One trend I find pretty consistent among business owners and nonprofits griping about their social media is that they don’t know what ISN’T working.

That’s always a big thing I learn by looking at metrics regularly.

Besides seeing what types of posts are working (hint: video of you does best!), it’s helpful to see when your followers are on social media so you catch them there!

One of my clients is based on the West Coast, in California, with me. So naturally, we were posting his content on Pacific time on the three platforms where he’s active.

After working with him a short while, I went in and looked at the metrics and found something that persuaded me to change when we posted some of his content. On LinkedIn, I could see that a significant portion of his followers were in the New York and Washington D.C. areas on the East Coast – places where he used to live and work.

We didn’t want to post stuff on Pacific time, which is three hours later than Eastern time. Even though a lot of his audience is on the West Coast, you never want to exclude anyone by posting at a time when they’re unlikely to see it.

We ended up adding some variety to when we posted content — some on Pacific time and some on Eastern time.

That’s the point of looking at your metrics: it helps you do things a little bit better because you have more information. So use it! You don’t have to guess!

So, be honest: how often do you look at your metrics? Have you found anything unexpected there that changed how you do things to help you be more effective?

Let me know in the comments!