With mainstream users spending most of their time using social media platforms, creating an impeccable and intriguing social media presence is important for your business. Small businesses have achieved greater milestones by syncing their brand identity within social media platforms using righteous social media automation tools.
However, the tools only work when utilized properly according to the niche and requirements of the business. The market offers a variety of social media management tools offering diverse features for small businesses and agencies.
Among the most popular social media automation tools, Sprout Social has created a decent user base with its advanced features for SMBs, mid-to-small-size agencies, and enterprises. However, catering to the limitations and cons of this tool, there are more efficient Sprout Social competitors that you can consider trying.
But eventually, before attempting to choose the best tool for your business, you must know what difference the most relevant social media automation tool can bring for your business.
How Can a Social Media Management Tool Make a Difference in Your Business?
Social media management tools can do a lot for your business, from optimizing the workflows to generating better leads. No matter what niche your brand follows, the right tool will boost the brand’s productivity and assets.
Here are some key benefits you can expect from a social media tool as a brand manager.
Saves Time & Effort
An efficient social media automation tool can save immense time and effort by automating most tasks.
Monitor Performance
No efforts will go in vain as the best social media automation tool will consistently evaluate the performance and suggest improvement ideas.
Improve Customer Response
You can enhance the customer response desk by integrating a social media automation tool that brings all the conversations into a single inbox and makes the conversations instant and easier.
Improve Team Productivity
By getting the most of your tasks done with the help of a social media management tool, you can improve the all-in-all productivity of your team by providing them ample opportunities to elevate workflow and come up with unique ideas.
Limitations of Sprout Social
Despite its note-worthy popularity, Sprout Social possesses a few gray areas that it lacks to deliver compared to alternatives to Sprout Social. Below are the top reasons you should consider trying Sprout Social competitors to make the most out of your business.
Limited Pricing Plans
The pricing plans offered by Sprout Social are quite expensive and appear to be one of the major pain points of the tool. Small and mid-size businesses will likely suffer with the user-based pricing model starting from $249 per month. In contrast, Social Champ offers a pricing plan starting at $29 per month with all the basic features included, lesser and better than Sprout Social.
Hence, if you analyze the pricing model critically, the value of money is lesser than the features and privileges offered by the tool. In this case, looking for Sprout Social competitors becomes important.
Delayed Customer Response
Various review sites have called out the customer service of Sprout Social as slow and unresponsive at times. This lacking put the tool back and requires the need for better tools to take over.
Here is a review of the services by both platforms.
Less User-Friendly Interface
The dashboard displayed by the tool is well-designed and attractive, but if you are a beginner, you might find the operations difficult and hard to navigate. Hence, you might end up lost within the tool, unable to find the right features for your tasks.
One of the reviews at capterra.com suggests:
Related Article: Sprout Social Pricing: Is It Affordable for All?
What Are Some Industry-Specific Features Necessary for a Social Media Management Tool?
Here are some industry-relevant features that must be on your checklist while opting for the best competitors to Sprout Social.
Platform Integrations
Your social media management tool must offer social media integrations for mainstream social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, etc.
Post Publishing
An efficient social media automation tool should allow you to plan, manage, and publish posts across all the social media channels saving time and effort.
Performance Analytics
All your effort goes in vain if you cannot track the performance and results. Hence, go for a social media management tool that can provide you with brief reports on what is performing for your brand and what is not.
Hashtag Tools
Hashtags play a great role in enhancing the visibility of your content on social media platforms. Choose the social media management tool that offers suggestions for the best usage of hashtags.
Engagement Management
Your audience must be seen, welcomed, and responded to. The best social media management tool offers a social inbox to manage all the conversations, comments, and customer reviews, improving customer satisfaction.
Grow Your Business With Social Champ!
Manage a consistent and dynamic social media presence with the scheduling, monitoring, and management features of Social Champ.
Top 10 Sprout Social Competitors to Look Forward to in 2023
Fulfilling your expectations of a brilliant social media management tool, Sprout Social best competitors have made it to the list of our suggestions for pocket-friendly and rising social media automation tools.
Social Champ
Social Champ is an all-in-one social media management tool topping the list among the leading Sprout Social competitors. It is power-packed with social media management features, including content scheduling and analysis, a social inbox to manage all the conversations in a single place, and an efficient analytics dashboard to keep an eye on all your activities.
Compared to Sprout Social, using Social Champ can easily help you create a powerful social media presence across eight major social media channels.
Premium Features
Power-packed with tools, the most popular features offered by Social Champ are discussed below.
- Free Social Media Scheduler: Schedule and plan your posts with the help of a free social media scheduler.
- Bulk Upload: Upload posts in bulk across all your social media accounts with the bulk upload feature.
