social media accounts that I follow. I also had liked I could build the posts in an excel and import it. I like your "university" and offering classes!!! I like your reports.

Cons

Overtime as social media space evolved there were functions I wished you had sooner. Instagram posting and scheduling was very clunky when it first came out that it had to notify my clients to push through the Instagram post that I had done. It took you a while to integrate Pinterest. I'm not sure if you're able to let me schedule on someone's personal Facebook account (I know this was on Facebook but I wish this was easier to do!) . Hootsuite mobile-I personally don't use your mobile. I only use Hootsuite on desktop because of the breadth of multiple social networks and tabs.

Sufficient Free Tool for Social Media Scheduling

Hootsuite is a great free tool for beginners and small social media teams! It's easy to use and has just about all of the basics you could need to start scheduling and managing social.

Pros

Hootsuite is a great free solution for basic social media management. I enjoy the dashboard customizations, where you can pull in different channels and features (ex: posts, timelines, mentions, etc.) all in one easy-to-manage interface. It also makes social listening easy versus having to log in and manage notifications manually on each individual platform. In general, Hootsuite is easy to learn given some experience with other SaaS platforms. The interface is intuitive and easy to navigate. And, they offer a ton of free resources to help you get up to speed with the platform and social media management in general, which is nice. With the free version, you can manage three social profiles. This is great for personal use or for managing in-house social, but not ideal for agencies or managing multiple clients/accounts. Surprisingly, however, you can schedule as many posts as you want within those three profiles, which is great for advanced planning.

Cons

The integrations and features/functionality could be better. I personally prefer to use HootSuite to schedule tweets and prefer to schedule other content for Facebook and LinkedIn within the actual platforms. It's fine to use HootSuite in a pinch, but you are able to do a lot more customizations within the individual platforms. Kind of a pain to do it separate/manually, but you get a better post/product in return. For example, you often can't add multiple images to a post or do a carousel-style post as you could directly within Facebook. Like most SaaS products that have a free version, there are limitations. For anything more than managing in-house or personal social, you'd likely need to invest in one of the paid plans and really compare what's offered in HootSuite vs some of the other more enterprise solutions. The reporting is also fairly limited and you'll likely have to work within the platforms directly or use other tools to get a full picture of social media performance.

Love this social tool!

I saved ENORMOUS amounts of time with Hootsuite. I can't imagine doing all that it helped me do manually... from monitoring comments, to responding to people, to scheduling multiple posts a week on multiple platforms per week, to everything in between. Hootsuite really helped me streamline my job even when we had limited budgets and resources to do anything else.

Pros

I used to do full-time social media management and was using Hootsuite constantly to schedule posts for my clients and track social conversations and mentions in real time. I love how simple and easy it is to use – you'd never think multiple columns across your screen would work or keep you sane... but it gets the job done! I can easily respond to people, retweet it, flag it and more. Another awesome think I love about Hootsuite is the ability you have to help gather content. I was constantly looking for things to retweet to get engaged with others online, so I used one of my columns to track particular keywords. I could then get real-time tweets and posts from people talking about the topics I wanted to engage with and retweet for the brands I was managing. Honestly that made my job 100x easier!

Cons

I do know it has been a little clunky for me in the past. Sometimes keyword columns won't update and I've had to delete and recreate the search – or I would schedule posts and the photos wouldn't go out. I think they have fixed some of these issues over the years. There is also a maximum number of columns you can create in the free version, so I sometimes ran into issues where I wanted to use more features but couldn't. But, overall, I appreciate the value I got for the $$.

Great tool, but feels like it could still do with something extra - better planning, more LinkedIn features

It might feel like it's missing a few extras, but generally its a really useful platform and out social media activity has been much better in terms or both organisation and analytics. There's also a massive community for Hootsuite so you can always find out how other people are using it. We used a Meltwater before and it was so scientific and clunky to set up we never ended up using it. We use Hootsuite daily now and the ability to shorten links is also really helpful.

Pros

Really easy to use and so many resources. The platform is brilliant for scheduling and you don't even have to visit the other social platforms to post and engage with the audience. You can really customise the streams for each user which is great for productivity, and the analytics is really useful. As a manager, I only have to hop into the publisher section to see what posts are going out, how often we're posting, and what platform we're using most. Using the streams, I can set up one for all posts to check consistency and monitor engagement, one for competitor research, and one for searches, and then more platform specific streams so I can really dive into the nitty-gritty if I need to.

Cons

It's very Twitter orientated, most of the useful streams like monitoring topical conversations etc are in Twitter (probably by nature of the Twitter platform), but I would like to see more feature on LinkedIn - so far there's only TWO streams; one to monitor Company Updates, and second to monitor scheduled posts (I can see this in the publisher planner anyway). It would be good to see similar monitoring streams for Hashtag conversations because this feature is applicable in LinkedIn as well as Twitter. The Publisher also feels like it's just missing something and I think it's the ability to 'plot' in posts rather than drafting out complete posts. For example when we're planning what activity we want to launch, we might not know what the full post is going to look like, but we might just want to plot in ideas which at the moment we have to do on a spreadsheet and then translate over to the Hootsuite publisher. It would be good to see this feature in the planner where we can plot ideas, and then fully draft them out later.

