Welcome to Mike Ferry TV. Tony Smith here. Obviously, not Mike Ferry this week. This is the week of September 28th, which is basically the week leading right into the 4th quarter. So, guess what? You know what we’re going to talk about here. We’re going to talk about how you should be approaching the 4th quarter of 2020 to finish out 2020 in the way that you would like.

I want to start with a question. If you follow sports at all … football, basketball, hockey … if you follow sports at all, how many of the games that you watch are won or lost in the 4th quarter? You know, in professional sports, we know that the competitors are usually pretty well-matched, right? It’s a professional sport. And often times, as you enter the 4th quarter, both teams have a chance and really seriously in most cases have a chance to win the game.  So, really … is it the same for us in Real Estate? Is it the same for us that you have the opportunity in the 4th quarter to still win or possibly lose the year?

The first thing I’d like you to really consider for yourself is are you planning on winning overall in 2020? And what does that have to do with the last three quarters? What does that have to do with it? You could have had phenomenal successes … listings taken, sales made … you could be having the best year ever, which many of our people in Mike Ferry are having, by the way. Or you could be having a disaster. COVID could have caused all kinds of challenges for you in the first three quarters of this year.

But do they really matter anymore? Here in a couple days … what does the 1st quarter, 2nd quarter and 3rd quarter have to do with it? In a couple days … it doesn’t have anything to do with it. What we have to work on now is what are you going to do from now until the end of the year, and what approach are you going to take to still win the game?

We all know some of the captains of industry … Rockefeller, Carnegie … they built their empires around 90-day cycles … and they figured out how 90 days was enough time to do something great, but it wasn’t so much time that you’d lose focus. So the power of a 90-day cycle … if you’ll understand …

Here at the Mike Ferry Organization, how we’ve adopted the concept is that we oftentimes challenge you to make a 15-month business plan. So October, November, December of 2020 … and then start laying out the groundwork for what are you going to do in 2021. And that 15-month plan basically will set you up to win. So I’m going to ask you to consider doing the same thing for yourself this year. Start considering a 15-month business plan, but what we’re going to focus on today is this last quarter.

So I wrote down some thoughts here for you. In this last quarter, I want you to consider something … you have some very, very important decisions to make … and these decisions are only up to you. I can’t make them for you. You have to make these decisions for yourself, and I’m going to ask you to make some very strong decisions for yourself.

I wrote down … you have to make a decision … what mindset will serve me best for the rest of the year? You have to decide what mindset will serve you best for the rest of the year. Do you want to be in a fear, skeptical mindset? Do you want to be in a “world is coming to an end” mindset? Do you want to in “oh my gosh, I had a horrible experience in 2020” mindset? Boy, we’ve heard plenty about 2020, haven’t we? You’ve got to decide what mindset will serve you best.

I’m going to suggest that you figure out how to have a mindset about opportunity, about change, about adapting, about succeeding, about finishing the year strong … making the entire year worthwhile. And I’m going to ask you to start playing with that mindset. How? If you haven’t already, you’ve got to eliminate all of those negative influences. You’ve got to shut off that news.

What’s going to happen in the 4th quarter? Is there going to be a Presidential election? Yes. Is somebody going to win? Yes. What are you going to do the day after the election? You’re going to continue your quest to achieve your goals and the things you set out to do for you and your family. That’s what’s going to happen. So the day after the election is the next day that you’re pursuing your goals and dreams. And that’s really all it is.

Or are you going to let the 4th quarter be all about the election, plus a pandemic, plus some unrest in the country? Are you going to let your 4th quarter be that? Or are you going to decide to carry a different mindset? You’ve got to make that decision for yourself. I would, in writing, decide what mindset I’m going to carry for the 4th quarter.

I wrote down next … you have to decide what skills you absolutely refuse … refuse … like what skills do you have going on right now that you are unhappy with and you refuse to keep them that way? Is it your time management skill? Is it your listing presentation skill? Is it your handling objection skill?

You know there’s some objections we’re going to get every year? What do we start getting? “I want to wait until next year.” You’ve got to sharpen that skill right away, don’t you? Of course you do. We have 11 reasons why you should list during the holidays. Check it out on our website. You should probably get really sharp at that skill.

But what other skills do you absolutely refuse to drag in to 2021? Shouldn’t you design maybe a skills improvement program for October, November, December? Wouldn’t it be great if you came into 2021 with skills that were so much better than 2020? That should be a big part of what you do in the 4th quarter.

