Theorize, Replicate, Take Action
If you have closed on your first deal, then congratulations and you are in the right place. Now it’s time to theorize, replicate and take action to get your next deals rolling. Your first deal provides tremendous insight into what will make you successful and it is crucial to understand exactly how it happened and on what time horizon. This series is teaching you to be an entrepreneur and successful business owner, not selling you a franchise so this is going to be all about you.
Write Out Every Action That Made the Deal Happen
Americans are taught that “hard work” leads to success and that nothing good comes easy, so they focus on what is hard to them all the while, ignoring their own native genius. Take the thing that comes easy to you and be the best at that. Getting your first deal is hard work, but true growth only happens when you focus on your core competencies and outsource everything else. Now that you have that first win, you must break down and analyze every action that occurred to make it happen. By evaluating a detailed account of your process, you will discover your strengths and weaknesses. You may be tempted to try and recreate someone else’s success by doing what they are doing and ignoring what you just did, which is what got you the deal. Avoid that roadblock by drilling down in your process analysis to find the KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), replicating them with more precision. You can learn more about KPIs by watching Christina Krause at Propelio Academy. Before trying to conquer the concept of KPIs, let’s look at some common first deal scenarios.
Spend an entire day by yourself writing out every action in the process. Next, find the exact first action that indicated it was going to be a deal and finally, circle all the tipping point actions that propelled you to the next major step. The tipping points are your KPIs and could look like this; Attended a Propelio Event, talked to a guy that recommended the Propelio Driving for Dollars App, downloaded app, drove around and got 63 leads, contacted each lead a minimum of 8 times each before getting 1 response, returned call from homeowner who got a mailer with a photo of her house on it, her house had very tall grass, etc. If you got your first deal from door knocking, the KPIs might look like this; Knock on 400 doors total, 82 doors before someone answered the door, 43 total people answered the door, 22 agreed to sit down and talk, etc. These numbers give you a raw baseline, which is meant to be improved upon.
Reflect and Perfect
Spend 30 days on defining and refining your KPIs so you can theorize, yes 30 days. Systematizing comes later. If you need help, post your KPIs in some real estate investor groups and ask for feedback. For example, it took 44 pin drops in the Driving for Dollar App before the first deal, how does this compare to your experience. The responses may lead you a more efficient way to accomplish the end goal. If you are thinking, “I just want my next deal, I don’t have time for all this,” then here’s a reality check, it will take 6-9 months to get your first deal and around 12-15 months to average one deal a month, and 18+ months before you are consistently closing 3-4 deals a month. And that’s if you do it the right way. Remember, this is all about you, which is where it gets complicated. Everything so far is about defining what YOU did that led to the close. Every successful investor, including Daniel Moore and Grant Kemp, will tell you how, if they had it to do over, they would have learned from the mistakes of others. If you got 3 deals in your first month of being a real estate invest, then, first, please post the story in the comments and second, you are the exception, not the rule. Regardless, this is the time to theorize.
Start analyzing what you would have done different. Using the example above where you knock on 400 doors total, 82 doors before someone answered the door, 43 total people answered the door, 22 agreed to sit down and talk. Maybe you could have gotten someone to answer the door after 35 knocks because you discover a pattern where the majority of answered knock came from homes that had a car with a handicap tag in the driveway, so you start with those leads first. Be hyper-aware of the minutiae of all your in-person interactions. Record your calls, listen to and analyze them (Check your state laws regarding call recording notifications). Pay attention to the phrases that work as that becomes your script. Write down the answers that buyers like to develop great answers that lead to a yes. If you don’t know the answer to a question, be honest “That’s a great question, I’m not clear on the answer, but I know tons of people who do, so let’s table that and figure how we can agree and solve this problem for you.” Record all your data and track the trends and emerging patterns, like the handicap tag. Eventually, not yet, you must systematize these processes to grow. Put anything that you must do into your calendar.
Operate in a Quarterly World
To get to the next level, you must now operate in a quarterly world because the number one reason investors fail is because they switch methods too quickly. So, 30 days to refine your KPIs is reasonable in a quarterly world. All these numbers and deep reflections are revealing that one thing that you do better than anyone else. When you find it, go in deep and hard and be aware that massive success requires inequality. People talk about a balanced life without understanding that balance is a verb, a dynamic concept that requires wild pendulum swings to maintain overall equilibrium. For the first 18 months, Grant worked 13 hours a day, 7 days a week. That is unsustainable so assign a dollar amount to every task that led to the deal close. Determine either how much you would have to pay to get that task done or how much revenue that activity brings into your company? For simplicity, use $10, $100, $1,000 or $10,000+ per hour. Grant requires that every task he does generate $10,000 per hour. Here is an example of a task that can be outsourced for $5-10 an hour: Download a list from Propelio.com, put it into an excel sheet, reorganized it to pull first and last name, made a mail merge to a word doc, then printed that out. Coming from a blue-collar background, Daniel assigned his worth to his physical output. If you have that mindset, change it TODAY or you will never grow your business. Maybe you do every task better than any other person, but your time is better spent on revenue generating activities. If the absolute best person you could hire can only produce 75% of what you can, then two of them would outproduce you every time. You may have to do everything for 18-20 months, but if you can afford to outsource, do so.
What was your KPI tipping point?
