Negotiating with Social Media Vendors

Before diving into social media vendor negotiations, let’s understand the broader categories of social media software as a service (saas) vendors:

• Social Media Management – Plan, schedule, post, engage, and perform analytics. Examples – Hootsuite, Later, Sprout Social, Falcon.io. 
• Social Media Listening – Gather social intelligence, crisis management, conversation and trend tracking, and competitor and partner monitoring. Examples: Brandwatch (formerly Crimson Hexagon), Talkwalker, and Meltwater. These tools often include robust analytics functionalities.
• Influencer Marketing & Management – Identity, contact, and manage influencer relationships and campaigns—examples: Upfluence, Grin, Traackr, and Mavrck.
• Social Media Automation – Tools automating different social media tasks such as posting, reporting, alerts, etc. Examples – Buffer, Zapier, HubSpot,  and IFTTT.
• Content Planning & Discovery – Find inspiration, ideas, and trends and plan your next engagement hit. Examples – Dunroe.io, Buzzsumo, and Curata.

Social media saas vendors connect to social media platforms through APIs. Vendors pay the Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn of the world for access, and the platforms then allow them to connect, pull data, schedule content, gather analytics, etc. Now with this said, many social media saas have very similar offerings, which leaves little space for differentiation. 

Social media saas vendors differentiate each other on the way they handle the data they gather from the platforms and by adding tools to make a marketer’s life easier (think AI tools). Now that we know what the categories are, how they are similar, and how they can be different, let’s dive into negotiations.

I prioritize practicality and functionality over price. Nevertheless, that doesn’t mean I will disregard pricing. How I balance practicality and price is described below and summarized by researching who I am talking to, what my stakeholders need, and analyzing the offering at a minutia level. 

Gathering Consensus Before Negotiating

Before starting a negotiation, ensure you know who your stakeholders are and what they need. Find out how long that will sign off-take and set expectations and timing early on. Identify the needs of all parties involved (departments etc.) and differentiate must-haves from like-to-haves. 

Keep stakeholders updated periodically (or as required) on your progress. Doing this allows you to attend to concerns and holdouts earlier. 

Information Is Power

It’s okay if you don’t have a full itemized wishlist. Often, we have a need but might not be aware of all the features/capabilities at our disposal. Take some time to browse vendor websites, read reviews and ask around. The more information you gather, the more of an upper hand you will have during negotiations. The 2021 HBR article “A Playbook for Negotiators in the Social Media Era” states:  the information revolution that social media has brought has been largely ignored in the field of negotiation. I encourage you to read the LinkedIn profile of your vendor before your meeting. Know where they are coming from, what industries they have worked in, and their accomplishments. More than likely, your vendor has done the same.

I am very organized when analyzing vendor offerings, often being the client, asking the tough questions that escalate to developers. I don’t take pride in it, but I do need to ensure that needs are met and that there’s room for the unplanned.

My Decision Spreadsheet

Part of my method includes building a needs analysis spreadsheet. I will list all features in the first column, vendors in the following columns, and comments for each feature in the last. Sometimes I will add a column between the features and the first vendor to add a number from 1-10, indicating the weight of that feature inside my decision-making process. Finally, I will compare different vendors.

When negotiations are in the mid to advanced stages, and vendor offerings are similar, I will share the spreadsheet with the vendors and additional questions to the email. This way, they can assess their standing and improve or tweak their package to be more competitive.

Remember, most social media vendors work with similar functionalities and can only do what the social platforms allow. For example, Instagram does not allow scheduling stories through any third-party platform. This can only be accomplished using their Meta for Business Suite. Try to pinpoint how these platforms differ and assess your needs.

With these tips, you should have a smooth, well thought, and competitive vendor negotiation process. Let me know how it went in the comments or via Twitter to @jvfdigital.