Social Media Tool review: Nimble

It seems there are so many social media channels to keep up with – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google+….the list goes on!   One way you can tackle this and manage several channels all in one place is to use a social media dashboard such as www.nimble.com

I came across Nimble some time ago.  Just went through my emails to check when and I actually signed up 15 months ago in May 2012.  I liked the look of it and glanced at the Nimble daily emails I received for some time afterwards, but then ended up rerouting them into a social media inbox folder I rarely checked much.

It’s quite ironic actually that a tool offering to make managing social media more manageable can often feel like “just one more thing” to deal with!  I saw a few invites for webinars that looked interesting – but again, just not enough time.  I was also already using Hootsuite.com (another social media dashboard) and not sure if I wanted – or needed – another.

The email that got my attention recently was that my Nimble account was scheduled for deletion in 7 days (in July 2013).  So I took some time to go back and take a better look and decide whether to keep the account.

Back to the basics first – Nimble offers a free personal account or a paid business account – currently set at USD$15 per month.  Here’s a screen shot (as at 10th August 2013) of the inclusions.  For up to date information, you can visit http://www.nimble.com/pricing/details/

Almost 3 weeks ago, I switched to the free 14 day business plan trial.  I was offered the opportunity to extend this to 21 days by tweeting about it.  I was pleasantly surprised to be acknowledged on Twitter shortly afterwards, being followed by the CEO of Nimble, @Jon_Ferrara:

This was a plus for me – the fact the CEO of Nimble is following over 11,000 on Twitter, which I see as a demonstration of being open to the relationships & conversations that the business preaches.

Essentially it’s a “social CRM” (Customer Relationship Manager).  I’ve always been keen to use a CRM and social media in my business and have tried several manners of bringing these together before – for example, with Zoho.  Until now, this has involved a lot of my own data entry and has all been put into the “too hard basket”.  I’ve also found that though there are some great CRMs out there, they are often expensive, therefore ruling out affordability for small business such as myself and most of my clients.

Nimble really does show huge potential as it brings CRM and Social Media features together in a way I’ve not seen before.  It is also not exceedingly expensive.

Here’s a few of the things I like about Nimble:

• The whole focus on recognising that being successful revolves around managing and nurturing relationships.
• That you can integrate Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and Twitter and communicate with your contacts all in one place
• You can also manage activities, calendars, emails and deals as well
• I was excited about the potential to integrate with Mail Chimp.  I did use Mail Chimp for a while but then swapped over to Mad Mimi and do love this.  But with the potential to manage my e-newsletter lists and social media all together, this is something interesting I meant to look into – but is still on the “to do” list.
• The “getting started” videos were helpful

Here were the deal breakers for me and why I won’t be extending my trial:

• You can only manage ONE account for each social media channel. (See table above).  I have three main brands: Zestee, Dutch Australian and Professional Parents Network.   The whole point of a social media dashboard for me and why I would actually pay for it is to be able to manage my several Facebook business pages, Twitter accounts and LinkedIn Pages all together.  Without this function, all the other features are nice, but still mean that I need to log in to the other individual channels daily – if not more regularly.  So this means that then using Nimble becomes ANOTHER thing to do and not the way to manage the others.
• The emails feature is based on gmail.  I only use gmail for my personal email.  My business email is via my hosting/domain name so this doesn’t work for me.

So I am about to cancel my business trial and move back to the personal account for now.  I admit this has not been a thorough review, but in this busy social media world where business owners such as myself have to make quick decisions, I do think I’ve put a significant amount of time into researching this.  Due to the points above, have decided to not continue much further at this point for my business.  For USD$180 a year (USD$15 per month), I just don’t feel it would offer value to my business at this stage.

On the positive side though, I do think it has huge potential.  Nimble seems to be a fast-moving business, very switched on and keen to develop with consistent innovation – check out their twitter feed at @nimble to attest to this.

I will certainly recommend that students of the  Zestee Social Media School and my clients consider signing up for the free personal account, “have a play” and decide if this might be a tool they would use for business.  Should my own business needs change or if I am consulting with a client it might be a good fit for, from what i’ve seen so far it’s well worth considering.

Summary:  Not right for my business right now but recommend taking a look and seeing if it may be right for you.  It could well be a fantastic tool for your business at a reasonable price.  

Would love to hear from you in a comment – have you heard of Nimble before reading this article?  Have you tried it?  Will you?

This post has been written by social media specialist Renee Veldman-Tentori as part of the Zestee Social Media School.  I’m passionate about the power and potential of social media and teaching others how to capture this for your business.  Why not browse this blog for other free social media & marketing tips,  find out more about Zestee’s services,  contact me via this website or LinkedIn, tweet me @reneeveldman  or come and join the Zestee Facebook community.