Work On Your Real Estate Business, Not In It Part 4

October 16, 2009

A rep who works in their business is usually very guarded when it comes to spending money on continuing education. If they went to university, they often found their education a real drag because many courses were highly abstract and impractical and the testing of their learning was so depersonalized and impractical.  They remember pulling many, many ‘all-nighters’ for last minute, “cram” studying for tests, exams or writing essays.  Their education was very expensive and often put set them on a very different path than thought they would go in, so they’ve come to associate learning with aversion.  They think life experience is always the best teacher.  They’ve often got a ‘know-it-all’ attitude, especially if they’re older.

So when opportunities for continuing education present themselves, reps who work in their business usually ignore them.  They really only take continuing education courses because they have to fulfill their annual credit requirements for maintaining their real estate license.  Like doing all-nighters in university, they often wait until the deadline for completing these courses is looming before finally taking them.  If their referral sources begin drying up, they may take a course or two purely as a reaction to this to try getting the prospect flow going again.  They’ll often keep putting their extra money into common investments like the stock market or RRSPs.

A rep who works on their business has a far more positive, productive attitude toward learning.  They recognize continual, career long learning is the real secret of top producing sales reps.  They recognize few (if any) successful people were born to be successful; rather, they made themselves successful through discipline and a drive toward continual, life-long learning and practice.  Even when things get very busy, they find ways of incorporating learning into their schedule.  For instance, their car will become a kind of mobile library, filled with various kinds of instructional and inspirational audio books.  They turn otherwise unproductive travel time into learning time. When they’re out exercising, they’ll put an audio book in their music player.

A rep who works on their business recognizes every dollar they spend on education and resources for their business will pay for itself many times over, sometimes dozens or even hundreds of times over.  Consequently, they’ll never invest their extra money in anything except their own business because they know the rate of return will far exceed that of investing in anything else, and far sooner too.

Filed under: Inspiration,Marketing Tips,Networking Tips

Tags: administration, branding, marketing, prospect, prospecting, real estate course, real estate education, real estate educators, time management