The What, Where and When of social media

Unfortunately, having a successful social media marketing strategy is not as easy as simply throwing content online and waiting for people to react to it. If that were the case, every company’s content marketing strategy would be a winner.
The truth is, what, where and when you post can have a huge impact on your social media marketing outcomes. If you’re ready to use websites like Facebook and Twitter for more than just keeping up with friends, read on.

What should you post?

In terms of what types of content you should post online, you’ve got a lot of options. Whether you choose to write and share articles or images, you need to make sure whatever it is will appeal to current and future customers. This means content has to be of a high quality and valuable to whoever’s viewing it.

At the same time, see to it that what you’re doing isn’t driving people away. What’s sure to alienate a significant portion of your audience is constant self-promotion. To avoid this scenario, Entrepreneur recommends you spend less time focusing on conversions and instead share content online visitors will find interesting. Do this and the conversions could follow.

Where should you post?

Which social media websites you end up sharing content on will directly influence what it is you post. A separate Entrepreneur article states that different platforms attract their own audiences.

Facebook users, for example, prefer pictures, according to the news source. Meanwhile, those who have Twitter accounts like to see images attached to tweets.

While men and women can be found using all social media websites, the news outlet reports that men tend to gravitate toward Twitter and Google+. Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest are popular among women. This just goes to show how important it is to research these online platforms and their average users. Finding out which ones your target audience gravitates toward could translate to content marketing success.

When should you post?

When it comes to social media marketing, you need to walk a fine line between staying on your customer’s radar and not burying them in content. So how often should you post via your accounts?

According to Business 2 Community, posting on social media differs depending on the website. For Twitter, you’re going to want to send out 14 tweets a day. In the case of Facebook, posts should be shared nine times a day. The source advises you not to share three separate posts in a period of two hours.

The time of day that you post is just as important. Entrepreneur states that 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. is the time to share content on Facebook, and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. is ideal for Twitter. If you’re using Google+, you need to start sharing even earlier – between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m.

People are checking other social media websites a little later in the day, based on Entrepreneur’s guidance. For example, the 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. window is good for Tumblr users, while 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. is recommended for Pinterest.

Once you figure out how many times a day you want to post, you can establish a schedule to ensure things stay on track. As you build your audience, you may even find they come back each day to see what fresh content you’re serving up next.

Remain reliable while delivering content people want and content marketing success could be within reach before you know it.