- Social Inbox: Instantly manage all the conversations and comments through a single inbox.
- Social Media Calendar: Make the best use of the social media calendar offered by this tool and edit and view your scheduled posts within a single glance.
- Team Collaboration: Assign team roles and collaborate with your team effectively through the team collaboration feature.
- Monitoring Analytics: Track performance and generate progress reports to spot loopholes and improve your marketing strategies.
The pricing starts at $29 per month plus a free plan.
Zoho Social
Next on our list of Sprout Social competitors is Zoho Social. This tool offers an easier way to manage your brand’s identity on social media. You can perform content scheduling in multiple ways, monitor performance, create analytics reports, and collaborate with your team effectively using this tool.
Compared to Sprout Social, Zoho Social offers a promising and easy-to-use social listening dashboard.
The pricing starts at $19 per month for businesses.
Emplifi
Emplifi.io is another promising competitors
- to Sprout Social, specifically catering to the marketing needs of small businesses and agencies. This platform provides social listening tools with actionable insights to create the best experience for prospects.Compared to Sprout Social, this tool offers an extensive content library to extract ideas. You can also track bloggers in any niche to collaborate with them with the help of the influencer tracking feature. Customer experiences can improve with this tool’s largest dataset in action.The pricing offered by Emplifi starts at $240, paid monthly.
NapoleonCat
NapoleanCat is another considerable option among the Sprout Social competitors. The platform has established a dedicated identity with its social media management features. Using this tool, you can easily publish content, manage a single social inbox, automate workflows, and measure analytics.
Compared to Sprout Social, this tool wins with a reporting feature allowing users to generate extensive reports keeping all the team synced with the latest updates and progress.
The pricing offered by NapoleanCat starts at $31 per month.
SkedSocial
SkedSocial is an Instagram-friendly automation tool you can vouch for among the competitors for Sprout Social. Alongside providing basic Instagram management features of scheduling and planning, the tool also handles multiple Instagram accounts.
Compared to Sprout Social, SkedSocial ensures an impactful Instagram presence with core features of advanced Instagram analytics, social media calendar, and a visual Instagram planner.
The pricing offered by this tool starts at $25 per month.
MavSocial
MavSocial is another reliable content management tool among Sprout Social competitors. This tool is power-packed with features that ensure effective content management, from scheduling posts to monitoring performance. You can also utilize built-in stock image libraries and editing tools to improve your content creation strategies.
Compared to Sprout Social, the core features of MavSocial include uploading creative assets on your MavSocial account, managing all the conversations and reviews in a single inbox, and making use of various integrations.
The pricing starts at $78 per month.
Pally
Next in our list of Sprout Social best competitors is Pally, a social media scheduling tool with intriguing team collaboration features. Using this tool, you can keep all the team members in sync, allowing them to change the status of posts, manage feedback, share a custom calendar, and tag members.
Compared to Sprout Social, the visual appeal of this tool stands out, making it look more user-friendly. It also offers a free plan with limited accessible features.
The pricing starts at $15 per month.
Iconosquare
Another rising tool is Iconosquare, among Sprout Social’s best competitors. Having a bunch of unique features and making waves for offering robust analytics, the tool integrates a custom dashboard. You can get easy-to-read reports, groups, and charts to overview your performance and take data-driven decisions.
Compared to Iconosquare, this tool can also use labels and albums to categorize your posts for an in-depth analysis.
The pricing starts at €59 per month.
Audiense
If you are looking for Sprout Social competitors for your brand’s growth on Twitter, then Audiense is the right tool for you. This tool offers useful features for implementing an incredible Twitter marketing campaign.
Compared to Sprout Social, Audiense provides you with custom Twitter chatbots to manage conversations according to your preferences, identify the most important audience segments, and generate potential leads by targeting the relevant people for your brand. Hence, you can rely on this tool to create a smooth Twitter presence.
The pricing starts at £39 per month.
Metricool
Metricool is another eye-grabbing tool among Sprout Social competitors for its insightful competitor analysis features. Alongside the basic features of managing social accounts from a single dashboard, this tool ensures the provision of important data, allowing the opportunity to get better with the strategies.
Compared to Sprout Social, you can use Metricool to gather insights about the latest trends and campaigns executed by your competitors and form your campaigns accordingly.
The pricing starts at $18 per month.
Featured Article: Best Social Media Marketing Tools in 2023!
Wrapping It Up!
The social media management tool is an asset for a business’s marketing strategy. You might find many options of the best tools on the internet that can help your business, but it is actually one critical choice.
Hence, you should be careful about choosing the best Sprout Social competitors. Remember the requirements you want to fulfill with the social media tool. Compare the pricing plans and feature sets, and look out for the tool offering the best value for money.
