How to take time off

Mar 21

*Disclosure: I only recommend products I would use myself and all opinions expressed here are our own. This post may contain affiliate links that at no additional cost to you, I may earn a small commission.

Prepping for vacation when you’re self-employed:

Have you been wondering how to prep for vacation or how to take time off, while still making money as a solo-entrepreneur , listen to Episode 049 of Her Messy Bun Podcast to learn how to take time off as a creative entrepreneur or keep reading.

How to Take Time Off as a Solo-Entrepreneurship

Prepping for time off can feel overwhelming and intimidating especially when you don’t know what to expect. When you are self-employed it can feel like you’re letting your business, clients or customers down when you take time off, even if it’s only for an extra day.

As someone who regularly takes time off of work, and am currently prepping for maternity leave, I thought what better time to help you prep for time off then right now.

Whether you are prepping for a long weekend, vacation or maternity leave - these tips are my go to for taking time off and trusting that my business is still going to make money.

Here are 8 questions that you can ask yourself when prepping for time off:

How long are you going to be away
What would usually happen during that time if you weren’t taking time off?
Whats you’re consistency going to look like?
What’s your financial goal?
What’s your awareness goal?
Are you still planning on showing up on social media?
If so what social platforms will be your focus?
What emails go out regularly that you can prep?

There are so many more questions that you can ask yourself, but these are the main ones I like to ask myself to kickstart my brainstorming for what needs to get done before my time off.

Let’s take these questions to next step and breakdown what other things we need to think about.

How long are you going to be away?

If you’re only planning on being away for one day, my biggest piece of advice is to ask yourself - “is there anything that I need to get to a client, customer, or in order for a launch in order to take that extra day off” if the answer is “no” then - TAKE THE DAY! Don’t worry about prepping, use this opportunity to recharge.

If you’re going to be gone for a week then you need to continue with the next question.

What would usually happen during that time you weren’t taking time off?

This question is geared towards the big projects first. For instance, every week I put out 1 new Her Messy Bun podcast episode which includes an email, a youtube video and adding it to anchor. I also make sure I post 5-7 times on TikTok for awareness, and recently I’ve been adding posting on Pinterest 5-7 times as well as posting a live blog post every Wednesday which will also include an email.

As for my membership, I do daily morning pages, and the other key components like group coaching, private pod and educational video are all spread out throughout the month.

While this sounds like a lot of work to “miss” a lot of it I’m able to schedule ahead of time, and almost all of it I’m able to create ahead of time.

Now that we have the breakdown of what an average week looks like before you go ahead and start creating more work for yourself, you need to ask yourself...

Whats you’re consistency going to look like?

Basically, you need to know if you want to prep for the bare minimum or if you want your audience to feel like you’re still actively working. Once you know this, you can figure out following questions.

What’s your financial goal?

Realistically what kind of income do you expect to see during this time? Are you prepped for passive income - if so are you set up to be evergreen? Do you have reoccurring income that you rely on? If you offer 1:1 services or physical products, is it clear that there will be a delay product and services received?

Meaning if you have a 1:1 coaching service that can be booked at any time, is your calendar schedule blocked off. If you have physical product, did you have a delay in shipping? These are things you need to have prepped in order to avoid requests for refunds, or cancelations.

What’s your awareness goal?

If your goal is to increase your brand awareness, is your SEO set up for that? Do you have posts scheduled for Pinterest? Are you email series updated and optimized?

Awareness is the first step in your client journey, so if you want that to grow when you’re on vacation than your lead magnets and email series need to be on top of their game.

While we’re on the topic of awareness:

Are you planning on showing up on social media still?
If so what social platforms will be your focus?
What emails go out regularly that you can prep?

These answers will depend on what kind of time off you are looking for. If your plan is to showcase your vacation or what you’re doing while you’re “off the clock” then maybe adding to your stories is good idea. If your plan is to keep everyone in the loop on your vacation, time off or maternity leave - what will that content look like.

In the end, the biggest take away is that THIS IS YOUR BUSINESS, if your goals are bigger than your available time to prep for them, that’s ok. You don’t owe anyone an explanation. Most of you are solo-entrepreneurs, which means you are doing this all on your own.

Don’t get stuck in the comparison mindset, try to remember you’re working on growing your creative mindset which means that nothing is fixed.

And if you need help growing your creative mindset, make sure you keep an eye out for next weeks episode when I breakdown what a creative mindset is and give you 11 tips to help you improve this way of thinking.

More Resources

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