One of the most frequent questions clients and potential clients ask us is how often they should be posting. Our answer, as always, is that it depends. In this blog post, we’ll summarize how to set your initial baseline and then help you decide when the best time to increase your frequency is.
Where Do I Start?
People who ask us this question have either been told by their superiors that they need to finally jump on the social media bandwagon, or they are just opening their own business. Companies with sufficient marketing support have already found their cadence.
Let’s go through your checklist to set your baseline frequency.
- How much time do you have to consistently devote to social media? One hour a week will achieve different results compared to three hours a week.
- Do you need to plan for busy times? If your workload goes through spurts, then estimate as accurately as possible how much time you have available during slow periods to batch process your social media.
- Do you need to post timely content? Businesses that thrive on immediate sales or that run a variable yearly schedule often benefit from creating content that reflects current trends. This also requires more frequent posting.
- Are you posting to stay in touch or to rapidly build business? Not every business needs 10,000 followers. Reaching 400 may be sufficient for you. But be realistic: aiming for 10,000 followers requires more time at social media than having 400 followers as your goal.
- What kind of content are you producing? For some business owners, producing video takes much longer than writing. For others, it’s the reverse.
- How easily can you gather everything you need for each post? This includes photos with sufficient rights and post copy that is on brand and relevant to your audience.
- What recommendations can you find for the social media platform(s) you’ve chosen? Social media platforms often publish their own posting recommendations. You can also find studies from large social media companies that can collate research from millions of posts to let you know the latest updates.
When setting up your social media calendar, remember that, for now, you are carrying it out. If you plan to spend seven hours a week on social media, you’re giving up seven hours of direct revenue generation. However, posting once every few months will look like you keep ghosting yourself.
When Should I Expand My Social Media Strategy?
Take time to answer this question. It can be easy to be inspired by an energetic, informational, exciting presentation on social media. But keep it realistic.
Why Do You Wish to Expand?
Often when working with new clients, we receive vague requests. A few examples:
- “I want to bring in more money.”
- “I want to start social media.”
- “I want to do more social media.”
Match your social media to your marketing and sales plans first. For example, retail companies selling low-priced goods generally expect immediate sales from social media. Social media carried out by a company whose product or solution is priced at six or seven figures, however, will use social media for awareness, engagement, and education.
Expanding your social media requires more time and resources, so be clear on why you’re doing it.
How Can You Expand?
Remember: you have options with social media. Just because the billion-dollar brands you consume every day market on every social media channel imaginable doesn’t mean you should, too.
When broadening your social media strategy, you have options. Start with these foundational questions:
- Have your sales increased? If the answer is yes, examine your financial and time budgets to determine resources available for this expansion. If sales have not increased, consider first internal and market context before blaming your social media strategy.
- Has your target market expanded? Always meet your target market where they engage with online culture. A growing target market may mean expanding to a new social media platform. But investigate this first.
- What can you learn from your data thus far? If your awareness, engagement, and click-through rates aren’t bringing in more customers or clients in the long term, first evaluate if you should change your content before automatically assuming you should post more often.
Create a Social Media Plan That Works for You
Using social media effectively means not only examining the reasoning behind your strategy, but also ensuring you can manage—and, if necessary, carry out—your plan. Many brands find huge success on social media. However, that may be coupled with an expensive digital advertising plan that leads to an automatic increase in reach.
Don’t give up just because you don’t have thousands and thousands of dollars for social media. Create a social media plan that works for your time and budget. Stay consistent, monitor results, and re-evaluate at regular intervals.
For a free 30-minute consultation on how social media can work for your company, please contact us via the form below. We’d be happy to offer you our thoughts.