Many social media platforms have a specific limit on how many characters you can include in a post. However, the ideal length of a post on each platform is not as simple as fitting the post into the character limitation. Each of the major platforms has an ideal character count based on several factors.
Ideal post length for each social media platform
One of the keys to an effective online marketing strategy is to match the correct content to the correct social media platform. Part of this matching process is choosing the ideal length for each post.
Facebook allows users to post longer content than most other platforms. You can include up to 63,206 characters in a Facebook post. However, Facebook posts that are 50 characters or fewer tend to get more engagement. If you want to share a large amount of information with your audience, it may be more effective to create a short post that links to a webpage or blog post on your website than to post it all on Facebook.
Instagram is more of a visual medium than Facebook, but you can add textual information through Instagram captions. Captions are limited to 2,200 characters. Large blocks of text can look messy and distract users from the image that should be the main focus of an Instagram post. Captions between one and 50 characters tend to get more interactions on Instagram. If your post does not make sense without a lengthy caption, Instagram may not be the right platform for that post.
At just 280 characters, Twitter has one of the shortest character limits. Like the other platforms, the tweets that perform well usually do not make use of the entire allowance. Tweets between 71 and 100 characters tend to have more replies, likes, retweets, click-throughs, and impressions.
Much like Instagram, Pinterest is primarily a visual medium but does allow some text to be added to pins. You are limited to 100 characters in a pin title and 500 characters in a pin description. Only the first 50 characters of the description are initially visible to visitors. Since many visitors are there to look at pictures, keep your captions short. An ideal length is 125 or fewer characters.
Posting strategy
Across all platforms, users prefer shorter posts to longer ones. Instagram and Pinterest are the obvious choices for content that is primarily visual. Facebook has a very large user base, but the algorithm limits the reach of businesses that do not pay for placement. The key to success on all platforms is to create shareable content that users want to engage with. Not every audience is the same, so it pays to experiment with your content and determine which lengths of posts get good interaction from your audience.
Boost your content marketing with Doctor Genius
The team at Doctor Genius knows which content works with each social media platform. We can optimize your content marketing strategy by matching your content with the appropriate platforms and creating social media posts that will help you get more engagement from users. Contact us online to get started.
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