Send It to the Internet!

The age-old question every social media marketer has heard AT LEAST once a week: “What are the best days and times to post on <insert platform>?” It never gets old…and there is no solid, concrete, universal answer.

The short answer: If you copy/paste “what are the best times to post on social media” into Google, click on one of the first 5 articles on page one and use that as a baseline, you’ll at least know what the algorithms as a collective whole favor and can base your success/failure of posting off of that. 

The long answer?

Well…here we go! 

I think it’s time we shift our focus away from “studies” on the best time to post on social media. Many of these collective studies that give precise times and days are based on aggregated data, meaning the audience is no longer unique to you, but it now spans across businesses and individuals in different locations across the globe in different industries in different time zones. 

Also, another huge factor, social media usage changes DAILY. A best example is if you’ve had a KILLER week on Instagram with Reels and your LinkedIn Unique Visitors has a positive percentage increase, to the following week being drier than a desert with maaaaybe 7-12 likes TOTAL during the week. To provide a personalized experience to your brand’s followers, you need to post according to your audience’s social media usage behavior. When done right, there’s a higher chance of them seeing and engaging with your social media posts — more reach and more engagement!

In my honest, humble opinion, the reporting information you collect MoM/QoQ/YoY can show you an average “best day” your audience is engaging with you - so, for example, Tuesday through Thursday and Sunday on Twitter works for my current company. That is how I structure our Tweets to go out and when I spend the most time engaging with our audience. Do I neglect the other three days? No, absolutely not, but you won’t see as much as you do on our determined best days. And, in 3-6 months, I am sure those days will shift and we’ll need to re-adapt. 

Your analytics are your best friend. Analyzing your audiences behavior is how you get (and stay!) ahead in the long game. Experimenting with content and “tested times” (times that are not laid out as your ‘peak performance’ window) shows you are paying attention but wanting to extend your reach. 

And, if you reeealllly just want a baseline, this post from HubSpot lays it all out very nicely.