EP #29: How to Achieve What Really Matters in 2017

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Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Hey listeners, Jeff Zimper, welcome to another episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio. Hope you're doing well. We are approaching what for me is probably the most favorite time of year for a variety of reasons. One is, hey, it's Christmas, right? So it's December 22nd and at this time of year, many people are engaged in year-end reflection. And I've got some exciting things brewing for you on an upcoming podcast which should be released next week, ideally. I'll plant the seed for you a little bit real quickly here. And that starts with a question is, you know, at the end of the year, right? Many people do goals in year-end resolutions and it's a matter of fact, almost 90% of people in the country put together some type of a New Year's resolution. But we all know what happens, right? End of January comes by the end of January, almost 60% of people quit. Give up, let go of their New Year's resolution. And so there's some number of reasons why and I wanted to address that. And not on today's podcast, but just wanted to make sure you haven't subscribed yet, subscribe now. So you don't miss this next podcast where I'm going to have a very special guest and we're going to talk about this question. And the question is, can one word change your life? Can one word change your life? Change the course, direction, outcome, level of happiness, fulfillment and satisfaction and achievement? I'm just going to leave you there with that cliffhanger and stay tuned because I'll be sending you the update as soon as that's released. But on with today's show, not going to spend a lot of time here today. I've actually really just got a favor to ask of you. You know, my goal, my focus here as the Chief Truth Teller at Mortgage Marketing Institute is to bring you truth in mortgage marketing. And part of that is the way I do that is to understand what's currently working for you. What types of tools and resources are you using out there in the marketplace today? And so for that, I've put together just a brief five questions, I believe it is, to get an understanding of what's working for you in your business right now. How was 2016 and what changes would you like to make in 2017? The purpose for that is, I want to know where you're at, right? I mean, it's like the Jerry McGuire thing, help me to help you, right? We've got some ideas that we think based on some other feedback we've got that would be relevant and useful to you moving forward in 2017, whether that's how to leverage video marketing, social media, you know, different forms of digital marketing and so forth. But I want to hear it straight from you, straight from you. So in the show notes for today's podcast is a link to a brief, as I said, five questions to help us better understand how to serve you, what kind of tools are you using out there right now, what's working, what's what's what could be better and things like that. So make sure you look for that in the show notes and I will just point out, I guess, real quickly that if there's any advice I can give you for end of year planning, right? I mean, when most people obviously use this time to carve out some strategic planning and things like that, I know there's some changes that I want to make for 2017 and you'll be hearing about those and seeing those as we come into the new year here. But I wanted to leave you a couple of quick tips and that is how to achieve what really matters in 2017 and some tips that high achievers use when they begin to reflect look back on the past year and look forward to 2017 and really the question becomes, you know, what are you going to do to make 2017 better than 2016 and regardless of how well you did in 2016, I know that leaders believe a key leadership trade is that you can always improve a little bit, right? And you look about, look at that in the world of sports and athletics, right? The high achieving athlete can always shave a few seconds off their performance. And so for you, what that is in 2017, I don't know. Hopefully you'll take a moment and answer the five questions that we've got in the links of the show notes here at mortgagemarketinginstitute.com forward slash podcast slash 29 is where you can find the show notes for this particular episode. But you know, it really comes down to what are the shifts you want to make in 2019 or 26. Yeah, I'm already jumping ahead 2017. Is it an increase in production? Is it a reduction in hours? Is it, you know, hiring that personal assistant finally, that business development person? Is it getting a more efficient loan process? Sure. Maybe it's the lose 10 pounds. Get in shape. Right? But so a quick summary is review of what high achievers do to set themselves up for a great year, sharing with you right now, people like Tony Robbins, Dave Ramsey and some others. I wanted to give you a quick high level overview as you are doing your strategic planning. Maybe some of these tips will help you real quickly. Okay? So let's jump into them. Number one, obviously reflect on the past year. The first thing high achievers do to set themselves up for a great year is review the current one. Okay? John Maxwell, right? The well-known author and expert in leadership has said he spends the last week of the year to spend time reviewing his entire year's calendar past year. And the reason is he believes