The best time to post, when is that? There are many factors that influence the effectiveness of a Facebook post. The time, day and type of post play an important role in the post’s success. The right time to post is not the same for each business. It is also important that the content of your post is relevant. There are many differences between the target groups and the product or service that is focused on. There are many tips that can help you decide on the best time to post on Facebook.
Best time to post according to research
There have been multiple studies to find out what the best time to post is, however the results of these studies vary strongly from each other.
According to a study done by Hubspot are the best days to post Saturday and Sunday, on these days your posts will get the most interaction. Thursday and Friday are good days to post as well. The same study shows that 9:00, 13:00 and 15:00 o’ clock are the best times to post on Facebook. At 15:00 o’clock your post gets the most clicks and at 13:00 o’ clock posts are most often shared.
A different study by Trackmaven shows that the best time to post on facebook is Thursday at eight o’ clock in the evening. This study is based on the average amount of interactions per Facebook post, per 1000 followers, for every hour of the day and every day of the week.
Research done by CoSchedule shows the difference between posting for the B2C an the B2B market. B2C means Business-to-Consumer, this is selling products to consumers. B2B means Business-to-Business, which is selling products to another business. The best times for B2C are from 9:00 – 10:00, 12:00 – 13:00 and 16:00 – 17:00 o’ clock. For B2B these times are: 9:00 – 16:00 o’ clock with a peak from 15:00 – 16:00 o’ clock.
A study from BuzzSumo mentions that content needs to be posted in the least busy hours. In the least busy hours there is less competition because less content is posted. This causes more interaction with the messages that are posted in these times.
Best time to post your content
The aforementioned times to post can help you get a sense of the right direction. For each business the best time to post is at a different time. It is important that you find that moment for your own page. There are a couple of factors that can help you decide what the best time is for your business. These factors are: the company’s industry, location of your target group, when your target group is online and the use of promotion for your posts. These factors decide when the best time is to post for your business.
According to a study done by Buffer there are two ways to find the right moment for your business. The first way is by analysing the data. Your own data is always the best when you need information specific for your business. The data shows when your target group is most active online and when they interact most with your posts. Facebook stores all data from its visitors and by using that you can easily find when your posts are most effective.
The second way is by deciding when a post is relevant to your target group. An example of this is a fan page of a football club. During the match, a post is put online when there has been a goal to keep fans updated. A business can capitalize on the perfect moment by using their marketing on different channels. When you advertise on a different channel than Facebook make sure that you put this ad, or a variation, also on Facebook. It is important to decide before-hand what your social media management strategy is.
Find and use data
To be able to analyse Facebook’s data is important to know where to find this data. The data of your Facebook page can be found under the statistics headline of your business’s Facebook page. When you click there you will find an overview of the of the results of your page from the previous week. In the left menu bar you can choose to see the details of your page. To see when your followers are online, you click the menu item: ”posts”. This will show a graph that indicates the hours per number of visitors that are online on average per week. On the top of the graph are some blocks per day of the week. If you hover over this with your mouse a new line will appear in the graph which shows the amount of visitors per hour on that day.
When you scroll further down you see your posted content. The date and time when the content was posted is visible so you can see when you posted each message. It also shows which target group it was targeting, the reach of the post and the interactiveness of your post.
By comparing the data of the page it should become clear what type of post, on a certain time and day generates the most interactiveness. Analsye this data regularly to get a clear view of when the best time is to post for your target group.
Do you need help deciding when the best time is to post or help with deciding your target group? Ask our experts for more information.
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