While looking forward to 2014, don’t forget 2013’s lessons

It become a bit of a tradition of mine to write a farewell blog on New Years Eve over the last few years. Sometimes it’s inspiring, sometimes it’s uplifting, and sometimes I’m just so happy to see the year leaving I can’t stand it. This year will be no different. I’m not quite sure why, but this is something that seems to strike my friends as odd. That I would share things randomly with the web. With essentially, strangers.

You see, it’s not that I think I have all of the answers. Because I don’t. Part of it is that being in the industry I am in (real estate) and being a coach on top of that, I see people who tend to focus so much on next years business this time of year. They focus on it so much that they forget about the last year and everything that came with it. Now, don’t get me wrong. You better have your business plan in place, and know your goals (I’m speaking to you with that one coaching clients)! But when did this become the only thing that we started focusing on for the new year? It’s incredibly frustrating. I guess that’s why I feel the need to share my year with you, and a few lessons learned along the way.

Some years ago I realized that new years resolutions were stupid. Thats right, stupid. They are stupid because we make them that way. We actually make them these worthless things. We say “I’m going to lose 5 pounds” or “I’m going to eat healthier”, blah blah blah. We make these “goals” for no other reason than we feel we need to at that very moment. We don’t base them off of anything. We just do as we think we are supposed to. So I decided that instead of setting some stupid goal like joining a gym, I would work on what I screwed up in the past year. There is usually quite a few for me to choose from. Think about it. What did you do in 2013 that if done differently in 2014 would greatly improve who you are. For some of you that may be joining a gym, but you’ve got to see the benefit for you and your loved ones to really stick with it. Not just say  “I’m going to join a gym for a month… weeeeeeee”. That crap doesn’t change anything.

You may be wondering what my resolution is. And you can keep wondering 🙂

Thats all I have to say about it, but here are a few highlights for my year in case you were wondering. I jumped out of a plane (again) and lived (whew), bought my condo, went on my first real vacation in years, switched to a MAC and loved it, spilled Kool-Aid on said Mac and had to buy another one. I held my new niece and nephew for the first time, I spoke on stage in front of the largest group in my career (thanks KWMC), I learned to cook (still a work in progress), had my first great birthday/christmas combo in a long time, I completed my second Tough Mudder, took over 60 airplane flights, helped several clients meet their goals and spend more time with their families, spent more money keeping my dog healthy than myself, realized that in your 30’s there is such a thing as a two day hangover, and I broke up with Jameson. Yes, those last two events are related.

As you ring in the new year tonight, please remember to be safe and get a DD. Cheers!

Adjusting to the NEW Craigslists

As many of you may have noticed, Craigslist has been making some BIG changes over the last few weeks. First it was that a zip code was required. Inconvenient, yet not earth shattering. Then, it was HTML photos not allowed. Followed by anchor text. None of this was a big deal, and was easily remedied. Now however, we are taking a big hit on ads not allowing any type of link in them. Even the long and dirty ones.

Craiglsist ads change. Real estate must change with it

This ad in todays CL world no longer will exist. The photo will disappear, the anchor text (hyperlinked) words will not be linked, and the long URL will not be clickable.

So the big question is, what do we do?

FIRST. STOP FREAKING OUT. Myself, as well as many of the other tech folks out there have been overloaded by emails, texts, FB messages and more with people all worked up over a simple thing. We understand that Craigslist has been a big part of your business. We also have been teaching for years to focus on other pillars of business in case CL ever did something like this. That day is here, I hope you’ve prepared.

SECOND. FIND A WORK AROUND. Now, there have been some work arounds suggested. Myself as well as some others are working on the problem as well. I can tell you, that we will not find a solution that will result in as much traffic as before! EXPECT your CL traffic to drop, significantly. We’re currently testing some solutions to see what type of traffic results they get.

THIRD. HANG TIGHT. If you find yourself breathing into a paper bag to stop the hyperventilating, just calm down and hang tight for a little bit. Craigslist has continued to make these changes over the last two weeks. We need to wait for the storm to pass to make sure we aren’t coming up with a solution that will be outdated in 4 days.

FOUR. PICK UP THE PHONE AND PROSPECT. Take this as a great time to pick up the phone and call all of the other leads that you have, and your sphere of influence.

