The 80/20 rule and the rule of thirds for social media: what each says, and what a business page should do

The oldest copy of Hootsuite's social media rule of thirds I could read is an Internet Archive capture from 27 June 2014.

I read it on 9 October 2026. Hootsuite's live blog refused my request, and in the archive most captures of that address from mid 2019 onward are redirects. The capture from 6 April 2026 lands on a list of best practices with no rule of thirds in it at all.

The 2014 article was written by Sam Milbrath. Even then she introduced it as social media's "so-called" rule of thirds.

Then I read the comments. A reader said he had been following the 80/20 rule instead, and asked whether the thirds were really meant to be equal.

Milbrath's reply, in the same thread: if 80/20 works for your business and your audience is growing, keep doing what works.

That is the complication with both rules. The people who publish them tell you not to take the numbers literally. Business owners keep searching for the numbers anyway.

Our earlier post on the 50/30/20 and 5-5-5 rules covered why none of these ratios has a study behind it. This one goes deeper on the two people search for most: what each says, where they differ, and what to put in the calendar instead.

Step 1: What the 80/20 rule says

The clearest current version comes from Sprout Social.

Sprout Social's guide to social media best practices, by Nader Nekvasil, last updated 1 October 2026 and read on 9 October 2026, says to give four parts in five of your content to educating, entertaining or inspiring your audience and the remaining fifth to conversions and product promotion.

Sprout gives a reason, not a source for the split. It points to its own Sprout Social Index, which it says found that authentic, non-promotional content is what consumers most often report not seeing enough of from brands.

The rule is older than that page. Social Media Today ran an article by Sofie De Beule on 17 December 2013 arguing that only a fifth of your social content should be about your brand, which I also read on 9 October 2026.

Her version: one part in five promotes the brand, and the other four parts go on content that interests your audience and starts conversations.

Neither page cites a study for the four-to-one split. Neither says where it came from.

Step 2: What the rule of thirds says

Hootsuite's 2014 article splits the feed three ways.

• One third promotes the business, converts readers and makes money.
• One third surfaces ideas and stories from thought leaders in your industry or like-minded businesses.
• One third is personal interaction with your audience, which the article says also builds your personal brand.

Blogging Wizard's version, by Lyn Wildwood, published 30 July 2025 and read on 9 October 2026, names the three buckets promotion, engagement and value. It says the name is borrowed from photography, where the rule of thirds is a grid for composing an image.

And it says the rule is not strict. Its own example of a valid split is three fifths value, one fifth promotion and one fifth engagement.

So the rule of thirds, as its own explainer writes it, does not have to be thirds.

Step 3: Where the two rules differ

The numbers are the obvious difference. Four to one, against one in three.

Read the original definitions side by side and there is a second difference. The 80/20 rule has two buckets: selling, and everything else. The rule of thirds splits everything else into two jobs, other people's ideas and conversation with your audience.

That second split was written for a feed of shared links. The 2014 Hootsuite page still carried a share button for Google+.

It reads badly on a video-first page today. On 30 April 2026 TechCrunch reported, in a story I read on 9 October 2026, that Instagram would stop recommending accounts that regularly repost content they did not create, extending to photos and carousels a protection already in place for reels.

VALORAE Cast wrote up what counts as an edit under that change in its post on Instagram's originality rule.

So the third built on sharing other people's work is now the third most likely to cost a business page its reach on Instagram.

Both rules agree on the part worth keeping, which our earlier post landed on too. Cap the posts that are only about you.

Step 4: Why a ratio is the wrong input

The ratio is a result.

Both rules assume every post fits in exactly one bucket. A video of your product doing its job is promotion and education at once. A founder answering a customer's question on camera is conversation, value and a sales pitch inside sixty seconds.

So which bucket does it count in? Neither source says, and the answer changes the arithmetic.

The bigger problem is that a ratio starts from the wrong end. It tells you what share of posts to make before it asks what you sell or what you can film. A business that sells one service and can film for two hours a month will struggle to hit any ratio worth having, and a business with a busy shop floor will blow straight past it.

At VALORAE Media we treat the content mix as an output of two lists: what the business sells, and what it can put in front of a camera. The percentages fall out of those. We do not set them first.

Step 5: What to do instead

Here is the replacement, built for a business owner with a phone and a calendar.

1. List what you sell. Each offer by name, with the question a buyer asks before paying for it. Your inbox is where those questions live, which is why we treat DMs as sales calls.
2. List what you can film. Places, processes, people, before and after, with honest hours. If someone else edits, agree the monthly filming batch before anything else.
3. Pair them. Every offer gets at least one video that answers its buyer question using something you can film. That is your promotional content, and it is useful to someone who has never heard of you.
4. Fill the rest with the stranger test. Would this be worth someone's time if they had never heard of us? If yes, it goes in.
5. Load it into a calendar with a buffer. The calendar that survives a busy month holds finished pieces ahead of the publish date, so the mix you planned is the mix that ships.
6. Read the mix after ninety days. Sort by saves and shares, as the earlier post describes, and move toward what worked. Then you have a ratio, and it is yours.

Look at what this does to promotion: a post that names your offer and answers the buyer's real question passes the stranger test. The 80/20 rule would count it against your fifth. I would count it as the most useful thing on the page.

Step 6: When a ratio still helps

I am not telling you to ignore the numbers completely.

If you have no footage yet and no idea where to start, the 80/20 rule is a fine seatbelt for the first month. It stops the page turning into a price list.

And if you are reviewing someone else's work, a quick count is a cheap smell test. A month where nine posts in ten are offers tells you something, whatever the rule says.

But a count is a check. It is never the plan. A page can hit four to one exactly and still post nothing anyone would save, and that is the failure VALORAE Media is hired to fix.

The short version

• Read the 80/20 rule as Sprout Social writes it: mostly educate, entertain or inspire, and sell in the rest.
• Read the rule of thirds as Hootsuite first wrote it: promote, share other people's ideas, talk to your audience.
• Drop the third that reshares other people's work on Instagram, where reposting now costs recommendations.
• Build the mix from what you sell and what you can film.
• Pair every offer with a video that answers its buyer's question.
• Check the ratio after ninety days and keep the one your own saves and shares give you.

This is how VALORAE Media plans a business page, at valoraemedia.com.