How Many Social Channels You Should Really Cover
Being everywhere feels prudent and is almost always the choice that produces the least. How to decide where to focus your energy.
Opening a profile costs nothing; keeping it alive costs plenty. That asymmetry produces the most common situation: five channels active on paper, two genuinely updated, three broadcasting abandonment.
The real cost of a channel
A covered channel needs content in its native format, regular publishing, conversation management and periodic data review. Multiplying channels multiplies all four items, not just the first.
Three criteria to choose
Where your audience is
Not where audiences are in general: where yours is. The most reliable answer comes from current customers, not from industry statistics.
Which format you can produce
A channel demanding daily video is unsuitable for someone with no way to shoot it. Better a channel compatible with your real production than a theoretically superior but unsustainable one.
What kind of relationship you need
Some channels work for being discovered, others for maintaining the relationship with people who already know you. Different goals, different content.
The practical rule
Two channels covered well, a third possibly on trial. Add another only when the first ones run autonomously and predictably — not while you're still chasing them.
A profile frozen for months communicates more than you'd think, and nothing good. Better to close it than to leave it there.
Sources and Further Reading
Official documentation and guidelines cited or useful for going deeper.