5 Vacation Tips For Small Business Owners

If you are a solo-preneur, finding time to do everything you need to do on a daily basis to market your business can feel daunting. When it's time to take a few days off, have you thought of how you will keep your business "running" while you're away? Ask yourself these questions.

How "unplugged" will you be?

• Will you monitor and respond to email?  
• Will you answer client calls?
• Will you post on social media?

​If the answer to these questions is "no", here are 5 ways to make your business work when you aren't working.

1. Create a vacation auto-reply for your email.

You can use a basic out of office message, but why not toss in a little marketing when you have the opportunity. An out of office message that includes marketing goes something like this:

Hello and thanks for your email. I’m currently away until mm/dd with limited / no access to email. If your request is urgent, please contact [NAME] at [EMAIL or PHONE]. In the meantime, did you know I have a monthly e-newsletter? Yep, you heard that right! A monthly dose of all your favorite [COMPANY] content sent right to your inbox. To ensure you don’t miss out on all the good stuff, sign up for my newsletter here. [insert email sign up link]  I’ll be sure to get back to you when I return on mm/dd.  Thanks,

2. Create a voicemail greeting for your work phone.

If you use the same phone for work and pleasure, being away from the office can be a bit tricky.  The best advice is to NOT pick up the phone and encourage callers to leave a voice mail. 

3. Send an email to your mailing list subscribers.

The timing of this email may depend on your type of business. If you let people know you're on vacation in 5 days, you may get last minute requests for service just when you're trying to lighten your work load. I prefer to send this shortly before I will be unavailable for a period of time. The content for this message can be similar to a voice mail out of office greeting,  Consider including support service contacts.

4.  Pre-schedule social media content.

Just because you're away, doesn't mean that you can't be marketing.  There are apps available to help. Here's a pretty comprehensive list of free and paid apps you might want to consider: sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-scheduling-tools/
If you are only posting to Facebook, did you know that you can schedule posts directly from Facebook? Just create a post, but instead of clicking on Publish, click the down arrow beside it and choose Schedule. You can choose the date and time you want the post to appear. All your scheduled posts will show up in Activity.

5. Pack the essentials.

There are times when you may want flexibility to do a little work. Be sure to pack your wall charger, solar charger, laptop or tablet. If you need wi-fi, know where hotspots are available, or better yet, avoid the public wi-fi network altogether and add tethering to your mobile phone plan. 

Happy travels!