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Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring)

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring)
Formerly Radian6 + Buddy Media

Overview

What is Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring)?

Radian6 was acquired by Salesforce.com in 2011 and - along with Buddy Media - became Salesforce Social Studio. The product is slated to be retired in November 2024.

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Recent Reviews
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Popular Features

View all 27 features
  • Content planning and scheduling (10)
    10.0
    100%
  • Broad channel coverage (10)
    10.0
    100%
  • Twitter (10)
    9.0
    90%
  • Workflow management (10)
    8.0
    80%
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Pricing

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Basic

$1,000.00

Cloud
Per Org Per Month

Pro

$4,000.00

Cloud
Per Org Per Month

Corporate

$12,000.00

Cloud
Per Org Per Month

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Features

Listening/monitoring

Using complex keyword searches to surface insights from social media conversations.

8.5
Avg 7.7

Publishing

Scheduling posts to various social media channels and profiles from one interface.

8.5
Avg 7.9

Engagement

Engaging with customers and responding to comments and inquiries via social media channels.

7.6
Avg 8.1

Marketing

Using the software to increase customer engagement and grow customer base via social media channels.

5.5
Avg 7.7

Channel coverage/integration

Effective integration with social media networks, including the ability to monitor, publish and respond.

8.1
Avg 8.5

Reporting/analytics

8.6
Avg 7.8

Account management

Users can manage access to multiple social media accounts.

9.5
Avg 8.2
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Product Details

What is Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring)?

Social Studio (formerly Radian6 and Buddy Media) enables users to listen, engage, and publish within a social media marketing and management suite — and connect enriched social data to marketing with sales and service. Social Studio was the result of Salesforce' combining of Radian6 with the capabilities of Buddy Media, a social media publishing tool acquired by Salesforce in 2012. Social Studio is slated to be retired in November of 2024.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring) Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationNo

Frequently Asked Questions

Radian6 was acquired by Salesforce.com in 2011 and - along with Buddy Media - became Salesforce Social Studio. The product is slated to be retired in November 2024.

Bottlenose, Brandwatch, and Verint Messaging are common alternatives for Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring).

Reviewers rate Sentiment analysis and Broad channel coverage and Content planning and scheduling highest, with a score of 10.

The most common users of Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio (retiring) are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(149)

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-5 of 5)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
November 04, 2014

Radian6 Review

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • The ability to dive into data various ways and bring user directly to source of mention. I love the ability to look at data and dig into the data. For example, looking at Topic Trends and then being able to dive into the River of News from a specific point in the Topic Trends. Another way would be to look at the keyword groups, dive into media type and then dive into a specific media type for more detailed data about Twitter or Forums specifically.
  • I really like the art of the Keyword Configuration and ability to filter noise.
  • Number of sources covered. One of the things I love about the tool is the ability to crawl so many sources including social media sites, blogs, mainstream news, forums, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and more. The tool covers over 650 million sources of data the last rep I talked to in late July, 2013.
  • Ability to train multiple users across the organization.
  • I really like the Engagement Console workflow and use the feature to delegate mentions to the appropriate stakeholders. I also like to flag and prioritize mentions among team members. We can also respond to mentions from the tool specifically if we need to.
  • Provide insights based on data.
  • Customize Reports. Many times, I would like to see data a specific way. Currently, this tool does not allow me to custom build a report in the tool to send to my managers. I will need to export data and create my own dashboard based on the data I would like to see. The Summary Dashboard does not provide me the reporting I need.
  • Sentiment could be improved.
  • Turning data into actionable insights across the organization.
  • Using custom reports to gain more budget for paid media and other areas.
We evaluate up to five listening tools every year and each has their pros and cons. Radian6 satisfied our needs in reporting, insights and the representation of the data. We also liked the amount of data the tool could pull conversations from. We found this tool had the ability to capture a wide range of sources for mentions.
4
Analytics, Marketing Strategy and Internal Marketing
2
Analysts and Strategists.
  • Listening for mentions of the brand, industry and competition.
  • Based on insights determining what actions should be made for the product, company or brand.
I am trained, comfortable and understand how to use the tool to its full potential.
We were not currently investing in a listening tool.
  • Implemented in-house
Our company, Sundog can provide implementation. www.sundoginteractive.com.
It's an ongoing process to filter noise and optimize the keyword configuration to its fullest potential.
  • Online training
  • Self-taught
Love the live webinars and schedules.
Yes and No. I believe the live webinars are needed and then time needs to be dedicated to self-train or work with a team who has additional training.
I really love the overall support process for Radian6; however have had some communication issues with some reps to clarify understanding at times.. I find the overall process of this tool's support great. I would like the Account Reps and Customer Service Reps to be more knowledgeable once I get to them. Sometimes, it takes a few times to connect before an issue is solved.
No
We have a team in-house.
Very easy to use and find valuable mentions.
Could vary based on your internet connection.
  • Google Analytics
  • Omniture
  • Salesforce
Salesforce is an ongoing project to identify and build social profiles.
October 18, 2013

