Mindset

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⚖️ Five Ways to Improve Your Life and Work Balance During the Holidays

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‘Tis the season to be jolly, but for real estate professionals, the holiday season often brings a flurry of activity that can make achieving work-life balance seem like a distant dream. Fear not, though, as we’ve curated a list of five ways for you to navigate this festive season without sacrificing your well-deserved downtime.

📆 Prioritize and Plan Ahead
The holiday season can be unpredictable as there are events popping up from all corners of your life, but with careful planning, you can stay one step ahead. By taking the time to create a detailed schedule of the season you can better prepare for your events and reduce scrambling for last-minute gifts and pot-luck contributions. Make sure you add personal and downtime during this season, if you push too hard it could lead to exhaustion or illness!
Take stock of your projects and tasks due during this time and make sure that you have prioritized them properly to ensure that you aren’t waiting until the last minute as staying on schedule will reduce your stress.

⚠️ Set Boundaries and Communicate
Communicating effectively is going to be on any list of helpful tips we send to you, but this is especially important for setting clear boundaries with clients and team members about your availability during the holidays. Make it known when you’ll be taking time off and establish expectations for response times. This proactive communication not only manages expectations but also fosters understanding, which promotes a healthier work environment, encouraging others to do the same.

💻 Leverage Technology to Streamline Processes
Make the most of technology to streamline your processes and save time during the holidays. Shore up your Follow Up Boss Systems (have you taken our FREE Building FUB Course yet?), automate email responses and as many routine tasks as you can. By embracing technology, you can maintain a strong online presence and keep your business running smoothly, allowing more time for holiday festivities and rest after a long year.

🤝 Delegate and Collaborate
You don’t have to do it all alone and attempting to do so is a sure-fire way to lead to burnout. Delegate tasks where you can or hire additional support during peak periods during busy seasons or times when you’re taking time off. By collaborating with others to share the workload you can divide and conquer to ensure everyone gets some well-deserved time off. A collaborative approach not only lightens the load but also creates a supportive network within your organization.

💆‍♀️ Practice Self-Care and Enjoy the Festivities
Yes, this is the season of giving to others, but by prioritizing your well-being during the holidays you will not only feel better, but you will have the foundation to show up in better ways for those you love…and your clients too! Schedule regular breaks throughout the week to recharge, whether it’s a short walk, meditation, or a festive coffee break. Take advantage of downtime to immerse yourself in the holiday spirit by attending local events, spending quality time with loved ones, and embracing the joy of the season as time away from your business, even in short bursts, allows you to come back with fresh ideas and the energy to tackle the next big thing.

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🚢 Navigating Industry Changes and Challenges

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Whether it’s a DOJ ruling, industry changes, market shifts, companies getting acquired, or some other news that seemingly has an uncertain outcome, the real estate industry is always changing and presenting us with new challenges. It reminds me of the saying, “A smooth sea never made a skillful sailor,” and underlines the fact that those who choose to navigate changes and challenges to make the best of it will strengthen their business and be able to stay out at sea to face future storms.  

Whatever the wild world of real estate throws our way, we are committed to
supporting and helping you to build the business of your dreams.

Here are some strategies to face news head-on with your clients and agents so that you remain the steady beacon of leadership through whatever the industry throws your way.

📱 Prompt and Transparent Communication

  • Act swiftly to communicate the situation to your team and clients. A delay in communication can lead to speculation and increased anxiety so it’s always best to face it head-on while acknowledging that you may not have all the information just yet.
  • Be transparent and honest about what is happening by sharing all available facts, even if you perceive them to be unfavorable. Never downplay or sugar-coat the issue at hand.

🫡 Take Responsibility Where Necessary

  • Own up to any mistakes or challenges immediately as this demonstrates both maturity and integrity.
  • Clearly outline the company’s commitment to addressing the issue and preventing similar challenges in the future, if applicable.

🥰 Show Empathy

  • Understand and acknowledge the concerns and frustrations of your clients.
  • Express empathy for any negative impacts that the situation may have caused them.