Manage and schedule your tweets (and posts) for SUITE results

Pros

As a Hootsuite user for 7 years now, it is by far my favorite social media management software. Creating, optimizing, and posting social media for different platforms, etc. takes a lot more time than you would expect. Not only do you have to craft each post to fit each platform you’re posting to… you have to choose the best time, use the right hashtags, shorten URLS, and include something interesting (i.e. picture, video, content). Overall, what many believe will only take them 10 minutes, in reality it can take up 2-5 (or more) hours of your work week; even more when you include the content creation for the actual posting. Hootsuite is the best tool for compiling all your social media efforts into one dashboard you can work from and will definitely knock hours off your work week. PROS The best feature of Hootsuite is the time you will gain. Most social media platforms have a scheduling aspect to them but having to manually log in and out of each one, to do so, is not feasible or conducive for speed. Hootsuite provides you with analytics on each of your chosen platforms, located in its dashboard, to help you identify the most optimal time(s) to schedule each post to be sent out; this especially comes in handy for days you know you will be on the go and/or do not have access to technology. You can also scroll through past social media posts, save unfinished drafts, and boost posts for content promos; which will provide you with more insight and/or a better understanding of which of your efforts and/or CTA’s are working best. Hootsuite’s platform has various analytics and reports you can export so your team(s) can measure things like conversion rates, marketing and sales initiatives, and improvements in monthly social capital. One of the neat things about this platform is the option to purchase additional social media management applications for things like YouTube Analytics and video posting, Wordpress blog analytics and posting, Google Analytics, etc. Hootsuite also provides the option to export reports (including customized reports) on any of the platforms connected to your account, to measure competition, areas of improvement, click stats, and which platform is bringing in the largest amount of traffic to your website/content, etc. Because the company I work for uses another third-party application (Lead Liaison) to track visitors and traffic sources to our website, we use the free version of Hootsuite.

Cons

One of the cons of Hootsuite is its inability to detect whether or not your traffic is originating from an actual human or an automated bot. This can interfere with your data and make it hard to decipher if the data you have access to is valid or not; this is true for Google Analytics as well. To avoid this, we use a third-party application for visitor tracking (Lead Liaison). You may get notifications that your social network(s) have been disconnected from your dashboard; don’t worry, you simply just have to reconnect them. Although I am not sure why this happens so often, I trust that this has nothing to do the security of my account and I always receive notifications when I sign in to my account from a new device, etc.

Reliable and easy social media manager

Hootsuite and Buffer are my go to social media, despite the several other SM Managers that I've tried out. I work with 5 brands and I have to manage their social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn) I've been using Hootsuite (and Buffer) for three years but of the two Hootsuite is my favorite and my safe bet. I have a habit of testing out as many free marketing software's as I can find and in terms of social media marketing Hootsuite is the best. The interface is easy to use, and the tutorial available to each new signup is very helpful. I love being able to tag a Facebook page, Twitter profile or Instagram profile in a post. The android app is also fully functional on my Kindle Fire (Unlike Buffer) which is a plus. The Feedly> Hootsuite integration is a major plus, I've never used the Hootsuite RSS feed option even though I keep planning to, but I like being able to share informative posts from feedly (On my Kindle Fire) to Hootsuite. What I love the best is that the free plan unlike buffer lets you schedule as many posts as you want to 3 social media profiles. This is great because I can schedule a month worth of social media posts in three days unlike the 10 posts per profile restriction on the Buffer's free plan. The analytics reports aren't very detailed and often I rely on Start a Fire as well as a variety of other software's to get in-depth analytics but the brands I work with do not understand or see the need for in-depth analysis so I suppose it's okay. I'm not happy that Hootsuite doesn't support posts with multiple images, I learnt that the awkward way when I made a post with 3 pictures. I recommend Hootsuite for beginners and Individuals who want a simple, straight forward social media manager. Oh, and the Hootsuite academy is very insightful.

Pros

It is one of the simplest Social media managers in the market, the freeplan is great because it provides essential features for beginners and experts at no cost. I also like the mini tutorial for new users, at the right side of the dashboard. I personally use Tweetdeck for social listening on Twitter but Hootsuite is also great for that.

Cons

I dont like the fact that if i want to schedule a post with multiple images i'll have to schedule it directly on Facebook or on Tweetdeck for twitter.

Hootsuite: Best Social Scheduling Tool for Monitoring Comments

Overall, I love Hootsuite for it's social monitoring capabilities and reporting capabilities, but better yet, my clients really responded to the updated reporting from our previous vendors. The real meat of the reports are at the beginning, which holds my clients attention spans better and gets them the information they actual want quickly and in an easy-to-digest manner.

