Ah yes, the age-old question: If nobody sees your post, did you even post?
When it comes to running a small business, there are so many things to consider, and social media is one of them.
We all know the importance of social media. You’re scrolling through your feed just as much as I am.
During your social media binging, you’re absorbing a lot of marketing campaigns. And now, it’s your time to join and market your message to potential customers.
But what time should you post on Facebook? Is it the same time as you would post on Instagram? While you may think the answer is yes, it’s actually no. Each platform has its own optimal time for you to engage with your audience.
If you’re scratching your head right now wondering how you’re going to figure it all out, don’t worry.
You think we would leave you high and dry? Think again. Based on data from Statusbrew, in this post, you’re going to learn what are the best times to post on social media.
With so much information online, sometimes you wonder whether everything you’re reading is true or not. I don’t blame you! Maybe you’ve heard about the “right” time to post on social media, but is that true?
The answer is yes. The best time to post on social media is when your followers are the most active. But is it that simple? No. So, here’s the thing. While the best time to post online is when your followers are most active, it can be hard to find that ideal time. What if your followers are global?
Firstly, if you already have a social media following, it’s much easier to figure out the best time to post by using the right tools.
If you don’t have a following, it’ll take some time for you to learn who your audience is and when they engage with your content the most.
However, there is a general universal time you can use as a starting point until you learn more about your audience. Once you start to gain more insight into your audience, see what works for you and your audience. Remember, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to social media, so use this guide as a general recommendation.
Through social media, you have the opportunity to engage with tons of people as it’s still one of the most effective platforms to promote your brand. So, when’s the best time to post?
Generally speaking, the best time to post on Facebook during the week is at 9 A.M. as that’s when people are starting their working day and tend to check their online profiles.
Facebook traffic peaks again between 1 P.M. and 3 P.M., when people are on their lunch breaks. But on weekends, audience activity isn’t very high (people getting the most out of their days off), so if you post on weekends, the peak hours are between 8 A.M. to 10 A.M.
The best days to post on Facebook are Tuesday and Thursday. If you’re going to post on the weekend, Sunday is the best day to post.
Instagram may look innocent, but its algorithm isn’t easy to crack. But if you want to get seen and engage with your audience, here are the times to know.
The best time to post on Instagram is between 10 A.M. and 3 P.M. This peak time correlates with the average person’s working day. Most people check their posts around breakfast, lunch, and after work. Those are the times users are most active. There’s also a peak at 2 A.M.—some late-night scrolling.
But your level of engagement also depends on the day you post.
The best days to post on Instagram are Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Thursday has the largest peak, followed by Friday—aim for these days to get some extra likes and comments. As for the weekend, if you are going to post, avoid Sunday.
If you’re trying to catch your business audience on LinkedIn, you’ll want to use these times to help you out. The highest interaction peaks happen earlier in the morning before the working day starts between 8 A.M. and 11 A.M.
When it comes to LinkedIn, it’s pretty easy to follow. The best days to post are on Tuesday and Wednesday.
A lot of people scroll through Twitter throughout the day, but many start the morning catching up on Tweets they missed the night before. That said, the best time to post on Twitter is at 8 A.M. However, posting between 6 A.M. to 9 A.M. will help you increase engagement.
The best days to post on Twitter are at the beginning and end of the week, Monday and Thursday.
If your content is mostly video-based, then you can find your audience on TikTok. With over one billion people on TikTok, there are plenty of people to engage with and just to let you know, TikTok’s platform algorithm rewards posts with high engagement. So you want to post at the right time.
The best time to post on TikTok generally follows a typical work/school schedule. Post in the morning from 6 A.M. to 10 A.M. and at night from 7 P.M. to 11 P.M. On Fridays, you’ll want to get up early as the best time to post is at 5 A.M.
On weekends, TikTok performs well. Saturday has peak hours at 11 A.M. or in the evening between 7 P.M. and 8 P.M. Sunday peak hours are at 7 A.M. to 8 A.M. and around 4 P.M.
The best days to post on TikTok are generally throughout the entire week. But the days with the highest engagement are Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.
If your audience is visual-based (which is basically everyone), then Pinterest is a great platform to use. Posts on Pinterest appear chronologically, so if you want your post to be seen, you need to know when to post.
The best time to post on Pinterest is late in the evening between 8 P.M. to 11 P.M.
A majority of Pinterest’s audience are women and they’re most active late at night. Yet, the best days to post aren’t during the week. Pinterest users are most active during the weekends. The best days to post are on Friday and Saturday.
When posting on Reddit, keep in mind that most users are from the United States. So, if you want to reach your audience, keep in mind the time zone as it depends on where you’re targeting (New York isn’t in the same time zone as Los Angeles).