📝 Provide Solutions and Action Plans

  • Present concrete steps that the company is taking to resolve the issue and prevent its recurrence and explain how these actions will benefit team members and clients.
  • Offer a timeline for when clients can expect to see improvements or resolution

📈 Regular Updates

  • Keep your agents and clients informed about progress and developments through regular updates. One announcement is never enough and you need to keep the conversation going as long as it takes.
  • Even if there isn’t any significant news to report, a simple message acknowledging the ongoing commitment to resolution can be reassuring

👩‍🏫 Learn from the Experience

  • Conduct a thorough post-incident analysis to understand what went wrong, and how you can prevent it from happening in the future or how you can strengthen your business from similar things happening moving forward if the challenge was completely out of your control.
  • Share the lessons learned with your clients to demonstrate a commitment to improvement and transparency.
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Five Ways to Support Your Team in Q4 

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Last week we discussed ways to set your team up for success in Q4. If you missed it, you can read it here. This week we want to talk about supporting your team as this is not only a great way to love your people, but it’s a great retention effort as well. Here are some ways to support them during this time, while employing the tools we shared last week to structure their business (and yours!) for success in the new year.

🗣️ Clear Communication. With so much going on this time of year having clear communication is extra important. Avoid last-minute changes and allow additional planning time for any events. Ensure that your team knows the goals, objectives and priorities and regularly share and re-share the updates and expectations so that they have a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities. Provide a platform for them to ask questions and seek clarification to stay ahead of any bumps in the road.

📆 Flexible Scheduling. Life-work balance is incredibly hard to find this time of year with so many having both personal and professional obligations and fun events. Allowing flexibility in work hours or remote work options will better assist team members in finding a way to make things work and reduce stress.

🧰 Resource Allocation. Assess your current workload and allocate your resources so that your team has the necessary tools, equipment, and personnel to meet the demands of the season. If necessary, consider temporary staff or outsourcing to ease the workload.

🧘‍♂️ Team Well-being. Our people are being pulled in a variety of ways both personally and professionally to celebrate holidays, travel, and attend school functions, and that can lead to a lot of additional stress. Simultaneously, more than you might think may be suffering from some form of seasonal affective challenge, whether it be the actual weather that bums them out or a personal history that makes the holidays hard, this time of year doesn’t leave everyone on your team feeling their best, whether they show it or not. Being aware of this will go a long way, but encouraging breaks, reminding them to recharge and take time for themselves, or offering a wellness program for stress management or mental health support will aid them in coping with the increased demands.

🏆 Recognition and Awards. Have you ever been Jelly-of-the-Month-Clubbed? I have, and failing to be properly recognized for your hard work and dedication sure makes it easy to hand in your notice the Monday after the Holiday party. It’s not about the amount, it’s not about the shape or size of the award…it’s about how you make that person FEEL. Avoid giving out participation awards or awards to your entire organization, if everyone receives one it becomes diluted. Find other meaningful ways to show your appreciation for those who do not receive an award. Make efforts to show your appreciation to your team year-round, as the excitement of the annual awards ceremony doesn’t last long. If you didn’t do a great job of this last year, make a plan to recognize and appreciate your team throughout the year in 2024 to keep morale high. You can even make a smart list in Follow Up Boss to reach out to everyone on your team in a personal way so that no one falls through the cracks! (Reply to this post and I’ll show you how!)

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Five Ways to Master Q4 Prep for the New Year 🎆

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Fourth quarter of the year is here, and with it comes so many things to wrap up and plan for while simultaneously experiencing a landslide of holidays and events until the end of the year. Use our guide below to help you approach this quarter with a solid plan and a sense of calm to prep yourself and your team to turn 2024 into your best year yet!

📈 Take an honest look at your 2023 goals. Did you adjust them properly to the current market conditions, or were you overly optimistic that things would go back to the way they were? Make any adjustments needed in your 2024 goal setting based on your predictions vs performance of the year so far.

👩‍🏫 Re-Train your team on the basics. If you’re a professional, you don’t start practicing free throws when the season starts, you master that in the off-season. Revisit and re-train your team on the basics so they are educated, confident, and ready to hit the ground running in the new year. Better yet, don’t stop training on the basics throughout the year and see how much better your team performs!

