Most people already know that when it comes to posting on social media, it’s critical to focus on providing as much value as possible. While it can be tempting to just throw out messages that are self-promotional in nature, these are generally nowhere near effective for sharing information that people find useful or engaging.
However, because the internet is such a busy place, simply sharing great content isn’t always enough to maximize the effectiveness of social media. To generate the best possible results, it is vital to consider other factors such as time. Although that may sound stressful, the good news is that a lot of analysis has already been done on this topic. That means you just need to learn that information and then put it into practice.
Since Twitter is a very busy place, it should come as no surprise that there is a huge amount of data out there. Of all that has been studied, one of the most interesting findings is the fact that Twitter is extremely active on the weekends. Specifically, brand engagement is 17% higher Friday through Sunday than Monday through Thursday.
While that’s a very interesting takeaway for businesses, it doesn’t mean you should only tweet on the weekends. Since there is still a lot going on during the week, you’ll want to stay engaged. When it comes to the best weekday times, that really depends on your goal for individual tweets.
If you want as many people as possible to click, 12pm and 6pm are the two peak times. And if you’re looking for retweets, 5 pm is the ideal time. So, as you can see from both facts, it’s best to focus most of your Twitter activity later in the day.
When it comes to Facebook, people become more active as the end of the work week approaches. Thursday and Friday are generally identified as the two days with the highest engagement, with Sunday being next on the list. And when it comes to posting, 1 pm has been considered the best time to share, while 3 pm generates the most clicks. So if you want to strike a balance between those two goals, posting your social media to Facebook during the afternoon is a smart bet.
google plus
Although Facebook and Twitter are generally credited with creating the major social networks, Google+, LinkedIn, and Pinterest have become major social networks in relatively short periods of time. Since there are signs that Google may use Plus to help influence the SERPs, all businesses can benefit from publishing on it. The best hours for this network are from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m., while the worst are from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m.
If you are in the B2B space, LinkedIn can be very useful. Peak hours for this network are just before and after work, 7:00 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays are the best days to post on LinkedIn, while any time between 9 am and 5 pm on Monday and Friday is considered the worst.
interest
For products and businesses that have to do with beauty, fashion, decoration, design or DIY in general, Pinterest can be a gold mine. The average Pinterest user spends over 16 minutes on the site each time they visit! During the week the best times to post are 2 pm to 4 pm and 8 pm to 11 pm The other time that can work quite well is Saturday morning.
Although email is a different medium than social media, as it plays an important role in many companies’ online marketing strategy, it’s worth taking a quick look at the best time to send. According to various research, if you are sending a promotional email to consumers, 6 am to 10 am and then 7 pm to 10 pm are the two sweet spots. And if you are in the B2B market, 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm is the best time to send emails.
Now that you know the best times to post on social media, all that’s left for you to do is take what we covered and put it to use. Keep in mind that if you use a social media dashboard, you will be able to track your exact results and refine these times to the ideal range for your specific business.