How To Take A Proper Social Media Vacation
I interviewed three bosses on how they plan to take social media vacations from their digital businesses.
Fa-lalalala-lala it’s time for the holiday season and time to take an actual vacation from the digital world. Or even if you’re reading at any time of the year, you don’t need an excuse to take a social media detox or a break from your business. In fact, I greatly encourage you to pencil in a social media vacation quite often. Let’s take a look into three incredible bosses with different businesses and varying ways that they’ll be taking a break from their social feeds this holiday season. These bosses are offering their best tips for preparing for time off and strategically planning for a vacation.
Vacation Hack #1 - Outsourcing and Hiring a Badass team.
Sarah Williams, the founder of Rebel Office, is taking time this holiday season for friends and family with the help of a team behind her. When it comes to scaling your business while working less on the tasks that aren’t your specialty, growing from solo to a small team can help your business grow even when you aren’t working.
“Making sure I have a solid team behind me to help really takes the pressure off. Rebel Office's Facebook and LinkedIn strategy is pretty straightforward, so I schedule all that in bulk at the beginning of the month. Instagram, on the other hand, requires a lot more attention so I outsource that to the wonderful Sol Studio to manage. It literally saves me HOURS every week. Pinterest, ads and any other little things that need done go on to my Virtual Assistant. We're all pro-scheduling and being prepared in advance, so while I look to my team to relieve some pressure & stress, we've all got systems in place so handle our workloads!”
After being in business for three years, Sarah explains that you intuitively begin to notice which seasons are slower and which are more productive. This intuition along with processes helps your business run while you’re taking off time.
“I'm ALL about systems and streamlining, so I've got things working while I sleep and enjoy my life. This includes funnels via blogs, pre-scheduled social media, and really taking December to focus less on sales and more on support & love & helping THEM get ready for 2019. The key is to use this time the most effective way possible!”
This boss will be taking December as a business development month to ensure Rebel Office is set up for success for the coming year with less pressure on making sales.
Vacation Hack #2 - Scheduling and Planning Ahead.
Linsey “LJ” Marchant is the designer behind LJ Media House and a solopreneur looking to take a mini-vacation this December. As a branding and SquareSpace web designer, LJ plans her entire year by mapping out her availability for projects each month. By planning her client projects ahead of time, she can make the time to leave December open to business development and holiday cheer.
“I’ve been planning for this (holiday season) all year! By planning out my booking schedule in advance, I was able to ensure my finances wouldn’t falter by taking less work and time off during the holidays. I’m also offering promos for a few of the easy-to-do lower ticket services I offer so I can do a few easy things to bring in revenue.”
Not only just she plans and structures her packages to allow for time off, it also allows for her to plan financially for a month without a new client. LJ swears by her budgeting spreadsheet that allows her to save what she needs to be more than comfortable when taking a vacation. When asked about the key to planning for a business break, she explained that her saving plan allows her to do so.
“Savings! I use a financial spreadsheet for all my budgeting so I can see my financial outlook through January. I’ll also be offering holiday specials!”
By offering holiday specials, this can create a income stream during the off months doing smaller projects while still freeing up your time for goal planning or a brand refresh for the new year. If you’re planning to spend less time on social media, use tools like timers to track your time on your phone.
While Linsey will only be taking a partial social media and digital break, she’ll be relying on tools like Planoly for Instagram and MailChimp for email marketing to schedule and automate her content ahead of time. Leading up to the month of December, Linsey and I mapped out her business development tasks for her brand refresh using Airtable to help her stay organized.
To learn more about Linsey’s tips for planning ahead this holiday season, take a read at her blog “Planning Time Off As A Solopreneur”.
Vacation Tip #3 - The Full Detox.
So let’s say you want to take a full sabbatical from your business for family time, travels, or a maternity leave. Bulk scheduling your content will be a game changer for you and automating your business strategies while you’re completely unplugged. Take the time to plan a few days before you’re time off to bulk create and schedule content to go out while you’re gone.
Emily Stoker, a video content creator and YouTuber, is taking a full social media detox during the month of December which included deleting her apps and logging out of her accounts. Buffer for social media scheduling and Google Calendars for planning her off-days will be her go-to resources for taking this time off.
“I will be finishing off a number of projects and even begin to shift my processes to my new 2019 strategies before the holidays. I will be stepping off of actively spending time on social media, and schedule all of my social media content for December. Preparing for this is a big focus.”
While Emily is still setting up the processes access Buffer and her YouTube channel during her time off, she plans to fully take time off in December.
“I'll be taking a proper work break for two weeks, which I'm excited about as it will be the longest I've taken off since I started the business. However, I still need to set my boundaries surrounding this. It would be a great time to work on business development, but there's something to be said for completely taking a step away from the same thought patterns we're constantly repeating and coming back in the new year with fresh eyes.”
Often, the pressure to not work can encourage creativity and inspiration. I always like to suggest working when you have the urge to do so. But also, take the time to fully detox and return to work refreshed.
In summary, planning and scheduling are two effective strategies for planning for time off or a full detox. If you are in need of a strategy session to plan content and steps for taking time off from your digital business, book a free discovery call to learn more about our content calendar and content planning services.
