Sleigh bells are ringing, Christmas lists are being written, plans are being made – there’s an unmistakable buzz at the end of the year, and thoughts often turn to getting together with family, having some time off to recalibrate (and if you’re in Australia, spend some time in the very warm great outdoors!) and start afresh in the new year.
But hold up – we don’t have employers or people telling us when our holidays are. We work for ourselves on our blogs and social platforms, don’t we? (Well, mostly!) – who’s going to run this ship while we’re on the couch watching National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation/out on the back patio with a beer?
You might be the kind of person who shows up, rain or shine, on your blog. No matter your belief or social conventions, it’s your pride and joy and you like being there. You might have a more commercial situation where some well-written earlier posts can be re-floated over the holiday season, posts written and scheduled in advance, or just some radio silence after a final “we’re taking a break” message. Or perhaps a bit of both!
We usually do a mix here at ProBlogger – some super-useful posts are rounded up and repurposed, and there are a couple of days between Christmas and New Year where we take our ProBlogging hats off and put some Christmas cracker paper crowns and wide-brim shady hats on instead. We always advocate a balance, and to get off your blog sometimes and into the real world, otherwise how else would you have a life you could ever possibly write about?
So for this fortnight’s community discussion, we thought we’d dive deep into the Holiday habits of our readers. What do you do? Where do you go? What happens to your blog when you’re doing it? Are you a repurposer? An avoider? A creator of brand-new content to tide you over? We’d love to know!
If you are thinking of taking a break, you might like to wander through the advice we’ve given over the years on doing just that:
- Five Steps to Have Your Your Blog and Business Run Without You Over The Holidays
- How to Take a Blog Break Without Losing Momentum
- Offline Marketing: Great Ways to Promote Your Blog Without the Internet
- 8 Signs it Might Be Time to Take a Break from Blogging
- Take a Break – Battling Bloggers Block
- My 6 Best Tips for Beating Blogger Overwhelm
Hey Stacey,
Christmas bells are ringing and people are about to have the best time of the year.
Most of the bloggers take a break from their work and have fun at the end of the year. But it’s important to have the backup for the holidays.
Whether bloggers can schedule their blog posts or hire someone to do it for them. Break doesn’t mean totally cut-off from the work.
~Ravi
No, not all the time! But I think sometimes a cut-off is just what we need. I guess it depends on where in our blogging journey we are. I hope you have a wonderful holiday season!
Hi Stacey
Actually, since my blog and online business is a side hustle, Christmas time is my most active. I have time off of my day job and I’m able to spend a good amount of time actually dedicated to my blog. I’m actually looking forward to my “time off” so I can do work. haha.
Cheers!
– Jeff
Ah yes I know how that feels! I bet it will be great to have a stretch of time to really sink your teeth into it. Good luck!
Hi Stacey,
Holidays over here come a bit later than they do in America and Western Europe, plus I only started my blog, so I’ll be going strong during that time.
Vladimir
Totally understandable! Enjoy!
As I am doing it by passion I spend a lot of time improving my on line presence! So vacations are welcome and appreciate!
I understand that! It’s fun to be in the motivated stage :)
I’m actually hustling even harder in December than any other month of the year. I’m seeing results and that motivates me even more – so far I’ve made 3 times more than what I’ve made in November and it’s only been 13 days!
Ah don’t you love those success streaks!
Not doing any new posts over the Christmas period but sent out a ‘roll up’ post this week with links to our 10 most popular posts.
Will be using the time over Christmas to do some planning and schedule some tech improvements to the blog.
Such a good use of time. I think those roundup posts are a great idea.
I am in the middle of creating a course so right now, my main focus is that but for my blog I am still planning to get one post a week out this month. There is one week that will have 2 but I think this is such an important time to look back and see what worked and plan for the year ahead. I have my content calendar mapped out til the end of March so there will be no guess work during my busy launch period.
Excellent plans! It always pays to think ahead and be flexible.
Honestly, I’ve decided to take Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day and one additional day off. Having extra time at the end of the year to regroup is really important to me! The day’s I’m not taking off will be used to assess 2016 metrics and plan for 2017. *Side note: I’m a full-time eye doctor that created a video based website as a resource for the general public. Therefore, this time off will be from both patient care and blogging.
I haven’t been actively posting on my blog for a month and a half due to personal issues I was experiencing. Now that that’s been resolved, I believe this will be the right time to sit down and roll out my content creation and marketing plans for next year.