Long story short, don’t let this stop business for you. Focus on your other pillars of lead generation and when the dust settles in a week or so we will give you the best solution we’ve found along with some solid results analysis from it. Til then, I love you all. BUT PLEASE STOP PANICKING AND FILLING UP MY INBOX 🙂

Teach Your Staff to Leave You

     Every time I hear Gary Keller talk he talks about talent. EVERY TIME. And it never fails, someone in the room raises their hand and says something like “I’m having trouble with my buyers agent.” or assistant, or whatever. Who the person is doesn’t matter. What matters is that people are always the problem! Yes. People. People are our problem!

Why are people our problem? It’s usually a combination of things in the beginning. Rookie mistakes that we make hiring. First, we may have hired the wrong person. Well if we hired the wrong person we simply need to “de-hire” said person and hire the right one. Initial problem solved.

Now we’ve done it! We’ve got the right person! Happy day! We’ve got our amazing buyers agent, assistant, marketer, etc. We couldn’t be happier. Business is running smooth and we starting thinking that people are the solution and not the problem. Yes, if people are the problem then people are also the solution. Enter problem number two: We notice that performance begins to slip, our people seem unhappy or discontent with their job with which they once thrived? Well, it goes back to people being the problem. EXCEPT this time the person that is the problem is generally US, not THEM.

Yes. We are now the problem. What happens is when we hire capacity talent (people who can grow in their role and ultimately into a new one) instead of cul-de-sac talent (people who lack growth capability) they want to be developed. Capacity talent wants to thrive at their job. They want to be the best they can be. They want to learn more. They want the opportunity for advancement even if they choose not to take it. Capacity talent will rarely rest until they are the absolute best at their job (and possibly even better than you at yours). And this is where we lose them. Because our leadership skills are lacking. We fear that if we develop our staff to be “too talented” that they will leave us! And then our perfect business where we were once so happy will be shattered. I can tell you this is not the case.

In my early leadership days I had the same fear. That if I taught my people enough to leave me that they would. Reality is that if I taught them how to thrive on their own and go it alone, they stayed! They stayed and were happy and more productive than ever! Enter: happy dance! This happens because you are satisfying their need to grow and develop. You are providing the leadership that they desire. And through this process they usually realize that going it alone would be harder and less rewarding for them. By less rewarding I don’t necessarily mean financially. We’ve all stayed at underpaying jobs because we’ve respected and liked the people we worked for. And if you’re anything like me I can say that you’ve probably given a boss or two the “one fingered peace sign” at a good paying job. Yes, I have actually done that. That woman was evil. But I digress…

Teach your people to leave you and they rarely will. Be the solution to their career desires and they are yours forever.

Is your middle name “Real Estate”?

Come on. Lets be honest here. You know that you secretly roll your eyes when you see someone changes their name to “Joe RealEstate Johnson” or “Suzy SellingHomes Smith” or “Liz Jacksonville Landry” on Facebook. We all hate it. If it isn’t on your passport, don’t put it on your Facebook profile. I am very vocal about things like this with my coaching and training around the country. So why do people still do it? Well, what I have found is that there are is a segment of trainers out there that are spreading this non-sense (not to mention violation of FB terms of service) through out the real estate world quicker than rumors in a middle school locker room. I partially blame them, and I partially blame us as an industry.

We as an industry are all about hopping on the latest and (often not) greatest way to get out name out there and tell everyone that we sell real estate. Making sure people we are friends with know that we are in real estate is a good thing.  Slapping it in their face as the first thing they see or hear from you is a bad thing. This is why people refer to us as sleazy used car salesman. Now; if you are wondering why this is so wrong and offensive I’ll lay it out for you.

1. It is a clear and direct violation of Facebooks Terms of Service.
2. Facebook is what is considered the “backyard bbq” of social networks. – you would NEVER walk up to someone in your business suit at a backyard bbq to shake their hand and immediately say “Hi, I’m Liz Selling Jacksonville Homes Landry. Great to meet you.” would you? NO. OF COURSE YOU WOULDN’T! Just think of the reaction on that poor persons face. They would run away from you.
3. Facebook is comprised primarily of people who already know you and like you. Hence the fact that they already know you are in real estate. You need not put it in your name.
4. There is a convenient little spot RIGHT UNDER YOUR NAME on your profile page that says where you work.
5. If you just hover over someones name in the news feed where they work shows up there too! So you don’t need it in your name. See proper example below.

Now here is the deal fellow real estate agents. I am kindly asking; begging in fact, for you to STOP pissing off you your friends and family! By doing this you look unprofessional, sleazy and frankly just desperate.