📊 Work with your team on THEIR goals. I hate to break it to you, but no one cares about your company goal. “But if YOU sell more houses to get us to that goal, you’ll make more money too!” Nope…still don’t care. Of COURSE, have a company goal. That’s necessary to any business plan! But what your team cares about is their bank account, their family and loved ones being taken care of, the food on their table, and if they can afford to go on that family vacation or not. Make your goal-setting conversations about building their book of business and accomplishing their personal goals. Keep the focus on them throughout the year and you will find that investment in them personally will pay off for you professionally. 

🔎 Inspect your marketing. What marketing efforts or campaigns generated the most business for you last year? Look at reporting on what your results were so that you can lean into the messaging that resonated with your audience and do less of the things that didn’t. Keep varying your message, but double down on the types of things that were a hit.

📱 Dig into your outbound communications. Your 2023 goal has already been pre-determined by the efforts you put in earlier in the year. Sure, you may get someone who registers in your database, answers their phone, and writes a contract that will close before December 31, but you can’t count on those bluebirds to get you to the finish line. The real estate cycle from new lead to closing is anywhere from 90 days to nearly a year, depending on your local market and efforts. I’m not saying to abandon your 2023 efforts, but if you dig into your database of leads now, you will not only make up some ground to hit your 2023 goal, but you will be laying a super strong foundation of business for the first half of 2024. Educate and remind your team of this sales cycle and help them see the vision of putting in the work now to reward their future selves. The work you do today will pay you in 90-120 days from now, dig in and reward your future self!

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✈️ Getting the Most Out of Attending a Real Estate Conference 

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Real estate conferences are always a good time and can be a transformative experience. You meet dynamic, like-minded people, get motivation and ideas from the industry’s best thinkers and speakers, and walk away with a real shot in your arm, ready to tackle your business in a whole new way. But…after a week or so, many of us tend to slip back into the behaviors and patterns we lived in before the conference, and other than riding that high for a short period, nothing changed at all. 

Here are some strategies to use to ensure that the next time you attend a conference (cough, like FUBCON, cough,) you know you’re going to maximize your time, money, and energy and implement lasting positive changes to your business when you get home.

🏅 Set Your Goals
Think about the conference before you go and define your objectives. What are your goals in attending? Expanding your network, learning more about a specific topic, finding a new partner for a business opportunity, recruiting others to join your cause, or finding potential clients are all things you can accomplish while you’re there. By defining these goals specifically, “I am going to learn how to connect everything in my business to my Follow Up Boss account,” or “I am going to find another team to partner with and grow my business,” you will know exactly what you want to do and be much more likely to accomplish them. 

🗓️ Plan Your Schedule
Look ahead at the agenda for the conference and make a plan as to what you want to attend and create a personalized schedule. Knowing where you want to be and when in advance will cut down on your game-time decision-making and reduce stress when you’re in an unfamiliar place and time zone. Be sure to also leave some wiggle room for breaks, meals, and spontaneous networking opportunities. You wouldn’t want to miss out on meeting someone fantastic if you are always rushing to the next event.

🤝 Be Prepared to Network
Can you describe who you are and what your business is within a few strong sentences? Prepare your elevator pitch in advance so that you can easily deliver it on the spot. Use any available event apps, Facebook Groups, or other social media to connect with people you want to meet before the conference begins. Having the initial formalities out of the way will make your in-person meetings more productive. Being approachable is also important, you never know who you will run into at the breakfast buffet or standing in line so keep your phone in your pocket and be open to chatting up strangers in any setting, opportunities abound if you are looking for them! 

👩‍🏫 Attend Diverse Sessions and All Exhibits
A real estate conference is not the time to stick to your comfort zone. Of course, hit up the sessions most important to you, but take the opportunity to attend sessions and meet exhibitors that you are less familiar with or think you may not be interested in. Your perception of those topics or vendors may change and you may find just the thing that your business is missing!

📝 Take Notes and Ask Questions
Be sure to take notes and truly engage (where appropriate!) with those presenting. If it’s not welcomed during their presentation, stick around afterward to ask clarifying questions. The presenters, I am sure, are eager to share more and get to know the pain points in your business so that they can help. Taking notes may not seem like the cool thing to do, but our brains can only retain so much information. Documenting your notes and takeaways will be a valuable resource that you can use long after the conference is over.

