At the end of June Agents notice that a substantial part of the year is passed. Six months, or one half of the year is behind us. That makes some Agents anxious and nervous about how the year will wrap up. Others are excited and eager. The difference is completely based on each Agents feeling about how they are doing. Following are four of the best solutions to being excited and eager about your business instead of anxious and nervous.

1. 1. How you feel about your business is a distraction that is more likely to hurt your business than help it. If you feel bad it may motivate you, more likely it will de-motivate you. And if you feel good it may motivate you or it may make you complacent. I am a HUGE believer that your “attitude dictates your altitude.” However, in terms of your how you are doing in your business it is your measureable results that dictate your success, not your attitude. Focus on measurable results. So…
2. 2. What gets measured gets done. You get what you inspect not what you expect. What measures do you keep track of? What measures are you aware of? Do you have a sales goal for each month? If not, start there and set one now for July, August, and every month to the end of the year. Be sure it is open sales; in other words what you put under contract not what you close, in June etc. You must measure what you have the most control over. In terms of sales volume you have much more control over what you will put under contract each month than what you close that month.

   Do you have a listing goal for each month?  Set those too.

3. 3. Look at your monthly sales volume and listing goals every day. Yes, every day. Of course there are days they won’t change. And of course you will remember what those goals are and how you are doing if you only look at them a few times a week. But you won’t do it unless it is a habit. It will take you… oh, let’s say… thirty seconds, maybe less because you could be looking at a goals sheet on paper or on your computer while you are having breakfast so can do it in N.E.T. (no extra time). When you have those goals set and you look at them every day, it prevents lengthy slumps and it motivates you in the most effective and legitimate way.
4. 4. Choose, right now, what success in your Real Estate career will do for your life that you desire most. What is it? Will it reduce the stress of unpaid bills? Will it buy you another income property, fund college educations, pay for that surgery, allow you to take that trip or take the trip with greater ease and enjoyment. What is it for you? And once you hit on that thing that gets your juices flowing, that thing that creates a sense of excitement in you, when you hit upon that thing; write it down. And each day as you look at your goals connect that desired outcome with those measured results. That $400,000 of sales in June means that I’ll be able to… Make that connection each day. Dwell on it. Yes it may be painful for some who are struggling and exhilarating for those who are already doing well. For both and for all it will ultimately create permanent motivation.

The secret to the success of my coaching Clients are a few simple disciplines. The business is hard. Buyers and Sellers, Lenders and Appraisers, Personal Property and Possession Dates and more, offer continual challenges; awareness of your numbers brings greater ease, sanity and motivation. These four simple solutions will make a huge difference to your success.

The Problem

Buyers are tougher than ever.  Buyers are taking longer to buy, looking at more properties, offering less, and negotiating more.  The list goes on.

The Solution – Five Keys

The Buyer’s motivation dictates everything.  As an Agent you must find out why the Buyer is buying.  Use these four questions:

1. Why are you thinking about Buying at this time?
2. Where are you thinking about going?
3. Ideally, if I could snap my fingers and make it happen for you, when would you like to be in your new home?
4. How important is it to make that move in that time frame?

Once you know the answers you will be able to accurately predict and anticipate the Buyers behavior.

Buyers are inexperienced.  Doctors, lawyers, accountants, teachers, business executives don’t know as much as you do about buying a house.  The Internet doesn’t teach them.  If you bought in another state how much would you know about the market, the contracts, the inspections, and even the financing?  You would know what questions to ask.  They don’t even know what questions to ask.  Your first job is to educate the Buyers.  (I recorded this a couple years ago.  It is still completely applicable today.  www.BuyerMarketTips.com)

Educate the Buyers as early in the process as possible.  Educate the Buyers means to have a sit down session with them in which you go through the entire buying experience step by step.  Ensuring their understanding.  Answering their questions.  Preparing them for the subtleties and possible surprises of each step.  I call this your Buyer presentation.

[Nearly] Every problem you have with Buyers is solved in the Buyer presentation.  Can this be true?  Of course, because each time a new problem arises you add it to your Buyer presentation so that all of your future Buyers anticipate and are prepared for it.  Only those of you with weak Buyer presentations or none at all will disagree with this.  Those who already do it know the truth of it.

This thorough Buyer presentation is a skill equal to your listing presentation.  It takes time, effort, and practice to get good at it.  A poorly prepared Buyer wastes as much or more time than an overpriced listing.  A well prepared (and motivated but you find that out at the presentation) Buyer is as valuable and efficient as a well priced listing.  If you plan to work with Buyers.  Build this skill.

Buyers have had a bad reputation ever since the expressions “List to last,” and “Listings are the name of the game,” became popular.  The truth is that every sale and every commission requires a Buyer and a Seller.  The most successful Agents have a team of Buyer’s Agents.  Hmmmm, there must be a lot of value in learning and developing a high level of skill with Buyers… if you work with them.  If not, pass these tips on to your Buyer’s Agents and congratulations on a successful team.

