Blog Post #4- Time is of the Essence: When should you post?
By Madeline Feehan
This week in class, we talked a lot about content calendars and needing a plan in order to run social media successfully. This got me thinking about another key aspect that will help with your posting schedule: time. Is there a 'right' time to post? Should you be thinking about time in order to get the most engagement? Does this change between platforms?
According to the social media management platform, Social Pilot, time plays a greater factor than you might think. It's a good idea, as a start, to observe your own habits. When do you tend to use social media most? Is it when you wake up in the morning? Is it when you get home from work? More importantly, when do you post, and do you notice a change? Do you get more likes and comments on the weekend or the weekdays? Once you take notes and observe, you can start looking into some statistics to see if your behaviors align with most other people's.
After tracking 7 million+ posts from over 50,000 accounts, Social Pilot concluded that the best times to post on social media (in general) are during mid-week days (Wednesday and Thursday) in the morning (7-9 am), afternoon (1-3 pm,) and the evening (7-9 pm). They also broke down each weekday individually to show the difference. For example, it's ideal to post on Monday morning but Saturday afternoon or night. The most common range I noticed is the 9-2 range. This makes sense because most people check their phone right in the morning, and that 12-2 range falls into many people's lunch break. I also thought posting mid-week made sense because at that point, people are more settled and bored and might have time to spare,while the beginning and end of each work week might be more hectic.
Different platforms also vary within timing. Think of social media intended for professionals vs. social media that centers around entertainment: LinkedIn vs. TikTok. LinkedIn might get more action during work hours, while TikTok might get more late-night or off-work views because people will be looking to unwind.
SocialPilot also included graphics like the ones below for each individual social media site:
Other sources use different methods to test their theory:
Even if you think some of these observations are obvious or doubt their accuracy, the main takeaway I'd suggest is being guided by your own trial and error. The best way to put this theory into practice is to start posting and pay attention to engagement. When working on your content calendar, do a trial week or two where you post a bit more randomly. Use this time when you're still finding your footing to see what times are the best for each platform. Make note of your posts that get the most engagement and when you see people are most active, and let that influence your calendar. Once you find that posting sweet spot, your calendar will become more cohesive and you'll have a consistent posting schedule. My advice to you is that you are not a computer, and this one guide is not the end-all be-all answer. You can research the optimal posting times tirelessly, but at the end of the day, what works for most might not work for all. Pay attention to your target audience and demographic. In this post, I've made observations about what works best during the work week, but that might not apply to your intended group. For example, if you're posting to an audience of kids or seniors, their schedule differs from a typical 9-5, so you might want to take that into account.
The best way to test timing is to put your theory to the test and post. Monitoring your social media will help you improve your content calendar and get the most engagement possible!
Dear Madeline,
ReplyDeleteReading your blog about the importance of timing for posting on social media reminded me of the timing of email blasts. Years ago, when Constant Contact was the go-to promotion tool for all businesses, we would run reports to determine the best time of day to send out an email blast. It makes sense to review the insights that social media platforms provide to choose the best time of day to post content.