You Need More Business. So What Deserves Your Attention Right Now?

When you need more business, it can be difficult to think about anything else.

You need transactions in the pipeline. You need closings on the calendar. You need income you can count on. And it would probably feel pretty good to stop wondering where the next deal is going to come from.

So you start looking for what might work.

Maybe you should make more calls. Hold more open houses. Buy leads. Create more video. Post more often. Try the new strategy another agent says is working incredibly well for them.

There are plenty of ways to generate business. You probably already know most of them.

The harder part may be deciding which ones deserve your attention right now.

Because when you need a transaction, almost anything that might create one can start to look like something you should be doing.

Pressure makes every opportunity feel like an obligation.

And before you know it, you're trying a little of this and a little of that, while still wondering which of those activities is actually going to create the business you need.

When Someone Else's Strategy Starts Looking Pretty Good

Have you ever watched another agent talk about what's working for them and immediately wondered whether you should be doing it too?

Of course you have. So have I.

Especially when what you're currently doing isn't producing enough business.

The problem isn't that their strategy won't work. It might. The question is whether it's the right strategy for you.

Do you enjoy it enough to keep doing it? Does it connect you with the people you want to work with? Is it likely to create the kind of business you want? And perhaps most importantly, are you willing to do it consistently enough to find out whether it works?

Those questions can be harder to answer when you're worried about your next closing.

Fear makes someone else's strategy feel like a requirement.

That's when the search for the easy button can become really tempting.

If there were one strategy that could quickly create the next transaction, wouldn't you want to know what it was?

I certainly would.

The problem is, after 32 years in real estate, I still haven't found the easy button.

What I have found is that there are a lot of ways to build a successful real estate business. The agents who build businesses they can rely on don't necessarily do all of them.

They get very good at consistently doing the things that work for them.

So perhaps the question isn't, What else should I be doing?

Maybe it's:

How do I decide what deserves my attention?

What Are You Asking Your Business to Do for You?

This is where I think we sometimes start in the wrong place.

We're taught to set the goal.

How many homes do you want to sell? What's your GCI goal? How much do you want to grow this year?

Those numbers matter. You need transactions and income to have a profitable business.

But could it be possible that the number isn't actually what you want?

There was a time when one of my goals was for our team to gross a million dollars. I became very attached to that number and worked incredibly hard toward it. Somewhere along the way, work became an obsession.

Then Gary became ill.

The million dollars suddenly didn't seem nearly as important.

What became important was having the resources to support the life we wanted to live. Money still mattered. Business still mattered. But I began to understand that the business was supposed to make our life possible, not become our life.

That changed something for me.

Instead of beginning with How much can I produce?, another question became much more important:

What do I really want?

And then:

What would having that make possible?

Those questions don't make the need for transactions disappear. They give the transactions meaning.

What If Clarity Made the Business Decisions Easier?

Imagine for a moment that you knew exactly what you wanted your business to produce and what that would make possible in your life.

Not someone else's definition of success. Yours.

Now imagine looking again at all the things you could be doing to generate business.

Would every opportunity still deserve your attention?

Would you need to do what everyone else is doing?

Or could you begin asking different questions?

Does this move me toward what I said I want?

Is this one of the activities most likely to create the business I need?

Am I willing to do this consistently?

That's where clarity becomes much more than an interesting exercise.

Clarity keeps pressure from choosing your strategy.

It gives you a filter.

And when you have a filter, you can begin narrowing all those things you could do into the few things that deserve your attention.

That's exactly where What Do You Really Want? is designed to take you.

This Isn't About Creating Another Goal

During our 90 minutes together, I'm not going to tell you what your business should look like or hand you another list of activities you should be doing.

We'll start somewhere very different.

You'll look one year ahead and get specific about what you want your business and life to have made possible. Then you'll look at where you are now and what's standing between the two.

We'll get curious about what you really want, what matters most about it and whether the goal you've been pursuing represents what you actually want or simply what you thought you were supposed to want.

And then we move into action.

You'll decide what you're committed to, identify a small first step and narrow the many activities available to you down to the three most connected to meaningful progress. You'll also identify what is likely to get in your way and decide in advance what you'll do when it happens. That's the work at the center of the workshop, not simply setting another goal. 

Because clarity without action isn't going to create another transaction.

The goal is consistent action that creates more opportunities for business and, over time, more consistent income.

More Business Without Chasing Everything

If you're looking at your pipeline right now and know you need more business, I'm not going to suggest that you stop caring about transactions and start thinking about your life's purpose.

You need transactions.

You need income.

And you deserve to build a business that doesn't require you to live in a constant state of worry about where the next one will come from.

Perhaps the way forward isn't finding more things to do.

Perhaps it's becoming clear enough about what you really want that you can decide which activities deserve your attention, commit to them and give them enough consistency to work.

Urgency is a poor business model.

It can keep you reacting, searching and changing direction when what you may need most is a reason to stay focused.

That's why I created What Do You Really Want?

Not to give you my answer.

To help you discover yours and turn it into action.

So, out of curiosity, if you could create more transactions, less stress and more consistent income, how helpful would it be to finally know which activities deserve your attention and which ones you can let go?

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Chris Ruszkiewicz is an Exactly What to Say® Certified Guide and the founder of CMR Coaching & Consulting, a founding partner of Keller Williams Realty Milwaukee, and an Executive Business Coach with 32 years of experience in sales, negotiation, and leadership.