End Of The First Quarter And where are you???? It is hard to believe that this year is 25% over, isn't it? Well, that makes it a good time to do a reality check with your business plan and see if you have started the year on target. So, you did do a business plan for this year, right? Even if it is just a number in your head for the year, you've got a frame of reference. Now, how are you doing?  Are you on target? Are you ahead? Are you behind?

The press is giving such mixed reviews to the housing market, I believe consumers have become extremely cautious. Many who don't "need" to move are still holding off. If your business plan for 2007 didn't take into consideration the changing climate, a review of your strategies for the year is necessary.

The great hockey player, Wayne Gretzky, had an edge over his competition, because he looked to the future: "Some people skate to the puck. I skate to where the puck is going to be."

Where is your market going? Are your present strategies and plan positioning you to hit your targets this year? It is NOT a bad market. It is a market full of opportunities for those who remain flexible and creative.

Now is the time to block two to three hours on your calendar to work on your business in the coming days. If you do this every quarter of the year, you will be able to make course corrections and will be more powerful in achieving your goals.

Three Steps For Tweaking Your Business Plan for 2007 

1. Review your first quarter numbers - Do this in depth to discover information to make and keep you profitable.

Numbers to track:

• Your Gross Production
• Your Net Proceeds
• The Number of Listings Taken
• The Number of Buyers Sold
• Average List Price/Average Sales Price
• Where each transaction came from
• Where your advertising dollars were spent

• The market absorption rates in your niche markets

2.      Compare To Your Plan -

• If you are right on target, congratulations! Keep up the momentum and find any areas where fine-tuning will leverage where this year's business is being generated from to enable you to maximize what is already working.

• If you are behind: What is the gap? What will it take to get on target by the end of the 2nd quarter? What new strategies need to be employed? Do you need a new niche? Do you need to go back to basics? Prospect FSBOs or Expireds? Take a look at where you have gotten business this year.What actions need to be increased?  Is your marketing plan aligned with the results you are getting? In other words, is where you are spending your money where you are getting business from? If the Internet is generating 20 percent of your income and print ads are generating 5 percent, is your marketing reflective of this? Where can you tweak your actions and dollars to be more effective?

• If you are ahead, great job! I like to see my coaching clients have their financial objectives met by the end of October so they can relax towards the end of the year, if they want to (or just get real picky about working with the perfect clients, instead of the high maintenance whiners). What IS working? Can you go deeper with your impact in these areas to take advantage of the trend?

3.     Strategize For the Future - Regardless of which category your numbers fell into, the most important action you can take from this business planning session is to look for the trends.

• Are the niches you are focusing on the ones where the activity is occurring? Look at the MLS data to see what trends emerge. If you do geographical farming, review last year's numbers vs. this years.
• What new areas are emerging? A young new home subdivision (3-5 years old) is a great place to establish a foothold as a expert before anyone else does.
• What changes in consumer buying trends should you be taking into consideration? A need for homes with offices could be an opportunity. With consumers hungry for information and learning they educate themselves before they call you, would call for using good content on your website like informative reports or using a hotline such as Automatic Response Technologies. (use code 8000 for a discount)
• Real estate can be held in an IRA. Let your sphere know! This could be a great opportunity to generate sales that weren't going to happen anyway by contacting your clients to share this opportunity with them. Invite a client to lunch each week and talk about how this or investing might be a good strategy for them. 
• We are beginning to see more repossessions. Build alliances with lenders and banks now to yield new business in the coming months and years.

Wayne Gretsky also said, "You'll always miss 100 percent of the shots you do not take." And "The fundamentals of the game are never going to change, but the things you're going to do, that changes."

Every marketplace offers individual and unique opportunities. The agents that are aware and awake to shifting before others see the trends will have an edge! Will you be there?