✅ Decide Which Items You’re Going to Implement
Using your notes, decide which items you want to implement and make a list of what you want to implement when you get back. We suggest keeping a list either in the very beginning or end of your notes and jumping there as soon as you have an a-ha moment. Keep this running list during the conference and then revisit it when you get back. Some things you may add out of excitement and decide not to pursue, but having an easy-to-find list will be helpful in your next step.

🏗️ Make a Plan to Implement
Using the list you created during the conference, order these items as to which are going to move the needle the most for your business and start with those items first. If you have a team, delegate what you can to others to champion so you’re not doing it all yourself, and assign some rough deadlines on when you want to have these items implemented. Then go back and fill in the individual steps to complete each item to make smaller deadlines, giving you a solid plan to implement the things that you learned.

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📰 Ways to Connect with Clients Amidst a Sea of Bad News

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The media isn’t doing real estate agents any favors these days, are they? Once a potential client has seen enough headlines, they firmly believe that the market is crashing and it’s tough to move someone out of that belief once they’ve made up their mind. Fear not, dear reader! This won’t be our reality forever, or theirs, and we have some effective strategies to help you navigate the current storm. Remember, a calm sea has never made a skillful sailor, so let’s adjust our sails to the conditions and get to work!

👂 Hear Them Out and Genuinely Listen to Their Point of View
When someone you are chatting with tells you completely wrong information, they are saying it because they believe it, and none of us ever want to hear that what we firmly believe to be true is wrong, or crazy, even. Fight the urge to correct them and ask questions as to how they know that to be true, where they heard it from, and genuinely listen to their point of view. Once you’ve heard them out, ask them if they would be willing to learn about your point of view as a licensed professional who works every day in the current market and has their boots on the ground.

📉 Fight Feelings with Facts
Most of our potential clients aren’t economic or real estate market experts. They likely don’t even read the entire articles that are attached to the sensational headlines they consume every day. Wild headlines sell views, attention, and clicks and that is what the media is going to continue to pump out. As a modern agent, you’re fighting for the same attention but instead of just stating, “The market is NOT crashing!” in a video or post, back that statement up with a chart or graph from a reputable source. This simple yet effective strategy will help set you apart from your peers and tee you up to be a local market expert that people want to learn from. Back up everything you can with documentation to bolster your reputation. 

👩‍⚕️Be the Actual Expert You Say You Are
Carve out time in your schedule each week, each day if you can, to study both the national and local markets. Thirty minutes a day would be ideal here. This will allow you to confidently share facts and their sources with anyone you are speaking to which will, in turn, boost their confidence in you as the market and real estate expert that you present yourself to be. 

👩‍🏫 Stay in Front of Your Audience With a Steady Stream of Up to Date Information
We are all marketers now and if your messaging has been solely your amazing transaction numbers and happy clients, you need to make the shift to education and expert knowledge. When people are fearful about the decisions they are making, someone who is steadily educating them about current market conditions, sharing historic data to put things into perspective, and advising them on what to expect next is going to have an advantage over someone who just celebrates their newest listing or latest closing. An educated client is a calm client who can confidently make decisions. Begin educating your entire community to nurture them into your very own calm clients!

📊 Share the Good, Bad, and the Ugly
Sometimes there isn’t good news to share, and that’s ok! Don’t hide from it, face it head-on and share what it means, put it into perspective over the long term, and educate your audience on when those conditions are predicted to lift. 

💪 Don’t Resist the Market, Lean Into it and Get to Work
This market is asking more of us and there isn’t anything we can do as individuals to change the market, so do not waste your precious energy resisting the current conditions. The market is always going to do this, that’s it’s nature, so let’s get to the acceptance phase and get to work. Make a plan for what you need to do and stick to your plan. Soon enough, the market will shift again and we will adjust again together!

You’re doing great, just keep going. Continuity is the secret to success.

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What Got You to This Point, Isn’t Going to Take You to the Next Level

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Adults, on average, gain one to two pounds per year as they age. This means if you’re a runner, or insert your particular flavor of exercise there, that in order to maintain your weight year over year, you will need to increase the time and intensity with which you run – and that’s to maintain the same weight as the year before. By the same principle, you would need to do significantly more yearly to lose weight.

