I’m sure you’ve been noticing a decline in your Facebook engagement since 2012.

And if you’ve just recently started an online business, maybe you have never even experienced the glory days of organic Facebook reach, and you only know pay-to-play techniques.

Either way, ads are one sure-fire way to boost Facebook engagement, but there are three free and easy ways to bring some life back to your page. And all the data you need to find them is right there on your little “Insights” tab on Facebook.

Post Only When Your Fans are Online

Did you know that the time of day you post, could be negatively affecting your Facebook engagement rates? It’s true! If no one is on Facebook at 1 a.m., why are you scheduling posts? Or, if most of you audience is on the west coast (but your business is on the east coast) stop posting at 6 a.m. EST, because everyone in California is sleeping! (or just getting home from a night club).

So, how do you know what is the right time to post in order to boost Facebook engagement? Easy!

Just check out your Insights > Posts > When Your Fans are Online, and you’ll see an awesome little chart that looks like this:

Each peak and valley show you an average of when your fans on online most. This FB audience is pretty consistent, but if you look closely, you’ll see a little spike at 12 pm, 2 pm, 5 pm, and 9 pm. Those would be your ideal times to post, if you wanted to have a consistent week, and people know what days/times you post, every day.

However, if you want to get even more particular, you can hover over the bar chart above, on a day like Friday, and see the variances between the times above (averaged), and the specific times that your audience is online on a Friday. Below, you’ll see that Friday peak times are 11 am, 1 pm, 6 pm, and 8 pm.

If you’re truly looking to boost Facebook engagement, then I suggest that you take the time to investigate the individual day and time that your audience is online.

Since Facebook (and tools like Hootsuite) allow you to schedule them, just take an hour each week to notice the times you want to post, and schedule out your content ahead of time.

It’s also important to note that Facebook updates these stats every week, so make sure you come back at least twice per month, and make sure your times are still accurate.

But, by posting your content when the majority of your fans are online, you’ll naturally boost Facebook engagement, because more of your audience will see your post organically.

Post Content Types That Your Fans Will Like

Just check out your Insights > Posts > Post Types, and wait for Facebook to load your stats. Then, you’ll see a colorful little bar chart that will look like this:

Now, this chart is amazing because it will tell you specifically what types of content (video, photos, etc.) your audience is engaging with most.

If you’re in a visual industry, like an interior designer or a graphic designer, it’s likely your chart will look like the one above, with video and photo posts ranking higher than just a status update.

For most people, though, photos will be your top result, because it has been proven time and again that photos boost Facebook engagement more than other content types.

But, the great thing about this is you can see what type of content to create more of, and what you can do less of.

Want to take it a step further, and get really specific about what content to recreate? Great! Facebook insights can help you with that too.

Post Content That Your Fans are Guaranteed to Engage With

Scroll down the Posts page a little further, and you’ll see a list of your recent posts. You will also notice that you can select a line from the top menu, and sort your posts by Type, Targeting, Reach or Engagement.

Click on Engagement, and sort by Likes, Comments & Shares. Your chart will reorganize, and you can now see your Top 10 posts, based on engagement.

They “Type” column has the same symbols are your Post Types chart (above), so you should first make sure they line up in similarity.

Secondly, analyze your top posts, and ask yourself why you think they were so successful.

In this example, from a health coach’s page, her first top post is a testimonial about the incredible results someone had with her online program. Also, the post was “boosted”, so it received a little more engagement. But, this still tells us that her audience likes to see the testimonials, and the results of her client.

The second post, a motivational post, and the last post on the image, and inspirational quote, tell us that her Facebook audience also likes motivation to help them reach their goals.

The third post, is an informative (and gross!) article about instant noodles.

And, then the fourth and fifth posts are questions that she asked of her audience. The first is a fun question, about workouts, and the second question is an opinion she asked on what topics they wanted to see her write about most.

So, from this analysis, we know have four types of content we can start circulating on her page to boost Facebook engagement: Testimonials, Motivational Quotes, Information, and Questions.

Doing this research for your own Facebook page can help you create a full social media strategy. Using the popular post types, subject matter, and posting at the right time guarantees you’re placing your page in the best chance to boost Facebook engagement without ever paying for it.

And, this also guarantees that when you spend all your time creating sharable Facebook content, the posts you’re creating exactly what your audience wants to see from you.

Leave a Comment: This week, I want you to go in to your Facebook page’s insights tab, and do some of the research outlined above. Then, come back here and tell me what you were most surprised to find out! I can’t wait to hear what your research reveals.