A rundown of what we wanted to test on Facebook, and how it all went for the first two months.

1. April/May 2013 – Social Media Testing
Test Objectives
Page level
1. Determine whether posting at night and weekends versus during
weekdays significantly improves the post reach.
2. Gather new data about night and weekend post performance to
analyze for other trends.
Post level
1. Establish benchmarks for different campaigns and types of posts
based on data from tagging posts for the month.
2. Establish and follow quality assurance process for all posts.

2. The Post Category has a very big effect on the popularity of the post. Over the 2 month period,
“Informative” and “Awesome/Inspirational” categories were the most frequently posted, but
their reach was limited.
The best performing post categories were “Good News/Solutions”, “Fear-Mongering/Outrage”,
and “Cute Animal”.
“Funny”, “Sarcastic”, and “Informative” posts were generally the lowest performing.
Are there ways to slightly alter “Informative” posts to be more like the better performing Post
Categories, without fundamentally skewing the overall posting philosophy (nobody wants 24/7
Cute Animal pictures)?
Post Category
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
-
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
100,000
120,000
Awesome/Inspirational Cute Animal Fear-Mongering/Outrage Funny Good News/Solutions Informative Sarcastic
PostCount
PostReach
Average Post Reach/Total Post Count per Post Category
Average of Lifetime Post Total Reach Post Count

3. The campaign topic of posts has a big effect on the reach they have.
Key Takeaways:
- Climate is the biggest GP campaign by post count, and the most popular in terms of reach
- We post a lot on Arctic but the average reach is very low
- Misc posts tend to do well, and we probably post them at the right frequency
Campaign
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
-
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
100,000
120,000
Arctic Climate Democracy Forest Misc Ocean toxics Upworthy
PostCount
PostReach Average Post Reach/Total Post Counter per Campaign
Average of Lifetime Post Total Reach Post Count
Post Category Post Count Average of Lifetime Post Total Reach
Awesome/Inspirational 12 21,218
Cute Animal 1 27,053
Fear-Mongering/Outrage 4 30,089
Funny 3 19,193
Good News/Solutions 8 20,384
Informative 25 25,095
Sarcastic 4 19,457

4. 0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
-
100,000
200,000
300,000
400,000
500,000
600,000
6 Month Page Reach and Post Frequency
# of Posts Daily Total Reach Linear (Daily Total Reach)
Page Reach
Determining whether the Arctic Shop Window had a tangible impact on our
Facebook page is hard to determine, as it coincided with the Arkansas Oil Spill
and the Boston Marathon bombings,.
The average Daily Reach has increased steadily since December (despite the
peaks and valleys) although we are posting less posts per day – individual posts
are performing better and the “floor” has risen. Might this be a result of better
timing and quality of posts?

5. Time of Day
Breakdown of the # of times we posted in the past 6 months (Dec-Jan, Feb-Mar, Apr-Jun) and resulting Average Reach
Focusing on Apr-Jun performance compared to Feb-Mar, for all time periods except 9AM-Noon, we posted as
much if not more in Apr-Jun, and saw either similar Average Reach for each time or an increase in reach –
This is a result of us reaching more people in total during these times.
The Midnight-9AM and 6PM-9PM period stands out as an exceptionally good – we posted more frequently
AND had higher average reach.
*Note: Missing data for last week of May
-
20
40
60
80
Midnight-9AM 9AM-Noon Noon-3PM 3PM-6PM 6PM-9PM 9PM-Midnight
PostCount
Post Count by Time of Day
-
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
Midnight-9AM 9AM-Noon Noon-3PM 3PM-6PM 6PM-9PM 9PM-Midnight
AverageReach
Average Reach by Time of Day
Dec-Jan Feb-Mar Apr-Jun

6. Day of Week
Breakdown of the # of times we posted in the past 6 months (Dec-Jan, Feb-Mar, Apr-May) and resulting Average Reach
The Online team made a conscious effort to post more during the weekend, as shown by the post count
increase for Saturday/Sunday in Apr-Jun, relative to the other months. Saturday had a slight dip in average
reach, but nothing significant, while Sunday saw a marked increase. Overall, posting more on weekends has
been successful, as the total views/impressions has increased for those days.
Tuesday had a few outliers that are responsible for boosting the average reach way above other days for Apr-
Jun
*Note: Missing data for last week of May
-
20
40
60
Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
Post Count by Day of Week
-
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
Average Reach per Post by Day of Week
Dec-Jan Feb-Mar Apr-Jun