Hey, Patrick Riddle here, and first, I’m going to tell you exactly what will most likely either stop you or at least get in the way of you increasing your profits by 300% in the next 90 days.
And since I’m going to tell you what it is, I’m hoping you will identify it as soon as you see it and face it head on… YOUR COMFORT ZONE!
It is one of the biggest roadblocks that you will continually face throughout life no matter how high you go…
You’re probably very familiar with it and know exactly when you are stepping outside of it. When you get that light headedness, stomach wrenching, uneasy feeling that makes you just want to STOP what you’re doing and retreat back to safety, you know that you have ventured outside of your comfort zone.
Over the years, I have conditioned myself to identify the feeling and attach an entirely different meaning to it. It’s the same idea that Tony Robbins teaches with neuro-associative conditioning (his branch of NLP — Neuro-linguistic programming).
I know that when I do something uncomfortable, I have taken a step in the direction toward growth and progress. I know that I am in a position to learn an extraordinary amount. By knowing this to be true, I’ve attached that uneasy feeling to tremendous growth and development.
I actually feel excitement now, when I used to associate negative feelings with it.
Anyway, enough about that…
Just know that to increase your profits by 300%, you’re most likely going to be uncomfortable at some point. Whether that means being uncomfortable about investing more money into your business… uncomfortable approaching and negotiating with sellers… or uncomfortable learning how to track and account for the details in your real estate business.
So, assuming you’re willing to step outside your comfort zone, let’s take a looksie…
3 Keys to Making the 300% Leap
1. Fire Up Your Marketing Plan
You can’t reasonably expect to make 300% more profit in the next 90 days without putting some serious attention to your marketing strategy.
If you don’t have leads coming in at all or don’t have as many as you would like, how else do you plan on getting the phone ringing?
MARKETING!
And you might as well go ahead and decide to accept that marketing is an investment, NOT an expense.
If you are saying to yourself, “I don’t have money to invest in marketing, I’m broke,” — well, there’s plenty of low-to-no cost marketing techniques, many of which we’ve highlighted in these here DDA emails.
Your willingness to do them is the only question at hand.
If you already have 30 to 50 leads coming in per month, you’re going to need to triple that. This may involve simply investing more money into your marketing system or may force you to try something you’ve never tried before.
Either way, you’ve got to take the next step.
2. Sharpen Your Negotiating and Sales Skills
Whether you like it or not, you are a salesperson.
If you don’t like the sound of that, assign another mental representation to what you think of when you think of a salesperson. Everyone is in sales whether they admit it or not.
As an investor, you are selling — contractors, investors, buyers, sellers, attorneys, accountants, and possibly employees, just to name a few — on your ideas every single day! If there was a master skill to success as a real estate investor, I think that it would be to become an excellent communicator.
That is really all negotiating and sales is… communication.
So my question to you is, “What have you done lately to improve your negotiating and sales skills.” What have you read, what have you heard, and what have you tried lately to improve upon your ability to sell effectively?
A great book that’s an easy read is Zig Ziglar’s “Selling 101.” Also, Peter Conti and David Finkel’s books are a goldmine for good scripts for negotiating. You may not even realize how powerful they are until you study the subject in depth.
My recommendation to you is to find a good mentor, and simply do what he/she says. A natural tendency is to do things your own way, just like it’s a natural tendency to stay in your comfort zone.
Take an expert’s advice and once you master it, then tweak your strategy to best suit your particular style.
3. Get a Laser Focus on the Numbers
What I mean by that is:
- know your bottom line in every deal you do
- know which marketing strategy(s) is bringing the best results
- keep your eye on what you’ve paid your contractors
- watch the timetables and budgets for your projects and make sure they are staying on track
And I say this all from experience!
In some cases, I thought I knew exactly where we were in a deal, and then to my dismay, totaled up the numbers, and WHAM, we only made half the profit we were supposed to!
One time, I had 5 or 6 renovations going on at one point and extended money to one of our contractors who never completed the work. I didn’t realize we were paying him for work yet to be completed, and I had to file judgments against him — such a frustrating situation and waste a time!
It’s said that you can’t manage what you don’t measure, and I will attest to that!
The closer you pay attention to the details, the more money you’re likely to make.
To increase your profits by 300% in the next 90 days, no matter what level investor you are, do those 3 things I’ve just laid out.
Step outside your comfort zone! Your wallet will be thanking me later!
By firing up your marketing plan, leads will be pouring in from all directions. By honing and perfecting your negotiating skills, your closing ratio will dramatically increase. All that coupled with having an avalanche of leads, and you’ll be on your way.
BUT, don’t forget to keep a watchful eye on the numbers.
Remember, you can’t manage what you don’t measure. And if you want to increase profits by 300%, you’ve got to measure your successes and failures. That’s the only way toward improvement!