Category: 2. Getting Stuff Done

A Routine is something that you do on a regular basis, such as your grocery shopping every Friday or paying your bills on the second Thursday of every month.

Introducing Routines into your work-life is a powerful habit-forming technique to ensure you get all your important work done consistently.

For example, let’s say you commit to sending an Activity Report to all your listing clients every Monday morning. If you want to maintain credibility and build trust, you must stick to your planned routine.

You can’t just do it sometimes!

You can’t just sluff it off to Tuesday or Wednesday one week because you got busy. You’ve trained your clients to expect that report every Monday morning! 

When you make a commitment, you lose credibility when you don’t live up to it.

But how do you ensure you stick to your pre-set Routines?

The Rules

In The Clear Brain System, I talk about the importance of abiding by a set of self-imposed rules.

“EVERY successful person in the world follows a set of personal self-imposed rules designed to maximize their personal productivity.”

One of my rules is that I treat every ‘Appointment with Myself’ with equal importance to how I treat an ‘Appointment with my Best Client.’

What’s an Appointment with Myself? 

It’s a task that is time-sensitive. If I don’t get it done as part of the Ready Go List in my Clear Brain System, I must now move that task to my calendar and assign a certain day and time to complete it.

Once a task is on my calendar, I have no choice but to do that task when it is assigned. Why? 

Because of the self-imposed rules that I’ve assigned to myself to ensure I get stuff done.

What about you?

Let’s say you’ve got any one of these three appointments at 3:00 pm this afternoon.

1. A Listing Appointment
2. A Dentist Appointment
3. A Coffee Appointment to chat with your #1 client and best referral source

Now, it’s 11:00 am, and you get a call from a buyer wanting to see a property at 3:00 pm. Would you cancel any of these appointments above to accommodate that buyer?

Of course not! You would simply tell the buyer that you’ve already got an important appointment at that time, and you’d work out a different time. Right?

But what if your 3:00 appointment was an Appointment with Yourself? What would you do?

I’m guessing you would say, “no problem!” and you’d book the appointment for 3:00 with your buyer. You’d tell yourself you can do that thing you had booked with yourself another time.

You must stop doing this! Right now!

Start treating yourself with the same level of respect as you treat others.

Simply treat the Appointment with Yourself like any other important appointment. Tell your buyer client you’re already booked, and figure out a different time to show the property.

This is not rocket surgery!

What about Routines?

A Routine is simply a recurring Appointment with Yourself. Every Routine has a specific day and time when it gets done. 

Like this blog post, for example. I’m writing this on Monday morning because that’s my routine. I never have to think about what I’m doing on Monday morning because I know that I’m writing my blog post right after my Morning Routine, which is this:

1. Review and respond to messages
2. Review my calendar for today and the upcoming week
3. Review my Clear Brain System

By the way, do you remember the last time I skipped a week on my blog post? 

Me neither.

Routines are powerful and habit-forming.

So what about that weekly Activity Report to your seller clients? 

Time to adopt some Rules and Routines. 

To my regular readers: The previous 14 Memos were inspired by the 14 Agent Skills Master’s Program Modules. 

This is #15 in the series, so it’s a bit different. Yes, it’s a sales pitch for my course, but that’s not all.

Some things are just an undeniable win-win. So, sorry. Not sorry.

We’ll go back to the regular format next week, but this might be the most important Memo you read for a while.

——————–

It’s me! Future You! It’s the spring of 2021, and I just wanted to let you know that you are doing AMAZING!

For one thing, there’s no more stress about money. The commissions are rolling in, and there’s a sense of calm and freedom that we never had before.

The biggest surprise? How easy it was!

Honestly, I’m so confident; I feel like a completely different person!

Knowing exactly what to do (and say) in different situations is life-changing. It seems weird now that these simple things were such a mystery before. 

When you’ve got superior skills, people can sense it. It seems now like I’m attracting people without even trying!

I love all our clients! Honestly, work is much more enjoyable when your clients genuinely respect and value your time and expertise.

You know that listing you had with ‘Jerky Jerry’ back in December?

I fired him—what a relief!

Never again. 

Hey, You, before I forget, we’ve got a full-time assistant now! Our systems and procedures, and customer service, have evolved to a level you would not even recognize.

Suzy way more than pays for herself, and the bonus is I now have way more time to spend with family! ‍ ‍

More money and more free time!

We’ve got the cash-flow to implement the right marketing strategies now, which are working amazingly well. But at the same time, more and more business is coming from referrals.

I can’t believe how difficult it was to get a referral before, and now it just happens naturally.  I don’t even have to ask! 