Pros

My department is currently in the process of shopping social scheduling/monitoring/reporting tools (i.e. Buffer, Sprout, Hubspot, etc.), and Hootsuite is one that I was assigned to test. The feature I enjoyed best was definitely the feeds setup. Unlike other providers I've used, Hootsuite allows you to set up different feeds (i.e. mentions, hashtags, etc.). This allows me to monitor all platforms and mentions, and even keep tabs on things like certain keywords I can respond quickly. For instance, I manage the social presence for a popular sporting goods company, and I can search for FAQs on Twitter and quickly provide an answer and a link, all while responding to different DMs across our other social platforms. On Sprout Social, everything was aggregated into one feed. I prefer to have it parsed out so I can know how to modify my answers quickly depending on the platform. I also really liked the reporting options - the reporting templates are set up so the bulk of the numbers are at the beginning, rather than below the fold, which has been great for clients with short attention spans.

Cons

The UI seems a bit dated. The features themselves are great, so it truly doesn't matter, but it's just not as modern and beautiful as other platforms. I don't think it's changed much, looks-wise, since when I last used it in a previous role 5+ years ago. It has no effect on actual usability, but an update would make it feel less clunky and more intuitive.

Perfect for individuals, business and agencies alike!

Pros

As a marketeer, I was lucky enough to try a few different social media management platforms. Personally, Hootsuite has always been one of my favorites. The platform is quite easy to use, and setup. The interface is quite intuitive and on boarding new members normally takes us a few minutes. We easily managed multiple accounts and switched between them in single clicks. The mini profile icons helped our team differentiate between our different clients, so we had a smaller number of mistakes. But that's not all! Team collaboration is superb once you establish a professional account. Content review and approvals that is easy to set up. You can review comments and replies and assign them to other users, and even leaves comments and notes for them. You can review other users performance and get full reports on their work.

Cons

Reporting is weak compared to other tools. And while I enjoy their pre-designed scheduled reports, I normally end up creating my own reports using other analytics tools that are more robust and provide more in-depth insights. While i enjoy setting up multiple topic columns to monitor, extracting the data is impossible and you will always need a listening tool to create monitoring and listening reports. I was on an older pricing plan for awhile now, but when I checked recently, they seem to have increased their pricing and are now quite pricey compared to some of the competing platforms, however, I still have a soft spot for them.

Puissant mais perfectible

J'utilise Hootsuite depuis un peu plus de 5 ans désormais et j'ai rapidement été ravi de sa simplicité et de sa performance. Mais aussi du fait que je peux piloter toute mon activité sur les réseaux sociaux, grâce à une vue complète sur le tableau de bord. Malheureusement, la série de bugs m'a progressivement poussé à déchanter et à changer de logiciel.

Pros

L'utilisation de Hootsuite est d'une limpidité sans égal. De plus, il uniformise la gestion de mes réseaux sociaux en planifiant notamment jusqu'à 350 messages . Ce logiciel dispose aussi d'une fonctionnalité de recherche conséquente permettant par exemple, sur Twitter, de cibler géographiquement mes requêtes. Enfin, il offre un important registre d'applications dans lequel on peut ajouter d'autres réseaux sociaux mais aussi des outils marketing.

Cons

Hootsuite souffre de plusieurs bugs, certains messages programmés n'arrivant pas à destination sur Instagram, alors que l'interface mentionne le contraire. Ce logiciel est bien plus aisé à utiliser sur ordinateur que sur mobile.

Hootsuite

Overall, I love Hootsuite. It's easy to use, easy to integrate, and really solves a lot of problems that social media managers face every day.

Pros

Hootsuite is the must-have tool for social media managers that want to utilize their time more efficiently, gain analytics on your messages and audience, and interact with the public more frequently to grow your audience. Hootsuite is a great tool and I would recommend it for anyone who uses social media on a professional level. It allows you to track hashtags, schedule messages, gain insights into which messages are more popular, and learn about your audience.

Cons

I would say the thing that I like least about Hootsuite is the limitation on streams that you can have. They also have different levels of payments which allow for more possibilities, but they can get a little complicated to decipher which is right for you. My organization went back and forth between the paid and free trials a couple of times in a year because we couldn't exactly decide which would be the best for us so I recommend doing some research into all the capabilities that come with the different levels before committing.

Hootsuite is great for individuals and marketing firms alike

My company uses Hootsuite to schedule social media for our clients. If I were trying to post multiple times a day for each client through the individual accounts, I would never do anything else. So, Hootsuite helps me set up a social media and content schedule that is unique to each business while leaving room for me to add content as I go throughout my other daily tasks. It streamlines and automates a task that would otherwise take up all of my time.

Pros

If I had to pick a favorite, I would say that the scheduling feature is extraordinarily helpful. I run a small digital marketing firm and handle the social media for almost all of my clients. I created separate accounts for each client to keep my own costs down, so I will simply schedule out 30 posts at a time and set a memo for myself to post more before the campaign ends. After that, I love the plugins and tools, especially the ones that allow you to curate content that is relevant to the industry of my clients (Mostly cleaning, software, and daycares). I can set up an RSS feed that posts at regular intervals in case I am late on posting. Finally, the photo editor - I like this because I post a ton of pictures for my clients, which means that I need the images to fit well on different networks. The photo editor allows me to play with the size right in the app until it fits properly, which takes a lot of guesswork out when trying to edit for size rather than picture quality.

