The Best Social Media Scheduling Tools for Teams-of-One

If you’re a one-person band, you know how tough it can be to manage all of your social media accounts. In this post, I’ll share my top three picks for social media schedulers for solopreneurs, founders, creatives, and other teams-of-one.

Here are just a few of the reasons social media management can be challenging:

• You probably have more than one following you’re trying to grow.

• Each platform has a unique aesthetic, and different content performs well in different places.

• There are different community and advertising guidelines on each platform.

• The best time to post is different for each platform.

• Your audience is likely to be different based on the platform.

Some people are naturals at navigating all of these nuances. It may sound sacrilegious to say, since I am a marketer by trade, but I am not one of those people. Even as an experienced marketer, I sometimes struggle to stay on top of the ever-changing best practices. That’s a long way of saying “it’s tough, I hear you!”

If you’re a team-of-one, you know social media management can be challenging.

A social media scheduler is a super-valuable, time-saving tool for solopreneurs and teams of one.

My goal with a social media scheduling tool is to maximize the quality and impact of my posts to best serve my audiences, while minimizing the time and energy required to provide that value.

In that framework, a social media scheduler is a super-valuable tool. Here’s why:

• They aid in strategy and planning.

• They allow you to manage multiple profiles and platforms in one place.

• They often help you analyze your performance.

• They let you “set and forget” your social media postings.

More specifically, social media schedulers allow you to develop unified campaigns far in advance, and release those posts consistently and automatically. Most tools will allow you to manage multiple platforms in one place, increasing efficiency and providing a bird’s-eye view of your social posts. And finally, most of them will allow you to conduct some engagement analysis on which posts perform best.

As a team-of-one with a small social media presence (for now), these are the criteria I considered:

• Functionality, such as:

  • Ability to manage multiple platforms.

  • Ability to post multiple types of media.

  • Guidance on when and how to post.

• Ease of use.

• Price.

• Existing User Reviews.

After doing a bunch of research and testing, these are the four social media scheduling services that I considered:

• Hootsuite

• Buffer Publish

• Loomly

• Sprout Social

• Coschedule Social Scheduler

In addition, there are some solutions that are focused on only one platform. Namely, Instagram. I want to make sure to highlight Later, an amazing grid planner/scheduler for Instagram. I use the free version for linking posts on my grid to content on my website. Planoly is another Insta-only planner tool well-liked by influencers.

Spoiler alert: I ultimately chose Buffer.

To understand why, here is my overview of these four social media scheduling services, and my opinions on how they stack up:

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a popular social media manager used by a lot of large companies and even some marketing platforms. I remember when it was just a Twitter scheduler, but it has changed a lot since then.

Functionality: The platform offers scheduling, content curation, content promotion, analytics, monitoring, security, and plenty of integrations. It also offers team management, but you probably don’t need that if you’re reading this post. All-in-all, it’s a really robust and very feature-rich tool. (It may even be too feature-rich for your needs.)

Ease of Use: Hootsuite allows you to get a free 30-day trial to learn and use the platform, which definitely adds bonus points in the “ease of use” category. It’s not a difficult tool to navigate, but even if it were, you’d have plenty of time to learn it for free.

Price: Hootsuite costs a minimum of $29/mo if you pay annually; at this level, you can connect up to 10 accounts, but you won’t get a custom branded URL or a content library. The next level up will set you back $130/mo. As an early-stage startup with only one team member, $30 a month for a social media scheduler seemed high to me.

Existing User Reviews: 4.1/5

Verdict: Hootsuite is a powerful, slick social media management tool for slightly larger companies with more sophisticated needs - and bigger budgets.

Grade for Solopreneurs and Teams-of-One: C

Buffer Publish

Buffer is a really popular social media management platform, and the company is renowned for their incredible culture. Unlike Hootsuite, Buffer is designed to be a modifiable social media management platform. It has three main components - Publish, Analyze, and Reply - each of which are sold separately. Publish is the scheduler, Analyze is the reporting software, and Reply is the social conversations and inbox manager. As I was primarily interested in a scheduling tool, I focused my research on Buffer Publish. Here’s what I found:

Functionality: Buffer Publish allows you to draft and schedule posts, create tailored posts for each social network, and plan campaigns across channels from the primary page. It also has collaboration functionality, but again, that’s probably not a priority for you. Finally, Buffer really focuses on Instagram marketing and branding with lots of features like direct posting and scheduling, first comment, and a shop grid.

Ease of Use: Publish is super clean and easy to use. I was able to get up-and-running within just a few minutes with no problems.

Price: There is a free version of Buffer Publish, which allows you to have 3 social accounts and 10 scheduled posts, but that probably won’t be enough for you. Practically speaking, Buffer Publish’s pricing starts at $12/mo. billed annually. This provides a lot of functionality: 8 social accounts, Instagram first comment, and a 30-day post history report. The next level up is $56/mo., and provides even more Instagram services (including the hashtag manager) and a full history report.

If you want to add the analysis functionality via the Buffer Analyze tool, it would be $28/mo., billed annually. I am not yet ready for a robust analytical tool; when I am, it’s good to know that when I am, I can add it for a reasonable price.

Existing User Reviews: 4.3/5

Verdict: If you’re focused on Instagram and want a modifiable tool with just the features you need, Buffer Publish is a great option. It has the functionality you need today, with the option to grow with you tomorrow.

Grade for Solopreneurs and Teams-of-One: A-

Loomly

Loomly doesn’t advertise itself as a social media manager; rather, it describes itself as a “brand success manager.” That said, its features and functionality align closely with the ones that the other platforms on this list have, It is also used by a lot of big companies, like L’Oreal and BMW.

