Hootsuite vs Later: A Social Media Management Tool Comparison

SocialBee vs Hootsuite & Later: Side-by-Side Comparison Table

Hootsuite vs Later: How to Choose the Best Social Media Management Software

When it comes to enhancing social media marketing efforts, choosing the right tool is essential. With the impressive number of options available, it can be difficult to know which one is most suitable for your needs. 

Here is what to look for in social media management software:

1. Supported social media platforms
2. Content creation features
3. Social media planning and scheduling
4. Social media analytics
5. Social inbox and engagement tools
6. Team collaboration features
7. User experience and ease of use
8. Integrations
9. Pricing
10. Customer support

1. Supported Social Media Platforms

In addition to using a social media marketing platform, a management tool that supports your favorite channels is a definitive must. Make sure that the tool you’ll choose will ultimately help you manage multiple social media accounts.

As you can see, Later is not currently supporting YouTube and Facebook Groups, so this might be a dealbreaker for businesses that channel their marketing efforts on these two social accounts.

2. Content Creation Features

Creating engaging content is what a great social media presence is all about, right? Before you go ahead and choose your next go-to social media management tool, make sure that you are aware of the content creation features they offer.

Hootsuite has helpful features for content creation, including the post composer that lets you create and schedule posts. The platform also has a content library of templates that can streamline your entire social media publishing process and a Canva integration for creating visuals with ease.

As for Later, they offer their users a fully visual way of creating, editing, and previewing the content that’s going to get published. Also, they make content creation an easier task via their user-generated content feature which allows you to search various hashtags that relate to your brand and repost it with no effort on your part. 

Lastly, the Unsplash photo library is a great addition for those who are in a hurry to create engaging content.

3. Social Media Planning and Scheduling

Hootsuite’s social media calendar and planner can help you get things done from one dashboard. You will be able to plan and publish new content across your social media accounts and map out new campaigns in no time. 

Their bulk post scheduling feature and recommended best times to post will take the effort and guesswork from your daily tasks.

Later, on the other hand, helps you plan your Instagram posts with its highly visual social media scheduling tool. You can bulk upload content and store it in their Media Library, plan your Instagram grid directly from their Instagram Visual Planner.

4. Social Media Analytics

Analytics are an underrated yet vital part of doing social media marketing. Luckily, Hootsuite provides powerful reporting tools that include data about engagement, impressions, likes, shares, website clicks, top-performing posts, and so much more. Furthermore, you can generate compelling reports by using their pre-made templates.

Additionally, Hootsuite also offers social media monitoring features. If you wish to give your social media team a helping hand in terms of communication with your followers, this can be a great addition. 

As for Later, their social media analytics allow you to measure your growth over time and identify the posts that are driving the most engagement. From the analytics dashboard, you will also be able to export the insights into CSV files. Keep in mind that exporting is only available for Instagram and Linkin.bio analytics. 

5. Social Inbox and Engagement Tools

Hootsuite’s social inbox helps you stay connected to the followers across your social media accounts from one place. You can also set up automated replies for FAQ and make sure that the communication is always quick and on-brand. 

In addition to the social inbox, Hootsuite also allows users to monitor mentions and take a look at the conversations that surround their industry and brand.

As far as Later is concerned, it does not feature a social inbox. However, it does help you improve Instagram engagement by ranking existing posts by their engagement rate. This way, you’ll get a much clearer idea of what is working and what could use some fine-tuning in terms of Instagram-worthy content.

6. Team Collaboration Features

When it comes to team collaboration, Hootsuite allows you to assign tasks to team members, send them messages whenever something comes up, and manage social channels without having to share passwords. These features streamline the usual workflow and maintain proper communication between all parties.

With Later, you can communicate with your team members via Calendar Notes, a quick and easy way to leave suggestions. You’ll also be able to invite contributors thanks to the Contributors feature and allow them to send you images and videos for the upcoming content.

7. User Experience and Ease of Use

When it comes to user experience, most Hootsuite reviews reveal that the platform is user-friendly and intuitive. However, some users noted that it can also be buggy and clunky at times. 

However, Later is mostly praised for its modern and easy-to-use interface and lacks most of the complaints Hootsuite receives. Therefore, it’s another one of the better Hootsuite alternatives out there.

8. Integrations

Integrations are a vital component of having a social media marketing strategy. It’s important to be aware of the ones offered by both Hootsuite and Later.

9. Pricing

Money talks and marketing is not always affordable, so let’s talk a bit about the pricing of both tools before we dive into the topic of Later and Hootsuite alternatives.

It’s worth mentioning that Hootsuite offers its users a 30-day free trial for their Professional and Team subscriptions. As for Later, it offers a 14-day free trial on all their subscriptions.

10. Customer Support

Last, but certainly not least, Hootsuite’s customer support is giving users mixed feelings. Some are quite pleased with its quality. On the other hand, there are plenty of displeased customers that mention that email support is very slow.

The very same can be said about Later. There are many users who are happy about the professionalism levels of the support team. Meanwhile, a handful of customers complain about the lack of replies on chat, email, and LinkedIn.

When to Choose Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a social media management tool that can be useful for large businesses, experienced companies, and enterprises that have several social media accounts.

Here’s when you should choose Hootsuite:

• If you are a large business that manages multiple social media accounts
• If you have a big budget and are willing to invest
• If you want to monitor social media mentions and engagement across several social media channels
• If you collaborate with a large team of social media managers
• If you want to regularly analyze your social media performance

When to Choose Later

Later is a helpful social media scheduling tool that focuses on bringing your visual posts to the forefront. It’s especially useful for smaller businesses that wish to make it big on Instagram and are looking for an alternative to Hootsuite.

Here’s when you should choose Later:

• You’re an Instagram-focused business
• You’re a social media manager who wants to plan social media content visually
• You have a limited budget and want to make a smart investment
• You want to optimize your Instagram hashtag strategy
• You want to collaborate with team members

What Is a Good Hootsuite and Later Alternative?

Chances are that you’re still confused about which tool would complement your social media marketing strategy. Guess what? That’s perfectly fine. It means that you’re looking for the best tool out there and, luckily, there are other Later and Hootsuite alternatives for you to consider.

If so, you’ll be pleased to find out more about SocialBee, one of the best social media management platforms for entrepreneurs, content creators, agencies, and small business social media managers. It’s perhaps the best alternative to Hootsuite and Later out there.

Here are the features SocialBee has over Hootsuite and Later:

• AI post assistant
• Multiple social networks supported
• Evergreen posting
• Content categories
• Content category analytics
• Hashtag collections
• Client workspaces
• Multiple integrations
• Affordable pricing
• Stellar customer support

1. AI Post Assistant

Are you a social media manager? SocialBee offers the ultimate social media tools for maintaining a consistent posting schedule with ease. It’s one of the best Hootsuite alternatives out right now. With the help of cutting-edge AI technology, SocialBee’s social media post generator tool can assist you in producing high-quality posts, thereby speeding up your content creation process.

Leverage the creative power of SocialBee’s AI post generator and create content seamlessly.

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SocialBee’s AI-powered post generator allows you to quickly generate captions tailored to your specific needs. This tool can assist you with creating posts based on 1000+ detailed prompts that you can infinitely customize, summarizing complex concepts, and effortlessly transforming your existing product descriptions into promotional posts. Try our free AI social media post generator now!