When you are trying to get your social media and email marketing campaign, then you are going to need a software platform. Scheduling starts to become a pain without them. Two of the most commonly used social media management platforms are CoSchedule and Sprout Social. 

• CoSchedule is the cheaper and more basic option, ideal for companies just starting out in social media marketing.
• Sprout Social is ideal for larger companies that need more numbers-based decision making tools. 
• Both platforms offer a world class experience that gained top ratings on software sites.

Each has its own perks, but only one is going to be worth it for your company. Let’s figure out which one is best for you.

How are we going to do this CoSchedule vs Sprout Social comparison?

Before we begin, I’m going to take a look at the basics of price, features, ease of use, and integrations. Then, I’m going to take a look at their customer service and how well people like each option.

Which has a better price?

Pricing is a bit difficult to see at first, since they tend to try to hide their prices at first. Both companies offer up a free trial to see if you are satisfied before you buy. However, the pricing of each is going to be very different:

• Sprout Social’s pricing is going to make your jaw drop a little. It costs $89.99 per month. 
• If you choose CoSchedule, then you can get their services for as little as $29 per month. 
• Both platforms will have higher priced options that are meant to help you expand your service. 

Winner: CoSchedule

What does each software platform help marketers do?

Believe it or not, there is a lot of differences between the two. While they both offer marketing and scheduling services, how much extra they offer changes. Let’s look at both. 

What features does CoSchedule offer?

In a lot of ways, CoSchedule carved a niche for itself among new and small businesses. This software platform offers the following features:

• Basic social media management
• Editorial calendars
• Content management
• Grouping
• Multi-channel campaigns

So, what we have here is a major platform that’s mostly dedicated to scheduling. Everything is meant to be easy to access. The dashboard itself has a tab for team collaborations, calendars for content scheduling, and groupings by funnel stage. 

The analytics portion of the platform is going to be easy to use and understand. You can pair things by the part of the sales funnel you’re at, color-code things, and also check out your posting automation schedule in calendar form.

What features does Sprout Social offer?

Sprout Social is a great choice for people who want to have an all-in-one marketing option. They tend to be the more analytical side of social media management and social media marketing. As a result, they have all the features of CoSchedule plus a little extra. 

• Basic social media management
• Editorial calendars
• Content management
• Grouping
• Multi-channel campaigns
• Audience targeting 
• Conversion management

As you can see, Sprout Social is a little bit more “techy” than a typical tech platform would be. This means that you would get a better chance at analytics and better control over your conversion. 

Sprout Social has a lot of little perks that make it a smart choice for people who want to get a close watch on their analytics. For example, they will send weekly stats to your inbox and also make it easy to segment your market. 

Winner: Sprout Social

How easy to use are these programs?

Both Sprout Social and CoSchedule are pretty similar in terms of usability. Their programmers were fairly dead-set on making sure that their platforms are fairly intuitive. With that said, there are some key differences that may cause you to go towards one kit or another. 

• If you want to analyze the performance of your social media campaign, then Sprout Social is the way to go. This has built-in analytics and makes it easy for people to understand what’s going on. They also make everything really easy to navigate through. 
• Both CoSchedule and Sprout Social make scheduling content easy. I mean, this is what they’re there for. You can schedule stuff ahead of time, put it on multiple platforms, and also just work on getting groupings for your different campaigns. This stuff all matters. 
• Both CoSchedule and Sprout Social offer knowledge bases and communities dedicated to their use. So, if you’re feeling lost, you can rely on both to ensure you learn the ropes. There’s a tutorial for just about everything and everyone on their site.
• Oh, and both platforms have multiple access methods. You can use them on Android devices, iOS devices, Macs, and through webapps. In other words, you never have to worry about it being a matter of a hardware failure. 

Which platform is easier to integrate accounts with?

So, this is kind of hard for me to figure out at first glance. Both Sprout Social and CoSchedule have amazing integration abilities for their social media. They also happen to be really good at fast setups with other major platforms for login purposes, like Google. 

However, there seems to be a major difference between the two in terms of workflow and group collaboration integrations. Here’s what I noticed from the reviews:

• Sprout Social had better workflow ratings. This included workflow approvals as well as matters of content management, permissions, and logins. 
• CoSchedule seems to be the slightly easier one to set up. There was not much data to give on the matter of integrating login tools. 
• CoSchedule’s browser extension tool shows that it can work well with Chrome. This is a huge matter for people like myself, who work on a Chromebook. Sprout Social also has an extension but there have been complaints about it.

The Winner: Tied.

Which platform has better customer service and care?

This is a toughie, because it’s like comparing rose gold to regular gold. Both platforms have the same value that they bring to the table in terms of customer care. However, the way it seems to come out differs ever so slightly. 

Both platforms have highly active phone lines, but it seems like Sprout Social is a little bit more appreciated. CoSchedule has gotten several complaints regarding pushy salespeople, which honestly would be a major turnoff for anyone. 

The Winner: Sprout Social

So which one wins out?

Honestly, each platform has its own perks and pitfalls. If you are a fan of simplicity and want to put together a social media marketing campaign on a shoestring budget, then it’s going to be CoSchedule for you. On the other hand, if you want more bells and whistles, then it’s clear that Sprout Social is better.

The next steps

Now that you have a better understanding of each platform, the next steps should be pretty clear:

1. Figure out what stage of growth your company is in, as well as the accounts you need to automate.
2. Choose the social media marketing platform for your needs.
3. Start working on your campaign.

Of course, getting a social media marketing campaign off the ground isn’t easy. You need to learn more about it before you start getting your act together. Wanna check out SavvySME’s Marketing Group?