How To Reevaluate Your Business Goals (and Why Fall Is the Perfect Time To Do So)
Every real estate agent should have a set of defined business goals that they use to help themselves grow. If goal setting has never been your strong suit, read on below.
We’ll cover why setting goals is so important and how to go through the goal-setting process step-by-step. Armed with this knowledge, you should feel more than prepared to start setting some goals of your own.
Why fall is the perfect time to reevaluate your business goals
When you’re in business for yourself, it’s absolutely crucial to set goals for your business and to reevaluate them at least once a year. Put simply, setting specific goals will help you have a sense of direction and will make it easier to decide how to move your business forward.
In particular, as a real estate agent, fall is usually a great time to reflect on your goals because business tends to slow down around this time. Now that the craziness of the spring market has ended, you can take a moment to slow down and focus on other aspects of your business.
How to reevaluate your real estate business goals
Now that you’re clear on why it’s important to review your business goals regularly, the next step is to learn how to set them. Follow the steps below to start creating specific goals for your real estate business.
1. Take stock of where you are
The first step in reevaluating goals is to take stock of where you are. In real estate, this could mean going through your records to see how many listings and sales you’ve made this year and coming up with a current figure for your net profits.
Alternatively, if your goals aren’t financially-driven, think about which aspects of your business you may want to work on improving.
Taking the time to really evaluate where you are gives you a strong basis for forming your goals. It’s only after you have a firm idea of where you are with your business currently that you can picture how you want to grow in the future.
2. Think about where you want to go
With that in mind, the next step is to take some time to think about how you would like to grow your business. For this exercise, do your best to put obstacles aside and to simply visualize what your business would look like if everything went your way.
Ruminate on topics like:
- How many clients would you serve?
- How many transactions would you do per year?
- What would your net profits be?
- Would you build a team?
- What would your social media presence look like?
Remember, there are no wrong answers here. The best thing about being a real estate agent and running your own business is that you can shape it however you would like.
For the purposes of this brainstorming exercise, the sky is the limit!
3. Focus on creating SMART goals
Now, that you have a clearer idea of how you would like your business to look in the future, it’s time to start thinking about how to make those daydreams in to a reality. One way to help you move forward is to use SMART goals.
- Specific
- Measurable
- Actionable
- Realistic
- Time-bound
For example, instead of having a vague goal of: I want to make six figures, you might say: I want to make six figures by doing at least 34 $3,000 transactions in the next year.
4. Break your goals down into action steps
After you have your unique goals in hand, the next step is to break those goals down into action steps. As the name suggests, action steps are specific actions that you can take in order to help you get closer to achieving the goals that you’ve set for yourself. Again, you’ll want to follow the SMART formula when creating these.
You’re action steps might look like the following:
- I’m going to call two people in my network each week and ask them for a referral
- By January, I’m going to invest up to $2,000 into sessions with a business coach
- I’m going to send out a marketing postcard to one neighborhood in my farm area each quarter
- I’m going to send a pop-by to 20 people in my network each month
5. Add accountability to the mix
The last step to reevaluating your goals is to add some level of accountability to the mix. In goal setting, accountability is how you ensure that you don’t fall behind on completing your action steps.
You know yourself best, so you should have a good idea of how to hold yourself accountable. However, it could be something like meeting up with a friend monthly to go over your progress on your goals, hiring a business coach, or resolving to treat yourself after you’ve put another home under contract.
