By Shea Bennett on December 10, 2012 8:00 AM
Timing is, as they say, everything, and for brands, marketers and anyone else looking to use social media to raise awareness of products or services – and this includes self-promotion – ensuring that you share your content at the optimal part of the day is essential.
So, when is the best time to post? And is it the same for every social network?
RadiumOne’s Po.st examined the social sharing data from more than 10,000 publishers, reaching four main conclusions:
1. There are two peak sharing times during the day – 10 a.m. through noon and 8 p.m. through 10 p.m.
2. If you’re looking for clicks, the worst time to share an article is between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m.
3. Sharing and clickbacks remain consistent from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m.
4. The hours between noon and 2 p.m. see the most shares with the highest clickback rates
The study also revealed a disconnect between the best times to post to each social network, which are as follows:
- Twitter: 1 p.m.
- Facebook: 5 p.m.
- Pinterest: 11 p.m.
- Google+: 10 a.m.
Of course, this is all relative to your timezone, and also (critically) the timezone of the majority of people in your network. So, for example, while you might be updating in the UK, if your audience is predominately in the U.S., you need to adjust your publishing schedule accordingly.
That said, the Po.st survey also made the following observations with regard to different peak sharing times for different global regions:
- USA: 9 a.m is Highest Share Count, 1 p.m. Most Clickbacks
- UK: 6 p.m. is Highest Share Count, 4 a.m. Most Clickbacks
- France: 12 p.m. is Highest Share Count, 5 a.m. is Most Clickbacks
- India: 12 p.m. is Highest Share Count, 11:30am is Most Clickbacks
While you should certainly experiment with some of these schedules to see if they boost your click-throughs and shares, it’s worth nothing that, as with most things in the social space, peak posting times are as much art as they are science and vary dramatically from business to business, and profile to profile.
Bottom line: if what you’re doing now is working well, there’s absolutely no need to change anything. But if you’re not getting the results you’d anticipated, mixing up your content posting schedule could very well be the solution that you’re looking for.
(Source: Po.st. Clock image via Shutterstock.)
