How often should you post to your social media pages?

With so much conflicting advice online, it can be tricky to know exactly how many times a week you should be posting to your social media pages. And as a small business owner or a creative entrepreneur, it can be frustrating when an expert tells you that you should be sharing content every day. Who on earth has the time for that?

In reality, planning, creating and posting social media content to our pages every day of the week takes up a lot of time. Heck, it's a full-time job. (Bigger companies employ people whose sole responsibility is to manage and grow their social media channels.)

If you're a smaller business, posting content to your pages every day is a bit like going on a rigorous exercise regime - you notice results quickly, but you can't stick to it in the long term, and it takes up far too much of your time.

If you're a smaller business owner or creative, ignore those unrealistic recommendations and stick to an easier-to-manage goal. Focus on delivering quanity content over quality to your online audience in a way that works for you and your routine, and you'll be able to see more meaningful results over a more extended period.

What happens when you don't post to your page enough?

This is an interesting question because there are two elements at play here.

Firstly, if you don't post enough content to your page, you won't get the results you need to grow an engaged online audience who loves your brand and want to buy from you. Social media is a busy place with lots of people sharing content, so if you're not posting enough, you'll be drowned out (even if, from your perspective, it feels like you're sharing too much.) Fail to post regularly enough, and people may forget who you are.

Secondly, inconsistency can really damage your social media presence. Perhaps you share x5 posts one week, and then suddenly, you only have time to share one post the week after? The algorithms know how important consistency is to their users and will downgrade your content if you post randomly.

Facebook:

Many creatives achieve outstanding results by using their personal Facebook page to promote their work. And with Facebook Business Pages being so difficult to grow these days, this approach makes perfect sense. The following guidance can be suitable for both your personal page and your business page:

• Recommended by experts: x1 post per day.

• Realistic amount for a smaller business: x5 posts per week.

• Too little: x2 - x3 posts a week.

• How much is too much? It's recommended that you shouldn't post more than once a day - x7 posts per week is your maximum.

Instagram:

• Recommended by experts: x1 post or reel per day, x2+ stories per day.
  

• Realistic amount for a smaller business: x4 posts/reels per week, x2 stories every day.
  

• Too little: x1 - x2 per week with no stories.
  

• How much is too much? It's recommended that you shouldn't post more than once a day - x7 posts per week is your maximum.

LinkedIn:

• Recommended by experts: x2 posts per business day.
  

• Realistic amount for a smaller business: x3 - x4 posts per week.
  

• Too little: x1 post every few weeks.
  

• How much is too much? It's recommended that you shouldn't post more than x5 times per day.

Twitter:

Twitter is a very different platform, and when you share content here, it can quickly disappear into the Twittersphere. You need to share content more often throughout the day, with shorter tweets, to make the same impact.

• Recommended by experts: x5 tweets per business day.
  

• Realistic amount for a smaller business: x14 tweets per week.
  

• Too little: x3 - x4 times per week
  

• How much is too much? It's recommended that you shouldn't really tweet more than x5 per day.

Looking for more advice on how to grow your social media channels? Read more from our blog here:

How to (realistically) make time for growing your social media pages.

Were you thinking of having multiple social media accounts for your one business? Read this first.

Looking for content ideas for your social media pages?

Get 12 months of awesomely creative social media campaign ideas for your business.