Buyers talk about social media tool cost in two registers: where a tool sits against the alternatives, and what the plan inside it charges for. Buyer comparisons span lower-cost schedulers through Sprout Social to higher-priced enterprise suites such as Sprinklr, and within a tool, seats, listening topics and modules can move the number. Below are the seven mechanics buyers describe, how buyers rate the tools, and where moves go. The departure records are on Hootsuite alternatives and Sprinklr alternatives.
Seven things that set the bill
Across the interviews, buyers describe social media tool cost as shaped by where a tool sits against the alternatives, what the plan counts, which features cost more, and what it takes to run the tool.
Buyer comparisons run from schedulers to enterprise suites
Buyers compare the tools against each other on price. A Sprout Social customer says of Sprinklr, “they're so much more expensive. Comparatively, Sprout seems like a good deal, but now there are cheaper ones.” Another chose Sprout Social partly because “It's not as expensive or complicated as Sprinklr,” and a third puts Sprinklr in “the same bucket as NetBase, which is also incredibly expensive.” Below Sprout Social, a Buffer customer appreciates “the financial incentive of it being cheaper than a lot of competitors.”
Named in this context: Sprinklr · Sprout Social · Buffer
Suites sell bundles — and buyers trim them
Sprinklr buyers describe paying for more than they use. One customer says of its pricing, “Their entire pricing for all of their modules is just, they're like another Salesforce.” Another wants Sprinklr's new voice features, but “Now it's at a point where voice is prohibitively expensive to use.” Sprout Social buyers describe trimming features to bring the price down too: a team whose choice came in over budget says “in order to get the cost down, we peeled back some of the bells and whistles.”
Named in this context: Sprinklr · Sprout Social
Seats and users can move the price
Some buyers describe the number of people on a plan as what moves the price. A Hootsuite customer says “you get in and you're kind of locked into one, and then you're adding on from there,” and wishes “you could just add on your singles instead of having to get bucketed into these sales groups.” A team that chose Talkwalker for listening liked that “the pricing model was kind of unlimited seats versus Meltwater; we had a limited number of seats.” The number of profiles matters economically too: a brand with many local Instagram accounts runs a lower-cost scheduler because “we need something that is not extremely expensive.” Sprout Social's per-seat and per-topic pricing is in the stories below.
Named in this context: Hootsuite · Talkwalker · Meltwater · Sprout Social
Listening and analytics can sit behind a higher price
Several buyers describe paying more — or needing a higher tier — for listening, analytics or expanded reporting. One Sprout Social customer says the plans “can be costly, especially when considering advanced listening and analytics.” Another says that “to get some of the features that we would want and more expansive reporting, it's just a significant investment for a small brand.” A Sprinklr customer passed on its analytics: “I think that's like the next level package, and it just was too expensive.” A Buffer customer sees “more analytical insights that we could gain if we use something like Sprout, but it's just outside of our financial means at this point.”
Named in this context: Sprout Social · Sprinklr · Buffer
Sprout Social buyers describe renewal increases — and negotiation
On Sprout Social, buyers describe the price changing over the relationship. One customer says “I love Sprout Social, but the price is just, it goes up every single year,” and another that its prices have “kind of drifted up.” A third cut its Sprout Social contract by around two-fifths: “We also seriously negotiated that contract down, which they also were fine with,” for “more or less the same functionalities.” Months later the same team said “I think that Sprout is pretty expensive for what it does” and “I highly doubt we're going to renew.” Separately, a Hootsuite customer is reviewing what it pays, in “a procurement-led project to make sure we're getting the best value from the platform.”
Named in this context: Sprout Social · Hootsuite
The license is not the whole cost
Some buyers describe paying to run the tool as well as to license it. One Sprinklr customer says “It has also been very costly, requires a lot of manpower, and doesn't really integrate well,” and “We've had to hire a third party and then involve my team.” In a later interview the same buyer adds, “It's expensive as well, and it does take a lot to manage it.” Integrations can cost more than the tool: one Sprout Social customer found that a native connection to its reporting tool would cost several times its subscription over a year — “they were very expensive.”
