How Often Should I Post on Social Media
Casey Thorsen
When it comes to social media, one of the most common questions we get is, “how often should I be posting?” And our answer is… it depends. There are many factors that go into your social media strategy, and they should all be personalized for your business. Now, you may have already Googled this question and found a wide range of answers from hundreds of sources, confusing you even more. So, we’ll break down where, and how many times we recommend posting based on what has worked for us and our many happy clients!
More or Less?
The question of the ages… “Do I post more, or less on social media?
How often you’ll be posting depends on many factors, specifically which platform you’re using. A platform such as twitter would need a high volume of posts, whereas a platform that uses the algorithm heavily is focused on quality over quantity. Although quality is more important than quantity for most platforms, an account that doesn’t post often receives lower engagement on average, which could cause you to become lost in the algorithm’s black hole of unseen content. Generally, we recommend that our clients post anywhere from 3-7x per week, depending on the platform. So, let’s break it down for the most common platforms:
Posting to Facebook 3-5x per week is optimal. The Facebook algorithm prioritizes “fresh” content and shows users content from a variety of pages, so publishing more than once a day will decrease your chances of being shown, lowering your engagement. The lower engagement you receive, the lower Facebook will prioritize your posts and then you’ll end up in (you guessed it), the black hole, which is a very hard place to get out of. As long as your audience is engaging, Facebook will prioritize your posts. Focusing on quality over quantity for Facebook should be your main priority, until you can build up your post frequency once you have your audience engaged.
Instagram and Facebook are similar. Instagram is looking for relevant, quality content, and posting more than once a day causes your content to compete with itself. We recommend posting anywhere from 3-7x per week on Instagram. If you are a business such as a restaurant or clothing store, posting on the weekends will work to your advantage, but if you’re open during normal business hours (Monday-Friday), the best days to post are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. It’s still important to be prioritizing quality over quantity, but using more strategy here for when you post can boost your engagement, which the algorithm likes. We also recommend posting frequently to your story, especially if you are posting less than 7x per week.
Posting 3-5x per week on LinkedIn is optimal. The LinkedIn platform runs like business hours, Saturday and Sunday and any time after 5pm you won’t be seeing much engagement. LinkedIn, like the others, is looking for quality, engagement, and consistency. If you make a post and LinkedIn notices you’re receiving great engagement, it then starts to show your content to a wider audience, and if that does well, then an even wider audience.
Now although twitter has an algorithm and many changes to the site are in progress, the platform still runs mostly chronologically. This means you’ll want to focus more on the time of day you’re posting vs. the actual day. The beauty of Twitter is that it is the most sharable platform out there, meaning the more you post, the more likely you are to be shared. There really is no maximum you could be tweeting, and anywhere from 1-5 tweets per day can increase your organic reach.
The most important thing to remember is that quantity does not always lead to higher engagement rates. Using your time to create intentional, creative, engaging, and trending content is a must. If you need some tips on what type of content to create, check out our blog What Should I Post About on Social Media? ProFusion Web Solutions specializes in social media marketing, and if this all seems like too much to add to your plate, let’s chat! Schedule a call with us today to learn more about how we can transform your social media strategy.