(click to watch inFullscreen HD)
If you're just joining us, the purpose of this series is to help you build a deeper relationship with your customers so you can develop content that people will love interacting with, and products they can not live without.
So Far, We've talked about smart commenting strategies, and using Facebook Groups as a loyalty program, we've talked about optimizing the photostrip at the top of your page, and Edgerank the algorithm Facebook uses to determine what content gets shown in your news feed.
We've talked about the different ways you can use photos to really grab people's attention and explored some options on how you can use live streaming video directly from your page to really get people engaged.
With over 4 billion "things" being shared on Facebook every day, you have to make sure you're doing everything you can to stand out and grab just a little attention.
When should I post and how often?
Are there certain words or content that will generate the highest response? When are people engaging with my content?
Well, get your pen and notebook handy becuase all of your questions are about to be answered....... No seriously, grab a pen an paper
Buddy Media one of the top firms for Facebook Marketing came out with a report back in April that used data from 200 of their clients across many industries. These clients represent the worlds largest brands in entertainment, media, retail, automotive, business and finance, fashion, food and beverage, healthcare and beauty, sports, and travel and hospitality.
The primary success metrics were
- Comment rate: the number of comments as a percentage of fan base
- Like rate: Number of likes as a percentage of fan base
- Engagement Rate: a combination of likes and comments factoring in fan base.
And all analysis in regards to time and scheduling is based on Eastern time.
The first thing they looked at was Post Length
They noticed a strong negative correlation between post length and engagement. In orther words the longer the post, the less interaction it got. Posts between one and 80 characters had, on average, a 27% higher engagement rate.
Yet these shorter posts only accounted for 19% of everything analyzed.
The study also found that the engagement rate on articles that used link shortners saw 3 times less engagement than articles that used the full url.
This is likely because the "trust indicators" you get from a full url are missing when the url is shortened by a service like bit.ly
Think about it, in an environment like Facebook which sounds more trustworthy to you buddymedia.com or bit.ly/X367a2 ?
So shorter posts, and full urls statistically speaking get way more engagement.
When are the best times to post?
According to the study, approximately 60% of posts were published between 10am through 4 pm Monday through Friday, or core work hours.
But what the study revealed was that brands that posted outside of normal business hours like early morning, at the finish of the work day, or late at night had an engagement rates of approximately 20% higher than average.
According to the study, approximately 60% of posts were published between 10am through 4 pm Monday through Friday, or core work hours. But what the study revealed was that brands that posted outside of normal business hours like early morning, at the finish of the work day, or late at night had an engagement rates of approximately 20% higher than average.
This shows how critical it is to having a post appear at the top of the News Feed during the time of day people are most likely checking their pages.
This is why we covered EdgeRank in day 5, because if you're getting your content to rank high in the News Feed before people are going to work, right when they get home, or before they go to bed, statistically speaking, you're going to have a much better chance at engaging them. Now if you don't want to be awake at 4 in the morning, you can use tools like Hootsuite or tweetdeck to schedule your posts to be released ahead of time.
But to reiterate, Brands that post outside of normal business hours have an average of 20% higher engagement rates.
When's the best day of the week to post?
Well the answer will vary from industry to industry, but on average the research revealed that 86% of posts are published between Monday through Friday with engagement peaking on Thursday and Friday.
Engagement rates on Thursday and Friday are generally 18% higher than other days of the week. In other words, the less people want to be at work, the more they're on Facebook, which also coincides with the data from Facebook's "Happiness Index" where sentiment on Facebook spkes by 10% on Friday.
Engagement rates fall approximately 3.5% below average for posts published Monday through Wednesday and engagement rates on Saturday are 18% below average. But ultimately, engagment rates vary by industry.
If you're in the Entertainment industry, Friday, Saturday and Sunday are going to be your best days. Not only are people generally more engaged, but many other entertainment brands are neglecting these days all together.
If you're in Media, Saturday and Sunday are also great for engagement with the most engaging day being saturday seeing an average of 15% higher engagement, also try avoiding Monday.
Retail Sunday is your day for engagement. Feedback rockets up by roughly 25% and yet only 5% of brands are taking advantage, giving you a leg up now that you know. Also, the study finds that brands post heavily on Friday but engagement is significantly below average, look to post more on Saturday.
If you're in Automotive, Sunday posts will be your friend with engagement rates being about 110% higher than average. also less than 8% of posts being made on this day, so you'll have a much better chance of standing out.
If you're in business and Finance, the best engagement rates are seen on Wednesday and Thursday, and drop sharply from Friday to Tuesday. So consider keeping your best stuff for Wednesday and Thursday when engagement rates are at their highest.
Fashion Industry, Engagement rates peak on Thursday and show a significant drop on Friday and the weekend, despite most brands being active on Friday, so look to Thursday to publish the content you want feedback on.
Food and Beverage industry is the only industry reviewed that were proportionately more active with publishing on the weekend, but engagement was the highest on Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday. So if you're an admin of a food or beverage company, consider "anchoring" your content on these days.
Healthcare and beauty people, your engagement rates are 40% above average on Thursday, so save your best content for this day to capitalize on the higher feedback whenever possible.
Sports your best day is Sunday, with engagement rates being 110% above average however most sports brands are posting more on Thursdays and simply not taking advantage of the higher engagement rates.
Travel and Hospitality you're less likely to get feedback on the weekends and wednesday. The highest engagment is happening on Thursday and Friday, so look to the end of the week to publish your content. Tuesday also has about 20% higher than average feedback, so you may consider "anchoring" your content on Tuesday, then reinforcing it on Thursday and Friday.
The key takeaway
You want to be publishing your content when people are the most likely to interact with with. Use this data as a guide post for when you publish your best stuff, and you're going to have a much easier time standing out.
To drive comments, ask a direct question and ask for the response.
Ask fans to "post" "comment" or "tell" you something. Fans will listen and respond by commenting. The top two keywords, "like" and "post" both have positive comment and "like" rates, so keep it simple, and people will respond in kind.
If you're in promo mode, "softer sell" keywords tend to resonate better with users as opposed to more direct or aggressive languate like "contest" "promotion" sweepstake" and "coupon" keywords.
Two of the top five promo keywords were win and winner suggesting people are open to a contest or sweepstakes when the correct tone is set in the post. Win/winning keywords give fans someting to be excited about rather than the feeling they are being sold to.
Also posts that end with a question
(Rather than having it at the beginning or middle) have a 15% higher engagement rate. So if you're looking to invoke a response, you want to end your post with the question so it's the last thing they read.
Words with the highest interaction rates
Where, when would and should drive the highest interaction rates in this study. They're also highly under utilized. The word "would" drove an increase in "likes" on a post likely due to fans using "like" as a way to say "yes" rather than posting "yes" as a comment.
Avoid these words
"why" "did" "what" "who" and "how" because they get the lowest engagement rates, likely because they're perceived as intrusive and/or challenging.
To sum it all up,
While engagement and best practices differ by industry, it's important to keep things simple and be present when your fans are the most engaged (and when your competitors are nowhere to be found) keep this data by you for as a cheat sheet and use it to schedule your best stuff when people will be the most likely to interact.
And that's the end of Day 11 in the 21 Days to a More Engaging Facebook Presence,
If you like this video please share it, and if you haven't already liked my page, you can do so by clicking on the top left and corner of this video or by going to my page at Facebook.com/tommyismyname
And if you'd like to have access to all of the other videos in the 21 Days to a More Engaging Facebook Presence series, sign up via email to have each day sent directly to your email.