Can posting at the ‘right’ time help you grow on social media? If so, how do you find  the best time(s) for you? And what are the best apps/tools to help you find the right posting times? 

That’s exactly what you’ll find out in this solo podcast episode with me, Janet Murray.

[1:00] What social media influencer Jera Bean says about posting times

[2:30] The trouble with Googling for advice on posting times

[3:10] What social media is really about (and what this means for posting times)

[3:51] The surprisingly easy strategy to find the best posting times for your business

[4:00] My best social media posting times (and how I found out what they were)

[5:34] A hack you can use to find the best Instagram posting times

[6:10 ] What your Facebook analytics can tell you about best posting times 

[6:51] A common mistake business owners make with LinkedIn posting times

[8:00] Three key things that will help increase your social media engagement 

Key Links

Janet Murray’s Courageous Content Planner

Janet Murray’s Courageous Podcasting Content Kit

Janet Murray’s Courageous Planner Launch Content Kit

Janet Murray's Courageous Blog Content Kit

Save £30 on my Courageous Email Lead Magnet Content Kit using the code MAGNET67.

Save £30 on my Business Basics Content Kit using the code PODCAST67.

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Janet Murray’s Courators Kit

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Jera Bean on Tiktok and Instagram 

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Janet Murray on Twitter

Janet Murray on TikTok

IMPORTANT: THIS TRANSCRIPT IS AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED. WE GIVE IT A QUICK CHECK THROUGH BUT WE DON’T CORRECT EVERYTHING AS IT’S INTENDED TO HELP YOU FIND PARTS YOU WANT TO LISTEN TO AGAIN - NOT AS AN EXACT TRANSCRIPT. SO THERE MIGHT BE A FEW QUIRKY WORDS/PHRASES HERE!

I'm not saying posting times don't matter at all, but you really don't need to spend hours studying who analytics and you don't need to buy expensive tools or apps or read endless articles on Google about it. You're listening to the courageous content podcast. I'm Janet Murray, and I love helping coaches, creatives and entrepreneurs create super engaging content that generates leads and sales for their businesses.

No one starts a business and just knows how to create engaging. Content is a skill that has to be learned from practice. And there's always something new to learn, no matter how long you've been in business. And I know running an online business can feel messy, perfectionism, fear, self doubts, and other mindset stuff can stop you showing up online in the way that's best for you.

So you'll get help with that too. Ready to get courageous with your content? Let's get started. I recently watched a TikTok video from a social media influencer called Jera Bean. She was answering a question from one of her followers. What's the best time to post on social media. Jera has 1.2 million followers on Tik TOK and 179,000 followers on Instagram and always gets tons of comments and shares on her posts.

So I think we can safely conclude that she knows a thing or two about building an audience on social media. This is what she said. I'm gonna be super real with you on this one. I don't think about it. I just post when I want to post, I find that people get way too wrapped up in granular details. Like these don't actually matter that much.

I’d much rather you focus on the bigger picture, things that matter, like showing up consistently regardless of the day or time providing valuable content in some shape or form. Also having A little bit of fun , so what's the best time to post on social media. Jera is right. It really doesn't matter that much. Ultimately it always comes down to quality. Now I'm not saying posting times don't matter at all.

But what I am saying is that you really don't need to spend hours studying your analytics. You don't need to buy any expensive tools or apps and you don't need to spend hours reading articles on Google about it. I mean, I just Googled best times to post on your Facebook page. And I got this. This is from influencer hub. Apparently the best time to post is Wednesday between 11:00 AM and 1:00 PM.

The overall best day is Wednesday. Apparently you will get the most consistent engagement on Wednesday between 9:00 AM and 3:00 PM. And the worst day is Sunday. That's when you'll see the least amount of engagement. Now I find this just ridiculous because it doesn't take into account your audience and the clients or customers that you are trying to reach. I mean, nine till 3:00 PM might be the optimum time.

But what if you're trying to attract night workers who are asleep during the, or what if you were trying to attract people who have a commitment every Wednesday, lunchtime, which means they'll never be online. Okay. I'm being flippant here, but hopefully you get what I mean, social media is just that it's about being social. It's about building connections. It's about building relationships.

