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Planable is the best client-facing social media tool we've ever used and we've used a lot.
For any ambitious team, whether you're launching a marketing campaign, publishing content, or rolling out a product update, a clear and efficient approval process can make or break the final result. The fundamentals remain the same: alignment, accountability, and...
Oct 7, 2025
ZoomSphere has helped many social teams get their content out, especially those focused on short-form video and basic calendar planning. But as your strategy grows more complex, so do your platform needs.
From limited integrations (only 6 supported platforms) to ongoing publishing bugs, tagging glitches, and no plan for small teams or startups, many marketers find themselves looking for a better fit.
In this guide, I’ll break down the best ZoomSphere alternatives, highlighting social media management tools that I’ve tested and offer smoother workflows, more robust analytics, stronger community management features, and better value for your budget.
ZoomSphere lets users post to multiple social media channels, manage workflows, and keep track of ideas with the Notes feature (which supports images, plus multiple layouts and text formats).
The focus on short-form video means you can add custom covers by choosing a frame or uploading an image while also scheduling content from the mobile app.
There are also plenty of reasons why users might be looking to switch and schedule posts with other tools:
ZoomSphere’s Workflow Manager uses a single dashboard to assign tasks and deadlines. From the same place, you can track progress on various projects or organize ideas and insights.
It’s all done with Kanban-style cards, which can contain to-do lists and be assigned to one or more people, including freelancers you collaborate with.
The chat lets you manage various types of conversations, including DMs and group chats, as well as rooms dedicated to specific topics/workspaces.
It also comes with the ability to create polls or add voice messages of up to 2 minutes. And as someone who often thinks of the best way to word a message a while after I’ve already sent it, I appreciate that chat messages are editable.
However, there are limited automation features like custom workflows or triggers, and the dashboard I mentioned above can’t be customized much.
Client-related workflows in ZoomSphere only begin when clients make requests that you can then organize and prioritize.
You can deliver posts via chat, in bulk or individually, and clients also have the option of approving in bulk.
But users report a significant learning curve, which can obviously be a barrier for both clients and team members. And if you need to handle a lot of these tasks from the mobile app, you’ll notice that its UI is clunkier than the desktop version.
There’s also very little wiggle room in terms of customizing approval layers and permissions.
The ZoomSphere Scheduler covers only six platforms: Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok.
It gives you the ability to manage post ideas and quick notes or tasks in the same place. You can also save frequently-used hashtags and CTAs as templates.
I like that the Unscheduled queue holds posts without a publishing date and evergreen content (that can be duplicated for a different audience, whether it’s one that speaks another language or is more active within a specific interval).
In addition to the limited number of platforms ZoomSphere supports, users often mention issues like glitches with automatic publishing, including some posts going out too early.
Content scheduling comes with various outages, jams, and delays, plus there’s no easy way to adjust posting times in bulk.
When making your choice, consider the social media presence of the brands you’re managing, plus the directions you want to grow in, whether as a freelancer or as an organization.
These features are essential:
I tested all the tools below firsthand, and while they all offer solid social media management for growing brands, each one brings something different to the table: from unique features to distinct UI styles.
Read on to see which one might be the best fit for your current and future needs.
Planable is the place where your team can run full, efficient social media workflows, from strategic planning all the way to gathering insights.
Compared to ZoomSphere, it integrates with more platforms and offers more collaboration features.
Key features:
Newsletter collaboration post using Universal Content feature
Cross-channel analytics view in Planable
Plus, Planable’s learning curve is flatter than a pancake, so you’ll feel confident bringing anyone on board quickly: clients, stakeholders, external collaborators, or newbies on your team.
Projects for different clients and brands can be organized into different workspaces in Planable, each with its own roles, permissions, and media library.
The flow of feedback is positively serene compared to an old-school setup with input scattered across multiple emails and messaging apps.
You leave real-time comments, annotations, and text suggestions, then each comment becomes a task that can be marked as resolved with one click.
Team comments and suggestions in a Facebook post in Planable
Posts and comments stay internal until they’re ready for the client to see. Plus, activity history lets you track how well feedback was implemented.
Every workspace gets custom approval workflows (none, optional, mandatory, or multi-level), and every user gets their custom roles and permissions.
Customizable permissions in Planable
Posts can be automatically scheduled for publishing once approved.
Sharing for approval also comes with options:
Most importantly, you can approve on the move thanks to Planable’s companion mobile app, available on Google Play and App store.
If you want to approve (or edit, or schedule) content in bulk, you do it by using the scheduler’s list view.
It’s one of 4 views (alongside feed, calendar, and grid) that are perfect for content planning and organizing. So are the filters and color-coded labels.
List view of a social media calendar in Planable
You control everything (including written content outside the socials) from a unified marketing calendar that publishes to Instagram, Threads, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube, Twitter, Pinterest, and Google Business Profile (so that’s 3 extra platforms compared to ZoomSphere).
Oh, and every workspace has its own preferred posting times.
Pricing: Planable has tiers from $39/workspace/mo billed monthly, plus a free plan with 50 total posts and access to most features.
Drawbacks: There are no social listening features right now.
Final takeaway: Planable is the wiser ZoomSphere alternative for freelancers, agencies, social media marketers, and content folks who want to prioritize fruitful communication and creative strategic approaches.
Gain is a social media management tool dedicated to improving the agency-client relationship.
It boosts marketing teams’ capacity to bring more brands on board by providing an approval process that most clients can resonate with, no matter how tech-savvy they are.
Key features:
Pricing: Plans start at $119/mo billed monthly, and all but the one for enterprises have a 14-day free trial.
Drawbacks: Multiple platform-specific features aren’t included. Gain has limited capabilities for tracking and reports, occasional glitches with short-form video, plus various tagging and scheduling issues.
Agorapulse allows users to post content, engage with their community, and download reports from a single dashboard.
It covers the same platforms as ZoomSphere, plus Threads, Bluesky, and Reddit. It also has more features that cater to enterprise-level organizations, including B2B companies.
Key features not available with ZoomSphere:
Pricing: Agorapulse tiers start at $99/mo billed monthly and include a 30-day free trial.
Drawbacks: Scheduling issues, unposted content with no notification to the team, and inconsistencies between previews and actual posts. So in a nutshell, various publishing glitches.
Zoho Social is used to schedule and publish posts, but also to manage conversations across multiple platforms.
It offers more content management options and more integrations than ZoomSphere, but this is because it operates on a much grander scale. It’s part of a complex suite of products made for marketing, sales, CRM, IT management, and more.
Key features:
Pricing: There are plans from €15/mo billed monthly, a 15-day free trial, but also a free tier for 1 brand and 1 team member.
Drawbacks: Multiple platform-specific features are missing; this is definitely the most common complaint. Editing, tagging, and customization across channels are just a few of the affected tasks.
Choosing the right social media management tool is all about balance. Think about your long-term goals and which integrations will support your future growth. At the same time, the right features can start saving you time almost immediately.
Also, look for platforms that offer solutions tailored to your specific industry, because they can make a big difference in fit and efficiency.
Here’s my final take:
Register for Planable’s free plan with 50 posts today and build smoother social media workflows.
Irina is a freelance conceptual copywriter with an ethical edge and an advertising agency background. If she’s not rummaging for good synonyms, she’s probably watching a sitcom or listening to radio dramas with plucky amateur detectives. She loves collage, doing crosswords on paper and shazamming the birds outside her window.
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