Which 3 channels should I actually post on?

The one where your buyers already are, the one you can personally stand to use, and your own site. That third one is not optional and it is the one people skip, because it is the only channel whose rules you set.

Why only three channels?

Not because three is magic. Because a channel is a standing commitment, and most small teams can hold about three before quality drops to the point where presence stops helping. Being visibly inactive somewhere is worse than being absent from it.

Where are my buyers actually?

Most channel decisions get made on vibes, so start with the numbers. Pew Research surveyed 5,022 US adults between February and June 2025 on which platforms they use:

YouTube 84 percent, Facebook 71 percent, Instagram 50 percent, TikTok 32 percent, LinkedIn 25 percent, X 8 percent, Reddit 4 percent.

Two things there tend to surprise marketing teams. X reaches 8 percent of US adults, roughly a third of LinkedIn's reach, despite occupying a far larger share of marketing conversation. And Facebook at 71 percent is still enormous while being deeply unfashionable in the rooms where channel strategy gets decided.

Use this as a prior, not a plan. General population reach is not your buyer, and a 4 percent platform holding exactly your niche beats an 84 percent platform that does not. But if you are picking on instinct, instinct is usually calibrated to what your peers post on rather than to where anyone is.

What does choosing look like in practice?

Say you sell scheduling software to independent dental practices. The instinct is LinkedIn, because that is where software companies talk to each other. Look at who you are actually selling to and it falls apart: the buyer is a practice owner or an office manager, and they are not reading a professional feed during clinic hours.

Run the ten conversations test on each candidate. On Facebook there are practice owner groups arguing about no shows and staffing every day. On LinkedIn there is dental software marketing, which is your competitors talking to each other. Facebook wins on evidence and loses on prestige, and prestige has never bought anything.

So: Facebook because that is the room, a second channel you can stand to maintain, and your own site because it is the only one you own. LinkedIn is where you claim the handle and leave it. That will feel wrong to every marketer who sees the plan, and it will be right.

How do I pick the first channel?

Go where your buyers already discuss their problem, not where your industry congratulates itself. If your customers are operations managers who never open a professional network, then the professional network is not your channel however correct it looks on a slide.

The test is whether you can find ten real conversations about your problem there this week. Not ten accounts in your category, ten conversations. If you cannot, it is the wrong room, and the platform's total reach is irrelevant to you.

How do I pick the second?

Pick one you can tolerate. Enthusiasm is a real resource and posting into a format you dislike burns it faster than anything else. A channel you enjoy and post to weekly beats the theoretically optimal one you abandon in March.

This sounds soft and it is the most reliable predictor of whether a channel survives the year. Nobody sustains a weekly commitment to a format they resent.

Why is my own site the third?

Everything else is rented. Reach changes, rules change, accounts get restricted, and none of it is negotiable from your side. Your own pages are the only place where what you published stays published and keeps being found.

It is also the only channel that compounds. A post is spent within days. A page can still be answering the same question in three years, and it is the only asset here that an AI assistant can cite.

How do I test a channel before committing?

Do not adopt a channel, trial it. Thirty days, a fixed cadence you would actually sustain, and one question decided in advance: what would make me keep this.

Pick the measure before you start, because after a month of effort you will find a number that flatters the decision you already made. Reach is the wrong one. A conversation with somebody who could buy, or a signup you can trace, is the right one, and one of those in thirty days beats ten thousand impressions.

Then honour the result. A channel that produced nothing in a month of honest effort is information, not a reason to try harder for another quarter. Most channel failures are known by week three and abandoned at month nine, and the six months in between are the real cost.

When should I add a fourth?

When the first three run without you thinking about them, and not before. If any of the three still feels like effort each week, a fourth will not be additive, it will be the thing that breaks the other three.

The honest version of this rule is that most small teams never get to four, and the ones doing best are usually not trying to.

What about every other platform?

Claim the handles so nobody else does, and leave them empty. An empty profile is neutral. A profile with three posts from last year is a signal, and not one you want to send to somebody checking whether you are still trading.

Common questions

Should I post the same thing on every channel?

The same idea, not the same post. Each channel has its own norms about length and tone, and a post visibly copied from somewhere else reads as broadcast rather than presence. Change the framing and the format, keep the claim.

Does email count as one of the three?

It can, and for many small teams it should. It is the only channel besides your own site where you own the audience rather than rent it, so if you are choosing between a second social platform and a list, the list is usually the better long term asset.

How long before I know a channel is working?

Thirty days of honest effort at a cadence you would actually sustain. Decide the measure before you start, and make it a conversation with someone who could buy rather than impressions. Most channel failures are visible by week three and abandoned at month nine, and that gap is the real cost.

Related reading

On feeding three channels without tripling the work, see How do I turn one blog post into ten? and One article, every channel. On keeping the rhythm once it is chosen, see How do I stay consistent with content?.

Sources

Pew Research Center, social media fact sheet. 5,022 US adults, surveyed February to June 2025.