Holiday Hacks

In this episode, Karen and Michelle provide some holiday hacks – from navigating client gifts to reducing stress, let’s make the most of this holiday season.

Share your favorite holiday hack with us at soloprpro.com.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. How are you, Karen?

Karen Swim, APR (00:19):

Hi, Michelle. I'm doing really good. I am ready for the end of this year. Yes.

Michelle Kane (00:27):

And how by the time this hits, I'm sure we're going to be in full on scurry mode, getting everything done. And you may be thinking, how is this going to come together in the next week or so? And that is why we're going to bring you some holiday hacks today, or at least some giggles at the least, hopefully. Who knows?

Karen Swim, APR (00:51):

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

Michelle Kane (00:53):

We know how it is. It's like, oh, client gifts. What do I get them this year? Oh my goodness. Did I get, oh, there's a white elephant I have to do. Oh my goodness. Are we doing cards? I don't know. Are we doing cards? Who's buying stamps? What's happening? When is that store open? Especially post pandemic, those stores that you might be relying on having been open until 10 or 11 or goodness, even 9:00 PM What do you mean you're closing at 8:00 PM So let's just all take a moment, grab the nearest scented candle, take a nice inhale. Let's try and get through these last couple of weeks of the year together.

Karen Swim, APR (01:30):

Yeah, and I think, I don't know about anybody else, but I always, I overthink, so I overthink.

Michelle Kane (01:41):

I don't do that at all. Haha. All the time.

Karen Swim, APR (01:44):

So one of the holiday hacks is don't overthink it and stop doing the most. There are things that you can do that are still thoughtful without just going over the top. So for example, client gifts. There are sites like SugarWish and Snack Magic that you can just go online. You can buy the credits and they'll send a nice email link and to your clients and they can choose from treats, from all kinds of stuff, and they can pick out their own gift and have it shipped wherever they want. So if they're traveling over the holidays, they can have it shipped somewhere else. Perfect gift. All you need is an email address. So you don't have to go through all the stress of like, and if you have different client contacts, you can just go in and do the same amount of credit for each of the contacts and let them pick their own thing and call it a day. It's thoughtful, you're thinking of them. It's not. It's the thought that really counts. And I think we forget that. Or places like Pack for a Purpose. If you want to ship something to a bigger group, they have nice gift funnels in every single has a purpose. It supports some type of a nonprofit. So it's a definite feel good gift. So take the stress out of the holiday gift giving part by making it easier on yourself. Few clicks of the mouse and you're done.

Michelle Kane (03:15):

Exactly. So, so true. And if you're like me who has, well, they're not business contacts, but they're personal contacts who are out of the country. I like to try and shop local, but not a lot of businesses will have gift cards. You can just have a gift card emailed to the recipient and boom, there you go. Gift is given. For my locals, I like to try and shop local. There is a beautiful popcorn factory type place literally right up the street from me. So I usually go in with my little client list and I'm like boom, boom, boom. Everybody gets a can. And then of course I always make sure that the business card is on top. I don't want them to think they're getting that Walmart junk. You're getting real popcorn people.

Karen Swim, APR (04:08):

Yes. Well, and I love that you pick a place locally and just shop for all of your clients here again, we PR people sometimes are like, I'm going to customize each gift. And to admit in years past I've done that too. But it's stressful. You're adding the whole stress of this holiday season. Another hack is with your family, pick a day that's not the holidays. If you have lots of family and you traditionally maybe hop around a lot, don't do that. Just give yourself the time. This year, pick a day. I'm doing a sister brunch with my sisters and it's like 10 days before the holiday so that I see them. I'm probably not going to see them for Christmas and I don't feel bad about that. We're doing something separate. It's low key, it's a brunch, there's no gifts involved, there's nothing. But it's fun. It's holidays and we get to just spend time together. So we have to, especially these days because I don't think they feel so much harder.

Michelle Kane (05:12):

It really does. It really, really does. And I think another hack might be to let go of some of the things that you used to always do because you always did it. I know I used to be a fierce cookie baker and I still like to bake cookies, but I'm not going to make myself do it just to say, well, I usually do this, will I bake? A little bit? Probably. But it's like I don't want to, I'm over killing myself to say I holidayed in a certain way. And I think what you said is so important to give yourself that gift of time. And I'm not saying it's easy because sometimes when then I have that what I think is extra time, which is actually just plain old time, you get a little nervous. You think, oh, should I be doing something? What do I do with this? Sit your butt down and watch a Christmas movie. That's what you should do with this.

