5 Ways to Win January

Middleton Elite Coaching – Expert Real Estate Coaching for Top Real Estate Professionals

January is one of the most exciting months of the year!

You’re recharged, excited, and ready to go.  Perhaps more importantly, buyer and seller prospects are through the fog of the holidays and they are decisive.  They spent the holiday season thinking about what they did (or didn’t do) last year AND what they are (or aren’t) going to do this year.  

The real estate market is likely on their mind.

In our experience coaching top real estate agents, teams, and brokerages, we have found that January has a major impact on a real estate professional’s ability to hit their annual goals (or not).  While the year might not be won in January, it can certainly be lost.

Here are 5 Ways to Win January:

1. Be a sprinter
2. Keep your energy high
3. Stick with what got you here
4. Double down
5. Plus It

1. Be a Sprinter

Our real estate coaching clients know that we believe business is a marathon.  Most of us plan to be in the real estate business for years, decades, maybe even our entire lives.  In order to accomplish this goal, having a macro approach of a marathoner is important.  Focusing on rhythm, form, incremental improvement, and sustainable/repeatable growth are hallmarks of building a marathon-style real estate business.

However, there are times in the marathon where it’s important to Sprint.  This is one of those times.  January has the ability to make or break your first quarter.  It also has the ability to give you a big head start on accomplishing your annual goals – or not.

In business, especially the real estate business, sprinting is about intensity – not necessarily long hours.  When you’re on, be completely on.  When you’re off, then be off.  Now is not the time to jog into the new year.  Now is the time to run like something is chasing you.  

The best real estate coach will tell you to ask yourself “what are 3-5 things I MUST DO to win the month of January?”

Hint: Take as many listings as you can.

When you run January as a purposeful, intense, focused sprint toward your MUST Dos for the month, January will be the catalyst for a solid year.

You can find our ‘Could Do → Should Do → Must Do’ exercise here.

Bonus Script:

If taking more listings is one of your goals for the month, here’s a simple and effective script for listing lead generation. I’d recommend texting it to each person in your Top 100 (and more if you’d like).  

Hey (their name)! Happy New Year!

I’m doing a quick, informal poll…

Do you have any real estate-related plans this year?

• Yes

• No

• Maybe

Thanks!

(Your Name)

You’ll find a staggeringly high response rate on this and it’s super efficient.  For those who reply yes or maybe, the goal is to flip them from a text message to phone call by saying:

Great! Do you have 5 minutes to talk about that now?

 You can find more scripts like these here. 

2. Keep Your Energy High

You’ve probably set some new and/or improved fitness goals for yourself this year.  Perhaps you’re committed to working out more, getting better sleep, drinking more water, drinking less other stuff, meditating, etc.

If you picked a lot of different things to add, I’d recommend starting small and then focusing on Habit Stacking.  You can learn more about the power of Habit Stacking from James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, here.

The concept of Habit Stacking is pretty simple, yet very effective.  You take something you already do (a habit) and add a new thing immediately following it. 

For instance:

• As soon as my feet hit the floor, I will say one thing I’m grateful for.

• When I’m brushing my teeth, I’ll review my “win the day” list.

• When I get out of my car at home, I’ll take a quick walk around the block to decompress from the day before walking in the front door.

Stack small, new things on top of existing habits. Resist the urge to stack on too much too soon.  This is about incremental wins that bring you energy, not killing yourself with unmet “resolutions” in the first few weeks of the year.

Energy begets energy.  And you’ll need that energy to run the January sprint.

3. Stick With What Got You Here

Where did most of your real estate business come from last year?

Great.  Go there, right now.  

Real estate agents, teams, and brokers get caught up in the new shiny objects.  January gets lost to new ideas, new systems, new experiments.   Undoubtedly, there’s a place for that (which we’ll discuss in a minute).  FIRST, stick with what got you here.

If you’ve historically generated a lot of repeats or referral real estate business, work your sphere of influence.

If cold calling is your thing, hit the phones.

If you love real estate networking events, get creative on how you can do that in today’s environment.  There is always a way to do things that we deem to be important enough.

Bonus: Download our FREE Guide ‘How To Generate More Listings’ here.

4. Double Down On What Got You Here

Too much of a good thing is a really good thing.  Take the strategies you selected in #3 above and double down.  

If you typically talk to 25 people per week from your real estate sphere, talk to 50.

If you typically make 50 cold calls per day, make 100.

If you typically do 2 real estate networking events per month, do 4.

This is not a magic formula, this is being a Sprinter.  If your typical pace is the marathon pace, you can return to that in February.  To reiterate, this is not necessarily about working more hours (although you may choose to do that for the next few weeks).  This is about the focus that you bring when you’re working; the speed at which you run when you’re running.

Bonus: You can find our ’12-Day Lead Follow-Up Plan’ here.

5. Plus It

Hat tip to Debbie on this one.  She’s all about “plus-ing it.”

Plus-ing It is the extra rep at the gym when your muscles don’t want to do it.

It’s making the extra call when you don’t want to make it.

It’s waking up 30 minutes earlier to get in a morning run.

It’s taking the extra step to get your buyer to write a strong offer and not miss out.

It’s grinding a little more, even if you don’t want to.

As Art Williams said in his famous speech (and one of my all-time favorites) You Just Do It.

A Final Thought:

At Middleton Elite Coaching, we’re fans of making complex things simple and actionable.

So, here’s all you need to do to win the month: Decide.

Decide to sprint.

Decide how you’re going to sprint.

Decide to plus it.

Be Elite!

Bill