LinkedIn ranks among the top social media platforms for business. It’s primarily a professional networking platform, so you know those reading your posts have a work mindset. That’s an advantage whether you sell business-to-business (B2B) or market to professionals and job seekers.
LinkedIn is particularly effective at reaching high-level professionals and decision-makers. With 53% of six-figure earners and 54% of college and post-college graduates using the platform, it’s difficult to find a more concentrated online gathering place for these demographics.
You want to reach as many of those readers as possible, and no one can dedicate their entire lives to posting on LinkedIn. Even social media marketers must log off, and you have plenty to keep you busy already.
Don’t worry — this guide will help you find the best time to post on LinkedIn. You’ll learn about general best practices for timing your posts and how to find your audience’s engagement patterns. But first, let’s look at why LinkedIn timing is unique.
Why timing matters on LinkedIn
LinkedIn is part of its users’ professional routines. They use the platform as a tool and log off when they’re done. The best way to catch their attention is to post when more of them are online. Those patterns usually differ from other social media sites because people use LinkedIn differently.
How LinkedIn users behave differently
LinkedIn users log on to do business — to network, job hunt, or stay current with news in their field. They’re not there to kill time scrolling, so the odds of them accidentally stumbling on your content are much lower than on other social media platforms. You’re more likely to reach their feeds if you post during their active hours.
Understanding your business connections’ daily routines
The best time to post on LinkedIn is when your audience is active, so check the patterns of people who engage with you. Look at the comments on your recent posts and check the timestamps.
Then, click on a few of your followers’ profiles, scroll down to the Activity section, and note when they tend to comment or post. Recent timestamps mark posts and comments by hours — e.g., “6h ago.” Collect data on enough follower posts, and you’ll know when your audiences engage.
An overview of LinkedIn’s feed algorithm
LinkedIn has multiple algorithms that analyze user activity and predict what each person wants to see on their feed. Whenever someone follows a content creator, engages with content, or asks to see less of a specific post type, the algorithm gets more information and adjusts feed content accordingly.
You can use this process to your advantage. If you find the best time to post on LinkedIn, you can encourage more audience members to like and comment. The more they engage with your content, the more they’re likely to see.
Get to know your LinkedIn audience
LinkedIn has users in every industry, and every industry and market has its working hours. The best time to post on LinkedIn will differ if your audience works standard nine-to-five hours or is active on weekends, evenings, and holidays.
You need to dig deeply to learn these patterns. You can use the LinkedIn profiles of your followers and connections to learn where they are, what they engage with, and what they need from the platform.
LinkedIn users often create very detailed profiles to help them network. Once you’ve identified a few of your most engaged followers, scroll through their profiles and find what they have in common. You may have multiple commenters with similar job titles or career trajectories.
Pay attention to timestamps and types of content. Your audience might post and reshare in the mornings and engage with others in the afternoon. Look at the nature of what they read and post to learn if topics change by time.
Best times to post, made simple
The best time to post on LinkedIn varies by company and industry, but you must start somewhere. Fortunately, there’s enough data to give you a jumping-off point.
General guidelines
Overall, the best time to post on LinkedIn is during weekday business hours, as this breakdown shows:
Data suggests that the best slots within the work week are:
- Between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.
- Monday through Thursday, with Tuesday being the most active day on LinkedIn
Still, time details vary significantly by source. Some sources argue that engagement increases at the end of the week. Others say Mondays are best. The difference is partially because LinkedIn has a global reach, so no matter when you post, some people won’t be working.
Weekends tend to receive the least engagement, but some activity still occurs. Consider posting on weekends if you target markets with 24/7 activity or frequent weekend working hours, such as the hospitality industry.
Time zone considerations
To find the best time to post on LinkedIn, you need to know your users’ schedules, which means knowing where they are. If you have a local or regional focus that’s not your own, translate your ideal posting time into that time zone.
For example, if you have buyers across the U.S., consider when your post would reach the most people. Posting at 12:30 p.m. from your Boston location lets you catch locals on their lunch breaks. Meanwhile, your L.A. audience is just logging on in the morning. This way, you reach two groups with one post.
Consider rotating your post times to target business hours in various markets, especially if you have a global audience. Use this map of LinkedIn users as a resource for planning posts by time zone:
Use this map in combination with a market-based world clock like this one:
You may reach more active professionals if you post when your target markets are open.
