The Key to Staying on Track

Many of us work hard to generate momentum by going through coaching programs, reading books, taking classes. We et jazzed and vow to stick with it this time. "It" could be lead generation, budgeting, consulting your team, writing that book you keep meaning to write. Whatever "It" is distraction is right there to keep you company.

This is the cycle in business and life that keeps us from achieving our goals. Otherwise we would just stay focused and get it done. Take a minute and think about where you would be if you had stayed on track when you first got into this business.

So there's no question for the need to stay on track. The Key to staying on track is frequent coaching and accountability. If you want to stay on track put yourself into a coaching relationship where you meet frequently, in person or by phone, and report on what you have done and what you have not done.

A tip: The more often you meet the more chances you have to "correct" your course and get back on track. Did you know that an airplane spends over 90% of its flight on autopilot. Here's how it works: once on autopilot the plane does a ton of miny adjustments each time it gets off track. What would happen if it only did one adjust or no adjustments? Well, if you were headed to Hawaii from California you would end up either way South or way North. Coaching is like this. If you only meet once a year it's like autocorrecting once on your way to Hawaii. But if you met every week, or 52 times a year), you would increase your chance of staying on course by 52 times.

So what's the take away here? It's one thing to intellectually understand the principle of "It" (lead generation, budgeting, consulting your team, or writin that book). It's another thing to put yourself inside a structure that will help you autocorrect continually so you can stay on track and hit your goals.

So find a coach and stay on track.

How to measure success

I was talking to a top agent yesterday about the importance of measuring success. It's easy to just go about our business and our life doing what we do without measuring the results. What I've noticed in the past from not measuring is that people (myself included) can get frustrated and feel like all we do is talk about change, or our goals, etc. By measuring and constantly revisiting our measures we can have accurate feedback on our progress and encouragement on what's been accomplished.

So what to measure? I think there are 4 areas to measure: Market Share, Profit, Time, Freedom. Each agent will have to define how they will measure those. Market Share shows a growing of your business. When your business grows, assuming you keep your expenses relatively consistent, your Profit should then grow. Profit is the goal in business. A business that breaks even or loses money will create lots of stress and financial hardship and won't be around much longer. With Profit comes Time. Time is important to measure because you want to be constantly increasing your dollar per hour. Some agents make a ton of money but work 80 hours a week. Their dollar per hour is much less than someone making the same amount of money but only working 5 hours a month. When you begin to have more Time you can begin playing with Freedom. Freedom can be measured many ways but the concept is that you are Free to do things you want to do (whether that requires time or money). But Freedom is about your higher purpose and what you want to do with your life outside of business (or over and above the daily activities of your business).

How ever you define these measures, measuring is still a key feedback mechanism as you build towards your vision.

Realtors are Entreprenuers

I love this business for all the potential it has to give us what we want as Realtors. If we do the right things we can build a business that not only makes us a great living but funds our dreams and purpose. Watch this video to see what I mean.

Being Memorable

We live in busy times which makes it even harder for people to remember us; even our friends and family. Have any of you lost a deal because your past clients didn't remember you and used somebody else? That's a lack of "memorability".

This is why I teach specific strategies for memorability which saturate your target audience quickly. Keep finding ways to be memorable to your target audience because the game of real estate is all about "mindshare".

The Power of Leverage

"Leverage" is defined as: the mechanical advantage of a lever; positional advantage, the power to act effectively.

Would anyone like "positional advantage" in their market place? Would anyone like to act more effectively? Leverage is the key.

Leverage can come in the form of tools, systems, technology, people and even strategy. Does your strategy give you "positional advantage"? Do your people give you positional advantage? How about your technology, tools or systems? In order to get leverage on your side you'll have to think differently about this business. Track me down to find out more.

Accountability tricks

Who loves accountability? Having missed a couple days of working out I realized that I needed some accountability; something that would force my hand to work out. This is where tricking ourselves comes in handy. I can find all sorts of reasons not to do the work out. "I'm too busy", "I'm too tired", "I don't want to", etc. But over time I realize that what I really want is to feel better by working out. But wanting to isn't strong enough. We all want certain things but that doesn't mean we'll do the work to get it. It's a mind vs body thing. My mind is stronger than my body and while my body is literally aching for exercise my mind will beat it down and win every time. So rather than trying to overpower my mind, I've found it useful to simply use my mind against itself (or "in response" to itself).

This is where tricking ourselves comes in... I picked up the phone as I left the office tonight and told 2 of my co-workers that I would pay them each $10 cash tomorrow if I didn't work out tonight. Now I'm sure to work out because I don't want to pay out $20 tomorrow.

If you need to get something done, consider how you might "respond" with you mind in such a way that you "make" yourself do something. Here's to getting the things you want in life.

What you don't know could be stopping you

I heard a speaker the other day say "the only thing stopping you from making money is what you don't know."  That comment was made in a presentation promoting an educational seminar.  That's a good closing line because it makes total sense.

I have a seminar that will teach you certain things that you don't know and those things I teach you and that you don't know could be the things holding you back. (that's the point I think they were making under the surface).

But aside from my tainted view (I loved the presentation by the way even though I knew they were selling me on a seminar), the point is a good point.  I heard years ago that we don't know what we don't know. 

Consider that a top agents knows more about being successful in real estate than the average agent.  However, that top agent still has things they don't know. That's because we're not Omniscient as humans.

I guess the take away is we can always be learning and open to new ideas and strategies that push our thinking.  What are you plugged into?  What new strategies have you learned lately that are imnpacting your business today in a tangible (financial) way?