Item: Buffer
Rating: 10
Author: David Fox

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Our social media department uses Buffer to organize, schedule, and post custom content to multiple clients' social media accounts. Once we began posting for more than five clients, it became very difficult to manage all their channels efficiently. Buffer allowed us to have access to everything in one place with an easy-to-use and organize platform for everything we needed to be efficient and effective. Now, we can manage multiple clients with multiple channels and keep track of everything we need to stay on top of everything much easier.

Pros and Cons

Schedule posts.
Organize multiple clients.
Display past activity all in one place.
Set reminders and notify team members.

Some channels, like Facebook, have better internal posting systems.
We've had some issues with specific video files that Buffer does not handle well.
Would be nice if some of the useful FB tools would integrate with the platform.

Return on Investment

We've been able to double our social media clients without doubling our costs.
We spend less time posting and more time creating quality content.
We can expand to other channels without straining our systems.

Alternatives Considered

We have not used any other similar products to manage, organize, schedule, and analyze our social media posting. We have used other posting platforms within the channels themselves, however. Facebook is slightly more advanced than Buffer for posting on Facebook — but that is understandable since they own their system. We were very fortunate to do our due diligence and chose to use Buffer from the start.

Key Insights

Do you think Buffer delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Buffer's feature set?

Yes

Did Buffer live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Buffer go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Buffer again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Google Analytics, Adobe Dreamweaver, GoDaddy

Usability

After just a few hours using Buffer, you can pretty much handle most of the features it offers easily. It is pretty straightforward and idiot-proof. We've even had a few of our interns train on it and they pick it up right away. Some of the advanced features take a few tries to figure out but they come easily once you use them a few times.

Support Rating

Fortunately, we haven't had many issues with Buffer so we've only needed to rely on support a few times over the past few years. When we have had to use support, it has been quick and easy. Most of our issues have been minor so we do not really have any experience dealing with major issues. When we have had questions or issues, the response has been quick and thorough.

Likelihood to Recommend

Buffer has multiple benefits but to focus on the ones we like the most, we'd definitely start with the ability to easily schedule future posts for multiple clients on multiple platforms. We can see everything in one place and get a visual feel for the schedule going forward. Just the time we save from going between platforms is hours per day when managing a lot of clients. Since some of the platforms have useful tools and a better posting platform, we do not use Buffer for everything but it definitely saves us a lot of time for the channels we use it for.

Our Go To Platform for Social Media Posting, Management and Scheduling

Overall Satisfaction with Buffer