Unfortunately, there is no PDF download that is going to tell you exactly what to post when and exactly what time in order to attract your ideal customers or clients. I wish there was, but there isn't, there is always going to be some experimentation and it ultimately always comes down to the content that said common sense can go a long way. So for example,

if you're based in the UK and most of your customers or clients are also in the UK, it makes sense to post when they're awake; conversely, if you're based in the UK, but most of your clients are in the us. It's going to make sense to post later in the day, when you know that all of your ideal followers are going to be awake.

So in my business, I work mainly with small business owners who are running their business around a family, mostly moms. So I know that lots of them are out on the school, run in the morning and in the afternoon. So posting it, maybe eight, 9:00 AM, three to 4:00 PM, probably not the best time. So I don't tend to put content out at those times,

both internally. So I don't tend to run classes at that time. And I don't put external social media content out at that time either. It just doesn't seem to make sense. I've also through common sense, tested some posting times for social media, 7:00 AM, five or 6:00 PM in the afternoon, and also eight or 9:00 PM. They all actually work pretty well.

I've found that five to 6:00 PM tends to be better for me, but it's always hard because you're always saying to yourself, well, was that the content or was it the posting time? You might have had this experience too, but I've certainly had the experience of posting something later than I planned or earlier than plans. And it doing really, really well because it was a great post.

And I think if we get too bogged down in saying, well, the reason that did well is because I put it out at the optimum time. Sometimes we can forget to do the important bit, which is to look at the content. And often, unless we're putting our content out at a really, really silly time, she was right. It doesn't really matter.

But common sense can give you an idea of the times that your content is most likely to hit the right people. One thing you can do is use the native tools on social media platforms to tell you when your ideal followers are most likely to be about. So on Instagram, for example, you can hit the live button. Don't worry. You won't go live.

But if you hit the live button ready to go live at the top, right? You'll see an update that tells you how many of your followers are online. So what you could do is monitor a TAVR a few days or a few weeks. They can work out. What's the best time when this, if your ideal followers online and it would make sense to go live there and we'll put your content out out then,

but it doesn't mean that your content is going to do great just because you're going live at that time. Still going to be good content. You could also look at the analytics in your Facebook page, for example, and you could see which of your posts were performing best. However, again, you've still got to look and you've still got to ask yourself that question.

Was it the content or was it the time that I posted most times it really does come back to the content. Finally, although common sense can help a lot. Try not to make assumptions. So one assumption I hear people making a lot is that there's no point posting on LinkedIn over the weekend because apparently people aren't on LinkedIn at the weekend and it's just not true.

Less people are on LinkedIn, but that doesn't mean that it isn't a good time for you to post. So if you imagine someone who's looking for a new job and you create opportunities, they're updating their CV. They're actually probably more likely to do that over the weekend because during the week they're working a lot of things that I know we'll get on LinkedIn over the weekends when it's quieter.

A lot of business owners, I know spend Sundays or parts of Sundays planning for the coming week because they have a more flexible lifestyle. So try not to make assumptions. And in fact, pasting on a platform like LinkedIn at a time when it is a bit quiet, it might actually mean that your content hits more people and people actually have more time to engage,

to get into a conversation with you. So what's the best time to post on social media. I'll play you out with the music from an Instagram reel that I made on this topic. It really says it all doesn't matter. The bottom line is posting at the right time. It can amplify good social media content and get it in front of more people.

But if your content isn't engaging, it doesn't matter what time of day you post. So if that's the case, take Jera’s advice and focus on these three things, showing up consistently creating valuable content and having fun. Would you like to grow your audience on social media, head over to Janet murray.co.uk/audience to take my 62nd audience growth quiz, find out the steps you need to take to build your online audience and your sales you'll get a detailed report,

but actionable tips tried and tested with hundreds of my clients from both products and service-based businesses. So you can start creating super engaging content to attract your ideal clients today. Listening to the courageous content podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review on apple podcast or share the episode on social media. That way more people can benefit from the free tips and strategies I share and be sure to tag me when you do I'm at Jan Murray on Instagram,

Twitter, and TikTok.