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Nov 22, 2024
Are you looking into project management tools to help manage your marketing initiatives? You may have given Asana a try, but you’re not alone if you remain unconvinced. While it’s useful for organizing tasks, marketing managers often seek Asana alternatives due to its limitations in handling content management needs.
Asana can work as project management software, but there are better choices to streamline content creation and distribution. Many marketing teams prefer to use dedicated content calendar tools.
I researched and tried several Asana alternatives, and I selected the best nine that I believe cater to the unique requirements of social media and content managers. Let’s find the perfect fit for your team.
Asana is a project management tool that helps teams organize, track, and manage their work. It offers a wide range of features, including task assignments, project timelines, and deadline tracking.
I remember using Asana for project management when I first started working as a content marketing specialist for a software company. It was useful for managing tasks, but our team soon moved on to another tool specifically created for marketing activities.
Asana lacked in some areas essential to content workflows, such as limited feedback and collaboration mechanisms, social media integrations, and calendar options.
When you find yourself not using the tool and going back to plain old email communication, it’s a sign that the project management software is not a good fit.
Asana provides reliable planning tools that help teams create detailed project plans. Users can assign tasks, set deadlines, and create milestones. It offers various views, such as lists, boards, and calendars, to visualize tasks and timelines effectively.
While Asana offers comprehensive planning features, marketing managers, in my experience, need more specialized content calendar management features, such as direct social media scheduling or visually enhanced previews of campaigns.
Asana offers a calendar view for project management, not content planning. Customization is possible, but wouldn’t you rather just use a calendar designed for content needs?
Teams collaborate in Asana through chat functions, comment threads, and notifications. You can communicate within tasks and stay updated on project progress in real-time.
With that said, Asana lacks advanced features needed for content creation, such as version control and detailed feedback mechanisms.
For example, while you can leave comments directly within tasks and on images or PDFs, you cannot comment on documents, making collaboration on written content cumbersome.
Here is what Danielle M., a Content Marketing Specialist, had to say in her review of Asana:
I don’t find the editorial calendars to be particularly useful. I also find it difficult to communicate within the app. The threads are confusing, and there’s no good way to attach documents for review.
Asana allows users to create custom workflows that include approval steps in the form of approval tasks assigned to different team members. This ensures that tasks are reviewed and approved before proceeding to the next stage in the content workflow.
While straightforward, this process does not take into account the various roles that marketing teams have and their relationship with agencies or clients, where visibility and approval layers are needed.
Pricing: Asana offers a free plan that includes basic task management features. The Starter plan (starting at $10.99/seat/month) provides advanced functionalities like a timeline view, custom fields, and advanced search capabilities. Approvals and proofing are available only starting with the Advanced plan ($24.99/seat/month).
Let’s look at nine Asana alternatives that may serve marketing teams better.
Planable is an excellent alternative to Asana for teams focusing on content management and social media. With efficient content planning and advanced collaboration features, Planable allows teams to work seamlessly on every step of the creation and publishing process.
With Planable, you can enjoy real-time comments, annotations, clear text suggestions, and streamlined approvals through customizable multi-level approval layers.
Let’s look at these features in more detail to see why Planable may just be the best Asana alternative for your team.
The platform’s planning capabilities are top-notch, featuring a user-friendly calendar with drag-and-drop functionality for posts, which allows you to easily plan, organize, and schedule your content directly from the same place.
Organizing content in Planable’s calendar
Color-coded labels and filter views help you quickly select relevant content, making content planning more efficient.
The calendar view provides a visual overview of the entire content strategy, ensuring that nothing is overlooked and that content is distributed evenly and strategically across different platforms.
Content calendar in Planable
Planable excels in collaboration on all content types, including articles, social media posts, newsletters, press releases, briefs, and more. With features such as tagging, real-time comments, and instant feedback, working on content as a team becomes much more efficient.
Collaboration and approval features in Planable
Annotations and clear text suggestions allow you to provide feedback directly on the content, improving the quality and relevance of the posts. Email and mobile app notifications ensure that team members are always up-to-date, making the collaboration process smooth and responsive.
Collaboration on a newsletter in Planable
These features make Planable an ideal tool for teams looking to enhance their content and social media collaboration efforts. According to user reviews, Planable is an “easy-to-use collaboration tool for small to medium-sized teams that need to work quickly and efficiently.“
Planable offers customizable approval flows, from non-required to multi-level. This flexibility allows you to tailor the approval process to your organization’s specific needs, whether it’s a simple one-step approval or a complex multi-tiered process.
Multi-level approval flow in Planable
These customizable layers help maintain quality control and ensure that all content aligns with the brand’s standards and objectives.
External collaborators can act as approvers via an email invitation, without needing to sign up for an account. This stands out to me as perfect for agencies looking to give a client the final say and for marketing teams who want to include a subject matter expert from another team.
Drawbacks: Planable lacks social listening capabilities and does not offer direct integrations with CMS platforms for website publishing.
Pricing: Planable offers a free plan for up to 50 posts, while premium plans start at $11/user/month.
