Start Preparing Your Vacation Now

“I need a vacation.”

When was the last time you thought that? How often have you thought that?

Now, when was the last time you actually took one?

Small-business owners have a tendency to fall into the “work trap.” They can’t go out with friends to that big event because they have all that work that needs to be done. They can’t get away for a weekend because they have all that work that needs to be done. And they certainly can’t take a vacation…because they have all that work that needs to be done.

Yet, you know how important it is to recharge. Everybody needs to get away every once in a while. And when I say “need” I mean need. Getting away from work is important for the health and well-being of yourself and your relationships.

So, today, I want to look at how you can start preparing to go on vacation early, so when the time comes you don’t have to worry about missing work.

Plan for Your Vacation in Advance

Don’t wait until the last minute to say “Let’s go to Disney World!” Plan for your vacation as far in advance as possible. Procrastination is not your friend. Here’s why:

You can see the light at the end of the tunnel. When you schedule a vacation, it gives you something to work toward. You know that at a certain point you will be able to unplug and get away. That vacay start date on your calendar is like a pressure-release button. Everytime you look at it, you can see the finish line.

Some preparations take time. You are going to want someone to keep an eye on things while you are away, and it’s not always easy to get someone to cover for you at the last minute.

You don’t want to schedule work during that time. If you know in advance when you will be unavailable, you can avoid accidentally scheduling work at that time. For example, if you are running a membership class, you know you don’t want to offer live content every week, because that would prevent a vacation from ever happening.

Automate in Advance

“Vacation” means you aren’t available. That means you aren’t going to be checking your email every day. You aren’t going to be replying to social media every day. You aren’t going to be handling calls every day. Vacation means you unplug.

Here, automation is your friend. Make sure your emails have an autoresponder that turns on and off at the appropriate time. Do the same for your voicemail message. Otherwise, you may receive contacts, but the people on the other end have no idea that you aren’t going to respond for a week. That can lead to a lot of unnecessary frustration.

Consider setting the “back in office” date one day after you actually return to work. That will give you a little time to play catch up before they expect you to be back.

And don’t forget to block the time off on your calendar so you aren’t showing yourself as available to anyone going through your appointment funnel. (If you need to set up an appointment funnel to automate your business, check out the Get Leads & Clients Masterclass!)

Just because you are out of the office doesn’t mean that your social media has to stop. If you aren’t using social media marketing automation, you should be. Those tools allow you to sit down and set up all your social media posts for the week so you don’t have to deal with it day in and day out. If you just use Facebook, you can schedule in advance right inside the platform. If you have several social-media accounts, you can use a third-party tool such as Buffer (https://buffer.com/). All you need to do here is set up the posts in advance for the time you are away.

Your blog can be automated as well. If you are using a WordPress website, you can write your blog and schedule it to go live when you want. It’s really convenient.

So, you see, you don’t have to be physically present at your desk to make some of the work happen. Again, automation is your friend.

Leverage Passive Income

If all of your services revolve around meeting clients live, it will make taking time off extremely difficult. This is just what happens when your entire income is tied to your presence.

So, start thinking about how you can help clients without actually being there. Maybe you could create topical PDFs and sell them. Maybe you could create blueprints and templates and sell them. Maybe you could create video courses and sell them.

This is something I recommend you consider anyway, because this is a great way to start scaling your business.

Get Help While You are Away

If you don’t have someone to help you out already, you might want to consider hiring a Virtual Assistant (VA). Virtual Assistants are people who specialize in remote administration support.

To find out more about how a Virtual Assistant can help you, check out Heather’s interview with Laura Licursi of Elite Virtual Assist.