Brand Embassy (discontinued) vs. Sprout Social

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
Score 7.4 out of 10
N/A
Brand Embassy is now part of NICE inContact CXone (acquired May 2019). Brand Embassy is social customer service software designed to help companies with high volume social customer service prioritize and automate the customer experience. Incoming requests and mentions from social media, blogs and website forms are unified in one dashboard and routed to the most relevant customer service agent. Customers…
$39
per month
Sprout Social
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Sprout Social provides social media management, marketing, customer care, data and intelligence, and employee advocacy solutions for brands and agencies, including Ticketmaster, Chipotle, Grubhub, Subaru, and Zendesk. Sprout’s platform is used to simplify social publishing, engagement, reviews, analytics and listening for customers. Sprout also provides customer success and technical support, to deliver consistent value to all users. Any organization, regardless of size or industry, receives…
$249
per month per user
Pricing
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Standard
$199 annual / $249 monthly
per user/per month
Professional
$299 annual / $399 monthly
per user/per month
Advanced
$399 annual / $499 monthly
per user/per month
Free Trial
Free
for 30 days
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Listening/monitoring
Comparison of Listening/monitoring features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
7.2
53 Ratings
6% below category average
Boolean keyword searches00 Ratings6.739 Ratings
Filtering out noise/spam00 Ratings6.943 Ratings
Sentiment analysis00 Ratings6.924 Ratings
Broad channel coverage00 Ratings8.134 Ratings
Publishing
Comparison of Publishing features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
4.9
57 Ratings
47% below category average
Content planning and scheduling00 Ratings7.057 Ratings
Audience targeting00 Ratings3.148 Ratings
Content optimization00 Ratings3.749 Ratings
Workflow management00 Ratings5.952 Ratings
Engagement
Comparison of Engagement features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
5.9
55 Ratings
31% below category average
Automated routing and prioritization00 Ratings2.825 Ratings
Customer interaction histories00 Ratings7.751 Ratings
Bulk actions00 Ratings7.246 Ratings
Marketing
Comparison of Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
4.7
39 Ratings
48% below category average
Lead generation00 Ratings2.531 Ratings
Content marketing00 Ratings3.135 Ratings
Paid media management00 Ratings6.23 Ratings
Campaigns and promotions00 Ratings7.24 Ratings
Channel coverage/integration
Comparison of Channel coverage/integration features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
7.5
59 Ratings
13% below category average
Twitter00 Ratings7.757 Ratings
Facebook00 Ratings6.459 Ratings
LinkedIn00 Ratings8.252 Ratings
Google+00 Ratings7.721 Ratings
Instagram00 Ratings7.049 Ratings
Pinterest00 Ratings7.214 Ratings
YouTube00 Ratings8.01 Ratings
Reporting/analytics
Comparison of Reporting/analytics features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
5.8
58 Ratings
30% below category average
Campaign success analytics00 Ratings4.354 Ratings
Real-time tracking00 Ratings6.455 Ratings
Competitor analysis00 Ratings6.847 Ratings
Account management
Comparison of Account management features of Product A and Product B
Brand Embassy (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Sprout Social
7.6
58 Ratings
7% below category average
Role-based user permissions & privileges00 Ratings7.655 Ratings
Mobile access00 Ratings7.551 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Small Businesses
Simplify360
Simplify360
Score 7.8 out of 10
Publer
Publer
Score 9.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Emplifi Social Marketing Cloud
Emplifi Social Marketing Cloud
Score 8.9 out of 10
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Score 9.3 out of 10
Enterprises
Emplifi Social Marketing Cloud
Emplifi Social Marketing Cloud
Score 8.9 out of 10
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Social Suite by Reputation.com
Score 9.3 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Likelihood to Recommend
2.0
(12 ratings)
7.4
(115 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.7
(5 ratings)
9.0
(62 ratings)
Usability
1.0
(1 ratings)
7.0
(42 ratings)
Availability
8.2
(1 ratings)
7.7
(8 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(7 ratings)
Support Rating
3.0
(4 ratings)
5.1
(37 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(3 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(11 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Brand Embassy (discontinued)Sprout Social
Likelihood to Recommend
Discontinued Products
Though the strengths I listed in the prior question are really hopeful, the negatives outweigh the positives so much that at this time I could not in good conscience recommend this product. I really hope those issues improve - if they do, this would be a really strong tool for a customer service-based company like ours. Particularly one with so many people working remotely. For now, I'm honestly thankful I was able to take a different position here in which I never plan to touch NICE again.
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Sprout Social
Sprout [Social] is great for small businesses, small agencies and those who need a platform but don't want to spend a fortune. If you need multiple user log-in's, the cost will add up. This is great to share a log-in for different people to use or add one or two users
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Pros
Discontinued Products
  • Easy to understand and use interface with detailed perks for responding, evaluating and tracking user feedback.
  • Excellent and easy to generate reports with lots of relevant data for day-to-day operations.
  • Agent performance and team management.
  • Easily measurable KPIs thanks to detailed reporting.
  • Use of tags and sentiment help make analysis of customer behavior easier.
Read full review
Sprout Social
  • The Landscape system that Sprout Social offers allows me to modify all the images that I want to publish on my social networks. This service allows me to modify the size of the image, add filters, modify the colors and much more, it is a very important tool to be able to have a better presentation of the images that we use in our publications on social networks.
  • It offers me a perfect statistical system where I can consult all kinds of movements that have occurred in all my social networks, I can see statistics individually or generally. The statistics allow me to see group reports, participation, information on audience movement on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn and also allow me to view the activity that has occurred in my account.
  • Sprout Social allows me to view a record in real time that shows me all the movements that my social networks are having by my employees. As Director of the Marketing Sector, this is a very important role, as I can know what actions my employees are taking to improve marketing with social networks.