You are hurting your selves by doing this. More importantly if someone does get annoyed enough and Facebook decides to delete your profile you will lose not only all of the connections you’ve built, and all the pictures; you will also lose any and all fan pages that you are the only admin on. I often say there there are certain places to bend the rules, certain places to break them, and others we follow properly. This is one where you should follow the rules. The consequences are too great. So I ask you; is it really worth it?

*Names of all known violators have been left out in the hopes they will read this and correct the issue quickly*

Folding jeans… maybe some of us need a lesson.

It was 12 years ago for those of you wondering. No. This is not one of those blogs where I am going to talk about how much easier life was at 16. Or how I miss those days. Because it wasn’t and I don’t. I would rather poke my eye out with a fork than go back to high school. I am going to talk about the job I had when I was 16. That’s right. WORK.

I was a sophomore in high school. Played sports so I was busy, and I had a job at the local Levis store. I made crap money, I worked crap hours, and my boss hated me. None of these things were working in my favor. I mean seriously. I would be in school every day by 7am, ball practice in 100* weather until 5, work from 6-10:30. I worked every Friday night. Most Saturdays and Sundays. I would go into work after a day of ball practice and I had no car, so I had to get a ride from someone if my parents were not home that night. Then I would work for about an hour, the store would be slow so I would get sent home.

At first I was overjoyed to get sent home. “Awesome. Now I can go be a teenager. WORK SUCKS” – then I realized that as tough as it was for me to find a ride to work, it was even harder to find a ride home. I was broke because I only worked an hour. And to top it off I soon realized my boss sent me home not as a reward, but because I wasn’t good at my job and wasn’t worth it to keep around.  I know. Its hard to believe. But I like most 16 year olds thought I knew everything and that I could get away with avoiding work while at work. As a matter of fact, I know many adults that still do this today. So what was the outcome. I would exhaust more effort, had higher stress, made less money and was inconvenienced more by AVOIDING working while at work than if I actually just did my job well.

LIGHT BULB! 

It was a magical day the day I decided to actually do my job at work. Time flew by! I felt accomplished. My boss was impressed. The following chain of events was great. I got better at my job so it got easier. I got more hours because I was good at it (which meant more $ to me!). I got a raise! I got a promotion several months later. I ended up being promoted to a supervisor by the time I reached 17. At 18 I was making better money than any other high school kid I knew, and many adults. I had an understanding of business, profit and loss statements, working with and leading people, etc. Not to mention, I can fold a mean pair of jeans.

Why did this happen? BECAUSE I ACTUALLY DID MY JOB! I spent so much time and energy avoiding my job the first 2 months I had it that I am almost ashamed to admit it. Obviously I  changed that.

My simple point is this. And I am going to capitalize it because I want this message to be clear to everyone. STOP AVOIDING THE PARTS OF YOUR JOB THAT MAKE YOU SUCCESSFUL AND GET YOUR BUTT TO WORK! For some of you that means paperwork, for some it means lead generating, for some it means just working at all at anything.

My promise to you is this. If you actually work. If you actually do what you are supposed to. Your stress levels will go down, your income will go up, and the ease of your job will increase. Give it a try, the avoidance isn’t worth it.

If you think you’re job is tough. If you think its thankless. Do me a favor. It is the holiday season. Go to your local retail shop and get a part time job through the new year. There is no hell quite as special as working retail in the holidays.

 

LL

1 Hour Business Consultation with Ben Kinney – Yes, you could win it!

 Lets get straight to the point! You’ve got a chance to win a FREE 1 hour coaching session with Ben Kinney!

How you ask? Simple! Anyone who signs up for MAPS Mastery Technology Coaching during #KWMC is entered to win. ONE, yes ONE lucky person will get a one hour business session with Ben!

For the rest of you we’ve got something for you too! Any agent that signs up for a MAPS Tech Group Coaching session during #KWMC will be entered to win one of three 1 hour coaching sessions with one of our other tech coaches! They would be me, @ChadHyams and @ChrisMcnamara!

Registrations for group can be online OR at the MAPS Booth! MASTERY Registrations must be done in person at the MAPS booth. All registrations must be in by Friday to be eligible. Don’t wait, space is fillng up quick!

If you reallllllllllly want to do MASTERY Tech Coaching to enter for Bens time please Facebook MSG me and we can make arrangements.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Follow the Tweeters #KWMC

As many of us are just 5 days away from touching down in Austin, TX for KW Mega Camp the twitter streams and status updates will be overflowing with #KWMC information!

