The best time to post on social media for your practice – part II

Without this analysis, it will be difficult to determine the best time to post on social media …

Most social media platforms will allow you to see the analytics to know when your audience is most active, says Chrissy Bernal, founder of Be a Better Brand, regarding the best time to post on social media. If you’ve posted content about your practice before, “Take a look back at some of your more successful posts. When were they posted? Is there a winning pattern for certain types of content posted at certain times? For example, perhaps live videos do better at a certain time, or an educational post does better on a certain day at a certain time. It’s all about paying attention to your data,” explains Bernal.

To see part I of this article, click here.

If you want to find this information, for example, on Instagram, Carly Kerndt, CEO of FlyDog Digital outlines how: “To find this information, you can log into your Instagram business account, click on ‘Professional Dashboard’ then on ‘Total Followers.’ Scroll all the way to the bottom of the page, and you’ll see the days and times that your followers are the most active.

“Posting at (or near) these times will help your content get in front of your followers. The more views and engagement your posts get immediately after posting the better, which is why we suggest to our clients to post at these times.”

In terms of other social media platforms, Kerndt says that, “Facebook insights or YouTube analytics will tell you the the best time to post on social media when your audience in online. Then you want to schedule your posts about one hour before the peak so that your content has posted and will still be near the top of their feed when they get online.”

The best time to post on social media: how long to test?

Most of the experts we interviewed agreed that once you choose times to post content on various social media platforms, the optimum time to keep doing it is about a month. This should give you sufficient data so that you can analyze what kind of return you got on the content you posted.

If these times that you’ve chosen seem to be working for you, it’s okay to keep posting then. But don’t get complacent.

“Consistently review each month to make sure those times are still working well,” says Bernal.

Mistakes you don’t want to make

 According to McGraw, there are some common mistakes that you could make when you’re trying to decide the best time to post on social media platforms. Some of these, he says, are:

• Not understanding their target audience: It’s important to have a clear understanding of who you are trying to reach with your social media posts. Without this understanding, it will be difficult to determine the best time to post on social media.
• Not testing different posting times: It’s essential to test different posting times to see which ones result in the most engagement. Simply posting at the same time every day without testing may not be the most effective approach.
• Not analyzing the results: It’s important to analyze the results of your posting times to see what works best for your specific audience. Without this analysis, it will be difficult to determine the best time to post on social media.
• Relying on general guidelines: While it’s helpful to consider general guidelines for posting times, it’s important to remember that these are just that — guidelines. It’s essential to test and see what works best for your specific audience and practice.
• Not adjusting posting times regularly: Social media usage patterns can change over time, so it’s important to regularly test and adjust posting times to ensure you are reaching your audience at the most effective times.

These aren’t all the things you need to be aware of, though.

“The biggest mistake chiropractors make is not being consistent,” says Bernal. “Social media takes time to gain traction. It’s very rare to have a post go viral. Strong and steady wins the game.”

While it’s important to choose the best times to post, focusing solely on this can also be a mistake.

“Putting all of their stock in the timing of social media rather than the content [is a mistake],” says Chatellier. “More reach is possible with three awesome videos rather than 10 well-timed static posts or static pictures.”

And she says don’t “[post] at once specific time because it worked in a test.”