Named in this context: Sprinklr · Sprout Social
Existing contracts can change the incremental cost
For some buyers, an agreement the organization already held changed what the tool cost them. One preferred Sprout Social after an RFP, but “our digital media agency has a partnership with Hootsuite where we were able to get it for one third of the price, so we ended up going with that.” A hospital foundation uses Sprout Social because “the hospital we work for uses it,” calling it “a relatively affordable tool.” And at one large company, a team was steered onto the central Sprinklr license: “the central team has extra seats. Why are we going to pay for a different technology for your team to use?”
Named in this context: Hootsuite · Sprout Social · Sprinklr
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| Tool | Buyer rating | What buyers say about cost |
|---|---|---|
| Dash Hudson | around 8 | Called too expensive or cost-prohibitive by buyers, one of whom still sees its value; too few buyers for a decimal. |
| Sprout Social | 7.4 | Buyers place it between lower-cost alternatives and Sprinklr; seats, listening topics and renewal increases drive cost commentary. |
| Hootsuite | 7.2 | One buyer chose it over Sprout Social for “the most features for the most reasonable cost”; another left after a price rise. |
| Sprinklr | 7.0 | The highest-priced option in several buyer comparisons; buyers also describe bundled modules and, in one case, significant manpower to operate it. |
| Meltwater | around 7 | Called cheap under one buyer's enterprise agreement; another notes a limited number of seats. |
| Brandwatch | not rated | Weighed by one buyer as significantly cheaper than Sprout Social; too few buyers rate it to publish a number. |
The stories behind the bill
The counter-current: some buyers find the price fair
Not every buyer is trading down. A Sprout Social customer says “It's fine. Gets the job done. It's not too expensive,” and another chose it over Sprinklr because “the ease of use, integration, and price point was perfect for us.” A Sprinklr customer says “It does the job, the price is right,” and a buyer in talks with Sprinklr about paid social says “I feel like Sprinklr is a cheaper alternative” to the tool it uses now. A Meltwater customer calls it cheap: “We have a nice enterprise agreement with them.”
What this means for your social media budget
In these interviews, what a social media tool costs depends on where it sits against the alternatives and what its plan counts. Buyer comparisons span lower-cost schedulers through Sprout Social to higher-priced enterprise suites such as Sprinklr. Several buyers describe seats or users moving the price and listening, analytics or expanded reporting costing more; Sprout Social buyers describe renewal increases and, in one case, a substantial negotiated reduction; and Sprinklr buyers also describe manpower or outside support adding to the software cost. In the moves captured here, every move made explicitly on price went to a cheaper option. One way to read this — ours, not a buyer's — is as three costs: access (seats and users), capability (listening, analytics and modules) and operation (people and partners needed to get value from the tool). Our recommendation, not a practice buyers describe: count the seats and listening topics you will actually use before pricing a plan; price listening and analytics separately from publishing; check whether an existing organizational contract covers part of the job; and for publishing-only needs, compare the paid platform against posting natively.
Common questions
How are social media management tools priced?
Buyer comparisons in these interviews span lower-cost schedulers such as Buffer and SocialPilot through Sprout Social to higher-priced enterprise suites such as Sprinklr. Within a tool, buyers describe seats, users and listening topics moving the price, and several describe paying more for social listening, analytics or expanded reporting.
Is Sprout Social expensive?
Buyers compare it as pricier than lower-cost schedulers such as Buffer and less expensive than Sprinklr. The costs they name are per-seat pricing, listening priced by topic, advanced listening and analytics, and prices that rise at renewal. Some of its buyers call it affordable or not too expensive; one negotiated its contract down substantially for similar functionality, and another is weighing a cheaper tool.
Is Sprinklr worth the cost?
It depends on how much of it a team uses, in buyers' telling. Buyers compare it as pricier than Sprout Social and describe paying for modules they do not use; one also describes the manpower and outside support needed to run it. Others say the price is right for what it does, and one buyer in talks with it sees it as a cheaper alternative to a separate paid-social tool.
Can you negotiate social media management pricing?
Buyers describe it. One Sprout Social customer negotiated its contract down by around two-fifths with similar functionality, another took a discount on Hootsuite, and a Hootsuite customer is running a procurement-led review of what it pays. Others got a lower price through an agency partnership or a parent organization's contract.
What do buyers switch to when they leave on price?
In the moves captured here, every move explicitly driven by price went to a cheaper option: from Hootsuite to SocialPilot and to Amplify, from Khoros to Sprout Social, and from Sprout Social to Brandwatch or to posting natively on the platforms. The moves to pricier tools gave no price reason.
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