To make life a little bit easier on you I’ve compiled a list of some of the most active tweeters that will be updating live from the event. Feel free to follow each of these tweeps or the public twitter list I’ve put them on!

If you are planning on following all the news during Mega Camp you should also be sure not only to follow these folks, but to follow the #KWMC hashtag. It is the official tag of the event. Don’t know how to follow a hashtag? No worries, I’ve got this handy dandy video right here to show you. 🙂

5 Reasons to KEEP Your LinkedIn Profile

It has been brought to my recent attention that there is a (surprisingly) large group of people who are thinking about deleting their LinkedIn profiles. I had no idea about this epidemic. I was completely caught by surprise and I felt as if I needed to throw my friends a life vest before they drown in the waters of their own decisions. Luckily… this is not life or death. I will advise you though to KEEP your LinkedIn profile. And if you don’t have one, set one up.

1. LinkedIn has GREAT search engine optimization results and will show up if a potential client searches for you.

2. The boardroom of social media. This site is not for socializing. It is for networking and professionalism.

3.  They had an $8Billion IPO in May and shares are selling for over $100 each. Clearly, the business community see’s value here.

4. They just introduced the “APPLY” button for job seekers.

5. You may want to expand your business and search others profiles (aka – their online resume) for recruiting. Vise versa – you may need a job if you don’t do your prospecting.

So what I am saying here is that although LinkedIn is not the worlds most bustling social network they do indeed have their place. And they are important to have up, running and UPDATED.

LL

Because size does matter…

Stop your dirty thinking! I am referring to the size of your database! I know I tend to stick to the cool new things in my blogs and speaking like social media and internet; however today we are going to kick it old school. Sort of.

Do me a favor and think about your database. How many contacts do you have in it? Now ask yourself this. How many of them are likely to do business with you? Above I said we are going to kick it old school. Well the reason it is followed by a “sort of” is because in recent years our database’s tend to become more like phone books than ever before. The main problem for this is the internet. Yes, I just said the internet is causing problems. However it is not the Internets fault. It is ours. Because we are improperly managing it.

Lets look at what is happening. Our databases are supposed to be people who are likely to do business with us based on past and current relationships. With internet lead generation we tend to get a lot of looky loo’s and tire kickers who register either with limited information, or fake all together. Yes, fake. Mickey Mouse is not really interested in buying that lake front home. I promise. So what do we do? We filter, label and top grade our leads. Having a database of 8,000 people does you no good if you’ve never connected with them. Ever. We have the false belief that our large database of 8,000 people will produce us business simply because of its size. This is not accurate.  My recommendation is to use labels to differentiate who really is in your “database” and simply who’s data you are storing and mass emailing. Don’t get me wrong. I am NOT saying to delete all of those 5,000 emails you have. Yes, some of them may need to go. However its probably not costing you anything to do business with them and there are ways to pull them back in to convert them (but that is a different topic). I want you to clean up your database for tracking and conversion purposes. The size of your database (your TRUE database) will directly influence the size of your business. Manage your database well and you’ll thrive in business. Oh yeah, be sure to add your true SOI on your social platforms. It makes relationship building as easy as pie… or cake depending on your sweet tooth 🙂

LL

Waking Up In Vegas… with MAPS Technology!!

For those of you who missed our late night announcement from MAPS Agent Masterminds in Las Vegas Monday here is a recap for you!

We have exciting news! After months of preparation MAPS announces the launch of a large Technology Division! As many of you know this has been an area that has been much-needed in our industry and we plan on making waves… quickly! Program is being led and developed by none other than the amazing Ben Kinney. With your newest MAPS coaches in place powering this epic undertaking being myself, Chad Hyams, Chris McNamara and existing MAPS Coach Beth Torrence.

The quick program overview will consist of the following.

• BOLDTech – This is will be a one day traveling program designed to help you grow your real estate business with what? Technology of course!
• Mastery Coaching – For those of you who are serious about holding yourselves accountable to your business with a high tech focus.
• A la carte Consulting– For existing MAPS clients that need just a sporadic consultation on big tech decisions.
• In House Consultation – For offices and teams that are looking for a full business analysis and adding a large portion of business based around technology and internet lead generation.

We are all very excited to bring this to you… as well as I know Dianna is. Until all information is updated and released on the MAPS website you can contact myself of Chad for more info on programs! We are all very excited!