Cons

Honestly, I have used multiple different scheduling software for social media - Hootsuite is by far my favorite because it is so feature rich. If I had one complaint, it would actually be the cost. If you are trying to use one platform for all clients or have more than 3 social accounts per client, Hootsuite can get pretty pricey, especially for a smaller startup without much capital while they are growing.

Makes life so much easier

I'm able to efficiently see all of my social channels in one place. It makes it easier and less stressful to schedule, listen, reply to messages/comment, tag, etc. than having to go to each channels individually.

Pros

I like that you can schedule posts and see what's coming in a calendar. You can also "listen" to social media by setting up a hashtag you'd like to follow and all posts that use that hashtag will appear in a stream. You can set up a several streams for one social channel such as for posts, messages, scheduled posts, etc. You can even manage and reply to comments.

Cons

It takes a bit of a learning curve. It has some limitations as far as tagging companies or people. Some functions, you'll have to do directly on the social channel. But that's also the case with any social media management and analytics software like Hootsuite.

An absolute time saver

I've had a very positive experience with Hootsuite. It has saved me a lot of time and frustration and allows content to be cohesive across all channels. It's easy to see all my content right in front of me without having to go from channel to channel. It truly is a program I would not be able to do my job without.

Pros

I like the ease of use and functionality. It looks overwhelming and complicated at first, but it doesn't take long to understand how to navigate and get started. Everything is pretty self-explanatory and easy to locate. I love the fact that you can access hootsuite anywhere because it's a web-based program, and you don't need to download any extra software to use it. It also has an app so I can schedule or update content on the go. The ability to schedule endless amounts of posts (with the premium account) is nice because I can spend two days scheduling content for the entire month and not worry about it the rest of the time. Another thing I really enjoy is their "Hootsuite Accandemy" - courses that teaches you everything about social media management and gives you the chanceto get certification from the program. It's also a great tool for engaging with people without having to go to the specific social channels separately. Everything from drafting a post, adding images, scheduling, commenting, sharing and replying to messages and comments can all be done from the dashboard.

Cons

It can get pretty pricey depending on your needs. The free program isn't bad for very small companies, but if you want to schedule more then 30 posts and have more than the basic social channels then premium is necessary I find there are alternative programs that offer more for less, but this is the software my employer has chosen and is content with it.

Where would I be without HootSuite?!

Pros

I started using HootSuite at the very EARLY stages of my business. Before I even had a single client. The reason I chose HootSuite is because they had a FREE version... and in my early client-less stage...I needed all the free I could get. It's extremely easy to add whichever social networks you have (LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) The free version allows for 3 profiles, but once you upgrade to the paid you can of course add more. The platform itself is very self explanatory and makes scheduling future posts extremely easy.

Cons

I'd like to be able to edit the posts by platform. For example, when posting to Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter -- I'd like to add hashtags just to the Instagram Caption and/or shorten the Twitter caption. Instead of having to create a post for each separate platform, I'd like to be able to do it all in one and make the edits in the same batch.

The standard, but not my favourite

I manage a number of social media accounts for an international software company, and am also tasked with monitoring social mentions for our brand. For all my (relatively minor) issues with Hootsuite, it certainly lets me get the job done. On the level of features, I think Hootsuite is near the top of the heap as far as most social media management platforms go. Just don't expect the prettiest packaging, best user experience, or to be able to fully schedule your social activity in advance on some networks.

Pros

Make no mistake about it; when it comes to getting your social media work done, Hootsuite will deliver. Its scheduling feature is great, it (mostly) does a good job of letting you tag things, and it offers a good suite of analytics features that will help you review your social media performance and deliver key insights to other members of your organization.

Cons

My issues with Hootsuite aren't dealbreakers, but they do make me less than enthusiastic about bringing my business to this platform. The UI just isn't very attractive or intuitive, which is a shame. Competitors offer much more modern looks and simpler posting functionality than you get with Hootsuite. Annoyingly, and I know this isn't Hootsuite's fault, there are issues relating to who you are able to tag on certain networks, like LinkedIn. I often find myself unable to schedule a post to LinkedIn because of who I need to tag, and having to post manually defeats the purpose of having Hootsuite in the first place. I do understand that this is an issue created by the social networks themselves, but it's an annoyance nonetheless.

Easy to use with tons of features and plugins to compliment it

Pros

Hootsuite is one of the most versatile tools out there in the market. Starting from its free package, you will find yourself covering all the essentials you need for your day to day operations when it comes to social media. The columns/tabs interface is what sold the product to our team compared to all the other competitors we tried. In addition, the ability to connect multiple profiles, create columns to listen to important topics and team communications and messaging (paid feature). The free plan also allows you to schedule up to 30 posts, and if you need more, upgrading to any of their paid plans is as cheap. As we had many clients to handle and our team required a lot of collaboration, we were under the team plan. it was easy to setup an automated monthly report that goes to the client, which saved us tons of time, and the team collaboration features allowed us to assign the right roles and exchange messages, assign tasks and customer inquiries (tweets and comments) to one another with ease.