Taking the Agent Skills Master’s Program was the smartest and most important thing you’ve ever done, and I thank-you.

Keep your head up. It only gets better from here on out.

Has this ever happened to you?

It’s five minutes after the first showing for your new listing, and the seller’s on the phone.

“Did they like it? Do they give any feedback?”

You roll your eyes.

You tell them you haven’t heard anything yet, but you’ll follow up and get back to them ASAP. 

——————–

Meanwhile, you’re thinking to yourself, “This is such a waste of time.”

After all, here’s the kind of feedback you usually get, if any:

The house was too small/too big…

They didn’t like the floorplan/the location…

Passing this feedback on to your sellers is indeed a total waste of time. But worse, it makes you look bad.

Even though there’s nothing your clients can do about any of those things, you’re still dashing their hopes every time you deliver bad news.

After a while, they start to associate YOU, with bad news! ☹️

——————–

Here’s a super easy and obvious way to eliminate this problem forever:

Educate your clients during the listing presentation. Give them the straight-up truth, like this:

“Mr. and Mrs. Seller, I want you to know that I do my best to get feedback from every showing. However, despite my best efforts, my response rate is typically around 30%-40%.

This is better than the industry average. However, out of all the feedback I do get, about 90% of it is completely useless!

I mean, they’ll say the house is too small for them, or they don’t like the floorplan or the location, or whatever.

Of course, there’s NOTHING we can do about any of those things, so if it’s okay with you…

(drumroll)…

I won’t waste your time (or my time) giving you USELESS negative feedback.

Of course, the minute I get any useful or positive feedback, I’m going to let you know right away. Is that okay with you?”

“Yes, of course. Thanks for the explanation!”

——————–

Problem solved.

The ‘feedback talk’ is just a single example of many different ways to set proper expectations ahead of time. 

If you understand how to improve your client communication systems, you will eliminate at least 75% of your stress.

Bonus: You can stop being the bad-news delivery person.

If you can accurately answer these questions, there’s no need to read this article.

1. What percentage of your listing presentations did you win last year?
2. What percentage of the buyers you worked with purchased a property?
3. What is the breakdown of all sources of your business?
4. What’s working for you, and what isn’t?

So, how’d you do?

____________________

OK, you’d better keep reading, then! 

Don’t feel bad. 99% of all Real Estate agents already know they should be tracking this information, but don’t.

It’s because they spend too much time reacting and not enough time being deliberate. 

But think about this:

How are you supposed to make sensible business decisions without accurate data?

If you make your business decisions by the seat-of-your-pants, remember which body part fits inside the seat of your pants.

____________________

But, seriously…

You don’t need any fancy-schmancy software to do this, and it won’t take more than 2-3 minutes a day if you do it consistently. 

Even when I was doing over 100 transactions in a year, a simple, sortable spreadsheet is the only business tool I ever needed to provide a clear picture of where to spend more (or less) time and energy, allowing me to run my business more efficiently.

It’s not only the four simple questions above. You’ll be able to answer numerous other critical questions about your business, and you’ll wonder how you ever survived without this level of insight.

____________________

All you have to do is write things down. In a simple spreadsheet. Consistently.

Think about your last two or three interactions with clients or potential clients, and start a spreadsheet with all the pertinent information, including the date, business source, names, address of the property, and notes about what worked well or what you could have done better. 

Add a new row every time you have a new potential transaction, whether it results in a sale, or not. Recording missed opportunities are just as important as successes. ____________________

I urge you to set up a Simple Business Tracker Spreadsheet now and start using it. Then set yourself a daily alarm at the same time every day that says, “Update Business Tracker.”

You won’t start to see the real benefit of this until you’ve recorded several entries, but believe me, once you realize the power of this simple tool, you will no longer need a daily reminder.

There’s a bigger picture to this. When you start taking care of business deliberately, rather than in reaction, you become more aware of all the moving parts of your business. When you feel on top of things, it reduces your anxiety, and you’ll understand better where you need to spend your time and energy.

If you feel anxiety because you’re unorganized, stop running your business by the seat of your pants.

Part of the reason you became a REALTOR® was to “be your own boss,” right?

But then, “being your own boss” turned into “not having a boss,” which is like when you’re a teenager, and your parents go on vacation and leave you at home for the first time.

It’s fun at first , but then the house gets frighteningly messy.

Now you’ve got one day to clean up this pigsty and bring it back to “normal” before your parents get home.

But being your own boss isn’t merely about keeping things “normal.” Unless, of course, you’re entirely satisfied with the state of your business as it is. 

