Direct Answer
3-5 times per week per platform. For local businesses with under 1,000 followers, 3 high-quality posts per week outperform daily generic content. Consistency matters more than volume.
Why This Matters
Posting frequency advice usually comes from enterprise marketing playbooks. When Nike posts 3 times per day, they have a 20-person content team and millions of followers generating organic engagement. A local plumber has neither. For small businesses, the algorithm rewards consistency (posting on a predictable schedule) more than frequency (posting as often as possible). Three posts per week, every week, for 6 months builds more authority and engagement than 14 posts per week for 3 weeks followed by radio silence. The biggest enemy of social media growth for small businesses is not under-posting. It's the boom-bust cycle of posting aggressively for a week, burning out, and going quiet for a month.
Real-World Example
A solo realtor tested two approaches over 90 days. Month one: posted 7 times per week using quick phone photos and one-liner captions. Month two and three: posted 3 times per week with professional photos, detailed neighborhood insights, and market commentary. Her engagement rate doubled during months two and three despite posting less than half as often. Her followers grew 40% faster in the lower-frequency months because the algorithm surfaced her posts to more people.
What Most People Get Wrong
"Post every day" is advice designed for influencers and media companies. For a local business, an empty Tuesday post that says "Happy Tuesday!" does more harm than skipping a day. It trains your audience to ignore you. Three posts that teach, inform, or entertain are worth more than seven that fill space.
Related reading:
- What Happens If You Don't Post on Social Media Regularly?
- What's the ROI of Social Media for Local Businesses?
- How to Get More Customers from Social Media
- What Your Social Media Would Look Like If You Actually Posted Consistently