You spend a considerable amount of time and energy creating content for your website and social channels, you want to tip the sands of time in your favour to make sure those posts have the highest chance of being read! And to do this, take the following best posting times for the main social media channels into consideration.

Why different optimal posting times for different social media? This is because social channels cater to different audiences, and so the best time to post content on Twitter may vary significantly from the best time to post content on Instagram, Facebook or LinkedIn.

When to Post on Twitter

On Twitter, posts made during the week result in 14% more engagement than tweets made on the weekends for most businesses. Yet engagement for our community is the highest for tweets made on weekends and on Wednesdays. It would appear that people have more time to explore brands during the weekend.

If you’re going to retweet, 5pm is the best time of day for this, and click-throughs to your website from tweets you have made do best around 12pm and 6pm. This coincides with lunch breaks and commuting home after work, when people seem to have a little time to check out their social media and interact with the posts and content they find there.

When to Post on FaceBook

According to the statistics 86% of all Facebook posts occur during the work week, with peak engagement on Thursdays and Fridays. Monday through Wednesday your engagement rates will be about 3.5% below the average. The best time of day to post to Facebook? Early afternoon. 1pm is the optimal time to post if your goal is to get more shares, and 3pm is the best time if your goal is to get more clicks.

Posting to Instagram

Instagram engagement remains steady throughout the week with only a slight spike on Mondays, and a slight dip on Sundays. Business posts generally spike between 3 & 4 pm on Instagram, and 22.5 of every 1000 Instagram followers interact with videos posted by businesses during work hours.

Best Posting Times for Pinterest

Saturday is the best day of the week to pin content, and the optimal times to post on Saturday are between 2and 4 am or 8 and 11 pm. Pinterest activity peaks around 9pm. If you plan to pin during the day the best times are 2-4pm and 8pm to 1am. Besides Saturday, for beauty, fashion and retail businesses, Friday at 3pm is the peak time to post your pin.

Posting on LinkedIn

The regular business hours of between 8am and 5pm Monday to Friday works best with LinkedIn, with Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays being the best days of the week to post. If your goal is to get the most clicks and shares out of your LinkedIn post, Tuesday between 10 and 11am is the best time to post.

As most of these times are different for the social media channels, for posting to Facebook and Twitter I recommend and use PostPlanner. Using a scheduler stops you losing your mind with all the different posting times, and you can keep organised for weeks in advance.

Catherine Trebble works with authors, speakers, consultants, coaches and solopreneurs to help them to make the most of the internet and social media channels to get their brilliance out into the world. You can contact Catherine here>>