that reflection turns experience into insight. So what he does is he gains insight for what went well in 2016 and what should perhaps he be doing in the new year. Tony Robbins does the same thing. What he does is he is a avid journaler. So he journals throughout the course of the year to collect accomplishments in magic moments, almost like saving up receipts for tax purposes. So at the end of the year, what Tony does is he goes in and reviews all these magic moments, right? And accomplishments. And he looks at the area, all the areas, right, business, relationships, finance, family. And by reflecting on these moments, Tony is able to pull some principles and determine what he really want to make happen in the following year because you may see some patterns. You may see some things that you've developed momentum in. You want to continue to build on that momentum or some things that maybe didn't work out. You need to change course on those. Okay? So that's a very easy, quick process that you could do. But one of the things I've learned in reading through what these high achievers do is they definitely make it a priority to carve out time as you heard John Maxwell an entire day, right? Some folks do more than that. But you want to do that with no interruptions and spend it in reflection, contemplation, maybe even prayer if that's relevant for you. Okay? So tip number two, stay positive, right? Obviously, we want to stay positive. The point here is don't dwell on the negative. When you look back on the year you just lived, you might want to stare at it too long and you tend to regret over opportunities you missed or make mistakes. That's a mistake. Okay? Don't spend time hanging out in the negative and things we want to do achieve, but we never were able to really complete or get to. That doesn't build momentum for us moving forward into 2017. So remember, spend that reflective time focusing on the wins and it's okay to notice some of those things, maybe where we fall short, but really we want to focus on putting yourself in a positive state of mind because we're talking about making progress and looking forward. And I remember one of the quotes I remember from Tony saying all the time is you can't drive into the future using your rear view mirror to guide you, something like that. So quit hanging out in the past, focus on the future. All right? Okay. Tip number three, enter a place of gratitude. It helps to stay grateful. And for those of you who've practiced with this, it helps to stay grateful on a daily basis. There's various apps out there you can download on your smartphone that will allow you to focus on every single morning, take in a moment to be to reflect and be grateful for something. If you need help doing that, just search Gratitude app in the app store for iPhone or Android, Google Play Store, and that'll help you get on target and help you reconnect to being grateful every single day. And you really want to open this up and spend some time hanging out in this gratitude area. Eric Fisher and Ray Edwards, two well-known authors and coaches, I'm talking about preparing a gratitude flood, whether it's journaling, whether it's just reflecting, really connect everything to the past year that helps you be grateful. And that helps you set up to prepare for what you want to be most grateful and connected to and thankful for in the new year. This is a writing exercise, by the way, there's a lot of value to be said for writing about the things you want to be grateful for and focus on in the new year. For me, obviously I want to continue to focus on how grateful I am for my family, for my two boys, my wife, maybe not the two dogs, but really focus on all the blessings that I've got and the things that I really am grateful for. Because I know it's easy to get caught up on the negative and things like that, especially with median, how media influences us to always be comparing ourselves to someone else. And that's a no-win proposition. I am so blessed, I'm so grateful for everything I have and it's interesting when you really begin to study leaders, you'll find out that they really spend a lot of time in the space of gratitude and feeling grateful. And that, of course, can help to put you into place to want to give back and help those that perhaps are less fortunate. So that's tip number three, okay? Tip number four, cut the fat, remove the excess, okay? What we see from high achievers is that they eliminate the bottom 30% of activities, projects, commitments and things like that that don't ultimately serve the bigger vision, the bigger goal. So right down to everything that you think is distracting you and pulling you away, diverting you from the results you want. And here's an interesting concept, this is from Derek Halpern. Derek says, I try to quit the things I love that aren't delivering the results I want. Wow, I really sat with that for a moment, I took it on, I was like, wow, what are some things that I really enjoy, right? But it's preventing me from getting the results I want. So there's some ideas I came up with there, I mean, for some people, you know, maybe it's just been too much time watching TV, I don't know, I mean, you know, Netflix binging, right? Nelson, I'm all all for, we've got to schedule downtime and recharge and relax, absolutely. Are there things that are creeping into other activities we could be doing where we would be more productive? Oh, I'll give you a, here's a real story, okay? I used to really