I wrote down … what distractions will you finally eliminate in the 4th quarter? You’ve got to decide for yourself … what are those nagging distractions that you’re going to finally eliminate? Is it all the negative media that you’ve been watching? Do you have staff distractions? Is your staff distracting you all the time? Is it that crazy cell phone and your email? Are those distractions too great and too intrusive on your Real Estate business? You’ve got to decide in the 4th quarter what are the distractions you’re going to eliminate once and for all. Boy, if you decide that … you’re going to move forward.

There’s a little exercise that I ask a lot of people to do this time of year. It’s a simple exercise. It’s called “More of, Less of, Start, Stop.” “More of, Less of, Start, Stop.” What do I need to do more of immediately? More of immediately … do I need to eat better, more often? Do I need to prospect more? What do I need to do more of? Maybe there’s two or three things that you need to do more of.

What are two or three things that you need to do less of? I need to eat less cookies. Maybe I need to have less time on the internet? Maybe I need to watch less TV? What do I need to do less of?

What do I need to start doing immediately? Do I need to start an aggressive skills improvement plan? Do I need to start getting up on time? Do I need to start my prospecting on time? What are two or three or four things you need to start doing immediately?

And then, what are two or three or four things you need to stop doing immediately? Do you need to stop staying up until midnight on a worknight? Do you need to maybe stop all the things that get in the way of you eating right and exercising? Do that little simple exercise. Come up with three in each category. Stop … start … more of … less of. Come up with three.

And then we get down to the real specifics of it. Exactly how many days will you work between now and December 31st? I mean … you sit down with you and your family, you look at the calendar and you decide exactly how many days you’re going to work between now and December 31st. Very important to know that. If you don’t know how many days you’re going to work, the world and the 4th quarter will try to get you to work less. Did you ever take a 6 week holiday leading from Thanksgiving to Christmas? Did you ever take a Halloween and then you go into hiding and you don’t hardly work at all after Halloween? Very common with Real Estate Agents. Decide exactly what days you’re going to work between now and the end of the year. Tell your family, tell your boss, tell your friends, tell your Broker.

I wrote down … you need to decide, again, exactly how many listings you will take between now and December 31st. How many listings will you take? If you don’t decide, nobody else will … and if you don’t firmly decide, you have nothing to work towards. I don’t care if you only took one listing last month. You have to decide for yourself and recommit to how many you’ll take. Put it on a 3×5 card. Put it everywhere. Post it in front of you.

You have to decide how many listings sold I will have between now and the end of the year. Is it 6? Is it 8? Is it 4? Is it 10? For some of you watching, I know it might be 20. How many listings sold?

How many Buyer-controlled sales will I have, specifically? Am I going to do 8 Buyer sales between now and the end of the year? Is it 6? Some of you that don’t work with many Buyers, is it going to be 1? I don’t know, but you got to decide.

And then you’ve got to figure out … to make this whole thing work, how many listings must I go on, and how much prospecting must I do to make that happen? You’ve got to figure it out. If you need to go on 18 listing appointments between now and the end of the year to make this whole thing work … boy, I would sure focus on setting 20 listing appointments, wouldn’t you?

And then you’ve got to figure out the prospecting piece. You’ve got to come to grips with what it is. Am I going to make 25 contacts a day, 5 days a week, from now until the end of the year? Is it 30 contacts a day, 5 days a week? Am I working 51 days between now and the end of the year, and I’m going to make 30 contacts for each of those days? You’ve got to decide … and you’ve got to tell everybody what you’re going to do.

I’m convinced that everybody watching this today could have the best quarter of their year between now and the end of the year. I’m convinced that the agents that are already having their best year from now until the end of the year can do one notch better. I’m also convinced that if you had a really bad year so far, that it doesn’t matter. Fix it by your design in the 4th quarter. If you put all this together and you recommit, and you tell everybody that you know, and you put it out there for the world to understand what you’re trying to achieve, and you get started on it today, then the 4th quarter will be something remarkable and something to remember.

Would you like basically the end of 2020 to be … “It was a horrible year with COVID and pandemic and unrest, and then I just kind of melted off at the end of the year with my business too”? Do you want that to be the end cap on it? Or do you want to be the end cap … “Boy, there were some challenges in 2020 with the pandemic and the virus and all those things, but I figured out how to run my business, and I had my best quarter ever in the 4th quarter”? The choice is yours. The business is out there. You know it and I know it. Sales are happening at rapid paces. Go out and get yours, would you, please?

Thanks for your time and thanks for another addition of Mike Ferry TV. Bye now.

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Mike Ferry is the global leader in real estate coaching and training. Watch Mike each week as he discusses a variety of topics to help real estate agents and brokers. Grow your real estate business by improving your mindset, developing your skills and creating a plan of action to increase your production!