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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Buffer

    Score8.4 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.

    $6

    per month per channel

    Visible Intelligence, discontinued

    Score8.4 out of 10
    N/AVisible Intelligence, developed by Visible Technologies and formerly offered under the name Cymfony, was a listening tool with an analytics dashboard. Visible was acquired by Cision, and later discontinued.N/A
    Pricing
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Editions & Modules
    Free
    $0
    Essentials
    $6
    per month per channel
    Team
    $12
    per month per channel
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesNo
    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
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Considered Both Products
    Buffer
    No answer on this topic
    Discontinued Products
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    90%
    Would buy again
    27 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    93%
    Delivers good value for the price
    25 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    83%
    Happy with the feature set
    25 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    96%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    23 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    26 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Features
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Publishing
    Comparison of Publishing features of Buffer and Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    Feature
    Buffer
    8.6
    68 Ratings
    7% above category average
    Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    -
    Ratings
    Content planning and scheduling9.068 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content optimization8.061 Ratings00 Ratings
    Workflow management8.857 Ratings00 Ratings
    Reporting/analytics
    Comparison of Reporting/analytics features of Buffer and Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    Feature
    Buffer
    8.3
    63 Ratings
    5% above category average
    Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    -
    Ratings
    Campaign success analytics8.363 Ratings00 Ratings
    Account management
    Comparison of Account management features of Buffer and Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    Feature
    Buffer
    9.0
    65 Ratings
    12% above category average
    Visible Intelligence, discontinued
    -
    Ratings
    Role-based user permissions & privileges9.052 Ratings00 Ratings
    Mobile access9.062 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Small Businesses
    Sendible
    Score7.6 out of 10
    Mention
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Vista Social
    Score9.5 out of 10
    Mention
    Score9.4 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (discontinued)
    Score7.3 out of 10
    Social Suite by Reputation.com
    Score9.4 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.8
    (88 ratings)
    7.6
    (2 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.0
    (14 ratings)
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    Usability
    9.0
    (24 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Availability
    8.2
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    6.1
    (23 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Configurability
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    8.6
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    BufferVisible Intelligence, discontinued
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Buffer
    It helps me save hours by devoting only half an hour in a month's worth of posting, in addition to that it is quite simple to use. Buffer for scheduling social posts well in advance, but I have begun using it instead of posting natively on the social apps themselves because it makes it super easy to post the same messages to more than one platform.
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    The only time I have trouble recommending Visible is to my clients of specific markets. We work with several McDonald's co-ops and we can't narrow our searches to a specific region for example, to the state of Iowa or Kansas City region.
    Read full review
    Pros
    Buffer
    • 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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • The way the cloud of related terms, a.k.a "social media differentiating terms", was organized into a chart with the frequency of appearance was extremely helpful. Each term was also a link to other terms that may be related to your research as well, which was insightful.
    • Visible Intelligence allows you to view the differentiating terms across platforms. This is particularly a useful tool when trying to compare and understand what is being said and where exactly (Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, etc.)
    • Most of the social media analytical tools allow you to view "sample content". However, and I find this extremely useful in many cases, Visible Intelligence allows you to directly connect with the person that posted the content. Because of such feature more clarification can be accomplished.
    Read full review
    Cons
    Buffer
    • Expensive Analytics: The upgrade you need to access your analytics is quite expensive, and I have come across other tools that provide the same or even more for a lesser priced plan.
    • No Media Library: The one feature I have found on another social media planning tool that I wish Buffer had is a media library. This allows you to upload photos you aren't using right away to have them readily available when you do decide to use them. This is not a feature in Buffer.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Firehose terms. I wish there was a place in setting or somewhere that let us know what firehose terms we currently have. To make it really great it would be nice for it to also show a history of what terms we had in the past with dates and the start dates of current firehose terms. I can't tell you how many times we've had to reach out to our rep to let us know what we currently have in place and when you have multiple users in the agency using the tool, it's near impossible to keep track of when changes were made.
    • Exports, I wish there was a way to have larger exports. And if you can't, an easier way to break down larger exports. For example, say my timeframe is only 1 day and I have over 20,000 results in that day– there is no way for me to export all of those results by breaking it down because my only options are most recent, most relevant, klout, most confident, most influential, most followers, positive, negative. There's no option to break down 1 day by the first 20,000 then the second 20,000 and so on. Instead I have to then manually break it down by media type and hope each one of those is less than 20,000.
    • Author influence, I know this algorithm is tricky but at the very least I think it could be better explained within the tool so when clients ask questions we can answer them. It could be nice to have some filtering options with this because several authors get a 99 score and it's not valuable information.
    • Tagging, when tagging content it is extremely annoying that I can't add new tags in the "select tags" drop down. It takes too much time to go in to where I can add new tags and then go back to where I was.
    • It'd also be nice to have setting for a stream where only a certain folder or folders of tags display. So when I'm in client x's search the only tags that display are client x's instead of all 5 clients and I have to keep scrolling through to find what I need.
    • Archive, when you hit archive on a post it does nothing. It stays in your search and ends up in all you charts which skews your data. What I do now is I created an actual tag called "archive" (because if I didn't tag it with that and I exported everything nothing in the excel doc tells me I hit Visible's archive button for that result) I export the search, I remove everything I tagged as "archive" in excel and then I manual make charts. When I hit Visible's "archive" button it should be completely removed and if I made a mistake and I want to un-archive it, there should be a section where I can go and see everything I archived and be able to un-archive it.
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Buffer
    I am giving buffer this rating because of a couple issues that it has compared to other platforms. It does not always post to instagram and you will need to go in an manually post. Also, one of the biggest qualms that we have with buffer is the price it costs to have robust analytics
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    I loved the way Visible Intelligence was similar yet different from Radian6. Although I have more experience with Radian6, it still wasn't hard to use and get familiar with Visible Intelligence. I personally liked how easy it was to do your "thing" and conduct your analysis using VI. That is plenty of reason for me to consider re-using it in any project that requires social media analysis.
    Read full review
    Usability
    Buffer
    We use Buffer for certain website content that should be shared on social networks, having this tool helps us to do it faster and easier since we can send the publications from the internet browser and the stack of scheduled messages. It is really fast and easy for all team members who share access to the account, so at the same time that we analyze the information that we can share, the message stack is prepared
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    It's easy to user once you become familiar with it
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Buffer
    Buffer is always on hand and very reliable, their software suite rarely has outages
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    Buffer
    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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Buffer
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    My rep is always helpful and is timely with my requests
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Buffer
    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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Buffer
    I also used Combin which is easy and free to use. However, Combin only posts when the computer is active and connected to the internet. So, posting while you are not actively using your computer at that moment is not possible, therefore Buffer is much more efficient as you can even post while being on vacation without working.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Scalability
    Buffer
    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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Buffer
    • 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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Faster/better content analysis.
    • Faster return time of reports.
    Read full review
    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