Adobe Social vs. Buffer

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Adobe Social
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
Adobe Social, incorporates technology from Context Optional and Efficient Frontier. Adobe acquired Facebook advertising-management platform Efficient Frontier in November. Six months earlier, Efficient Frontier had acquired Facebook page-management platform Context Optional. Adobe Social is an enterprise social platform competing with Buddy Media and Involver, enabling things like automated content marketing and social sweepstakes and competitions. Customers tend to be medium to large…N/A
Buffer
Score 8.4 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
Buffer is a social sharing tool. When browsing content, clicking on the Buffer icon automatically stores the content and schedules posts to social media channels throughout the day.
$0
Pricing
Adobe SocialBuffer
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Free
$0
Essentials
$6
per month per channel
Team
$12
per month per channel
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Adobe SocialBuffer
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsA discount is offered for annual billing.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Adobe SocialBuffer
Features
Adobe SocialBuffer
Listening/monitoring
Comparison of Listening/monitoring features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.4
Ratings
4% below category average
Buffer
-
Ratings
Boolean keyword searches7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Filtering out noise/spam7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Sentiment analysis7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Broad channel coverage7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Publishing
Comparison of Publishing features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.4
Ratings
8% below category average
Buffer
8.6
Ratings
7% above category average
Content planning and scheduling7.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Audience targeting7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Content optimization7.50 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Workflow management7.50 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Engagement
Comparison of Engagement features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.7
Ratings
3% below category average
Buffer
-
Ratings
Automated routing and prioritization7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Customer interaction histories8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Bulk actions7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Marketing
Comparison of Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
8.0
Ratings
3% above category average
Buffer
-
Ratings
Lead generation8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Content marketing8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Paid media management8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Campaigns and promotions8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Channel coverage/integration
Comparison of Channel coverage/integration features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.9
Ratings
6% below category average
Buffer
-
Ratings
Twitter8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Facebook8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
LinkedIn7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Google+7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Instagram8.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Pinterest8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
YouTube8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Reporting/analytics
Comparison of Reporting/analytics features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.8
Ratings
1% below category average
Buffer
8.3
Ratings
5% above category average
Campaign success analytics8.00 Ratings8.30 Ratings
Real-time tracking7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Competitor analysis8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Account management
Comparison of Account management features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Social
7.3
Ratings
9% below category average
Buffer
9.0
Ratings
12% above category average
Role-based user permissions & privileges7.50 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Mobile access7.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
User Ratings
Adobe SocialBuffer
Likelihood to Recommend
7.5
(0 ratings)
8.8
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
5.4
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.5
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
7.0
(0 ratings)
8.2
(0 ratings)
Performance
5.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.0
(0 ratings)
6.1
(0 ratings)
Online Training
6.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
5.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
8.6
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Adobe SocialBuffer
Likelihood to Recommend
For intricate, complex organizations who dynamically fuse social and digital - Adobe Social is great. A methodical approach to social and its integration to other aspects of the company is needed. Furthermore, there must be buy in for many departments and the aptitude in those departments to learn how to use the tool - and then actually do it. There are many hurdles for most companies. It is NOT a tool for fast-paced social brands who want to react and measure in real time.
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It is a very interesting tool for entrepreneurs or CEOs of startups who do not have much time to manage social media communication and also have few resources at the beginning of their venture. It can also be convenient for small companies that do not have specific personnel with training in community management and require easy-to-use tools to carry out the basic actions of scheduled publication on social media.
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Pros
  • Provide extensive Social Media listening so we can evaluate new ways we can enhance our card member experience and constantly evaluate the needs of our card members.
  • Provides detailed and in depth analytics so we can make smarter Social Media decisions.
  • Allows us to provide content across multiple Social Media platforms.
  • Provides sentiment of engagement
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  • I can plan and publish content on social channels.
  • Buffer's interface is quite tidy and generates the necessary facilities to save us time in publishing consistent content.
  • It has a special price; it is pretty affordable.
  • It has the possibility of integrating with other tools to improve its functions.
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Cons
  • Editing a scheduled post is problematic in terms of content or just date/time
  • Reliability: I have experienced various glitches. Yesterday it would not let me attach a link to a post.
  • Ability to tag a Facebook page and other missing functionality.
