{"id":43,"date":"2020-03-18T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-03-18T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/?p=43"},"modified":"2020-03-18T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-03-18T06:00:00","slug":"lessons-from-the-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/?p=43","title":{"rendered":"Lessons From The Past"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lessons Learned<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most of us had some previous career before we became REALTORS\u00ae. How about you?<\/p>\n

What lessons have you learned from your previous life that you can apply to your Real Estate career?<\/p>\n

When I was 26, I started a wholesale motorcycle parts distribution company called Power Twins Performance Parts. \ufe0f<\/p>\n

In my first location, I shared a tiny office with another small business owner and stored my inventory on a 400 sq ft mezzanine.\u00a0 I remember climbing up and down a ladder every time I needed to pack an order.<\/p>\n

Early on, I had to sell my treasured vintage 1973 Yoshimura Kawasaki Z-1 to buy groceries.<\/p>\n

Also diapers for the new baby boy. Thanks a lot, Kevin! <\/p>\n

I still miss that bike.<\/p>\n

It was mostly youthful self-confidence and a strong work ethic that kept me going through those early years.<\/p>\n

Long before my phone was ringing with orders, I was doing the dialing, talking to motorcycle dealers across the country. \u260e\ufe0f<\/p>\n

I just straight-up asked them what it would take to get their business. The response was remarkably consistent and straightforward.<\/p>\n

“Have the parts in stock and deliver them quickly.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Okay, then!<\/p>\n

Based on this, I focused on two things:<\/p>\n

First, I vowed to have the best fill-rate in the industry.<\/p>\n

That wasn’t easy since I had extremely limited cash-flow. But I was determined.<\/p>\n

I watched the inventory like a hawk and placed smaller but much more frequent orders with my suppliers. It was more work and more costly, but I offset that by quickly improving my fill-rate to over 95%, a number that was unheard of in the industry.<\/p>\n

My customers started to take notice.<\/p>\n

Next, I established contract rates with the major national couriers allowing me to deliver over 90% of my shipments by overnight courier for FREE. This was years before Amazon. Free overnight shipping was unheard of in any<\/em> industry.<\/p>\n

Suddenly, my little company was a trend-setter. My customers were amazed at the new standard for fast and reliable delivery.<\/p>\n

My much larger competitors started to notice also, but they must have figured it was only a matter of time before I bankrupted myself.<\/p>\n

How could I afford to offer free overnight shipping?\u00a0 It wasn’t easy at first, but I also offset a portion of the cost with slightly higher prices.<\/p>\n

My customers were happy to pay a little bit more for fast and reliable service. After all, that’s what they said they wanted, and I was delivering!<\/p>\n

My sales increased at a rapid pace over the next few years, and I was able to negotiate better and better rates with the national couriers, so my margins steadily improved.<\/p>\n

By the time my competitors reacted, it was too late for them. I was no longer the “little guy.” Now, they were the ones going bankrupt, as I became more and more successful and took over their product lines.<\/p>\n

Out-Think, Out-Service, Out-Sell<\/strong><\/p>\n

Having the best fill-rate, and providing the fastest delivery were two of the most notable examples of how I out-serviced and out-sold my competitors, but there were many other programs I contrived and implemented over the years.\u00a0 I was always five steps ahead of my competitors.<\/p>\n

By focusing on delivering a superior experience to my customers, I never had to worry about the bottom line.\u00a0 In fact, I grew my sales at an average rate of 55% every year for 14 years.\u00a0 From a tiny start-up, my business eventually became a national leader in the industry.<\/p>\n

So, what does all this have to do with Real Estate?\u00a0 Everything!<\/p>\n

In business (and life), it’s all about your attitude.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

When I began my Real Estate career, I wanted to know what really<\/em> worked in Real Estate, and what didn’t.<\/p>\n

I ignored all the “fluff” that sounded good but didn’t work.<\/p>\n

I figured out what worked, and I stuck to my guns.\u00a0 Luckily, my approach to Real Estate proved to be the best for my clients and for me.\u00a0 It turned out to be an incredibly rewarding career.<\/p>\n

Keeping it Simple<\/strong><\/p>\n

My success in the motorcycle parts business was simple. I asked my customers what they wanted, and I figured out how to deliver it.<\/p>\n

In Real Estate, it’s the same thing. Just give people what they want!<\/p>\n

\u00a0“Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” <\/strong>\u2014<\/strong> Albert Einstein<\/strong><\/p>\n

My third venture (Agent Skills) is where I get to give back. It’s where I get to show you HOW to become a person of value. When you achieve that, success naturally follows.<\/p>\n

It really is that simple.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My lessons learned in motorcycle parts business was simple. I asked my customers what they wanted, and I figured out how to deliver it to them. In Real Estate, I did the same thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-6-relationship-selling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/44"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agentskills2.dvsrvr.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}