But then, you wouldn’t be reading this, would you? 

It turns out that everyone needs a boss, but being a good ‘boss of yourself’ is something you can learn, just like any other skill.

Let’s explore a few different ways to improve your ‘boss’ skills.

______________________

For starters, it’s important to know the value of your time. 

For example, a typical busy REALTOR® probably works close to 2,500 hours per year (50 weeks x 50 hours/week).

If you made $250,000 last year, divide that by 2,500 hours to calculate your hourly rate ($100/hr). 

That’s not bad, but once you deduct all your expenses and taxes, let’s face it: You’re not getting rich. 

If your goal is to make $500,000, and you’re willing to work 2,500 hours to get it, here’s the most critical mindset shift you need to make:

Start behaving like your time is worth $200/hr. 

It’s as simple as that, and as difficult as that.

It’s simple because there’s no reason you can’t make $500,000 or more if you’ve got the right knowledge and skills, and you learn to use your time wisely.

It’s difficult because it requires personal discipline to be a good boss of yourself.

Ask yourself: Do you spend most of your time doing highly-productive income-generating ($200/hr) activities?

Or do you spend half your time doing $20/hr work that you could easily delegate to someone else?

If you spend your time doing $20/hr work, that’s precisely what you are worth.

______________________

If you had a personal productivity manager who looked over your shoulder every minute of your working day, would they be impressed by how you spend your time? Or would they be appalled at how much time you waste doing completely useless, unproductive activities?

If you want to make $500,000, wasting two hours every day is like tossing four $100 bills out your car window—every single day. Visualize that.

That’s $2,000 per week (M-F). 

You could hire a full-time, experienced assistant for half that, and stop doing $20/hr activities, forever.

Don’t get me wrong. If you are earning $500,000 and you make a conscious choice to spend $400 of your time doing something unproductive, go for it!

I’m not suggesting that you should work continuously and never have any downtime to recharge. That leads to burnout.

However, you do need to stop running your life haphazardly (like an unparented teenager).

Start being conscious of what you are doing and what you are not doing during your regular work hours. 

For one single day, be your own productivity manager. Write down how you spend every minute of your day. How many hours did you waste?

Two? Three? Six?

If you’re afraid to do this, you already know you have a problem, and you know you need to shift your mindset.

Perhaps you’re feeling overwhelmed, like your house is a pigsty right now, and your parents are coming home tomorrow.

Here’s the good news:

If you think that shifting your mindset means you have to start doing things that you hate, and that you’ll never have any fun ever again , that is the ridiculous success-preventing part of your brain trying to sabotage you.

The opposite is true: Positively shifting your mindset is exhilarating, confidence-boosting, and freeing, not to mention the massive improvement to your bank account.

Only one person is stopping you from achieving your goals. It’s you.

It’s time to start adulting.

If you’d like to further explore this topic, check out this previous post: Five Simple Steps to Getting Stuff Done.

______________________

This article was inspired by module #2 – Getting Stuff Done – part of the Agent Skills Master’s Program.

As a busy REALTOR®, chances are you’ve got a hundred little things to get done every day.

And you DO get them ALL done! Congratulations!

But, what about the BIG stuff?

You know. That website revision you’ve been planning for months, the new listing presentation, or the (fill in the blank) that you never seem to get to, because “there’s never enough time.”

Do you know why there’s never enough time?

It’s because you do the big stuff LAST when you should be doing it FIRST.

Here’s the problem: The little stuff is NEVER done.

You’ve got your priorities entirely backward. Here’s how to fix that right now:

1. Accept that you CANNOT “fit in” the BIG stuff whenever “time allows.” Ha! The BIG stuff takes more concentration. You’ll need to work at larger projects for at least one solid hour at a time, without interruption.
2. Plan to work on your BIG project for one uninterrupted Power Hour, first thing every morning, Monday to Friday.

(Okay, you can get yourself a coffee, and you can quickly check your messages, but for each message, ask yourself if it’s vital to respond immediately, or can it wait an hour? To develop your habit of prioritizing your Power Hour, you need to purposely NOT respond to less critical messages.)

3. After you scan your messages, and you’re ready to work an uninterrupted Power Hour on your BIG project, turn OFF all your devices, including your phone and your email. Now, get to work! You can set an alarm for one hour if that helps. ⏰
4. Use your very first Power Hour to write a list of potential projects, prioritize them, and decide which one you’ll get done FIRST. They will ALL get done eventually, but it will go a lot faster if you learn to complete tasks, one at a time. ✔️
5. Set a rule for yourself that your Power Hour is non-negotiable. Life will conspire to throw you off track. You were up late negotiating a deal. You’ve got TWO hundred little things to do tomorrow. Your kids are up early. Whatever the case, you need to figure out how to modify your routine, which probably means you need to start getting up earlier. You can have a nap later if needed.