Easy To Use

Jeff Bachmann | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • It allows companies to easily publish engaging content on their Facebook page. Whether it was a sweepstakes, poll or photo contest, we were able to turn them around on a dime.
  • The only issue we experienced was during publishing status updates. There were times when it wouldn't publish to the entire public.
  • Improved engagement.
Shoutlet, Vitrue, Context Optional
3
  • We purchased Buddy Media because we wanted an easy and quick way to build out engaging Facebook tabs. What sold us on the platform was the analytics.
Budget constraints mean that we are unlikely to renew.
  • Vendor implemented
  • Implemented in-house
No
  • Online training
  • In-person training
Our contact, Pam, was wonderful and was always a phone call away.
No
Anyone who can operate a computer can operate Buddy Media.
Never had an issue with it.
Score 2 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • Localized, keyword, social media monitoring
  • The product had lot of "noise" despite filters; no easy integration with social intranet and natural employee workflow; standalone system.
  • We needed a tool that integrated with our social intranet (in this case Jive).
  • Additionally, we wanted workflow capability that would provide a clear process for all employees to follow, and not something we would have to buy an individual license for every user. It was crucially important to collect and filter the data, and then assign it to the right people within the organization to respond.
Overall, it was an ok tool for a standalone PR team; however, to do social monitoring across teams, other tools are better. It was also not as good as tools like Spredfast for engagement.

Radian6 is really built for listening to conversations, but Spredfast is built for engaging on the most important items. Radian6 might actually have more advanced listening filters (ie. Language); however, Spredfast is built for taking action, participating on conversations, and sharing relevant materials.
  • brand mentions and awareness tracking
Did a brief evaluation of other tools, but at the time, Radian 6 was the industry leader.
5
Marketing
Public Relations
Product Management
Customer Support
1
  • Social media monitoring
I found an alternative solution to be better (first Jive, and then Spredfast because it has a better listening component and engagement capabilities). Radian 6 was expensive to scale. The B2B company I worked for targeted several industries - ie. robotics, medical device design, automotive. Radian6 charged both by keyword and user. It was impossible to scale due to cost restrictions. Therefore, we could only use the tool to monitor and react to certain product keywords and not proactively to get involved in important conversations in various industries.