enjoy smoking cigars. So I would smoke, you know, probably at least two or three cigars, right, two or three times a month, go out with the buds, hang out, have some cigars, right, all that fun stuff. And then one day I realized that smoking cigars was not moving me towards the direction, towards the results I wanted, my area of health and fitness. So I had to make a choice. I had to either let go of wanting to have increased levels of health and fitness and energy. Or I had to let go of something I loved and enjoyed, which was smoking cigars, hanging out with the buds, right? One of them had to go, I couldn't have both. It was affecting the progress I wanted to make towards that goal. So I had to let go of that. And maybe there's something in your life you've got to let go of that you're getting enjoyment from, but it's still holding you back. Does that make sense? Okay. Maybe it's going out and watching Monday night football drinking too much, eating too much, right? How about this? The inability to say no. That's another one, right? Because some of us are people, please, and we want to say yes all the time. But we can't say yes to everything. Sometimes the biggest gift you can give yourself is to say no. Okay. All right. So where are we? I think we're on step four or five. Let's call it number five. It's clear on your why, obviously setting goals is important, right? It comes down to this that if you want to do some really, if you really want to do something, you'll find a way. If you don't, you'll find an excuse. The power of why in goal setting will drive your behavior long after the goal setting is done. And I'll give you a great example of goals of the power of why. Go back on the podcast here and listen to podcast episode number 28, I guess Bobby D. Bobby D. Oriel talks about starting his career in the mortgage industry over. What did it zero after the mortgage market meltdown in 2008? He was left with no contacts, no referral partners, nothing. Start it from zero. This year in 2016, he'll close out the year at $40 million literally from zero to $40 million. How did he do it? How did he get up and get at it every single day? Even when he didn't feel like it even when he was tired and frustrated and unsure and trying to find his way. He did it because he had a compelling why that he connected to every single day. I'll put a link to that podcast in the show notes also. All right. So get big on your why. Why are you a mortgage loan originator? What about it gives you passion? Give you purpose. Get clear, get connected to that because that helps you. Your why will help you figure out the how your why will help you break through the resistance when you run into the resistance wall because you will meet Mr. and Mrs. resistance on your journey. So get clear on your why. I'll look for that link to the podcast episode number 28 with Bobby D number six. How do you eat an elephant? You know, when we look at planning out our year, sometimes it seems daunting and overwhelming. I would say you eat an elephant. You may have heard this, but one bite at a time. It helps to break your goals down into quarterly milestones so you can check your progress as needed. This makes sense. Okay. Boil it down. Simplify it. Bite it all off at once, map it out, quarterly milestones, and here's a great quote from Chris Brogan. Your day is your week, is your month, is your year. So a year from now, when you look back and we're meeting here again, we're having this reflective review process, you're going to want to obviously look back and say, wow, look at everything I did and how was I able to accomplish that and make that manageable and actually have a plan that I could execute on and believe in. You'll be able to do that by what Jim Rohn calls a few simple disciplines practiced every single day, a few simple disciplines every single day, whether that's, you know, your workout schedule, your meditation, your breathing, your eating right, your balance, your scheduling, your date night with your spouse, you're putting in the activities that you need to manage your business properly and effectively, those are a few simple disciplines practiced every single day, at the end of the course of the year, we'll show up as you achieving what you want. All right. Tip number seven, I just alluded to this a moment ago and that is schedule your year in advance. For some, that may sound crazy. I know for me a little bit it did because it's like, well, I don't know what I'm going to be. Well, you need to map out the activities and that's why the quarterly milestones come in and are helpful. It's not all of it may be filled in in great detail, but you want to begin to build out the framework, right? You're on a destination, you're on a journey, you know, you think about an airplane when it takes off, right? It knows where it's going, but guess what? It's making the entire time through the entire flight. It's making adjustments. It's not a straight path, right? It's a line that moves up and down and adjusts accordingly based on the the winds and so forth, right? And obviously the earth is spinning underneath, so it needs to adjust course correction for that as well. Same is true in our lives. We're going to have this big vision and plan of where we want to be 12 months from now, but we're going to need to make adjustments on the way. However, there will be milestones. We'll need to check in throughout our flight to know that we're even on course. So there's certain