Over 21,000 agents opened (and read) the article “Top Ten Negotiating Rules for REALTORS®.” from the Pacific Coast Highway to the Hamptons; from the Upper Peninsula to Corpus Christi; real estate agents are eager to improve their negotiating skills.  It makes sense since REALTORS® negotiate all of the time, yet get little or no formal training in it. Here are a handful of quick tips you can begin using immediately.

Stay focused on the goal of completing the sale.  In other words, don’t let the buyer, seller, other agent, or anyone else distract you from the goal.  And, when others get fascinated by some minor issue, encourage them to keep their “eye on the ball.”

Don’t let the buyers and sellers come to a place where they dislike each other.  It is usually best to say little or nothing personal about your client.  Too often, your well-intended information is misunderstood and used as ammunition against the interest of the transaction.

When you hit an impasse, settle the issues where there is agreement and come back to the areas of negotiation later.

Take time to think.  Give your clients time to think.  Unless their decision  is a quick yes, and even then take the time to reinforce their decision.  Allow the clients to consider the options and the consequences of their decisions.

Be honest.  Integrity and courtesy always win.  Exaggeration and dishonesty are costly at many levels, for a long time.

Finally, negotiators are made, not born.  Negotiating is a skill that is learned, then strengthened with experience, education, and application.

If you love negotiating, make a commitment to learn more and get better at it.  If you dislike or fear negotiating, then realize that many of your normal strengths, like integrity, commitment to the client’s interests, and ethics work in your favor.  In real estate, unlike some other venues, intimidation tactics don’t work.

I am proud to work in real estate.  You, too, can be proud to work in a profession where integrity works and integrity wins.  That is particularly true in your negotiating.

Imagine learning to drive in a car with no speedometer.  You could drive and do pretty well, but you would have a handicap compared to other drivers.  You would have to judge your speed based on the speed of the others around you, and if you were on the road alone, you would always be worried and stressed about your speed.  That’s how most agents “drive” their businesses, because they have no “speedometer” to know how they are doing.

Now, imagine learning to wake up each day with no sense of purpose.  The first e-mail you read or the first conversation you have determines what you will focus on and how you will feel for the day.  It may not take an e-mail or conversation; just your first thoughts of the day to determine the quality of the day.

That is how many agents live each day.  They have the knowledge and skills to have a very good business.  It is not real estate knowledge, skills, or tools that are missing. In addition to knowledge and skills it takes a “speedometer,” and an accurate one.  In a real estate agent’s business, that means a method to know their “speed,” in other words whether they are winning or losing.  Like a car’s speedometer, the agent’s “speedometer” has to be in real time so the agent knows their speed each day, with confidence.  Most agents don’t have that method.

It also takes knowledge of how to create and control your attitude.  Notice that I did not say that it takes a good attitude.  That would be naïve.  Of course it takes a good attitude.  The challenge is learning how to create and control that attitude so that you are able to generate it at will.  And, I am not talking about repeating an affirmation that has little real impact on you.  I am talking about shifting your mindset and your emotions at a level that motivates you deeply.  And, knowing you can create that, at will.

Why do Agents fail soooo often?  Because they are always working on just one of these three aspects of their business; the three are: knowing your accurate numbers, controlling your attitude, and your skill set.  Agents learn the skill sets and spend little or no time on knowing their numbers or learning to control their attitude.  Unfortunately, this means that many of those that produce good sales numbers are not stable, confident, or comfortable with their business.

Build your business on a foundation of all three of these aspects and you will succeed more quickly, with greater control and satisfaction.  For more information on how we coach and teach agents to do this, go to www.BestCoachingOnEarth.com and join our Daily Coaching Program.

K.I.S.S., or keep it simple, stupid; or, the more polite version, keep it simple, salesperson. Or even, keep it short and simple. This has been used as an instruction to teach salespeople to avoid unnecessary complexity with prospects.

The simpler the salesperson can make the decision for the prospect, the more likely they are to take action. It makes complete sense, violating this principle is the reason most agent business planning does not stick.

Here’s a radical thought, any business plan that can’t be created in less than an hour is unlikely to be implemented. Take one hour to complete a plan for 2011 as if that is all the time you have; as if that is the plan that has to guide you for the entire year. And, it has to be completed in one hour.  Whether you complete your plan in that hour or not, that sharp focus motivates you to create a better plan because of its simplicity. Keep It Simple and Succeed!

A coaching client, a real estate agent, recently asked this question.  It is a common problem, and here is the solution.

The Question
I think I am missing the boat on some clients because I forget about them.  I lost contact with them and it is costing me thousands of dollars, maybe tens of thousands of dollars, every year.  I really need to improve my average in this category.  I need something to keep them in front of me.  I need some sort of physical chart to keep them in my mind.  I can probably make my own if I knew of three or four columns to use.  How should I keep track of these clients?

The Solution
I teach my clients to use their CRM (Contact Relationship Management) software to keep track of these clients.  This doesn’t work for some, in which case we pursue whatever system will work for them.  People are different from each other and need different solutions.  A good one is the whiteboard.  The board itself it is quite easy to put together; let’s go over how to do it.

