When And How To Post On Social Media For Maximum Results

Every smart company and marketer knows that social media is important for developing your brand, increasing your sales, and keeping in touch with customers. While you might have researched the best social media platforms to use, how to use social media to boost SEO, and even how to research your competition, many marketers fail to research how often they should be posting. All social media channels are not created equal, and audiences love each one for a different reason. There is a fine balance between posting too much and not posting enough. Here are 5 tips to help you decide how to best use your social media accounts.

When to post: There is no firm answer to the question of when to post on each social media channel. However, figuring this out is a very important step in keeping up a good social media presence. The maximum guideline for each outlet is as follows: Facebook up to twice a day; Twitter up to ten times a day; Pinterest up to 30 times a day; LinkedIn about once per business day; Instagram up to twice per day. This does not include disappearing “stories” on the sites that do provide them, although you do not want to go overboard with those either. Alter this guide to what channels you are using, and how often your customers are responding to your posts. It is important to find the right balance for your company so that your audience is neither bored nor overwhelmed. Besides the trial and error method, there are infographics to help you decide when and how often you should post.

Choose your channels: Every company does not need to be on every social media channel. Know your target audience and choose to spend your time and efforts on social media sites that they actually use. For example, if your main demographic is middle aged men, you will not have much of a need for a Pinterest account. Instead, you would focus on LinkedIn and Facebook. If your target demographic is young women, you will want to utilize more social media accounts such as Instagram and even Snapchat. Bringing content to your users in a way that they value will help you connect with them. Also take into consideration what outlets will play your strengths. If you do not have a psychical product you are selling, than Instagram and other visual-based outlets are probably not worth your time. However, if you sell apparel, home goods, or other aesthetically pleasing items, Instagram will be valuable to you.

Share content from others: Your social media accounts are not all about you. Rather, they are all about your customers. Do not be afraid to share content from other sources that you think your customers would like. Pay attention to what your audience is responding to, and what audience’s on your competitor’s pages are responding to. One of the best reasons to use social media is to directly interact with customers, and listening to their feedback shows that you care about them, and not just about sales. However, do not rely on others to come up with all of your content. Your customers are interacting with your social media channels to see what you are doing and keep up with your products and services. Let shared material be a guest appearance, rather than the norm.

Publish content at busy times: With all of the ever-changing algorithms, posting at high volume times of day is the best way to get your content to reach as much of your audience as possible. Often, posting when a large number of users are online will allow a wider audience to see the post when it appears. Having your post near or at the top of audience’s feed means having their attention, and a higher chance of them interacting with the post. The more people like, share, or comment, the more “relevant” the post is labeled, which means that it will continue to show up at the top of other customer’s feeds.

Be social: Social media is named that for a reason. You get the unique opportunity to be able to interact with customers one-on-one, and to allow them to interact with one another. Make sure to engage with customers, ask questions to get conversations started, and monitor your posts to ensure everyone is being respectful to one another.

Although posting on social media seems like a simple task anyone can do, posting at the right time takes research and consistency. Having a strategy and analyzing what works as you go along will pay off, and you will quickly start to see great results.