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Cons
Discontinued Products
  • In terms of reports that we get from Brand Embassy, it would be great to have information about the number of cases, or conversations that we have with our customers. At the moment, we have just info about number of interactions and the total workload.
  • There are options to tag every conversation, in order to track why our customers contact us. Their tag menu is a bit too small, it would be great if it was larger.
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Sprout Social
  • I'd love to see more robust tag reporting capabilities, but they mentioned that this is something in the pipeline for improvement.
  • I wish it was easier to batch content and shift it to approval or draft mode. Sometimes clients can change their mind and moving through each post individually can be a bit time consuming. This is a very minor thing.
  • I'd love to see more customization options come to its reporting feature so we can insert graphics. Currently it supports the insertion of text only.
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Likelihood to Renew
Discontinued Products
I still use the platform: - its use is customer friendly - improves and speed up customer care on SM - improves speed and quality of internal processes/communication - monitor/measure all valuable metrics
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Sprout Social
While I am currently no longer working with the company in which I was employed and utilized Sprout Social, I do know that the company is still utilizing Sprout Social on a daily basis and I do not foresee a time when the subscription would be cancelled.
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Usability
Discontinued Products
Please see all other details from previous answers in this survey.
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Sprout Social
Sprout Social is extremely user-friendly. The publishing feature is easy to use, and provides previews of what your content will look like once posted. I also love the calendar view where you can view all posts you have scheduled for the month. The collaborative nature of the platform makes working directly in Sprout Social with clients a breeze, and we are seeing our content get approved much faster.
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Reliability and Availability
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Sprout Social
Uptime was OK, but given the fact that we are in Europe, there were some specific problems: They tended to take the system down for maintenance during the night in the US, which was during our workday. This was definitely problematic and hard to explain to our clients.
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Performance
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Sprout Social
It is quick to post, however you have to refresh the page every time you add a new scheduled item.
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Support Rating
Discontinued Products
It is difficult to describe just how awesome the support guys and gals at Brand Embassy are. Ever-present and eager to help, with kind and helpful attitude and you can really feel they are doing this to help you make results
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Sprout Social
Sprout Social's customer support is extremely prompt and always helpful. Not only do they provide quick and useful service, but the representatives follow up multiple times to ensure that the issue is fully address and/or completely resolved. The overall experience is exemplary; very few other companies provide comparable service.
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Online Training
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Sprout Social
Their training is good, but the promotion of it is even better. I don't need or have the time for training, but I was always happy to know it was there. They did a great job sending updates out and making me aware when there was a new feature that I may want training for. As for the training I never used it, so I can't comment on that
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Implementation Rating
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Sprout Social
Make sure you do it all the way. Do not break it into phases. Pour yourself a coffee, start it in the morning and you'll be done before you finish that coffee.
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Alternatives Considered
Discontinued Products
Generally I don't see huge differences between social CRM tools - it's mainly in the details of how well it's implemented and connected to your channels. For example other tools cannot easily process non-standard channels like custom made forums or have a e-mail based ticketing for private follow ups. Brand Embassy shines in this area.
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Sprout Social
I used Buffer previous to Sprout Social for two years. It was a good solution as we were getting a handle on scheduling content. It was the first real tool we had for this. But we outgrew it and they began removing features that were critical to our workflow, such as the RSS Feed. While their 50% off policy for non-profits was very helpful, once we started adding up the cost to use features like Replies and Analytics, we discovered that our needs were simply too robust for Buffer to handle. Sprout Social was the solution suggested by all our peers and we've been very happy with it ever since.
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Return on Investment
Discontinued Products
  • The first year when we started to focus on social care, we received 736 mentions. 4 years later we are dealing with 725, 942 mentions per year without the necessity to hire more people into our social care team. The seven of them are still able to respond to our customers very quickly and with high quality. And we believe that Brand Embassy is the key to our success in social care. Thanks to this tool we can simply manage such a big amount of mentions and questions.
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Sprout Social
  • Sprout has given insights to lead our creative refreshes every quarter. As we have a healthy budget on paid social, it is crucial to understand the type of creative that works best.
  • Sprout has the ability to send notifications based on certain types of messages received. This is crucial for social media teams who don't have 24/7 coverage but need to be notified of urgent matters.
  • Sprout has saved me hours of time as I no longer pull analytics natively from each social platform. The generated reports give me a look at all of the platforms and can be customized.
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ScreenShots

Brand Embassy (discontinued) Screenshots

Screenshot of

Sprout Social Screenshots

Screenshot of Sprout’s social media publishing tools, used to schedule and post messages to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and LinkedIn simultaneously from a single Compose window.