The best time to post on Reddit on the weekdays is from 6 A.M. to 9 A.M. On weekends, the best time to post is between 7 A.M. and 9 A.M.
When posting on Reddit, post during the week between Monday and Thursday. These are the days with the highest engagement as most people are near a computer.
Here are some key factors to consider when deciding on the best time to post on social media. Remember, your goal is to increase engagement and attract your audience when they’re most active.
What’s your goal for posting on social media? I know for a fact, you’re busy and aren’t doing this just to waste time.
Whether it’s making more people aware of your brand (brand awareness), gaining more followers, or selling products, you need to know why you’re doing this.
Where does the majority of your audience come from? I know social media attracts people from all over the world, but where is your target audience located?
By knowing this, you can align your posts to fit their online activity. That way, they’re more likely to engage with your content.
If you have multiple time zones to consider, then try your best to find a time that hits peak hours for all time zones.
For example, for Facebook, to reach your audience in EST, CST, and PST all at once, you would schedule your post for 4 pm EST. That way, it’ll show up on people’s feeds at 3 pm CST, 2 pm PST—all peak hours.
Here’s the thing, when you post too often, you may be flagged as spam. When you don’t post enough, your content may not be seen at all.
You have to find that sweet spot that suits your business. You don’t need to be posting three times per day, but you should post regularly (meaning, once a day or a couple of times per week).
If you know your target audience, then you already have detailed information about their demographics, like their gender, age, occupation, and education.
Use this information to help you understand when they’re most likely to be active on social media.
If your target audience is married women between 35 to 45 with children, posting at 8 am when the kids need to be taken to school isn’t a good strategy. However, posting around lunchtime or later in the evening may work best.
Ah yes, the algorithm. I can’t forget about algorithms. You’ve probably heard about it too. Social media is designed so people keep coming back to view the content.
Each platform has a different way of doing this. Some rank posts based on the number of engagements, while others rank based on the time of posting. To get the most out of each platform do some research on its algorithm.
While I do suggest observing your competitors, I don’t recommend following everything they do.
You should focus on posting when your audience is most active on social media, not when your competitors post (because they may not be posting at the right times).
The general times to post on social media can really help you engage with your audience.
But there will come a time when you’ll want to be more accurate and really engage with as many people as possible. For that, do the following:
Your past social media posts can provide you with a lot of valuable information about your audience. It’ll show your least and most active posts, which can help you determine when is the best time to post. When looking at insights, pay attention to these metrics:
Awareness – this includes impressions and reach. Impressions are the number of times a post shows on a person’s timeline. Reach is the number of unique viewers that have seen the post.
These insights are provided for free by most social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
Engagement – this means how the audience interacts with the post (via likes, comments, clicks, and shares).
Conversions – when someone makes a purchase on your site that occurred after they visited your social media channel.
Like I said before, it’s important not to follow everything your competition does.
However, you should check their social media and see what they’re doing.
Is there a specific pattern you’re noticing? What times do they post? This doesn’t mean you should change your social media strategy, but do keep your eyes open.
You’re not posting for yourself, you’re posting for your audience. And that means you need to post when they are most active.
Who’s your audience? Are they early risers or night owls? If your target audience is 18 to 24-year-old men, you’re probably not going to post at 6 am. Post to suit your audience.
When it comes to social media, you don’t know until you try. You can do everything by the book, yet, not get the results you want.
You should always be testing your posts and seeing which ones engage with your audience best. It may not necessarily be the time you’re posting, rather what you’re posting.
I wish social media could just stay the same and never change, but in reality, it’s changing all the time. The world changes and social media follows.
For example, the pandemic brought people even closer to social media than ever before. So, it’s normal to see changes in your performance.
What’s important is you flow with those changes and adjust your strategy to compliment them.
While you can always refer back to this article, sometimes it’s nice to have all this information bundled onto one page. And that’s exactly what we did. On this cheat sheet, you’ll find everything you need to know when posting on social media.
Download this PDF template and have it available whenever you need.
We’ve covered when is the best time to post on social media and the factors to keep in mind when doing so. Now, it’s up to you to put it into action!
Just remember, social media isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon. So, be consistent and make changes based on the data given to you. You got this!
The information provided on this page is for information, educational, and/or editorial purposes only. It is not intended to indicate any affiliation between Tailor Brands and any other brand or logo identified on this page.
Natasha Ivanovic is a Vancouver-born creative writer that started her writing career as a freelancer while studying for her Master’s in Investigative Psychology. On the weekends, she writes short stories for her blog, TheLonelySerb, and cuddles with her bulldog, Bob.