Choose your posting schedule
There’s no single “right answer” for the best time to post on LinkedIn, nor is there a cadence that works for every business. Companies with large social media teams and dozens of buyer types might post daily, while a small local business gets maximum engagement from posting twice a week. The key is to start small and learn what your audiences respond to.
Step 1: Set engagement goals
Begin by setting concrete goals for your LinkedIn strategy. Choose how you want to measure engagement and get your current baseline. For example, if you plan to track post comments, how many comments do you currently get at different times?
Step 2: Publish your first posts
Post once a week at the time you’ve selected. If you have audiences in multiple time zones and need to post at different times, rotate week by week. Keep up that cadence and start tracking interactions.
Once you have some engagement, gradually start posting more often.
Step 3: Create a posting calendar
When you start seeing regular engagement, create a posting calendar. You can incorporate it into your current social media schedule or create one from scratch.
Your schedule should include each post’s date, time, and topic. To optimize engagement, align your post topics with industry news and trends.
Tools to schedule posts
Don’t worry if you already have a packed marketing calendar — Constant Contact’s social media marketing tools let you schedule posts in advance so you never miss a target time frame. You can use the same tools to post and keep track of comments across multiple platforms or focus exclusively on LinkedIn.
Test and improve your timing
LinkedIn makes it easy to track content performance. Navigate to your posts and activity and click View Analytics on the content you want to investigate. You’ll get a quick view of how many impressions, reactions, comments, and reposts your content received.
Switch your time slot
You can experiment with your timing once you’ve been active at similar times for a few weeks or months. Schedule your next few posts for a different part of the day without significantly changing other aspects of your strategy. Then, compare engagement data to see which posts performed better.
Aim to compare posts with similar audiences and topics to minimize distractions. Look for differences in performance, especially:
- Drop-offs or increases in engagement
- Changes in impressions
- Shifts in audience characteristics, including geographic locations.
Test a few times and days. Identify when you get the best results, remembering that different segments may have different ideal times. Adjust your posting calendar and schedule to target those times, and watch what happens. If engagement stays high, you’ve found the ideal time to post on LinkedIn.
Quick tips for better results
LinkedIn and other social media platforms allow you to market your small business to a highly engaged audience. Here’s how to stand out and get that audience to focus on you.
Add images and videos
According to Tequia Burt, editor-in-chief at LinkedIn, posts with images get twice as many comments as those without. Videos are even more powerful. Uploaded videos get five times the engagement as text posts, while live videos get 24 times more.
Ask thoughtful questions to prompt comments
Posting at the right time can earn you more attention, but engagement is how you reach your goals. Add thoughtful, open-ended questions to your articles and posts to encourage engagement.
For instance, if you share an article with important industry news, ask about readers’ response strategies. When you post about a common pain point, ask readers to share solutions.
Try to create engagement opportunities that add networking value for readers. Many LinkedIn users comment on others’ posts to highlight their professional expertise and make connections. The more detailed insight your readers can offer, the more they want to add their two cents.
Tailor content to your posting schedule
If it’s 9:30 a.m., people are planning and prioritizing for the day ahead. They might read market updates, check messages, and strategize problems. Their minds are fresh, and they’re ready for more thought-provoking content, such as:
- Thought leadership
- Market analysis
- Industry news
- Trend explorations.
By the afternoon, most professionals are ready for their second wind. This is the time for shorter-form and less demanding content, such as:
- Company announcements
- Client success highlights
- Office humor
- Interactive polls.
LinkedIn makes it easy to add polls to your content. Here’s an example of what that looks like:
Use these ideas to jump-start your content strategy, especially when you’re ready to change things up. Watch which posts perform better at which times, and don’t be afraid to think outside the box. You might find that your audiences respond better to heavier content in the afternoon or lighter content in the morning.
If it works for them, it works for you.
Save time by automating
Social media automation makes it easy to maintain your posting schedule, even while running a successful business and marketing on multiple other channels.
Automation lets you schedule content for each social media account you use. Tools like Constant Contact even automatically collect data, so it’s available when you’re ready to review your strategy.
Take your LinkedIn strategy to the next level
Congratulations — you now have the information you need to find the best time to post on LinkedIn. You know that weekdays and working hours are generally best, though those times vary by market and industry. You also know how to monitor results to develop a strategy and tweak that strategy based on engagement.
Start by creating your first few weekly posts and choosing a time to make them live. As you wait for the data to roll in, keep learning about LinkedIn basics and best practices for the platform. The team at Constant Contact is here to help with strategy guides and customer support for subscribers.
