The Best Times for Your Company to Post on Social Media

Success in today’s business world hinges on online and in-person relationships. Understanding which social media platforms best fit your business is crucial to staying competitive. Establishing a presence on these platforms is just the beginning, though! The timing of your posts is a central strategy that significantly influences their reach and engagement.

Understanding when your audience is most active on social media enhances the visibility of your content, increases engagement rates, and maximizes your overall social media effectiveness. However, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. The best time can differ across social media platforms, industries, and more.

Read on to discover what factors influence optimal posting times, the best times for major platforms, how to combine insights across platforms, and how to be sure you’re posting at the correct times.

Identifying the best times to post on social media involves more than just following generic best practices. Several factors affect what makes a post timely. The most significant factors are:

• Audience demographics: Different audiences use social media at varying times. Posting when your audience is most likely using social media can greatly impact the performance of your posts.
• Time zones: If you’re a local business, it can be easy to determine when your followers are most likely to be on social media, but if your audience spans across time zones, the best time to post may not be as clear.
• Platform type: The best time to post is different for every platform. Knowing when your audience is likely using a specific platform is essential.
• Typical usage patterns: Some platforms, such as X (formerly known as Twitter), will likely require more frequent posting than a platform like LinkedIn, where posts often have long lifespans.

Knowing how these factors affect your performance is an important first step in deciding the best time to post.

Facebook is still a widely used platform, and understanding its users’ usage times can enhance post-performance. Generally, Facebook user activity peaks on weekdays during mid-morning and then again in the early evening. These times mirror common daily routines — people check their feeds over morning coffee or check their social media after work. Studies indicate the best times to post are between 8am – 12pm or 4pm – 6pm, depending on your audience.

Instagram is a visually rich platform that can provide businesses with high user engagement, especially among younger demographics. Because of Instagram’s entertainment-forward content, the peak user times are typically during hours associated with downtime, such as lunch hours from 11am – 1pm and the evening from 7pm – 9pm.

Due to the fast-paced nature of X, the best times to post are much more relative than Facebook and Instagram. While 8am – 10am, 12pm – 1pm, and 6pm – 9pm tend to be the peak usage times, timely posts on ongoing discussions are the most effective.

Using Twitter’s “What’s Happening” tool and following thought leaders in your industry can help you determine what trending topics users are discussing. Replying to other posts and sharing other’s content in a timely manner will help your business stay at the center of discussions.

Like Twitter, participating in ongoing conversations is essential to maximizing your post-performance on LinkedIn. However, peak usage times are much more defined. Because it’s a platform designed for professionals, the peak hours are weekdays in the morning, when people are likely commuting or catching up on industry news. While 7am – 9am is typically the best time, between 10am – 12pm can also be effective, as it will get your content in front of people on their lunch breaks.

TikTok differs from other social platforms because users depend more on its algorithm to deliver content. Due to TikTok’s younger audience, the best times to post on the app tend to be between 3pm – 6pm, which coincides with after-school hours for Gen Z and Gen Alpha. Although TikTok enjoys high engagement on the weekends, Sunday is generally the least successful day to post.

Efficiently managing posting schedules across various platforms requires a structured approach that aligns with your audience’s engagement patterns on each channel. You can begin by creating a calendar that includes all your social media activity. This calendar should detail what content you plan on posting, where, and when, allowing you to visualize how your posts will be distributed across platforms throughout the week or month.

• Content variation and frequency: Adjust the frequency and type of content for each platform based on the insights you’ve gathered about what performs best. For example, while you might post multiple times each day on Twitter, a more measured approach might be necessary on LinkedIn or Instagram.
• Cross-Promotion: Strategically plan your content to promote interactions between platforms. For instance, Twitter can drive traffic to an Instagram Live session, or Facebook can be used to increase awareness about a detailed guide posted on LinkedIn.
• Know where to spend your time: Joining discussions and trends is an effective way to maximize your potential on social media. However, that can take time to execute, especially for small businesses. Set aside specific times to check social media to see what’s going on in your industry, ideally during the best times to post on those platforms.

While this guide may be a great place to start, the only way to determine the best times to post for your business is to post at different times and record analytics on which times perform best. You’ll need to post at each time more than once, so expect this process to take a few months before you have an accurate idea of your ideal times.

Just because a post at a specific time performs well, its performance could be attributed to something besides the time it was posted. Factors such as quality of content, tagging, and hashtags can also impact your post’s performance.

Don’t want to spend months determining the best time to post? You can always reach out to a third party with experience in social media to help you get the most out of your efforts.

At Stellaractive, our digital marketing experts can help determine which times are best for your business and maintain a social media schedule to make sure your posts have the best chance to reach their full potential.

Ready to get the most out of your social media profiles and reach audiences that want to engage with your content? Feel free to contact us or call 503-384-2413 for the support you need to begin your journey towards a better social media presence.