Earlier today Hootsuite annouced that they are now offering premium packaged plans designed for businesses and organizations, but will continue to offer a free verison for their customers. The packages are tiered to provide useful tools to as many customers as possible and provide advanced tools to those customers who need the business features.

The good knews for those that are not interested in paying for a service, Hootsuite will continue to offer a free services to most of their current users.  What this means to me and other users is, we should be able to continue to use Hootsuite the same as we normally do, but power users and enterprise teams will have more tools at their finger tips.

When Do Users Have to Choose a Plan?

As of August 11 th, 2010, all new customers will have to select a plan during the sign-up process. Then next week, current Hootsuite users will be asked to choose a package. If you are unsure of what package to choose, there is a migration wizard that will help you select the best plan.

If you are interested in the premium plans, there is a 30-day free trial. During the trial period, you will be able experiment and find out what plan is best for you. Of course, if these plans are more than you need, then you can always select the free plan.

For more information about these options, check out Hootsuite’s latest blog post. To keep up date on all things Hootsuite make sure to check out and mark their blog.

So What Are The Plans

Below are the plans available to choose from.

Premium Plans

Hootsuite Enterprise

Image Sources: Hootsuite