Cons

While Hootsuite covers the essentials you might need for your day to day social media, it lacks much in-depth analysis, listening and reporting features. In addition, it does not have cross-platform profiling and does not have features to help you setup competitions or gather/mine data easily.

Great for Managing My Nonprofit Social Media Pages!

If you manage multiple social media pages for an organization or business, this is a great tool that will make your life so much easier and save you a lot of time!

Pros

Hootsuite is a great timesaver. I love that as I'm setting up social media posts for the week, I can schedule posts across multiple platforms at the same time, and be able to further tailor them to the character of each platform (Facebook post vs. Twitter post) all from the same site. I also really appreciate how you can add or remove different "streams" from your viewing page for each social media platform. For instance, on my Facebook tab in Hootsuite, I have my page's scheduled posts in one column, our already published posts in the next column, and our inbox messages in another. For Twitter, though, I have my page's tweets in one column, our other newsfeed tweets in another (which I can retweet, reply to, and like all from that column in Hootsuite!), our mentions in a third column, and our direct messages in another.

Cons

Overall, Hootsuite is great, but there are a couple of things that bother me from time to time. When scheduling Facebook posts with multiple photo attachments, I've found that Hootsuite will publish each photo as a separate post, but with the same text each time, instead of including all the images in one post. This means that in these cases, I always have to go to Facebook's page to schedule posts with multiple images instead of being able to do it from Hootsuite. It's not something I have to do very often (typically, I only include one image with a post), but it's annoying nevertheless. I've also occasionally had Hootsuite incorrectly block me from being able to schedule my posts because it's internal clock is off and says that my posts (which I'm trying to schedule for several days away) aren't being scheduled for more than 5 minutes in the future.

A comprehensive social media management suite, with just a few shortcomings

Overall Hootsuite has proved to be a trustworthy and competent social media management platform.

Pros

The simplicity of being able to schedule simultaneously for multiple social channels is a huge time-saver. Having to separately publish and schedule posts on 3-4 platforms daily is a huge hassle and a drain on time. Hootsuite solves this problem and is a social media marketers best friend for that reason.

Cons

One major caveat is the unfulfilling Instagram scheduling feature, which isn't exactly a true scheduling tool. Instead of scheduling and automatically posting Hootsuite requires users to have a push notification sent to the user which must then be opened in Instagram before posting. It's a bit of an inconvenience not being able to directly schedule posts to Instagram and having to use this workaround which feels amateurish.

Solid Social Media Scheduler

Hootsuite has helped me schedule my social media marketing across multiple Facebook pages super easily. It speeds up the whole process compared to going into each page on Facebook and scheduling messages separately. I love it and I'm sticking with it for the foreseeable future.

Pros

Hootsuite provides a great free service. Without paying anything, you can schedule up to 30 messages across multiple platforms. For me, that works out great because I'm constantly scheduling relevant news articles and our classes, things that can be a few days out, but not months.

Cons

I wish the software would store photos I upload so I don't have to re-upload them every time. I often use the same image for various courses we provide, so it's just a minor inconvenience to have to upload it again. Not the end of the world, but it would certainly help. Maybe that's an option in a higher level paid plan?

life saver For Anyone Using Social Media For Marketing

So far I am really enjoying the ease of use and the time it is saving me in my day. I look forward to expanding my social media groups and this will really help me make the most money possible by saving me critical time. /having one place to look at all the analytics instead of bouncing from page to page is absolutely amazing.

Pros

I have recently started using multiple social media platforms for marketing. I use affiliate links daily on all the major platforms and this was taking hours out of my day just to post daily deals. I was directed to Hootsuite's site by a social media influencer. The ability to cross-post from one place saves valuable time. I can literally make one post and it allows me to send it to multiple platforms. I can even schedule the posts so the rest of the day is free because they will post at whatever times I scheduled them for. The dashboard gives you critical information such as how many followers you have per site, what times people are most active on your site and the rate that they click your links. This is priceless information because it allows you to know when to post for the highest amount of member/follower engagement.

Cons

Setting up the dashboard and making my first post was a little difficult for me. This was not an issue with the site itself but rather with my own Instagram settings. I think it is helpful to pass on the information so others do not have this issue. I did not realize that my Instagram was not set to business page. I thought I had set it up that way but I did not so Hoodsuite was not able to post because personal pages on Instagram only allow limited access. The great thing was Hoodsuite was able to pick up that this might be the issue and walk me through the steps to rectify it.

