Newer agents: Are you ‘stumbling’ or ‘up and running’? (post 2 on this subject). It’s estimated that over 50% of new agents fail their first year in the business. From talking with thousands of them throughout my coaching, managing and speaking career, I know why: They can’t answer the questions below. In addition, they may be getting little guidance from their manager. Not having the combination of these two things almost assures their failure.
I’ve compiled 10 questions you should ask yourself. In the last post, I gave you the first five. In this post , I’ll give you the rest of the questions.
Ask yourself:
1. Do I know how long it will take to get a sale? To get a listing? To get a listing sold? (so you can project your income) (New agents tend to wait, and wait, and wait, to get into the business ‘stream’, thinking that there is no time frame to buyers’ decisions—wrong!)
Key point: Use the time lines in Up and Running to project your income. You don’t want to run out of money before you run out of time!
2. Do I have a method of setting goals and tracking accomplishments in the areas above—so I can analyze my specific strengths and challenges in this business? (Most agents never track what they do, so they don’t know what worked—or why what they’re doing isn’t working).
Key point: If you know how many listing appointments it takes, for example, for you to list one marketable property, you can project with confidence your income. You have truly become independent.
3. Do I have a budget so I know how much money I should be spending in marketing myself/marketing my listings?
Key point: Creating a marketing budget from day one assures you get paid for all that work you’re doing in lead generation (Up and Running has a prototype marketing plan for you, too).
4. Do I have someone to talk to regularly, to coach me, to keep me on track, and to help me if I fall off my start-up plan (to keep me from failing)?
Key point: Most new agents drastically over-estimate their mental toughness in the face of adversity. Studies show that having a mentor, a coach, someone on your side, greatly increases the chances of your success.
5. Do I have a method to keep myself motivated and inspired to keep on keeping on (like a coach or your manager)?
Key point: All the successful people I’ve ever met have a method to ‘keep themselves up’—diaries, logs, inspirational notebooks, readings, CDs, etc. That’s why I put so much inspiration and motivation in Up and Running—we all need it!
Give yourself every chance to succeed to answering ‘yes’ to all of these ten questions. You deserve success! Quit stumbling and get Up and Running!
