6 Strategies for Starting the New Year STRONG!

As the clock winds down on 2020, it’s time to review our performance for the year, and get our heads into 2021.None of us will soon forget the COVID-ravaged year of 2020. The pandemic disrupted our lives, personally and professionally. But, for many real estate agents, 2020 was a case study in resilience, and sticking to their plans. And, of course, it helped that we experienced historic low interest rates for most of the year.Now, we’re ready to turn the page on 2020. Most of us enjoy a psychic “fresh start.” If your 2020 wasn’t what you had hoped for, this is the time to recalibrate, to assess your business strategies for success in the coming year. We all know, there is no magic formula for success in real estate. Your New Year’s resolution might be to double your transactions in 2021, which is an awesome goal. But you can’t wish yourself to twice the number of transactions. As we frequently stress in this blog, real estate success is truly driven by sticking to fundamentals, year in and year out.Perhaps now, in the quiet of the holiday season, is the ideal time to make a commitment to yourself, in writing, to refocus your energy on making 2021 your best year ever. Here are six fundamentals that might help get you off to a good start:

• Daily prospecting: If you’re not among the 2% of agents who prospect on a regular basis, now is the time to commit to a daily schedule of prospecting. The transactions are out there. And with Espresso Agent, you get the best leads delivered to your desktop every morning. Plus, scripts and a state-of-the-art CRM. In other words, it’s all there for you. But you need to make the commitment to yourself to get on the phone each day, even if you only do an hour at the beginning.
• 8-hour day: When we work solo, especially in a home office in the time of COVID, it can be easy and convenient to whittle away at our production hours. Commit yourself to working a minimum of 8 hours per day, up to 10 if possible. Stick to a schedule, starting and ending the same time every day. Put in the hours, not only for prospecting, but follow up and administration. If you aren’t currently working an 8-10 hour day, maybe it’s time to recalibrate your schedule to ensure success.
• Lead follow up: How dogged are in following up on leads? One metric is the number of appointments you have set up for the new year. At minimum, you should have 6-8 appointments to start the year strong. Be aggressive when it comes to lead follow up. In fact, you should have at least a half-dozen or more appointments set up for the first weeks of 2021. Go into the new year STRONG!
• Pre-qualify: Be focused and committed when it comes to pre-qualification. You'll save a lot of time and energy by doing so. Check out our earlier post PRE-QUALIFICATION.
• Listing focus: No surprise here, but if your goal is to double your transactions in 2021, you need to focus on listing presentations. For most top-performing pros, listing presentations account for a minimum of 80% of their on-going activity. Whether in person or virtually, listing presentations are the most productive way to drive your revenue goals. And we all know that the positive energy of productivity begets even more productivity.
• Be responsive. Focus on your most important request first-and do your best to avoid those people and requests guaranteed to waste your time and drain your energy.

And even though you are probably well into goal-setting for 2021, we thought we’d close this post with a refresher that the best goals are:

• Specific...and in writing
• Measurable so you can easily chart your success
• Realistic, relative to your skill sets and personality type.
• Time sensitive-your goals should be tied to an attainable date, as opposed to being open-ended.

We hope you start 2021 strong, and finish even stronger.