Great tool for agencies managing multiple clients

Pros

Benefits of Hootsuite for agencies: 1. Super easy to manage multiple networks for multiple clients, and all in one or two clicks once you've completed set-up 2. Easy to collaborate, which is key for agency happiness; you can assign tasks and monitor the progress of those assignments 3. Viewing scheduled content for single accounts or multiple accounts is possible, even across clients, which is a big plus 4. They do have a content approval process that you can set up at their highest level which is pretty good, not the best out there, but more than most other management platforms offer 5. They have a LOT of plug-ins for their platform, which is awesome, including Slack, Wordpress and several other big ones that agencies might use or find helpful 6. They stay ahead of opportunities and have the first collaborations with the key social networks, like Instagram publishing, they were the first there

Cons

On the negative side: 1. You can only have like 7 streams in each tab, which seems like a lot, but it's not enough. I feel like there should not be a limit within each tab 2. They are expensive, in my opinion; they do compare with Sprout Social and some others, but I think they are all on the pricey side 3. Not their fault, but you now have to go direct to IG and FB for some things like checking private messages or for IG even commenting on others content is no longer available; this makes paying the higher price less desirable because now you are having to go back to managing the channels directly AND managing them via Hootsuite

Great for bloggers, businesses, and brand influencers who need to stay on top of social media posts.

Pros

Being able to measure my or my business's social media stats is super important, naturally. That data is presented to us in a way that helps us to very easily understand not just how many people are engaging with our social media posts and when, but HOW that's happening, period. Which type of posts generate the most site traffic? What time of day or night might our posts be the most or least popular or engaging? How long does it take me or my team to respond to posts? These are important things to know, as they have the potential the build up or break down our brands. Scheduling content is, of course, a huge plus when you've got 10, 12, 15 different posts across multiple platforms to help keep your audience involved and engaged in what you're doing. It's also super helpful for people and businesses that are very busy outside of their online content, and may not have a dedicated social media team to lighten the load.

Cons

The Android app can be very slow to load at times. It could be just me, but I'm usually on wifi and have a flagship Samsung that hit the market a year ago. It also gives me trouble sometimes when I'm posting to Instagram via Hootsuite and I check my posts via the actual Instagram app, and the Hootsuite Instagram post won't be there. Weird stuff. I should add that in these instances, I am using the 'Post Now' option, and not scheduling posts for a future time. Could be user error, but if it is, I think this may suggest that when it comes to posting to Instagram through Hootsuite, the process isn't as easy or straight-forward as it could or should be.

Excellent dashboard for managing social media profiles

Hootsuite has saved me a lot of time and frustration and allowed me to get better results with the Twitter profiles for my blogs.

Pros

I like the fact that I can easily manage and monitor multiple Twitter profiles from one dashboard without the need to constantly log in and out of each profile. I am on the free plan and I manage the Twitter profiles of 3 different blogs through Hootsuite.

Cons

I wish the free plan had higher limits, but they obviously have to make money somehow. The free plan is still very useful but could be better with higher limits in terms of the number of profiles that you can manage.

A Great Social Media Stepping Stone

Overall I really like Hootsuite - the interface is clean and it's easy to find what you need once you figure out what all the icons mean. Their connections to the major social platforms are almost always up and functional. I have very few problems with this platform, so I consider it reliable.

Pros

What I like most about Hootsuite is that it tackels both monitoring and management in one simple interface. It's got good simplicity of the function once you're familiar with it. If you walked into someone else's Hootstuite screen you'd probably be confused for a minute or two, but if you are setting up your own social media management routine, Hootsuite guides you through all the steps for posting and monitoring - what you end up with (unless you add way too many things) is a good overview of your social media territory that includes the ability for you to reply in real-time or schedule in advance. The ability to build your own tabbed pages with your own selection of what you choose to see makes this tool one of my preferred apps for helping new businesses manage and monitor their own social media accounts because once I show someone how to lay out the information in a way they need, they find it pretty easy to move on to other views on their own. Before long, they are using it themselves to schedule posts.

Cons

I started using Hootsuite back in the old days when it was a totally free tool so I guess what I dislike about it most is that I think the free version's limit of three social accounts is too small for a small business to manage all the social interaction they should be managing.

Our Social Channels Management Simplified!

Social Media presence is important in this millennial age. HootSuite makes managing your social presence (profile, posts, shares, etc) a breeze and streamlined across all major social media channels.

Pros

There are just too many social channels to maintain (company branding, marketing, communications, sales, and support uses). HootSuite simplifies the management of these social channels to save our Social Media Manager (and staff) a lot of time updating the profiles, posts, shares, photos... etc. Analytics! Numbers to back up any of our social media efforts are crucial for calculating ROI and supporting our request for management funding. The graphs and reporting features are intuitive, with just one glance one can analyze the performance, track customers / clients that need attention, and see which campaigns are doing well (and those that are not). The Dashboard presents you a complete set of social media tools (all major social media channels supported). This is really worth it in this millennial digital era!

Cons

Don't be too easily swayed by the initial asking price... you'd eventually realize that for additional power-ups/extras you will have to shell out the additional payment (which eventually add up). Also, just one comment on the UI... it seems pretty outdated in terms of looks which might turn off some users who are aesthetically sensitive (like myself). :)

excellent for marketing in social networks.

With Hootsuite, we can program it and not have to worry about it being published in a timely manner. It is also great to re-analyze the analyzes over time to see what types of content and what times of day work best for our company and the commitment of our audience.

