Don’t pick a platform.
What app do you open when you sit down with 10 minutes to spare? Is that the same app someone 20 years younger than you would pick? What about someone in another country? Probably not. If you want to reach everyone, you can’t silo your content in one place.
Preferences matter – both personal and government.
Beyond trends and personal preference, it’s worth considering that apps get banned. Russ1a blocked Instagram in 2022. Ch1na blocks YouTube. TikTok is banned in several countries. In the US, it’s banned on government-issued devices. TikTok is also currently not in compliance with EU law. If not remedied, they could face sanctions [Which potentially impact 27 countries].
It’s ok to be redundant.
A popular tactic for solving the challenge of different platforms for different audiences is duplicating content across social media platforms (Called cross-posting, when the content is identical). It’s popular because it’s successful — your content is available for your audience on whatever platform they use. Tweets can become Instagram posts. Instagram Reels can become TikTok content. TikTok videos can become YouTube Shorts. Blog entries can become Carousel posts on Instagram. If you want to stretch a YouTube video, ditch everything but the audio and call it a podcast. Create a subreddit for your content, and post when you’ve published something new.
As of 2022, Instagram now tries to decrease the number of times non-unique-to-platform content surfaces in-feed (specifically, Videos and Reels with a competitor’s watermark). Keep that in mind, and post content to Instagram without that TikTok watermark wherever possible.
There are solutions other than cross-posting.
If you approach each platform with a different strategy and tone, chances are you’re doing so because you’ve scaled to accept some decrease in reach in favor of depth. There is a better solution for you. Continue to tailor your content per social platform but keep core content on your site.