Last month I spoke about business planning for an uncertain new year. I introduced the concept of aligning goals with different scenarios. However, we must go deeper with regard to the goal planning process. Typically, the average “goal planner” does not go deep enough within the process. What do I mean by that?

Goals Require A "Why"

The usual goals for the new year? I am going to produce $____ volume and/or ____ number of units and I am going to make $____ in 2025.

First, I ask the question: Why do you want to achieve these goals? There must be a higher purpose. Because if you don’t know the “why” of your goals, you will not be as motivated as possible to reach them. What are some possible reasons why? 

• I want to pay my bills off and increase my credit rating.
• I want to save to send my child to college.
• I want to purchase my first house.
• I want to retire in ten years.
• I want to have a cushion to last through the next downturn.

I am sure you can think of plenty more. Here is the point: the motivation of retirement or purchasing a home is more tangible than “x” amount of dollars. Post the picture of the house you want to purchase or the college you want your child to attend, and you will witness real motivation day to day. That is more important than posting the picture of a $100 bill. 

As an aside — I use the same technique to teach approaches to converting prospects: find the potential borrower’s “why.” If they are interested in a cash-out refinance in order to purchase a new car, it is important to talk about the car, not the new mortgage. 

Connecting The Dots

We are still not done. There is a wide gap between the picture of a house and you achieving that goal. And again, I am not referring to the monetary aspects. Thus, I ask the next question:

What are you going to do in order to achieve your goals?

The setting of activities has to be specific. General statements such as “I will work harder” will not help you. If you are going to work harder — what does that mean? Are you:

• Going to get up one hour earlier and start working more quickly?
• Going to eliminate [specific time-wasting activities like scrolling through social media] and replace them with [specific productive activities like reading up on local real estate trends]? 

If you are going to make more calls each day — who are you going to call? Not the Ghostbusters, I hope. What are you going to say on these calls? What is your goal for each call? 

From these questions you can see how specific I want you to get. Because what you are doing is setting a roadmap for your goals. If you have a roadmap, it is much easier to stay on course and more importantly, recognize when you move off course. 

Want More Referrals?

If you want more referrals, where are they going to come from? Resolve to capture your existing sphere on a database. If your database is 300 people, go through a thorough analysis to bring this number up to 3,000. Your sphere should include everyone with whom you have something in common as well as your current and previous relationships. And do not stop there. Put a plan in place to increase that sphere every day. For example, if you are not a “joiner,” become not only a “joiner” but a leader of organizations. 

From this sphere, you should be able to identify whom you are going to prioritize as targets for your activities — calls, lunches, joint marketing, and more. And in order to achieve results, you will need to deliver value. It is not enough to finally identify your sphere. You must set a marketing plan in place that focuses upon the delivery of value to everyone in it. This value must be tailored to the segments of your sphere — prospects, previous customers, those you have worked with, etc. You must implement certain activities designed to deliver that value on a regular basis. A marketing plan should identify actions that will deliver value to specific targets within your sphere. 

A word of caution. These activities must be limited so that you can execute them regularly. The key to marketing is consistency and that is achieved by not undertaking too many activities. In general, you want to go deeper, not wider, with your marketing.

While it can’t hurt to identify your monetary and production goals, the exercise will not have any meaning without the “why” to provide motivation. And it is the actions you take to achieve these goals that are of primary importance. Time is not a renewable resource. Every day, month, and year you waste, you will not get back. It is time you start changing the foundation if you want to change the results.