All About Your Audience: Tips to Pick the Best Time to Post on Facebook
There is no denying the fact that Facebook is an important part of social activity online to connect with friends and family. But it’s also becoming more common for users to connect with their favorite brands and companies through Facebook.
Online marketing through companies such as Facebook, Twitter, and Yodle, Inc. is vitally important for businesses in today’s connected world. Even small businesses have to be online in order to compete successfully. With more than 727 million active daily users, Facebook has great potential for anyone looking to reach a massive audience. But how exactly can a business use Facebook effectively?
Get To Know Your Audience
Each business has their own key demographic that they target, and the secret to success on Facebook is knowing the audience for your particular business. What is the age range of your audience? Are they male or female? These questions are important to determining when is the best time to reach your demographic. If you have a Facebook page already, you can use it to find the answers to these questions. When you log into your business’s Facebook page, you should see an “Insights” button in the top right of the page. Click that button and then click the “People” link in the bar on the next page. This will give you the breakdown of your Facebook page audience by gender, age range, and location. Don’t be surprised if the audience you think you have is different from the one your page is actually reaching.
Best Times To Reach Your Audience
Now that you know who your audience actually is, think about how they spend their days. Studies show that 80% of smartphone users check their phones within 15 minutes of waking up each day. If your audience is composed mostly of adults who work typical 9 to 5 office jobs or even students getting up for school, early morning is a great time to tap into your audience as they start their day.
Commute times can also be great opportunities to reach your audience through Facebook posts. Many commuters on public transportation use their phones to pass the time as they travel, and so a good idea is to time your posts during peak travel hours.
What about during the day? If your audience is working or in school, daytime hours between 9 A.M. and 5 P.M. may not be the best time to catch their attention. Facebook posts tend to get the most views within the first 30 minutes after they’re posted, so if you post at 2:30, but your audience doesn’t get out of work and check their phones again until 5:00, you’ve missed your biggest chance to be seen.
Evenings And Weekends
Many Facebook users also check their news feeds while watching TV or eating meals, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that evening is the best time to tap into your audience. Chances are good that all of their friends are also posting to Facebook during this time, so you have high competition for your demographic’s attention. Weekends also don’t fare as well as weekdays in getting visibility for posts. Studies show a drop off in commenting on Facebook posts on both Saturday and Sunday.
Know your audience and how they spend their days in order to determine the best times to update your business’s Facebook page. By knowing this information, you can more successfully reach your audience and stay competitive in this new social marketplace.
Amber Davis is a social media marketing consultant. She frequently blogs about effective strategies and tricks to successful social media marketing.
