How often should you post on your social media accounts? I get this question a lot from my customers. There really is no “one size fits all” answer. If your posts offer value to the reader then the more the better in most cases. The trick is determining what your readers are willing to absorb without tuning you out.
Here are some tips to keep in mind.
- Keep your topics “on-topic.” If your business is construction, then don’t post about pet care and flower beds and children. It’s important to be authentic, but someone interested in new home design features is going to quickly tire from repeated posts about your dog, Fido. If you don’t have anything to say, don’t feel like you have to post. Your readers will appreciate your posts a couple of times a week if they’re valuable. Users aren’t going to unsubscribe from you because they’re not hearing from you. They typically unsuscribe when you talk too much.
- Post when your readers are online. Traffic among working adults on social media sites peaks in early morning 7am-9am and late afternoon 4pm to 6pm, and again late evening 9pm to 11pm. You may find that your customers are online at different times. If you are actively engaging in your social media accounts, you’ll soon learn what times are best for your messages. There’s a service available that will analyze your follower and tell you when to tweet. http://www.whentotweet.com/. Cost is $4.99 for a one-time analysis.
- Be Clear. This goes without saying, but I mention it specifically in regards to re-tweets and shares. When you choose to retweet or share someone else’s post, add some commentary telling your reader why you’re choosing to share it. I have followed a few users who often retweet retweets. On Twitter especially, most of the 140 charaters are used rehashing all of the previous user names. The meat of the message gets so truncated that you don’t have a clue what it’s about anymore. If your reader doesn’t know what is in the link, they’re not going to open it. And if they see these retweets several times in a day, they may unfollow you.
- Test your audience. If you’re just starting out, try posting on Facebook two to four times a day. Once in the morning, once in the afternoon, and once or twice in the evening. Watch your audience reaction. If they’re not unfollowing, but are not engaging either, you can probably post more frequently.
- Not all social media platforms are created equally. Twitter users generally follow more accounts than Facebook users. They post more and their streams are more populated. Because of that, they are more likely to see “snapshots” of their stream around the time they logged on. You can get away with posting more often on Twitter, and in fact, you may want to consider posting important information two or three times on Twitter spread out throughout the day. Facebook users are more selective with the people and companies they like. Their streams are less crowded and they are likely to go back and check all the posts they missed since the last time they logged on. If you regularly post things twice on Facebook, some users will get annoyed.
- Be wary of connecting accounts. Facebook allows you to connect to your Twitter account and Twitter allows you to connect to your Facebook account. This can save you time when you want to post something in multiple places. Be careful though. The environment on the two platforms are somewhat different. The kind of conversations you have on Twitter may not be as well received on Facebook and vice versa. Also, if you choose to post a single tweet multiple times on Twitter and are connected to Facebook, your Facebook audience may be annoyed. It works well for me to connect my business Facebook account to Twitter since I post to Facebook less frequently. I like the way LinkedIn allows you to make the decision to post to Twitter with each post, not as a blanket setting.
- Space out your posts. If you have several things you want to post, but only login once or twice a day, consider using a tool like TweetDeck or HootSuite to schedule your tweets. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve unfollowed because they retweet a bunch of things in a row. It’s like being at a cocktail party and someone walks in the room with a bullhorn and won’t stop talking. Don’t feel locked into a schedule or routine for posting. It’s best to be genuine and authentic, conversational and engaging. It’s hard to be any of these if you’re locked into a rigid strucutre. Establish a strategy and start with a goal that makes sense for you and your business. As you become comfortable you’ll learn what’s enough and not too much.
Related articles:
The Social Timing Sweet Spot – by The Next Web
How Often Should I Tweet – by TodayMade