The same effort-to-outcome equation applies to us in the current real estate market: The efforts and activities that found you success over the last few years are not going to yield you the same results if performed now.

But Kris, I can’t POSSIBLY work harder. I’m already pushing it to my limit!

If you are already truly giving your business 40 hours a week then you’re right, you don’t need to put in more hours, you need to take an honest inventory of the work that you’re doing to ensure that you aren’t unknowingly behaving as though you are still in the previous market conditions.

We are creatures of habit and the groove you got into and found success with a year or two ago is likely not yielding you the same results. So let’s pop the hood and look at how we are spending our time and make the changes necessary to get some real traction.

Self-Check: Are you putting in the work where it counts, or are you waiting for something to fall into your lap?

If real estate is your full-time career, are you truly putting in 40 hours a week?

  • If the answer to this is no, then get to bed earlier and add the hours you need to! If you’re treating this like a hobby, it will pay you like one.
  • If you are hitting the office full-time, are you working the entire time you’re there…or are you playing office? Perform the money-making activities and ditch the rest! If you were your own boss, would you be considering yourself for a promotion or would you need to be fired? Don’t be your own worst employee!

Is there an activity you’re still doing that isn’t gaining you results?

  • Just because you started doing something a few years ago doesn’t mean that you have to continue to do it forever. Perhaps it’s second nature now and you can kick the reminder or chart to save yourself some time. Perhaps it worked during a super hot market and it’s not being fruitful now.
  • It’s okay to stop doing things that don’t serve you anymore. The market is different, you are more experienced and have more information. Drop the things that aren’t gaining you more clients, exposure, and transactions, and replace them with more fruitful activities.

Do you have time set aside every day to prospect for new clients?

  • Put this on your calendar every. single. day. and honor the time. Schedule around it wherever possible. If you miss a day or two here or there, that’s fine – it happens! But don’t let it slip to a week or worse, a month. The work you do now will pay you 90-120 days from now so it can become easy to fall out of the habit of prospecting when you don’t see immediate results.
  • Every single top producer I know prospects every single day that they can. If they miss a day, they hop right back on the next and don’t let it get to day three.
  • If this is a challenge for you, figure out how to make it easier. Do you need it on your calendar with reminders set? Do you need an accountability buddy to hold you to it? Can you turn it into a game with rewards? Make the time for this and you’ll be thanking yourself in short order.

How are you staying in front of existing contacts and clients?

  • Kill the call to check in, call to show them your value, and give them something they can use or think about each and every time you reach out. If you’re struggling with what to say or share with them, that means you should increase the amount of research you’re doing about the market to give you material and ideas!
  • Stay in front of them so you are top-of-mind. This is crucial to connecting with more clients and increasing your number of transactions. If someone says they are a year out, that means you need to be reaching out for updates and sending them information at least once a week – in addition to their home search. Life situations change so quickly, the last thing you want to hear after a month of silence is that they got that promotion and went under contract with someone else because your follow-up wasn’t frequent enough.
  • Are your buyers still pre-approved? Interest rates are on the rise and that pre-approval your buyers received 90 days ago may not mean the same thing for them as it did when they first received it. Their price point or other search criteria may have changed. Discussing changing interest rates and encouraging getting RE-approved is a fantastic reason to reach out to buyer clients who are on the fence.

Are you the expert you say you are on your market and its current conditions?

  • Hustling alone will not set you apart from other agents within the market. You need to be informed so that you can be an information broker. There is a ton of misinformation and seemingly scary news floating out there, position yourself as a beacon of truth, accuracy, and helpful information to your community.
  • Read, subscribe to newsletters, watch videos, attend trainings that are offered to you, and listen to podcasts to the point where you can confidently educate someone on what it takes to get a home under contract and close it in your current market.
  • Be ready to answer the question: “How’s the real estate market?” at social gatherings with a really strong answer.
  • Know how to share this information about your market during a conversation without having to look it up:
    • Current inventory levels
    • Average days on market
    • Current interest rates and how it affects buying power
    • Highlight the most recent market reports
  • Make educating your community, customers, and clients a priority.

