Meltwater

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Meltwater
Score 6.6 out of 10
N/A
Meltwater Media Intelligence platform is a set of public relations software tools for media monitoring, social media monitoring, and collecting brand insights. The four areas of functionality are Monitor, Analyze, Distribute, and Engage. (Note that this product combines features from the vendor Meltwater's former Buzz, Press, and News products.)N/A
Pricing
Meltwater
Editions & Modules
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Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Meltwater
Free Trial
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup fee
Additional Details—
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Meltwater
Considered Both Products
Meltwater
Chose Meltwater
I believe they are fairly evenly matched, Meltwater has better search options but it really goes back and forth on who has the most updated contacts.
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Meltwater has more detail in its analytics, and is far more complex.
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Meltwater serves as an all-in-one platform, so it has benefitted us greatly in being able to service a variety of needs in one place. Having a streamlined platform is important to our team since it can feel counterproductive to visit a variety of products to service one …
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Cision PRWeb has a more robust toolset and provides more precise metrics and analysis, as well as a better media outreach database of journalists.
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I started using Meltwater because of a client. I do find it much easier to use than Cision. I hear good things about Muck Rack and recently had a demo. That's probably the one I would use if I were to leave Meltwater. Cision has always been difficult to use, in my opinion.
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I have tried several platforms but continue coming back to Meltwater. Even though we are a national company, I like the global reach that Meltwater offers.
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We actually use both Cision and Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform. I prefer Cision over Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform in that the analytics are better, plus the competitor tracking has made my job SO much easier. After working with the customer service/technical …
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I was looking for a full-service option. I did some research. What really sold me was the presentation. They offered products that were helpful, and I wasn’t even aware of them. It is more expensive than the other products that are out there, but you get more. The other …
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Meltwater is our primary tool, however, we have engaged TVEyes as broadcast media has not been a strength of Meltwater. We would love to see that change and use Meltwater for all needs.
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Meltwater is a do-everything platform so it automatically ranks above these two programs. That said, due to these two programs focusing on both incredibly thorough reporter contact databases and tv/radio monitoring, their specialties are reliable when needed.
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Cision and LexisNexis are better for accessing articles behind paywalls. I've found that social-specific tools like Sprout Social or Sprinklr seem to be better for monitoring social media mentions. However, Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform may have upped its "social game" …
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[In my opinion,] Meltwater [Media Intelligence Platform]'s media database simply doesn't stack up to what Cision offers. It doesn't matter how nice the interface is if the data included in the database you're pulling from isn't complete or well organized. Cision can be clunky, …
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The functionality, customer service, and quality of databases are all better with Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform. I have used Cision in the past and have not been as happy with it.
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Crayon [Intel Pro] is slightly better, but not by much. If you are set on using a service like this, I'd choose it, but Crayon [Intel Pro] is more expensive. [In my opinion, it is] best to use an intern [where] you can target their efforts, not some hit-and-miss AI program.
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We've used Cision [PRWeb] for their media database for a long time, and then we've used TrendKite for media tracking [and] reporting, as well. While we're new to [Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform], [concerning] media tracking [and] reporting, it seems to be as good or …
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Meltwater is the most expensive option with the worst customer service. Terrible experience.
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We have yet to use other platforms as a comparison.
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Cision acquired TrendKite which we loved. I was worried that TrendKite would not be supported as well so we switched to Meltwater.

Years ago Meltwater was a fine choice. Now ... it is so bad it's hard to even imagine how they get by with the state of the product and the very …
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Meltwater is a fully reinforced software and its features outweigh the purpose of Mention, but they are similar in that they provide insight into where your brand is being discussed and who is talking about it. I was able to find what I needed out of Mention, within Meltwater, …
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We originally had Salesforce/Radian6 and switched to Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform to align with what other similar brands were using, and because at that time, Salesforce was experiencing technical issues. After a year and a half with Meltwater Media Intelligence …
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TrendKite is much more flexible with an unlimited amount of dashboards, searches, metrics on a particular dashboard, and more. There are pricing systems with all platforms sure, but to add broadcast is outrageous. Not to mention, their live chat staff has been rude in the past …
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While we use Google and Hootsuite as part of our class education, Meltwater's platform is our go-to every semester. Meltwater provides a dashboard that makes it easy for the new and/or experienced user to understand the data, share it with a class or group, and offers room for …
Top Pros
Top Cons
Best Alternatives
Meltwater
Small Businesses
Newswire
Newswire
Score 8.3 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud
Score 7.6 out of 10
Enterprises
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud
Score 7.6 out of 10
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User Ratings
Meltwater
Likelihood to Recommend
5.7
(71 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.0
(9 ratings)
Usability
2.2
(3 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
7.5
(28 ratings)
In-Person Training
8.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
8.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
6.1
(2 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
1.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Meltwater
Likelihood to Recommend
Meltwater
Meltwater is well-suited for agencies that have an engagement team who is looking to service a variety of client needs such as social media reporting, public relations outreach, and community management. If you're looking to have a platform serve just one need, you can still use Meltwater but will get more bang for your buck if you are needing a variety of tools.
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Pros
Meltwater
  • Media research - you can search for relevant publications and journalists to add to your media list.
  • Earned media coverage - you can search for coverage of your brand and find news stories that also include data that may be useful (how many people did the story reach for example).
  • Building media lists - if you have no current existing list, you can build and export one in Excel for example.
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Cons
Meltwater
  • The dashboards are not user-friendly, customizable (color, font size, etc.), or worthy of presenting to a client. All of the insights from a dashboard get pulled from the platform and placed into a more client-friendly presentation.
  • Paywalls for certain publications connected to who-knows-what. DowJones racket limits media monitoring capabilities and results in manual searches for a growing number of publications.
  • TVeyes, the broadcast monitoring arm of the media monitoring capabilities, just needs TLC and to become more client-facing. Currently, the links produced to share clips look sketchy, and they have a relatively short shelf life.
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Likelihood to Renew
Meltwater
Meltwater works well for our organization and has allowed us to meet our internal goals. We are always open to new products and services that may be able to provide similar or better features; however, our experience has been that many of Meltwater's competitors are not up to the task.
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Usability
Meltwater
Once you get some basic training it's pretty easy to use. I would like to see training manuals, or instructional videos to help me explore features I'm not currently using.
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Support Rating
Meltwater
Our account rep at Meltwater went dark for a long time. Then, a couple of weeks ago, our new account manager reached out to set up a meeting. Apparently, they had a big shakeup in the company, and there were some personnel changes. Our new account rep was great in discussing the platform's capabilities that were available to us and even offered to schedule a follow-up meeting with his technical team to introduce our new social media team members to the platform and how it could help them with their jobs.
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In-Person Training
Meltwater
Again, really in-depth and helpful for a program that is really easy to use.
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Online Training
Meltwater
Walked step by step through program. Very informative on a program that doesn't require much training.
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Implementation Rating
Meltwater
You are only allowed 15 users, so make sure you've identified who will have access to use the tool.
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Alternatives Considered
Meltwater
I was looking for a full-service option. I did some research. What really sold me was the presentation. They offered products that were helpful, and I wasn’t even aware of them. It is more expensive than the other products that are out there, but you get more. The other companies are good, but Meltwater Media Intelligence is more full service.
Read full review
Return on Investment
Meltwater
  • As a PR firm, we rely on the media databases that [Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform] supplies to deliver the media exposure that they expect from us.
  • We utilize their tracking of media hits for our overall reporting to our clients.
  • Both of these are advantageous in helping us to not only keep our existing clients happy but also to gain new clients (and, in turn - revenue), as well.
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