After only two weeks of this, you will have devoted TEN hours to completing your first BIG project. It’s incredible how much you can get done in ten hours! This, after wasting (insert number) of months/years, spinning your wheels.

And guess what else? You STILL get the hundred little things done during the day, in LESS time. That’s right. You’re not only getting the BIG stuff done now (finally), but you’re also training your brain to be more efficient.

For many agents, this is the #1 most important change they can make to their business.

What if you fall off the wagon?

Don’t worry about it! Just get back on. The longer you can do this (every day) without interruption, the more it will become an ingrained habit, and you’ll become a high achiever, just like that.

Yes, it really is that simple.

I strongly suggest you start this new habit TOMORROW. Otherwise, you might look back at this article six months from now and realize you’ve completely wasted six months of your life. Perhaps you’re thinking that right now.

Write this in your calendar NOW, and good luck!

To help you stick to your decision, send me a message NOW and let me know, “I’m doing it!”

I’ll be cheering for you!

When I was an active Real Estate agent, I always had an office in the brokerage.

I found it too distracting to work from home. Now, of course, I have no choice!

Working in an office can be distracting, too, what with other agents stopping by to chat.

But I considered these interactions one of the many benefits of working at the brokerage. It kept me in the loop, and I learned and became a better agent by listening to others.

Besides, when I needed to Get Stuff Done, I simply closed my office door, and everyone knew not to bug me.

I would often get asked, “What do you do in there all day, Ted? Prospecting?”

Ugh. Not a chance.

I made a cold call once, hung up the phone, and swore I’d never do it again.

“So, what do you do all day?”

“Um… I dunno. Mostly just take care of my clients?”

They would look at me in silence like they didn’t believe me.

Remember, I earned $590,000 in my second year.  And, not long after that, I was making over $800,000 a year.

“No, really. What do you do? What’s your secret?”

I’d look back at them in silence. I didn’t understand the question. ‍

They’d walk away, shaking their heads. Some of them got mad like I was selfishly hoarding the “secret.”

But honestly, I WAS mostly just taking care of my clients.

Some of you are still suspicious because I said, “mostly.” So, what else, Ted?

OK. I was also figuring out better systems and procedures. To take better care of my clients.

Hey, if you don’t believe me, maybe you’ll listen to this guy:

“Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” — Albert Einstein

That’s my “secret.”

The details of exactly HOW I did it and HOW it resulted in a business that attracted clients, rather than having to chase them continually, cannot be described in a short article like this.

That’s why I developed the Agent Skills Master’s Program.

Are you stuck at home?

Feeling cooped up?

Me, too. I’ve NEVER worked from home, so this is bizarro strange world to me.

There’s one member of our household who is thrilled about it; my dog, Bentley!

He’s getting multiple walks daily, and he’s never left alone. He’s got a permanent smile on.

Lucky for him, he’s oblivious to the challenge we humans are facing right now.

But, I’ve noticed something different about me, too, when I’m walking Bentley.

I appreciate it more! I’m not in a hurry to “get it over with,” like I used to be.

The sun’s beating down on my face. I’m breathing in the fresh air. And you know what? I’m suddenly enormously grateful that I’m able to enjoy the simple things in life.

I think others are feeling it too. I live in a friendly neighborhood, but it’s somehow even friendlier, now.

When a neighbor walks by—even on the other side of the street because we’re all doing social distancing—we’re waving and saying hello to each other.

It’s like, “Hello, fellow human!”

We’re all in this together, after all.

You know, I don’t have all the answers about what life is going to look like when we come out the other end of this thing.

But I’ve decided I’m going to look at this “forced” time spent at home as a blessing, and I’m going to make the best of it.

I’m going to read, I’m going to learn, I’m going to work hard and accomplish whatever I can, and perhaps most importantly, I’m going to remember to take some time to appreciate the little things.

What about you?

It’s tempting to sit around watching Netflix or staring at Facebook for hours, or just plain hibernating. It’s tough to be disciplined at a time like this.

Perhaps now, more than ever, it’s wise to remember this sage advice from Jim Rohn:

“We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.”

Please send me a quick email and let me know how you’re spending your time at home. I’d love to hear from you. Here’s my email ted@agentskills.com.

If you’re feeling stressed or unsure what to do, or if you need someone to talk to, please give me a call any time at 403-973-9730.

Hang in there. We’ll get through this together.