Do you remember the last real estate seminar you attended? While you were there you were probably exposed to some new marketing or selling techniques.
How much of what you learned that day have you actually started using? Do you even know where you put those careful notes you took?
If you’re like most of us, you took good notes and had every intention of coming home and putting some of the good ideas to use.
But then, after taking a day or more from work to attend the seminar, you have plenty to do to catch up with things. You’re busy answering emails, following up with your buyers and sellers, calling agents for feedback on listings they showed while you were away, checking the progress of current transactions, and maybe even working on an ad with a deadline in a day or so.
In short, you’re busy. So instead of sitting down and re-writing your notes or even going over them to see what you can use right now, you put them on “the pile” or shove them in a drawer or a file folder. You have fine intentions of coming back in a day or two – just as soon as you get caught up.
And… it doesn’t happen.
Maybe you’ve attended a National Real Estate Convention. That’s even worse!
At a convention you listen to multiple speakers, all with a different kind of advice to give you. And you may even purchase more than one program to use when you get home. I recall attending one such convention and having to ship my purchases home because there was no room in my suitcase for all of them.
By the time you get home and get caught up, the enthusiasm for diving into pages and pages of notes or starting on a new program has vanished.
One lesson at a time is easier to put to use…
And it’s even better if you can listen and learn at a time when you aren’t required to do something else immediately after the class.
The most influential “seminar” I ever attended was in my own home. I had purchased the set of Home study CD’s produced after a Copywriting Bootcamp, and had started watching them one at a time after dinner in the evening.
One night one of the sessions was so loaded with good information that the minute it was over I came back to the computer, looked up the presenter’s website, and read every word of advice she had written. Then I stayed up until the wee hours following her instructions.
That seminar was about SEO, and since I maintain my own web pages, I was able to put the information to use immediately. (And yes, everything she taught really did work.) By the way, her name was Heather Lloyd Martin, and she really IS dynamite.
But it doesn’t always work that way.
Not long ago, while sorting through one of the “piles” on my desk, I came across the notes from a tele-seminar I listened to several months ago. It looked like good information, but had I actually tried to put any of it into practice? Heck no.
Now, as you head into a real estate season which might be just a bit slower, it’s time to set aside an hour or two every week to put some of that good information to use. Since it’s easy to put off such a task, write it down in your day planner as an appointment with yourself.
Just choose one set of notes or one program and spend an hour reviewing it. Jot down one important “take-away” and find a way to put it into practice in the coming week.
Give yourself the benefit of money you’ve already spent.
