Quantity versus quality
For years, the debate about quantity versus quality has raged on with consumers leaning toward quality, so we won’t rehash the merits, rather focus on how brands are treating their Facebook pages.
According to SocialBakers research on the number of posts major brands place on their Facebook pages, they noted a distinction between news organizations and retail brands.
Below are the average number of posts per day (note: SocialBakers is a European company, so to make sense of the data, place a decimal where the comma is).
SocialBakers summarized, “there is no exact ideal number, but there is a range. Typically if you post fewer then 2 posts a week, you will not engage your audience enough for them to maintain a social connection with you, and you will lose engagement. If you post more then 2 per day (as a brand) you will typically lose engagement. That means the ideal number is between 5 – 10 posts per week as a brand, and as a media company, this is typically 4 – 10x higher, as news are information people engage with all day long.”
How Facebook should be used in real estate
The above data is useful to an extent but should not be used to determine your volume. First of all, it only takes into account what major brands are outputting but doesn’t measure what the response rates are, what their cost was, or what their results were. Do you care if Nike averages four television ads per Super Bowl? No. Do you care if a local pest company sponsors the five o’clock news on Fox? No. The ads could be cheap or expensive, effective or ineffective, but their frequency is one of the least important factors in measuring their success.
All that said, the theory of touch marketing remains- you want to drip market but you don’t want to overwhelm. A daily update for a Realtor’s Facebook page is appropriate, but fifty updates are not as they will overwhelm. Asking questions or interacting with people breeds more success on real estate Facebook pages than an automated feed of new MLS listings in the entire city.
The bottom line we would remind you of is that asking how many times you should post on Facebook is akin to focusing on quantity- be the value added and treat Facebook like any drip campaign where you’re present but not obnoxious. Each market is different- a city with high saturation of tech users will most likely tolerate a higher volume from you whereas users with only 20 friends will be flooded with your updates if you comment on your page every hour.
There’s no magic number and the focus should be on success over volume. What is working for you in your market?
Fabian
August 11, 2011 at 11:41 am
You should post as often as necessary. When there is nothing to tell, just don't. But don't keep quit for too long.