Takeaway: If you’re looking for an Asana alternative that is tailored for content creation and social media publishing, Planable offers the most comprehensive set of features to meet your needs and a user-friendly interface that marketing teams love.
HubSpot offers comprehensive CMS and marketing automation tools, providing an all-in-one solution for complex marketing needs.
HubSpot is popular for its marketing and sales functionalities, integrating with a robust CRM. It offers a complete suite of tools for businesses to streamline operations, making it a good Asana alternative for marketing teams with more complex needs.
While tools like Asana focus on project management, HubSpot’s strength lies in its integrated approach to marketing and sales.
Pricing: HubSpot offers a free tier with basic features, while premium plans start at $15/month and can go up to $3,600/month for advanced control and flexibility.
Drawbacks: HubSpot’s cost can escalate quickly as you add more advanced features, and new users may have a steep learning curve.
Sprout Social excels in providing deep insights and engagement tools for social media managers.
This Asana alternative focuses on social media engagement, offering advanced features specifically designed for this purpose. The platform includes social media analytics and reporting tools, providing in-depth insights beyond basic project tracking and reporting.
Sprout Social also includes collaboration and publishing tools that are specifically designed for social media management, making it a superior choice compared to project management tools that lack built-in social media management capabilities.
Pricing: Plans start at $199 per user per month, with a free trial available.
Drawbacks: Sprout Social’s high cost may be prohibitive for smaller teams, and its focus is more on analytics and engagement rather than content creation.
Wrike offers extensive project management features tailored for large teams and complex projects.
It provides highly customizable options to fit specific team needs, ensuring scalability. This Asana alternative includes in-depth real-time collaboration features, enhancing teamwork and productivity.
Additionally, Wrike offers extensive integration options, making it a versatile tool for various workflows. While Asana also integrates with many popular tools, it may not provide the same level of customization and depth of integration as Wrike.
Pricing: A free plan with limited project management features is available. Paid plans start at $9.80/user/month.
Drawbacks: Users report that the interface can be overwhelming to navigate, and customization options can be too complex for small teams.
Planoly specializes in visual content planning for social media platforms, offering features specifically designed for this purpose.
The platform includes a user-friendly content calendar that makes planning and organizing social media posts straightforward.
Compared to Asana, Planoly offers built-in social media management capabilities but is more limited in its project management and collaboration features.
Pricing: A free trial is available, after which the Starter plan starts at $16/month for one user.
Drawbacks: Some users complain that the platform lacks client collaboration features and that connecting and publishing don’t always work for all platforms.
Hootsuite is a social media management tool that streamlines managing multiple accounts. Its combination of social media management and collaboration features makes it a popular choice for marketing managers looking for Asana alternatives.
Hootsuite offers a content scheduling tool specifically designed for social media and specialized social media analytics, offering deeper insights compared to Asana’s basic project tracking and reporting features.
Pricing: Plans start at $99/month for one user, with a free 30-day trial available.
Drawbacks: Some Hootsuite users complain of the high price point for the features offered.
Airtable is a versatile platform designed for data management and organization. It offers flexible and customizable database features that cater to a wide range of needs.
With this tool, teams can easily create and manage databases, benefiting from integrations with various third-party apps and services. Airtable also includes automation features that streamline workflows and enhance productivity.
While Airtable provides basic collaboration tools, it is primarily designed for data-centric tasks, so it’s more of an Asana alternative for teams looking for an app-building platform.
Pricing: Free plan available, with paid plans starting at $20/user/month.
Drawbacks: According to reviews, Airtable can be intimidating to work with and has a steep learning curve.
ProofHub offers a comprehensive suite of tools for team collaboration and project management. Its high level of customization makes it a favorite Asana alternative for those who want to tailor features to their specific needs.
This project management tool includes built-in collaboration features that enhance communication and teamwork. ProofHub is also a useful tool for proofing, being one of the best Asana alternatives for approval workflows.
Pricing: A free trial is available, and the pricing starts at $45/month for unlimited users and core features.
Drawbacks: According to reviews, ProofHub’s notification system can overwhelm users, lacking filtering and customization, and the editing and feedback features could be improved.
ClickUp is an all-in-one productivity platform designed to replace multiple apps and streamline work processes.
The platform includes extensive features that go beyond standard project management tools. It’s designed to scale for complex projects, making it ideal for larger teams and more intricate workflows.
Compared to Asana, which is more suitable for small to medium-sized teams, ClickUp offers more customization options and real-time communication features.
Pricing: A free is plan available, with premium plans starting at $7/user/month.
Drawbacks: The sheer number of features can be overwhelming for new users, requiring time to fully make use of the platform.
While Asana is a powerful project management tool, its content-specific feature limitations make it less ideal for social media and content managers. If you’re looking to streamline content management, automate social media publishing, easily customize feedback workflows, and improve team collaboration, Planable is the perfect alternative.
Try the free plan to experience unlimited features for 50 posts and discover how Planable can transform your workflow.
Sabina is a freelance writer with 15+ years of experience in the MarCom industry. Her to-do list includes helping people write better and businesses sell more through content. She is the host of Zest, a podcast that brings writing within listeners’ reach.
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