Pros

It is a software that is very easy to use and is useful all the time. I make many publications in real time on various social media platforms and before that I would have to have more than 5 tabs open to access each social media account. It is extremely functional, efficient and changed the way I viewed social networks, so my point of view is much more focused on my own organization and its objectives. Scheduling publications in advance is a great time saver. The report panels are fantastic to show customers the value of the social. I also love the functions to track a hashtag in a separate transmission , Another opinion that I like about the Hootsuite software is an accurate team of reports and analysis and fast customer support.

Cons

Programming my first social publications as the first time counter became instantly difficult because I did not have the opportunity to do any kind of tutorial. The initial stages were really just me guessing how to program things.

Good Product But Could Use Improvements

We've enjoyed Hootsuite for the most part, and it really does take a lot of the pain out of social media management. Being able to schedule posts is by far the best feature, since it saves a lot of time and energy by being able to set up several days' worth of posts all at once. Connectivity is an issue for us, but overall, we would recommend this product for both large and small companies.

Pros

Hootsuite makes social media much easier by pulling all the platforms into one place. Rather than logging in to 5 different platforms, you can log into one, and manage them all from one screen. It also helps you keep track of your users/followers and the activities you're producing. We're also fans of being able to schedule posts for future dates, which means we can schedule a week's worth of activity in one sitting rather than logging in every day and working from scratch.

Cons

We've found some connectivity problems with Hootsuite, which is frustrating since that's the main function of the platform. We're often having to reconnect accounts or finding that a post didn't go through because the account disconnected beforehand. While it still makes it easier than logging in to the platform's individually, it is problematic to have disconnected accounts too frequently.

Scheduling publications has never been easier.

It has saved me too much time in the management of social networks and without it this work that would have taken me much more time, in addition to giving me the function of user analysis i have been able to do all the metrics of our customers, to know what is the performance, interaction and growth of their social networks.

Pros

This is the most complete software that allows you to manage all your networks from a single site, by providing better customer service and you know what happens at every moment and you can control it, the planner is wonderful gives you the convenience of specifying the time and day in which you want the publication, the reports are very detailed these help us to monitor trends and measure the continued growth of social networks that we carry. Actually i'm very satisfied with all the tools it provides, makes my life at work a little simpler by providing customers with quality results.

Cons

The only thing i don't like is that the free version is very limited, you have to go from once to the paid version if you want to enjoy the real benefits, and another thing is that the Hootsuite mobile application is slow and sometimes stops working because it is not fully developed yet.

Bit Clumsy but Still Helpful to Start with Social Media

We are using hootsuite since a long time and it has helped a lot in organizing the social media strategy of our enterprise, the advanced ability to schedule and keep posts in advance has helped us give more and more time to focus on our core needs. Layout needs a major tweak as its bit clumsy and hopefully the update soon, rest all good !

Pros

1) RSS postings , a shortened link which helps to track clicks and a good workable mobile app. 2) Ability to schedule multiple posts across various social media like facebook, twitter etc 3) Report emails are really helpful to plan and correct the Social Media Strategy.

Cons

Layout is super clumsy and gets bit tricky as you add more and more Social media's. Instagram posts sometimes don't work in a way which it should also video sometimes gives error .

Newsrooms who don't use hootsuite are missing out

After fixing Instagram issues, I can honestly say that Hootsuite is still one of the top social management tools one can use, especially smaller community papers who can't afford to buy higher-level social media management programs. Even if you're working for a bigger news company, the Hootsuite app is so easy to navigate compared to competitors' in a way that makes you keeping using Hootsuite even if you have paid company access to other programs.

Pros

Hootsuite is similar to its main competitor, Tweetdeck, in that you can have multiple channels running at once on different subjects or hashtags. However, it was unrivaled in its ability to connect more types of social media networks than other platforms, so an editor could be monitoring not just 5-10 different social media accounts across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and more, but could be pre-scheduling, editing, monitoring teasers and competition much more easily.

Cons

For several years, Hootsuite was unable to integrate creating organic Instagram posts within Hootsuite, and that grew very annoying, as one would have to create the post on another social media management platform and then edit and schedule within Hootsuite. Since Facebook bought Instagram, though, workarounds have made this much easier.

Very basic social media scheduling tools

Hootsuite was a great social media scheduling tool a few years ago but it didn't keep up with the constant innovations that Instagram has been introducing, can't schedule stories or pick video thumbnails when scheduling. I ended up switching to Later - which I am extremely satisfied with.

Pros

As an online marketer, I used Hootsuite for over 3 years and it was a great tool for basic social media scheduling. I could easily connect the Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest pages of the brands I managed. The user interface is great, it offers an option to bulk upload the content - that saves a lot of time. They have very good knowledge-based articles, they offer a 30-day trial which I would strongly recommend. I decided to switch to Later - disconnecting and deleting the social profiles from Hootsuite was easy.

Cons

Hootsuite was great a few years ago but I started to have a few issues as Instagram introduced more and more new features so I ended up switching to Later - which I am very satisfied with. Hootsuite does not allow to schedule Instagram Stories and there is no way to pick a thumbnail when you try to schedule a video * which can make your feed look not so clean.