Functionality: Loomly provides tons of great features, including organic posts and advertising scheduling, an overview calendar, trending topic ideas, a content library to store your photos and videos, best practices, interaction and social inbox tools, and analytics. Loomly’s integration of organic and advertised posts seems to set it apart.

However, if Instagram is important for your social media strategy, Loomly may not be a great option. It cannot (yet) publish directly to Instagram.

Ease of Use: Although Loomly isn’t difficult to use, I think Loomly’s interface is not as modern and user-friendly as some of the other tools. (Its calendar looks like the Apple Calendar app.) It’s not quite as beautiful or as easy-to-use as the other tools.

Price: The most basic subscription to Loomly includes the core features of Library, Post Ideas, Post Optimization Tips, Audience Targeting, Post Preview, Approval Workflows, Automated Publishing, Post Sponsoring, Interactions & Basic Analytics for just $25/mo. billed annually. It also lets you have two users, and 10 accounts. Upgrading to the next subscription level will include analytics, at the very reasonable price of $57/mo., billed annually.

Existing User Rating: 4.6/5

Verdict: Loomly is a lot more like Hootsuite in terms of included functionality, but I think Loomly is a much better value. Here’s a good example: if you wanted to have a content library in Hootsuite, it would cost you $599/mo. versus Loomly’s $25! As The Lane Collective grows, I’d consider switching to Loomly.

Grade for Solopreneurs and Teams-of-One: B+

Sprout Social

When I was doing research on social media scheduling tools, Sprout consistently showed up in my search results. They are doing a great job with their content marketing. They frame their tool as a way to build and grow stronger relationships on social media. They have 20,000+ customers, and their reviews are great.

Like Buffer, Sprout Social has multiple different tools, each with a different set of features. The four key services in their platform are: Listening, Publishing, Engagement, and Analytics. To be totally honest, it’s not entirely clear whether those services align with different software solutions, or if that’s their marketing team’s way of grouping their features.

Functionality: Sprout Social has a lot of functionality, all designed to help you get closer to your customers. I believe strongly in customer success, so this really spoke to me. However, I found it kind of difficult to understand the features included in the different platforms until I’d done a lot of clicking. Ultimately, I found that every feature you could want in a social media manager is available - for a fee. More on that later.

All subscriptions include: 5 social profiles, a social inbox, the ability to publish and schedule posts, a content calendar, profile, keyword, and location monitoring, a built-in CRM, group/profile/post-level reporting, and paid promotion tools for Facebook.

Ease of Use: Sprout seems easy to use and very robust. Based on what I can see, it provides a TON of data and lots of ways to really closely engage with your audience. If social selling is a priority for your business, I can see how Sprout would really enable that.

Price: Sprout is one of the priciest on this list. The Standard subscription is $99/user, per month. The next level up provides a lot of strategic insights and reporting for $149/user, per month.

Existing User Rating: 4.3/5

Verdict: Even though I love the customer-centric approach and focus on relationship building via social media, I just don’t think Sprout is a real option for solopreneurs and teams-of-one. It’s really built for companies with an established social media presence, and an audience that is likely to or already engaging a lot via social media. If your business isn’t there yet, most of Sprout’s unique features wouldn’t really benefit you.

Grade for Solopreneurs and Teams-of-One: C+

Coschedule Social Organizer

Coschedule is a powerful content strategy platform that has a lot of great functionality. Their marketing is always positive, engaging, and genuinely helpful. I’ve used their headline analyzer for years, and love it.

One product they offer is their Social Organizer. This is a robust social scheduling tool that lets you manage multiple platforms with ease. In terms of functionality, it’s probably closest to Sprout Social.

Functionality: When it comes to functionality, Coschedule really isn’t lacking anything. I would say that it’s one of the most comprehensive and customer-focused products on the market.

In addition to planning and scheduling functionality, it also allows you to monitor your mentions and communicate with your audience via the Social Inbox. This functionality is typically not included in the basic subscription of social media tools.

Moreover, the Social Organizer is focused on helping you craft multi-channel campaigns, which is really helpful if you’re looking at launches or integrating with a complete content strategy.

As you can tell, the most basic subscription has tons of social tools, but it also includes basic features from Coschedule’s other content management tools, like a marketing calendar and a social calendar.

Ease of Use: For visual people, Coschedule’s tool is one of the nicest. Their calendar is a lot like Hootsuite’s, in that it provides a quick calendar snapshot with pleasant colors. The calendar includes drag-and-drop functionality so that you can quickly move posts around on your feeds.

Price: This one is definitely pricier, at least upon first glance. It starts at $100/mo, but that is for three users. The next level up is $300. For most small businesses and startups, that’s a lot of money to spend at the early stages.

Existing User Rating: 4.5/5

Verdict: Even though the price is a little higher, I think Coschedule edges out Sprout Social. There is more functionality, and that functionality is more integrated.

Additionally, the price includes up to three users. Even though that might not be helpful for you as a solopreneur or team of one right now, you might want to add to your team down the road. As you hire employees or partners, you’ll want to be able to easily scale without adding a ton more in cost, and Coschedule makes that possible.

Grade for Solopreneurs and Teams-of-One: B-

So that’s why I chose Buffer Publish for my social media management needs as a solopreneur!

It has enough functionality, fits within my budget, has powerful features for Instagram, and has the potential to grow with me for the next year.

Are you a solopreneur or team of one working on improving your social media presence? If so, let me know what you think of this post in the comments below! I’d love to hear about your challenges and triumphs with the process - it can be overwhelming and I’d love to talk shop.

In the meantime, check out this Guide to Marketing Your Startup!