Buffer vs. Crayon Intel Pro

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Buffer
Score 7.8 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
Crayon Intel Pro
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Crayon headquartered in Boston offers the Crayon Intel Pro marketing intelligence suite, including competitive intel and analysis, market and product trends, and search tools (e.g. filters and views) for making data intelligible.N/A
Pricing
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Editions & Modules
Free
$0
Essentials
$6
per month per channel
Team
$12
per month per channel
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Free Trial
YesNo
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
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Features
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Publishing
Comparison of Publishing features of Product A and Product B
Buffer
7.9
77 Ratings
2% below category average
Crayon Intel Pro
-
Ratings
Content planning and scheduling8.677 Ratings00 Ratings
Content optimization7.470 Ratings00 Ratings
Workflow management7.866 Ratings00 Ratings
Reporting/analytics
Comparison of Reporting/analytics features of Product A and Product B
Buffer
7.1
70 Ratings
8% below category average
Crayon Intel Pro
-
Ratings
Campaign success analytics7.170 Ratings00 Ratings
Account management
Comparison of Account management features of Product A and Product B
Buffer
8.3
72 Ratings
4% above category average
Crayon Intel Pro
-
Ratings
Role-based user permissions & privileges8.559 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile access8.168 Ratings00 Ratings
Market Research
Comparison of Market Research features of Product A and Product B
Buffer
-
Ratings
Crayon Intel Pro
9.2
2 Ratings
4% above category average
Competitor Research00 Ratings7.52 Ratings
Competitor alerts00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Market Insights and Reports00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Best Alternatives
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Small Businesses
CoSchedule Marketing Suite
CoSchedule Marketing Suite
Score 10.0 out of 10
Zoho Social
Zoho Social
Score 9.1 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
CoSchedule Marketing Suite
CoSchedule Marketing Suite
Score 10.0 out of 10
Conductor
Conductor
Score 9.2 out of 10
Enterprises
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Score 9.4 out of 10
Conductor
Conductor
Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
Likelihood to Recommend
7.8
(96 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.0
(15 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.4
(33 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Availability
8.2
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.0
(24 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.0
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.6
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
BufferCrayon Intel Pro
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
Crayon, Inc.
Elsewhere in my review, I've talked about Crayon's incredible capabilities to track competitors, make ingesting intelligence about those competitors automatic, and how easily it incorporates that intelligence into dynamically and automatically-updated battlecards. I've also talked about their expanding use of AI to improve user experience and to improve the final work of CI professionals. All of which is to say that Crayon is the best tool I've ever used for intelligence analysis- it's incredible. Another area of consideration is analytics, particularly around win/loss data - Crayon's integration with Salesforce creates insightful analytics for understanding which competitors you're winning against, which you're losing against, which sellers are having a hard time, which are succeeding, and which sellers are utilizing the battlecards during the sales cycle. Proving ROI is simple with Crayon's analytics, as well, with a tool to show how much revenue you (as an individual) or your team have influenced with your battlecards.
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.
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
  • Win/Loss Analysis
  • Competitive Listening
  • Battlecard Creation
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.
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
  • Crayon has been innovative in incorporating AI into the tool, both to enhance productivity and to enhance the outcomes of analysis. The fantastic thing is these features started rudimentary, have gotten better, and are set to get better still - I could recommend this to Crayon as an area for improvement (I suppose), but they're already working to take advantage of the latest AI features to make the user experience and our outputs even better.
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
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
No answers on this topic
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
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Crayon, Inc.
Crayon is super easy to use - regardless of level in the organization. As a power user, it's easy to curate the most important information about competitors and then distribute it out to leadership and other teams so that they can stay informed on the most important competitor trends. It allows me to share out information via email or through Slack and our competitive intel channel
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Buffer
Buffer is always on hand and very reliable, their software suite rarely has outages
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
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
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
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.
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
No answers on this topic
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
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Crayon, Inc.
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.
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Crayon, Inc.
The core features of all of these are essentially the same. Crayon Impact (the win/loss side) is what won us over compared to the other tools that we demoed.
Read full review
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
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
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
Read full review
Crayon, Inc.
  • Crayon has centralized what was previously a dispersed collection of competitive intelligence analysis, streamlined sharing of competitive insights, and allowed the CI Team unprecedented visibility into our impact on the business. This helps our business by: making sharing of analysis more efficient and creating a self-serve mechanism among our stakeholders, reducing the number of bespoke requests we receive; fostering competitive discussions among the wider workforce, which pulls in multiple perspective to ultimately shape and improve the quality of finished analysis; clarifying the impact of the CI Team's role on the business, which makes discussions around ROI with leadership much easier now that they're backed by hard numbers rather than a reliance on anecdotal evidence.
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