When should you post on Facebook?

Facebook has become an important marketing tool for many businesses. Just having a profile isn’t the key to success though. You also need to create content and posts that your audience can interact with. One key element is that they see your post. Often people’s profiles show over 100 posts a day when they log in and if yours is one of these then they may miss this. One way around this is to post when they are actually logged-in and using Facebook.

When it comes to posts on Facebook, timing is everything. It is a good idea to post when your audience is online. With higher relevant numbers available to view your content, your brand exposure and engagement will likely be higher as well.

The tricky part comes in knowing when your audience is online. We came across an interesting infographic from LinchpinSEO, that highlights a number of popular industries and when they saw the most engagement from their Facebook posts.

What exactly is engagement?
Before we go over some of the details, we should look into what exactly experts mean when they talk about engagement on Facebook. In the most basic of terms, engagement is any interaction from your followers. This usually means them liking, sharing or commenting on a post. The idea is that if they are sharing or viewing your content, they are interested, (on some level), in your company, and your products and/or services. The chances of them then thinking of your company the next time they need what you provide will be higher. With higher engagement comes the chance of more sales, or at the very least, increased interest.

According to the results in the infographic, engagement breaks down like this:

• Likes make up 79% of all interaction.
• Comments equal 15% of all interaction.
• Shares make up 6% of all interaction.

Some interesting results on when to post
Looking at the different results by industry, it appears that the best time for most industries to post is over the weekend. The reason for this is likely because fewer businesses post on the weekends, and many people are on Facebook much more during this time.

Some popular industries and days when posts saw the most engagement include:

• Food and Beverage: The highest interaction is, not surprisingly, on weekends.
• General Retail: The highest interaction is on Mondays, followed by Tuesdays.
• Finance: Businesses in the finance industry see the highest interaction on Sundays, followed by Fridays.
• Technology: The highest interaction is on Mondays.
• Travel and Leisure: Not surprisingly, this industry saw the highest interaction on the weekend, with a peak on Sunday.

What this infographic and the study that it’s based on found is quite interesting. For most businesses, posting on the weekends is more beneficial. A potential issue you may have is that your business isn’t open on the weekends. You can get around this by scheduling content to be posted ahead of time using a tool like HootSuite. If you would like to learn more about Facebook and how it can help drive brand engagement, please contact us today.