things you need to put into your business as milestones, as quarterly, monthly, weekly, even daily to know that you're going to be on track because, you know, you've got to check your instruments. You've got to check, you know, your altitude, your compass and gauge. Are you on track? And so you know there's activities you need to put together in your business. You need to schedule lunch and learns with agents finally and start getting in front of lots of agents. And if you want help on doing that, go to the website mortgage marketing institute.com on the homepage right side is a free guide to hosting realtor classes. Download that. Check it out. That'll get you started in hosting realtor classes. But you know, block time for what's really important. Those are obviously your, you know, your daily method of operation activities reaching out to past clients, to your referral partners, to new partners, to your affiliates, to scheduling, team building exercises and, you know, vision meetings with your team, such as your process of your title, escrow and so forth. You know, here's the bottom line. What gets scheduled gets done, right? You've got a book time on your calendar for your most important outcomes. This includes, by the way, vacations and fun time off and major business and creative projects. You know you want to host an agent class, come Q one of 2017, block it on your calendar right now. What's the date that you want to host that class and begin to work backwards from there, right? You're going to need to obviously have your desk, your location picked out. You're going to need to have your affiliate co-sponsors picked out. You have your topic, right? You're going to need to have your promotion activities put on your calendar so you can fill the room. Does this make sense? So you've got to map all this kind of stuff out because what gets scheduled with what gets done, what's not scheduled. It usually doesn't get done. So lots of different tools you can use out there for scheduling and building out your year. You can buy a big dry erase wall calendar and map out your entire year like Amy Porter Phil does. What's great about that is that especially if it's on a whiteboard kind of thing like that, you know, you can erase it because you know things that are going to be changing. But the cool thing about building out your year in advance, the big picture gives you certainty and you get pulled in the direction of accomplishing your big vision and purpose throughout the year. It becomes exciting. Okay? All right. So let's move on. Tip number eight, we're make sure we take time to unplug. It's important to recharge. Be intentional as well about scheduling time to refresh and recharge. I mentioned date night, right? Other things, getaways with your kids, short little weekend getaways. Maybe it's just a, you know, carve out time in the afternoon to go to that baseball game, that soccer game, or maybe, you know, play hooky for half a day and go to a movie with your family, your kids, your friends, whatever. Schedule your downtime, carve out at least one full day per quarter to get away and recharge. That's just for you to get away and focus on your business and be in evaluate, right? Just like that flight at destination, we're flying from West Coast to East Coast, right? If we never check in, how are we going to know where we're at? And if we never take time to refuel and recharge, we're going to run out of steam. So having your best year ever, accomplishing what really matters in 2017 will take planning and focus. I know this is a very high level overview, but I also know that you've got some resources and tools that you're pursuing. I'd like to know what those are, it's a matter of fact, and that comes back into the five questions I've got for you here at the end of the year. I want to understand how best can we serve you at Mortgage Marketing Institute. The goal for 2017 for us, I'll just tell you, is to bring you some more premium content, more usable tools and resources. You've got the guide for how to teach realtor classes. You've got the podcasts. You've got some other things we've been doing like the powerful presentations master class, which are the done for you, lunch and learn for you to get in front of lots of agents fast. But if you would, take a moment and help me out and answer a few of these questions. The link to the questionnaire will be in the show notes, and I would appreciate you just taking a moment to do that. You can always just send me an email as well, info at MortgageMarketingInstitute.com. Always like to hear from you. Be on the lookout for our next Mortgage Marketing Radio Show. As I mentioned, it's going to be a good one. It's going to have a very special guest and address the question of, can one word change your life? So, thanks for listening. I appreciate you so much. Have a merry, merry Christmas. Blessings to you and your family. Happy holidays and wish you all the best in the coming year. I appreciate you taking time out to answer these few questions. Look forward to seeing you connecting with you again in the new year. And by the way, if you haven't subscribed to Mortgage Marketing Radio, please take a moment to do that now on iTunes or Stitcher and leave us a review. Thanks so much. Take care. For listening to Mortgage Marketing Radio, one more truth in Mortgage Marketing, get more free training and resources at MortgageMarketingInstitute.com. 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