Five columns
The five columns you should put on your whiteboard are:

1. Urgency, label this column with A or B, so you are aware of the urgency level at all times.  A, of course, is urgent while B is not. This will also prompt you to work on converting the B buyers to A’s.
2. The name of the buyer
3. The buyer’s price range
4. Location the buyer is interested in
5. Comments, anything specific they are looking for in a property
6. Optional information, such as phone numbers (before PDA’s agents would put contact information on their buyer whiteboard.  Now, the number may not be necessary, because you have it on your phone).

When you, your assistant, or anyone on your team hears about a new listing or you are pursuing a new listing, you can glance at the board.  Sell more, act more quickly for your buyers, and stop losing the leads that you already know are causing you to lose money.

Honesty is often interesting.  One of my coaching clients, an agent, Herb (name changed to protect the guilty) is having a mediocre year.  I thought I knew the problem so I asked him this, “Herb, what percentage of your leads do you simply not follow up on, or call once and not follow through on?”

He was honest, he said, “Sixty.”

“Sixty percent that you do follow through on or sixty percent that you don’t?” I asked.

“Sixty percent that I don’t,” he said.

Herb would double his production simply by following through on the leads that are already coming to him.  Honesty is interesting.

Another client, agent, Laurie (name changed), who hit a very slow period in the middle of the year answered the question this way.  “Well, I started out strong and then I got pretty sloppy, but now I am following up on nearly everything again.”

Considering that the period in which she “got pretty sloppy” following through on her leads was the spring and summer, she would have doubled her production as well, simply by following through on the leads already coming to her.

There are a many agents like Herb and Laurie, who have the skills and the knowledge, but they lack the motivation, focus, and commitment to follow up and follow through.

To what extent does this describe you?  What percentage of the leads that came to you this year didn’t get followed up on or followed through?

It is the perfect time of year to recognize this, and correct it with a four step process that I call “Breakdown Leads to Breakthrough.”

Breakdown Leads to Breakthrough
Step One: Acknowledge the error.  Simply admit it honestly to yourself.
Step Two: Forgive yourself.  This can be quite easy, just say to yourself, “I forgive myself.”  Can it be that easy?  Absolutely, as long as you do Step One honestly.
Step Three: Recommit.  Decide if you want to recommit to follow through on your leads more conscientiously for the rest of the year and through next year.
Step Four: Get into action immediately on your renewed commitment.  This is the critical step.

Honesty is interesting.  Self-honesty is even more interesting, because  it is the key to your personal and professional breakthrough.

It was session three of seven of our S.P.A.R.K. Course, and one agent after another approached me at each break. Each comment or question had the same theme. It was weird.

Each agent said something along the lines of, “I can see how this is really going to work for me, but here is the problem.” Or, “This is great stuff and it would really work for me, except, here is what I face.”

There are over a hundred people in the class and over a dozen of them expressed this type of sentiment. The problems included other jobs that took their time, taking care of children, not enough experience, and more. It was clear that the problem had nothing to do with the issues that they were bringing up. Something else was going on.

While driving away from the conference center, I realized what it was. As these agents began seeing and feeling that they were capable of achieving and exceeding their business goals, when they were sincerely confronted by the prospect of their own success, then the psychological barriers that have prevented their success began to come to their consciousness. Their mind perceived their most desired future for their business and their psyche was finding the reasons that it was not likely or possible to achieve it.

This is the definition of a limiting belief: a thought that is perceived as the absolute truth by the person having it, when in reality it is a false barrier. So, at the next session I led them through an exercise to identify and eliminate limiting beliefs. The response was overwhelming. One person after another was experiencing a breakthrough they knew was possible, but couldn’t previously quite reach. Now it was happening. The skills were there and the barriers were not.

The most common questions an agent is asked are:

“How’s business?”

“How’s the market?”

The way you answer those questions can attract business to you or drive it away.  On our free daily webinars I often remind you (agents) to consider that half of the people that ask you those questions are either thinking of making a move in the upcoming year themselves, or they know someone who is.  They have a son or daughter moving to town; a parent or grandparent needing to sell; they are losing their job, or getting a promotion, etc.

Answer those questions with negativity, or a lack of enthusiasm, and you are communicating that you lack confidence in your ability to do the best for them. Even if the market is soft, there are easy ways to be honest and positive.

Answer those questions with complete honesty, and with the most positive spin you can find for the current market conditions; answer with modest enthusiasm, and you are communicating that you are the person to find the best way to get the job done.  On our daily webinars (which are recorded so you can listen to them anytime during the day) I share lots of ideas and scripts to communicate that enthusiastic, honest and positive response.

Right now, wherever you are reading this, imagine that you have just been asked, “How’s the market?”

Answer it quickly with the first thought that comes to your mind.  Examine that response.  Does it attract or repel?  Then consider all the ways you could answer it to make a better impression, to attract.

Make a note of those compelling, attracting answers.  Ask it of yourself again, and this time answer out loud.  Keep this up in your car, in the shower, at random until it is natural for you to use these opportunities to generate some of the easiest business you may do all year.