Digital marketing: How often should businesses post on socials?

Understanding how to navigate the balance between too little content, and too much is no simple task for marketers – Katrina Bell gets to the heart of the matter.

Just how much is too much when it comes to posting on socials? Consumers are hyper-aware of how much of their attention is taken up with commercial posts and can easily develop fatigue. But so can brands. 

If you Google this article’s headline, you will undoubtedly be given this information:

Instagram: Post 1-2 posts a day. 
Facebook: Post about once a day. 
LinkedIn: Post between 3 to 5 times per week. 
X: Post between 2 to 5 times a day. 

Just to clarify, this is absolute nonsense. Unless you are a mega brand or a news site, you can happily ignore this. Few brands can generate this level of content that is good enough to appease the social app algorithms. 

Chasing the platforms’ algorithms is a common cause of burnout – what worked for you last month could mean social Siberia this month. Advice like the above sets unrealistic goals.

Here’s what you should do instead...

INSTAGRAM 
Definitely multiple formats, concentrating on consistent quality over quantity. Mix up the posts between carousels, reels, static posts and stories. Certainly, being a regular poster will increase the likelihood that you will be shown on the personalised Explore feed of users looking for related accounts. That’s the special sauce for gaining new followers that haven’t looked for your brand name specifically. 

Posts in Explore are algorithmically selected based on a factors such as accounts you already follow, content you have Liked, and who your connections are. 

FACEBOOK
When you have something to say rather than when you feel you should say something. Due to the age demographic, this is the platform you are very likely going to end up doing some sort of customer service via the comments. So once every couple of days is probably more than enough. 

Due to the older skewed audience, they are also partial to giveaways, offers and any promotion that they can leverage for a deal. The 55-64 age range spend around 45 minutes a day on the platform, which is significantly higher than those in their 20s. So it is a bored and captive audience. However they too can easily get sick of seeing promotional material and will either unfollow you or press that See Less Often option. Two good posts a week will get you far more engagement than 5 mediocre ones. 

THREADS/X-TWITTER
Given that both platforms are short form, in real-time and users tend to bounce in and out rapidly, a consistent rhythm counts, as does time of day. It is less likely you are picking up new customers on these apps but you may find a peer audience that will read, engage and relate to your content. 

You may even find yourself part of a wider industry-related conversation that garners you mentions and shares – the Social Proof gold mine we all seek. The key is to avoid over promotion. Any marketer that spouts the stat that between 3 to 5 times a day is your goal is not understanding who your audiences are on these platforms. 

LINKEDIN
If B2B is an important audience for you, having a conversation is far more important than pushing tired content. Your time is better spent interacting with your core target as a confident expert that understands their struggles. So it’s time to create content to get the comments flowing, and for you to engage with other accounts in a similar way.