Blog - October 26, 2021

Best Times to Post on Social: Food and Grocery Brands

For content strategists and social media managers, it can be difficult to schedule posts. When will the audience be most likely to engage? How do you capture the most attention on your content? What times are best for what social media platforms?

While a strong audience will lead to engagement no matter what time you post, utilizing data can help to optimize that engagement and get the most out of your social content. It’s more important than ever to stay connected with current trends, as consumer behavior is changing so rapidly.

Where is the best place to post food content?

Before we break down when to post, it’s important to know where to post. Food and grocery brands are seeing a majority of engagement on Instagram when it comes to likes.

That said, the food and grocery category has about three times the percentage of engagement on Facebook, four times the engagement on Twitter, and a 14% lower share of engagement on Instagram than the consumer goods category as a whole.

So, when are the best times to post food and grocery content?

Within the food and grocery category, weekday afternoons are the best times for maximum engagement. As consumers scroll during their lunch break, they’re likely to see and interact with food content. And as it gets later in the workday and they start to think about dinner, social media is a great place to find inspiration and recipes.

Instagram:

A heatmap chart of views on Instagram for the food and grocery industry by time of day. The top engagement is described in the paragraph below.

Instagram posts in this category peak around 2-3pm on weekdays and weekends. This could be when people are craving an afternoon snack, deciding what to make for dinner, or simply scrolling through their feeds. Thursday and Friday are the days with the highest engagement here, so food & grocery brands should be sure to finish their week strong. For teams looking to post on the weekends, Instagram is the platform with the smallest drop-off in engagement on Saturdays and Sundays.

Facebook:

Facebook engagement sees its peak around 11am-12pm, slightly earlier than on Instagram, perhaps as people are prepping for lunch or just scrolling on their breaks. There is also a slight peak around 5 or 6 pm earlier in the week, perhaps when people log on during their commute or after work and are thinking about food. Friday is the strongest day for engagement on Facebook, but the other weekdays also have pretty high engagement. Weekends see a significant drop-off in actions, so social media teams should focus on weekdays.

Twitter:

Twitter engagement is scattered throughout the work week, with a drop in engagement after 6pm and on weekends. Twitter is a place people are likely to scroll through quickly and check periodically throughout the day to see what is going on, which could lead to this scattered engagement. Monday is the day with the highest engagement here, so teams should focus on starting off their week strong.

Key takeaways for food & grocery brands:

Each platform has its own peaks for engagement and its own content types that do well. It’s important to have a custom strategy for each platform, don’t just post the same thing everywhere.
While Instagram is dominant for engagement, food and grocery brands can find success on any platform with the right content, and the category already has high engagement levels.
Posts that embrace humor and nostalgia do well across platforms.

Interested in seeing a heat map for a specific brand - your own or a competitor? Give us 5 minutes to chat through exactly what you’re looking for and we’ll create a free report for you.