Karen Swim, APR (06:10):

It's a beautiful idea. And I mean even when it comes to client work, not saying coast, but we're saying focus on what's really important this year does. And this year especially, it feels like people have already checked out and we're at the very beginning of December. It's very, very quiet. So this is a good time for planning, a good time for strategy, a good time for going ahead and wrapping up those. If you do monthly type reports, start gathering all the information. I try to have my reports done weekly, even for a monthly so that when the last day comes in, I've already got the information all in place and I really just have to polish it and send it off. It does take a lot of the stress out. If you are responsible for content for clients, instead of writing new content, repurpose stuff, do roundups for their blogs, look at their LinkedIn newsletters and grab some stuff and do kind of a best of mix for the end of year because people are not paying that much attention anyway.

And sometimes we fall victim to our incredible work ethic and we just want to keep going, going, going, going. But it's a good time to just take it down a notch and not put the pressure on yourself to be Mr. Or Mrs. Perfect PR at the end of the year. It's okay. It really is. Okay. You can ease up on content, you can ease up on some of the activities with our clients. We set expectations around media relations. And it's not that we don't still have things to do, it's just that nobody's around and they're not answering stuff, they're over it. Right,

Michelle Kane (07:53):

Right. No, it's true. And I feel like that's, especially it's subtly I can't talk today, it's becoming a bit of the norm, I think. Yes. Are there some projects that are fast paced, full on, get it done? But I think for some of the more regular work that we might've been a little extra about in modern times, especially the last decade or so, I feel a little easing there, of, okay, yeah, we'll get it done. Alright, it's not on fire. It'll still happen. And I think too at the same time, because I know just attention spans of the people receiving our information, they can only take so much. So I think it all tends to balance out. So yeah, please do give yourself that time. This is the first year that I actually took purposely said, I am not going to officially work the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Now, did I end up doing a little work? Yes, I did. It was okay. It kept things moving, but it wasn't like, oh, here I go, I have to go sit at my desk. And I didn't want to. It was just, all right, let me handle that and then that'll take care of, so start now is a good time. Well actually when this airs, it's not a great time. Hopefully you've already planned it in when this is hitting your, hitting your ears. But if you're still struggling with whether or not you're going to take an extra day or so, please try to do it because if you don't do it now, when are you going to do it?

Karen Swim, APR (09:25):

And it's quiet, lean into the quiet. And on the client side, I know many of us do shut down the last two weeks or the last week of the year, and it only makes sense. And if you are feeling like there's some more client hours that you want to get in there, you can do things like go ahead and hold thought leadership calls, hold some quick thought leadership calls with your CEOs, your executives, and get content now and have it transcribed so that you have things ready to go in January when things restart. So you put the hours in this month, but it's not a heavy lift to just have those thought leadership questions done, do your agenda and have quick calls to get their thinking on things for next year. And now you're a step ahead for content and for trends and for ideas that you can be working on. But don't make things overly hard for yourself. Just try to find ways to do what you need to do. Do it well. But don't forget to enjoy this time of the year because it's one of those rare times in the year and we have Hanukkah, we have Christmas, we have New Year's celebrations. People really are taking off. And it would be a team to put pressure on yourself during a time when you legitimately can just take a breath because everyone is taking a breath.

Michelle Kane (10:51):

And like you said earlier, we are overthinkers, we are people who, it's in our nature. We want to dazzle. And I don't mean in a vapid way, we we're always striving to do the best work possible. And it's okay if you just again, just kind of relax a little bit and really, I don't think we can say this enough in this and maybe we're talking to ourselves, take that time to enjoy. And I can even feel it in my body right now as I'm saying it. It's going to feel uncomfortable. It's kind of like when I go to those every once in a while, my yoga studio will have a two hour, a special class where you really are deep relaxation and I am horrible at it. Okay, we're going to stay here in this pose for four minutes. And I'm like, okay, great. Halfway through. I'm like, are we done? Are we done now? Is this okay? Are we good? So don't be me,

Karen Swim, APR (12:01):

Don't be Michelle. No, enjoy the holidays. And on that note, we want to wish you all happy holidays. Whatever you celebrate during this time of year, we hope that it really is a joyous time. And for those of you who may be struggling during this time of year, we have you in our hearts and our thoughts and hope that you are surrounded by supportive people. And we just ask wherever you are, whatever you're celebrating, whatever you are going through, good or bad, just know that you're not alone. And we are sending our audience lots of love.

Michelle Kane (12:39):

Yes, indeed, we are. And to our friends who have celebrated Hanukkah by the time this comes around, we hope it was a really joyous occasion. We know this year hits a little different for many reasons, and we hold you in our hearts as well. But we hope just as we all move forward toward a brand new year, which I'm so excited for, we just want you to all be well and we care about you. And thanks for listening to us. We hope you get something out of hearing us jabber every week about the business that we so love. And until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.