  • Instagram.
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  • Analytics-- The analytics on the Pro plan are limited at best. You can simply review your posts from the past 30 days, but you can't access any analysis (or even simple tallying of Likes, Shares, etc.) without upgrading to the Premium or Business plans, which are otherwise more than we need at the moment.
  • Publish+Reply+Analyze-- It's a bit tedious to have these basic social media functions/tools separated out as three distinct products, as well as overkill for a small nonprofit without a dedicated social media team. I imagine each tool is good at its job if you need 'em.
  • Linking to Accounts-- Buffer seems to lose touch with Facebook and LinkedIn somewhat frequently. It's vaguely annoying but very simple to fix, so I just roll with it.
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Likelihood to Renew
I wasn't in charge of making the actual management decision, but I would absolutely renew Adobe Social. As I mentioned, it provides strong and in-depth analytics and listening tools. The reports that it generates are very thorough and easy to read. I loved the platform and would recommend it to anyone
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Ease of use, affordability, time saved and just love for the app and the team. It's not a miracle tool that will suddenly increase your company's value or leads, you still need to put in quality posts, thoughts and content but when used regularly and with thought, you'll be happy in the long run
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Usability
The reason why I give this rating is that the overall platform is simple to use. You don't need to be tech-savvy or have a vast understanding of how to work a marketing tool. It is very simple to use compared to different platforms and you learn a lot of different ways to build your business.
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Easy enough to use even my boss got it right away. It helps to off-set the workload to less active times, and we can preschedule way in advance, which also helps to keep the team on track as we know what we have planned and want to reach our milestones before posts go online.
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Reliability and Availability
No answers on this topic
Buffer is always on hand and very reliable, their software suite rarely has outages
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Performance
No answers on this topic
Buffer performs well on both desktop and mobile platforms. The one area as I have stated before is that it does not always want to automatically push to Instagram and the user will have to go do it manually. Buffer works very well pushing to other platforms. The instagram issue is the only reason buffer does not get a 10 on this section
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Support Rating
The reason why I give this a 9 out of 10 in terms of support is because of the mobile app functionality. I have had many issues in terms of logging in and also loading pages. The app overall is easy to use but at what cost? Other than that it is great and I still enjoy Adobe Social.
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  1. It really helped to my business to grow online.
  2. I was able to take actions mindfully as the analytics are damn good.
  3. Also used for managing clients social media accounts and it proved to be a best resource.
  4. Clients were really happy as they got high demand and growth on internet and the secret is Buffer.
  5. The user interface is really easy to understand and manage. Support is 24/7 available to help.
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Online Training
Training was long and a little confusing. While a number of features carried over, they were still covered in this elongated training. It would have been nice to have training tailored to experience level with the product.
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No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
The implementation was done during our POC. We had a very mixed experience here, and have had some issues arise since based on the way the tool was implemented. An Adobe employee went ahead and made a change to our account that was unauthorized (helpful for our implementation) which caused issues in on boarding another team who needed the same change, but could not get it done without costly Adobe certification
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We were very satisfied with the implementation of Buffer. We had no issues switching from the platform that we were using over to buffer. Our staff did not even miss a beat when it came to posting content. It was an easy transition and I feel that is something that buffer has really done well. They have an "out of the box" usability platform
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Alternatives Considered
I don't really use many types of Adobe products however I used photoshop in the past and in terms of similarities they don't have much since it is for different purposes. The one thing they are great at is functionality. Many features and ways to finish the job effectively but overall great!
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Both of them are great at their own levels but I find Buffer quite easy to go and the way they perform every task is quite like my way of work so I personally like Buffer more, it has helped me save my most of the time hence improved my work efficiency and also the creativity they put into my work is outstanding. The support I get whenever I run into problems they provide a quick response every time.
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Scalability
No answers on this topic
Buffer does what it say on tin as they say! you can always count on Buffer. Buffer can be scale to 25 social account with 2,000 scheduled post which is enough for most agencies or businesses
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Return on Investment
  • Although we chose Adobe Social believing it could provide ROI metrics we could not get elsewhere, that turned out not to be the case. Site Catalyst can give us everything we need without Adobe Social
  • Adobe Social did not create greater efficiencies and speed up our activity within social media. In fact, it has done the oppposite. It is very cumbersome with little clear benefit.
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  • It has saved money by allowing us to automate our social using one person
  • It allows us to connect one channel at a time instead of wasting money on larger account management tools
  • We are making money, because it has already delivered several clients
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ScreenShots

Buffer Screenshots

Screenshot of The Buffer dashboardScreenshot of Customizable posting scheduleScreenshot of Tailored PostsScreenshot of List or calendar view of scheduled postsScreenshot of Browser extensionScreenshot of Social media analytics