{"id":32889,"date":"2016-10-27T21:13:06","date_gmt":"2016-10-27T21:13:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regancomm355.e.wpstage.net\/?p=3198"},"modified":"2016-10-27T21:13:06","modified_gmt":"2016-10-27T21:13:06","slug":"unplugged-vacation-pr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/unplugged-vacation-pr\/","title":{"rendered":"Unplugged: Vacationing when working in PR"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>There once was a time when a vacation was the perfect way to take a break from one\u2019s job, unplugging from the work realm and exploring the elusive, magical world of Time Off.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/regancomm355.e.wpstage.net\/content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/LKO-beach-10-23-16.jpg\" alt=\"unplugged\" title=\"\" height=\"533\" width=\"800\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3199\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But time waits for no (wo)man, and in our industry especially \u2013 public relations and advertising \u2013 connectivity, email, and social media have cast a pall over our ability to get away. Instead, we never really unplug; we monitor, respond, react, and work to keep to our 21<sup>st<\/sup>-century responsibilities intact and our clients feeling that they\u2019re getting the service for which they pay. We can\u2019t afford for our clients\u2019 branded social media to take a vacation, too \u2013 it\u2019s not feasible to send an \u201cout of office\u201d tweet, Facebook post, or blog comment that is guaranteed to reach all followers. At best, we look like we\u2019re ignoring our responsibilities to clients\u2019 communities. At worst, our clients\u2019 professional reputation (as well as our own) may be on the line while we\u2019re catching few rays and ordering Pina Coladas at the pool bar.<\/p>\n<h3>Experts in our industry offer a few obvious strategies we must deploy in the age of instant gratification and massive social connectivity.<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>State the Obvious:<\/strong> We operate in a transparent world. If you\u2019re planning to go on vacation, it\u2019s not unheard of to say so. You don\u2019t need to share pertinent details of your family trip, but a message to your agency\u2019s accounts telling people specifically when they can expect to hear from you can work well for you. Consider something like:<br \/>\n<em>\u201cI&#8217;m on vacation through the end of the week and will be back on Monday. I am checking email and Twitter DMs daily, but not responding until my return. For immediate needs, please contact Julie in the office.\u201d<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong>Share the Wealth (of Responsibilities): <\/strong>Vacation or not, no one person should be the keeper of all logins and passwords for your agency\u2019s or client\u2019s social properties. Keep a spreadsheet of all of the pertinent information, and make sure others in the office know where it is, and how to access it.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Use Tools:<\/strong> Even though you have the luxury of taking time off from your clients\u2019 posts, their businesses are going to keep running. Consider pre-writing some posts to go live while you\u2019re gone \u2013 there are plenty of tools to do so and you can create scheduled posts without ever leaving Facebook.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Monitor the Obvious:<\/strong> You can take a trip but you never really leave the farm \u2013 your absence means nothing to people who are talking about you or your clients online while you are away. At a bare minimum, you need to monitor conversations. Don\u2019t let a crisis take you by surprise. Assign someone on your team to respond quickly when things are looking like they could go nuclear \u2013 and if it\u2019s you who has to do it, put on your big girl panties (or man up, as the case may be), and get on it, whether by phone, tablet, or laptop. This is your gig.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>By the way, I write this blog post on my first day of vacation. These photos are really me, in real time.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>Kelly Owens<\/em><br \/>\n<em> Alchemy\/Regan Florida<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; There once was a time when a vacation was the perfect way to take [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":3199,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crosspost_to_4":false,"_crosspost_to_5":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[308,563,564,565,566,567],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32889"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regancomm.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}