Instead we went with a service that integrated with our social intranet. This allowed the social team to quickly find internal experts based on their profiles, host a conversation about the social media post internally, and the publish a response back out. This was better than getting user licenses and training thousands of employees on a tool they may only use a few times a year or trying to manage the social media monitoring process via email.
I switched from free tools such as Google Alerts and TweetDeck to Radian6.
This is a SaaS product, so getting the product up and running is quite simple.
  • Online training
It was simple and efficient.
Couldn't ever help solve our spam issue, although they tried.
Yes
It was simple to use, although the filtering process could be improved. We were never really successful in filtering out SPAM.
No issues with performance.
  • No
# keywords, # users
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • We appreciate it's twitter results more than it's other functions. Twitter monitoring is acceptable and translates well to measurement reporting in Social.
  • Social Brand Analytics, Social monitoring & Competitive Analysis
  • FB analytics due to account privacy settings
  • Sentiment analysis
Overall Radian 6 is useful. The cons are FB mention data due to user privacy settings and the lack of solid Sentiment analysis
  • Social Brand Intelligence reporting. This involves monitoring of the client's brand as well as their competitive set. You can determine sentiment of conversation via random sample and can determine the Share of Voice in various media types to include, blogs, twitter & Facebook.
  • Helps develop Social insights through SBA performance, Sentiment and Competitive analysis
  • The alternative to not using this platform of course is to monitor manually. This is both cost prohibitive to the client and requires a large team of hourly billable staff versus one or two individuals using R6 which is less the $1000 per brand profile.
5
Any staffer from Intern to VP
0
  • For our purposes, we use Radian 6 for Social Listening and it serves as a both a listening and Real-Time monitoring tool and the output / or return provides us with data to produce analytic reports, Social Brand Intelligence as well as data that provides snapshot analytics for Competitor Intel reporting.
We are an agency and make product recommendations to clients on tools depending on what they are trying to achieve. In general, Radian6 is relatively inexpensive and provides great Twitter metrics. There are better platforms for various other tasks i.e. more accurate sentiment measurement, real time monitoring (less lag time), etc.
I did not switch from another platform. Was the current agency platform when I joined the agency 18 months ago (Aug 2011).
  • Implemented in-house
Creating a profile for a brand is self service and is time consuming. Training new users is also time consuming and the real experience comes from hours in the cockpit.
  • Online training
Training gives quick training but it really comes down to hours in the cockpit
They are quick to join a GoTo meeting to walk through the process together and if the issue / question is not resolved / answered they will pass along to the technicians who will respond quickly
Yes
There are often oddities, conflicting data that requires and explaination, etc. The client support that we have experienced has been terrific.
There are certain restrictions to profile creation, key words, and historical data only goes back 90 days. More $$ if you want increased historical data
The platform is rarely down
There is a delay which makes real-time monitoring a bit more difficult but overall it's performance is decent
  • BuddyMedia CMS
Yes. The Buddy Media integration with Radian 6 is now called Marketing Cloud. It combines the Radian 6 listening tool with a CRM tool. This allows the user to listen, manage and respond via social using one platform.
The terms are on a client / brand profile basis. Believe it is currently a $800 / profile for agency
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • Radian6 is the easiest platform to use. User experience is of great quality. Certain analysis and outputs of the platform are yet to be matched by other platforms (such as an analysis of most mentioned hashtags under a campaign)
  • Provides data for only 30 days from starting date, but it builds up (day 1 gives you access to 30 days prior. Day 31 gives access to 60 days worth of data)
  • Difficult to use 1 campaign (or profile) for more than 1 client (if the intention is to cut costs)
  • Not good for Arabic.
  • Stopped using it anymore so none.
Meltwater, picked it over Radian6. we picked Meltwater because Meltwater can pick up Arabic conversations, Radian 6 cannot.
2
2
Analysis and business development. Community manager.
  • We were using the product to listen to conversations and mentions about our clients and their competitors. We generated reports about these mentions and then presented them to the client and measured sentiment.The primary activities were listening, reporting, and online reputation management.
Because it doesn't support Arabic and when you look closely, it's more expensive that other tools we're using now, because Radian 6 is per campaign per user.
  • Vendor implemented
  • Implemented in-house
  • Self-taught
It's easy to use, easy to figure out, and my colleagues loved it.
Support was generally very good. However, Meltwater has an office in Middle East so it was considerably easier to connect with them.
Not Sure
This software is great, gives a lot of insights and neat reports, however, our only concern was Arabic keywords.
We never had issues with availability.
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