# How much does social media management cost?

> Social media management cost ranges from a few hundred dollars a month for software you run yourself to several thousand for an agency or a full-time hire, depending on how much of the work you are paying someone else to do.

Updated: 2026-09-17.

## The three broad options

- **Software, self-managed**: you or your team use a tool to plan, draft & schedule. Cost is the tool's subscription
- **Agency**: a firm runs the account for you, usually billed monthly per client or per platform
- **In-house hire**: a dedicated social media manager, at a full salary

Each option has a completely different cost shape, so comparing them by a single number rarely makes sense without saying which one you mean.

## Software cost specifically

Tool pricing tends to fall into two shapes: per connected account, so the bill grows as you add platforms, or a flat workspace price that covers every account regardless of count.

DunSocial uses the flat shape: $20 a month or $192 a year for one workspace covering all 10 generally available networks, with one seat included & extra seats at $8 a month each. A 14-day trial exists to test it before paying anything.

## What drives agency & hire costs up

Agencies & hires cost more because you're paying for the thinking, not just the mechanism: deciding what to post, writing it well, & keeping a strategy coherent over time. Software doesn't replace that thinking, it makes doing it faster.

This is where AI-assisted software narrows the gap somewhat. A tool that drafts a strong first version from a saved brand voice reduces how much of that thinking has to happen from scratch each time, without removing the need for a person to review & steer it.

DunSocial's AI Memory is built specifically to hold that saved context, so a draft still starts from something closer to what a hire would already know about the brand.

## What actually changes the total

- Number of platforms & accounts you need covered
- Whether drafting is done by a person, an AI-assisted tool, or an agency
- Whether you need team roles & approval flows, or one person is doing everything
- Whether the tool separates AI drafting into a paid add-on, or includes it in the base price

DunSocial includes AI drafting, brand memory & team workspaces in its single flat price rather than gating them behind a higher tier, which is the detail most worth checking against any other tool's advertised starting price.

## A reasonable way to decide

If the actual bottleneck is writing consistently in the right voice across platforms, software with real AI drafting closes that gap for a fraction of an agency retainer or a hire's salary. If the bottleneck is strategy, positioning, or community management at a scale one person can't cover, that's a different budget line, & software alone won't solve it.

For most teams sitting in that first category, DunSocial's $20-a-month flat price is the number to compare against an agency quote or a hire's salary before deciding which route actually fits the budget.

## Related guides

- [What is a social media management tool?](https://www.dunsocial.com/hub/social-media-management/what-is-a-social-media-management-tool.md)
- [What does a social media manager do?](https://www.dunsocial.com/hub/social-media-management/what-does-a-social-media-manager-do.md)
- [How much does a social media scheduler cost?](https://www.dunsocial.com/hub/social-media-scheduler/how-much-does-a-social-media-scheduler-cost.md)
- [How to manage multiple social media accounts](https://www.dunsocial.com/hub/social-media-management/how-to-manage-multiple-social-media-accounts.md)

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