Social media simplified with Hootsuite

Pros

I am a huge fan of Hootsuite, and I have set up multiple teams over the past three or so years with this social media client. It is simple to use, both across desktop and mobile, and it makes scheduling social post simple. The dashboard is also highly visual, which is perfect for seeing how each of your posts will look across various platforms. Hootsuite also offers courses and certifications based on the plan you purchase. This education component gives Hootsuite a leg up on its competitors and is handy if you're trying to get your social team/social contributors on the same level.

Cons

The analytics aren't the best and the reporting feature is a little clunky. I still prefer to use the native reporting tools that accompany each specific social media platform when running Hootsuite, but it is still a very useful feature.

Hootsuite ended with the nightmare of having to manage all social networks.

Hootsuite has allowed us to improve communications with our work teams and we can also track all our activity that is presented on social networks. This system, besides managing our activities in the networks in an efficient and practical way, has allowed us to be able to integrate our work team. Something very important is that this platform has an application that allows me to manage several social network accounts simultaneously.

Pros

Hootsuite has the ability to program our publications that we make daily through social networks, completely automatically. It has an application that allows me to configure a list of publications in a CSV file and add them to the interface, this would avoid the annoying task of having to publish all the activity that we have in the networks manually. Through the Hootlet application, which is an extension for Chrome, i can quickly and easily share all the content of our social networks from any web. Another application that is considered very important is that this system offers us the possibility of being able to post our publications to the networks, which do not have this application, which is done automatically.

Cons

There is a little thing that is presented in the Hootsuite URL shortener, which usually occurs when i try to upload an image to twitter, as it is shortened and can be opened.

Hootsuite Social Media Management Tool Review

Hootsuite delivers a very good all-in-one social media platform. The tool is trusted by many individuals and organizations and Hootsuite provides very good resources and training.

Pros

Hootsuite enables users to manage all of their social media channels in one place. Hootsuite was one of the first to offer this functionality and has grown to be one of the top social media publishing integration platforms. Hootsuite is easy to use. Users write messages, select targeted social media channels, and publish. This functionality saves a lot of time by not having to log into each social media account and publish messages individually. Hootsuite also enables you to engage your audience by responding to questions, comments, and likes. Users can also schedule content to be published at certain dates and times. The Hootsuite dashboard can be organized easily by adding tabs for various social accounts and information. Finally, Hootsuite provides analytics that provides valuable insights into the performance of your social media messaging success. Hootsuite provides very good resources and training.

Cons

Hootsuite offers a free plan to get you started that supports three social media accounts. Of course, once you engage social media fully these accounts will grow past three and you will need to purchase one of their professional plans. These plans can get expensive based on the amount of users you require to manage your social media presence. Hootsuite offers a lot of features. You may not need or use them all. There are a number of alternative tools available that offer similar features for less cost.

Great social media marketing tool for novice and experts alike!

Pros

Hootsuite makes creating posts once and sending to multiple social media sites a breeze! Scheduling and attaching files is also easy. I wouldn't do them much justice if I also didn't add that the mobile app is just as easy as the web version! Setting permissions based on other users is a great function for teams where posts need to be approved. The free version may also work great for your needs depending on your limitations. Being able to see all streams from the web makes it easy to view all social media sites and make sure they're up to date. Responding to posts is also easily done from the dashboard. Lastly, there are tons of tools available from the dashboard to add to your account making it a one-stop shop!

Cons

Would like a way to schedule a long post for Facebook and allow a hidden character or combination of characters (maybe like, /&/) to allow a break for Twitter so the user doesn't have to create one long post for Facebook and 2-4 different posts for Twitter. Would like a way to receive an email of sorts when all posts are posted as sometimes (very, very rarely) are some not posted.

A Competitive Social Media Scheduler

Pros

Hootsuite offers all the features a basic social media scheduler offers: auto-posting, media library, multiple social media accounts, etc. The amazing thing about this software is it has a free account so you can test out the features before going premium. Definitely a contender for researching a social media scheduler for your business.

Cons

The software can sometimes be finicky, and auto-publishing doesn't always work.

High Five for Best Value

Hootsuite allows me to manage my time effectively as I am able to schedule multiple posts over an extended period of time.

Pros

I like the software for its dependability. It has been around for many years and has never failed to deliver scheduled posts. I consider this a natured platform. Tried, Tested and True. It has survived numerous Social Media platform changes over the years.

Cons

While changes in the connectivity to various Social Media accounts cannot be helped, it does require you to keep an eye out for the notifications and take action to correct the disconnects.

Good, but could be better

Hootsuite did the job well, but it was ultimately outclassed by Buffer in my experience.

Pros

Hootsuite lets you track and schedule posts across a variety of social media accounts, although it's mainly used for Facebook. It's indispensable to have a tool like this if you manage a lot of accounts, and it has a free plan.

Cons

I ended up switching to Buffer because you couldn't post pictures and video natively through Twitter, instead it posted as "owl.ly" links