Are you wondering if there’s a best time to post on social media? After all, a post is only effective when people see it, right? And if we’re posting into oblivion when our audience isn’t online, marketing on Instagram may not be the best way to reach them.
We’re not going to waste any time in dealin’ it to you straight: What time you should post on Instagram completely depends on YOUR audience.
But before you hop off this article thinking you’re not going to get anything tactical, let us tell you how to use Instagram analytics to discover the best times to post for your particular audience. Let’s dive in!
How to determine the best times to post on Instagram with analytics
Instagram Analytics on Business and Creator profiles are great for determining your audience’s age, location, gender, your best-performing posts, and of course: metrics regarding their most active times.
To determine the best time to post on Instagram using Analytics, follow these simple steps:
Go to your Instagram profile.
Click the top right hamburger menu and click "insights". *Don’t see it? You have a Personal account! Skip to the next section.*
Click “Total followers” in the Overview section.
Scroll to the bottom to “Most Active Times.”
Use this information to determine which days and what times your audience is most active, and experiment with posting then!
Note: Unfortunately, detailed analytics are not available to Personal Instagram accounts at this time. If you have a Personal account like Jasmine, you can either switch to a Business or Creator account, or skip to the next section about determining the best time to post without analytics!
How to determine the best times to post on Instagram without analytics
To determine the best time to post on Instagram without using Analytics, it’s crucial to understand WHO your ideal client is and WHEN they are most likely to be active on social media… and then test, test, test your theory!
First, ask yourself the following questions to determine your ideal client’s social media habits:
What is his/her favorite social media platform?
When is he/she most likely to check this platform?
How long does he/she spend on social media each day?
Based on your answers to these questions, you should have a pretty good idea of where to begin your experiment.
For example, if your ideal client is a homeschooling mother of 2 who’s favorite platform is Instagram, there is a good chance she’s not checking it during school hours. Instead, she may be active on social media in the morning before beginning her day, during lunchtime, and after she’s put her kids to bed. Those 3 times are where your experiment begins!
Test, Test, Test
We know you probably don’t want to hear this, but we all know it’s the Truth... it’s time to TEST!
Whether you put yourself in your Ideal Client’s shoes or used Analytics to determine a few of the best times to post, we recommend testing your theory by taking 5 days to test different times of the day and keeping track of the engagement you receive in correlation to the time you’ve posted.
For the Social Curator account, we have tested our engagement levels and have found that our audience is on Instagram pretty consistently between 9am and 6pm. But others may test and see spikes, and BINGO!, they know when to post to their feed, Stories, Reels, etc.
We are all selling different things to different people which means our customers are scrolling on social at different times during the day… But when we know for sure the best time of day to post on Instagram, we will build our businesses to even greater heights than ever before.
Happy testing!
👉 Wanna Dig Deeper?
Check out Social Analytics - Knowing What and When to Post to learn:
How Analytics Expert Tony Rulli recommends you use analytics in your social media marketing strategy
What additional questions you should be asking to think like your ideal client
How to identify what THEY want you to post
The best ways to track your stats when testing different posting times