The holidays can be a fun and exciting time, especially with Christmas events and the idea of gifts just around the corner. But for marketers, holiday campaigns can cause you to feel overwhelmed and on the brink of burnout. The idea of sales, promotions, influencer campaigns, and increased engagement can start to decrease your energy levels when balancing work, life, the holidays, and everything in between.With the end of the year in sight, here are my top four tips to avoid holiday burnout and reduce the built up stress. Especially right now, when you're trying to push through to ensure that holiday campaigns are a success, be sure to be consistent with these tips and I guarantee you'll feel much better as you cross the marketing campaign finish line.

1. Take frequent short breaks from your screen

This one may come as a no brainer, but how many times you are sitting at your computer, only to realize 2 hours have gone by and you were barely effective in completing your tasks. Sources tell us that short, frequent breaks are better than less frequent longer breaks, so a 5-10 minute break after 1 hour is better than a 20 minute break every 3 hours.?If you're having trouble trying to remember to take breaks, try the Health Browsing Chrome Extension. This extension reminds you to take a break, blink even, or to check your posture. A small change every single day can have a huge impact on your day-to-day work.

2. Drink plenty of water

Now before you click out of this article, hear me out. Never underestimate the power of taking a moment to hydrate your body. During the winter months, our instinct is to grab warm tea or coffee that can dehydrate us and make us less productive. The Drink Water Reminder N Tracker app takes into account things like your climate and activities to remind you throughout the day to drink water. So, the next time you are feeling overwhelmed, or are on the verge of burning out, take a moment to take a deep breath and drink a glass of water to assess your situation and give you a positive outlook before starting a large task.

3. Leverage Technology and Automation

Automation is such a powerful tool for marketers to help automate repetitive and time consuming tasks. In return, you're able to free up more time to avoid burnout. Our favorite that we use is HubSpot, a free tool that allows us to automate responses to contact forms or automate responses with potential leads. Another great tool that we recommend is Calendly, allowing you to set aside time in between meetings and set up automatic 24 hour reminders to those who are meeting with you. Last but not least, Basecamp is another tool our team uses to keep us accountable on projects and ensure to-do items do not overlap with one another. Automation can help with:

Using technology to your advantage can give you the peace of mind that those repetitive and time consuming tasks are being done.

4. Create a realistic to-do list

When it comes to to-do list, seeing hundreds of items on a piece of paper can become overwhelming and you wonder to yourself "Where do I start?". We recommend breaking up your day with MITs, which are "Most Important Tasks". These can be things like a brand strategy, marketing strategy, or content development. Limiting your to-do list to 2 or 3 big items that absolutely must be done today can allow you to focus and hone in on what is important to complete the project. Next is to list out the "urgent tasks", that need to be done immediately because of deadlines. These are things like replying to e-mails or responding to phone calls. It is important to not always prioritize the urgent tasks since the Most Important Tasks (MITs) are the ones that bring the most value. Keeping your to-do lists all ine one place allows you to prioritize your tasks correctly. Our go-to tool for to-do lists are Basecamp and Trello, which we prioritize into "Urgent To Do" and "Most Important Tasks".In our line of work, it's important to be kind to yourself as we are constantly pushing ourselves to perform better and do more. The marketing landscape continues to change but taking care of you should always be a priority. If you liked this article, be sure to let us know and to subscribe to our newsletter where we continue to give valuable tips to marketers, content creators, and entrepreneurs. Wishing you all an enjoyable holiday season!