Review the above items and make whatever changes are necessary to streamline your work and gain better results from your efforts. This market is demanding more from us, but if you perform your work with more intention and focus, it doesn’t have to mean more hours.

You can do it, I know you can!

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The Art of Consistency

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Regardless of what industry you work in, you’ll find advice and articles that say, “The Number One Killer of a ______ Career is Inconsistency.” That, in my experience, is true for any career, relationship, hobby, exercise, or sport you are making a go of. This newsletter is about real estate, so I will keep it in that vein, however, increasing your consistency across all areas of your life will serve you well.

The most successful real estate agents have built their careers on years of effort and work. Putting in a few weeks or months of effort will not make you a wild success. Give yourself time to grow and accept this uncomfortable truth about success so that you don’t give up or become frustrated. Know that it is going to take you a while, figure out how to enjoy the process, and keep going.

Falling in love with the process will allow you to spend time thinking about and building processes around your work, learn from your mistakes and be consistent with your efforts. Growth comes from making small tweaks to improve what you’re already doing. You need a strong foundation to build upon and you cannot do that if you are scrapping everything and starting over brand new every time you run into challenges.

So if we want to build our consistency, where should we start that will have the most impact on our business? I would start with your prospecting and follow up. This is one of the most important aspects of building a business and something we can all improve upon, whether we are a newer agent or a seasoned one.

Prospecting and follow up is one of the first things to fall by the wayside when we get busy, and it should be the one thing we never stop doing.

Staying consistent with these means you have to push yourself. Humans, by nature, crave comfort, stability, and safety. By pushing yourself you naturally will become uncomfortable, making it that much more likely that you’ll stop, especially if you are unsure of the outcome: What happens on the other side of this uncomfortableness? What if I fail? What if I SUCCEED? If you aren’t pushing beyond what you typically do, you stay safe. You can control and anticipate the outcome because it’s what you’ve always done and, therefore, what you’ve always achieved.

But we aren’t here to do what we’ve always done and to get what we’ve always gotten. We are here because we want more for ourselves and our families and, to push yourself, means that you have to be willing to do the things you don’t want to do, to get uncomfortable to gain the rewards that no one else is willing to work for.

So how do we build increase the consistency of our prospecting and follow up??

Make time.

Schedule this on your calendar as a recurring event and honor that time. Yes, something will come up and you will inevitably need to move it sometimes, but if you nail it three to four days a week instead of one…or none! – you’ll be in significantly better shape than you were previously.

If you’re finding that your day gets away from you and you lack energy at the end of the day, schedule the time block for the morning. If your mornings are always a mess, schedule it for the afternoon. Choose the time that sets you up for success.

Make sure you’re speaking their language.

Do they prefer to email? Like to text instead of talk on the phone? Or do they want to have a call for every step of the process? Meet them where they are instead of how you like to communicate.

Provide value at every interaction.

No more “Just checking in!” Send them something that educates them, a tool they can use, or even just something to think about that will help them prepare for their move. Taking the time to offer them intentional, constructive information every single time you follow up will set you apart from your competition in the area and solidify your position as the local real estate expert. There’s a ton of information available, even if it’s just reading articles or watching videos about real estate and sharing with them what you’re learning.

Find a way to help them, even if it’s to pass them on to someone else.

Are they just looking for a rental? You’ve got someone. Do they need to repair their credit before they can do anything? You’ve got a great connection. Yes, you need to make this a quick transaction with someone who isn’t ready or willing to buy in the near future, but offering the tools and connections you have available will make them remember you and the conversations easier when you follow up down the road, vs if you had just blown them off.

Give your new and uncontacted leads a fair shot to connect.

So many times I see one to three attempts from someone to a new person in the database and the agent moves on…forever. These folks are at the beginning of their journey, this isn’t like buying a pair of sunglasses off an Instagram ad, they are going to need some time between when they first start learning and exploring and when they want to execute. Keep bringing them value, be patient, and meet them where they are.

Keep going. Know, without a shred of a doubt, that you are headed in the right direction and it’s going to work out.

You’re doing it. You’re already successful even if you haven’t hit it big yet. Keep going even when it’s hard, even if you’ve had a bad day or a bad week. Deep breaths and one foot in front of the other. You can do it, I know you can.

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