This is NOT advice on how to survive an apocalypse…however sh*t happens, and often at the worst time.
For a sole trader, an emergency can potentially harm your business, so it’s best to be prepared. Experience has taught me how to weather an unexpected storm with good habits and great connections.
Plan & schedule your Social Media marketing ahead of time – especially seasonal promotions:
My diary is irregular, my days rarely 9 to 5. So I have a regular agenda of social media posts that are scheduled at the beginning of each month. It doesn’t matter how busy I am, you’ll see a wedding photo every weekend. Any other activity is spontaneous.
In autumn 2022 Laura Sands hosted an excellent workshop on planning your Christmas marketing. The template provided was duly filled with all my social media posts, newsletter content, e-card distribution etc.
Hey presto – I had prepped & scheduled my Christmas marketing weeks ahead of time – BRILLIANT!!! I now use this template to plan all my seasonal marketing.
In the runup to last Christmas, all seasonal posts were scheduled in November and I concentrated on work and festive prep.
In the second week of December, this happened:
My head was like concrete, my energy tank empty and I was generally miserable.
I couldn’t shoot, any kind of extended office work was nearly impossible, and I had to cancel all my pre-Christmas networking events.
However, in the cyber world I was alive, kicking AND selling gift vouchers!
People emailed about January bookings and some of those queries turned into (remote) planning sessions – all I had to do was dose up on Lemsips for those….
Take detailed client notes: everything from contact details, addresses and the journey time. Prepare a brief!
Covid brain fog was SO intense that I wrote down EVERYTHING discussed at those virtual meetings. Booking logistics were diarized and detailed briefs created immediately…before I retreated back to bed.
I do this with every client in any circumstance. Once the booking is confirmed, I write down all contact details, addresses, parking details and journey times in the diary. During this illness these good habits were my contingency plan.
So, despite having scant recollection of those December interactions, I was ready and informed for the January bookings.
Nurture a community of peers with whom you would trust your business:
In 2017 a sudden bereavement meant dropping everything to cross the Atlantic.
Respected photographer colleagues were notified and ready to cover any bookings.
“Leave it with me” said a great friend with amazing business talents when she commandeered my diary.
She set up my autoresponder, call & email forwarding then got me to the airport. I returned to the UK attending the bookings she’d taken for me without a hitch.
Virtual Assistants like Get Ahead VA offer these services. I know that Rebecca and her colleagues would more than capably step in should something similar occur.
If you put contingency plans in place when things are going well, you’ll be ready when things go wrong.
I network regularly – there is a wealth of talent out there.
Maintaining business relationships outside of formal events is the enjoyable part as it usually involves cake.
I plan my marketing at least 4 weeks in advance and repeat any successes.
It sounds a bit obsessive, but the main work is done once when you develop a process that works FOR YOU!
There are many professionals out there that offer advice on planning and time management, see what fits.
I sound terribly organised…but most of the time I’m a free spirit easily distracted by cats….
Ingrid Weel 