Are You Wasting Time and Losing Thousands of Dollars? – Part 2
Posted on May 6, 2014 byIf you have too many emails in your inbox you can change your set up and create direct paths to instruct your emails to go directly into your subfolders without you even having to look at them and then next to the folder you created on the left there will be a number, for example: Seller leads (1), which means you have 1 unread email in the Seller lead subfolder.
Statistics show that 75% of workers feel colleagues overuse “reply to all.” I can attest to this. I always ask my students to email only one person in my office versus emailing the admin, Kristen, and myself. That is a waste of everyone’s time, as the email was only supposed to go to one person, not three. 15% of workers admit that they themselves overuse “reply to all.”
70% of workers often receive email with vague subject lines. I always recommend if you are emailing someone about a particular property that you put the address in the subject line. This way, in the future, you can search your emails more efficiently, if you don’t file them away. I often use the subject line as a quick message, so it would read: “Need copy of Seller info sheet for Smith.” Then there would be nothing in the body of the email. However, I was informed by one of my students, his phone does not allow him to see all of the subject line, so I quit doing that as much.
How much time do you spend on your emails? I have an AOL account from when I first started as an investor. Everyone got my email address and they just started sending me every promotion they could. It has over 11,000 emails in it, as I only go and clean it out every 4 to 6 months. I no longer use this AOL account due to the overuse of people sending me promotional emails.
I would recommend that you set up your emails and files as I have explained here, and your life will become easier. I use a setting in Outlook that allows me to see if someone has received my email as I get a “read receipt” returned to me. I use this specifically because of the banks and students, as I want to be sure they received the emails. However, it does fill my emails back up but then I don’t have to worry about the fact that I had a deadline and wonder if they didn’t read or receive my email. This option doesn’t work with all email accounts, so I have also included this text as the last sentence of my important emails: “PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT OF THIS EMAIL, THANK YOU!!!”
The first thing I do in the morning is quickly scan thru my 3 email accounts that are all inside of Outlook and delete all the junk email just by looking at who it is coming from and the subject line. This takes a total of 5 minutes. I then scan a 2nd time just focusing on who they are from and making a decision to open it and/or flag it to be opened based on my schedule of the day. The most I spend on emails per day is no less than one hour. And when I do use email, it is because I am working on a file and I am not sending a chain letter around to everyone or a funny little story. Not that I don’t need a joke or two, however, I am at work and I can always look on my Facebook and get a laugh.
You must use “Tasks” as reminders and a Calendar for all of your appointments. Your cell phone should sync up with this system so that you will have it with you always. Therefore, when I have a task due, I can set it to remind me that day or if it is a mentor call, it pops up on my screen that in the next 15 minutes a student is going to call in. Which also tells me I have 15 minutes with my existing student call, so if I need to conduct a three way with a Seller and close the deal, I need to move quickly, as building rapport with Sellers takes time.
I hope this article helps you at least set up your deal files, emails, tasks, and calendar so you too can be more productive in your business and make thousands of dollars. TIME IS MONEY! If you are interested in learning more about my One Day and Three Day Safaris, please email my office and we will send you information on how I can come to your area, organize you, analyze your farm area, call Sellers to get them on board with you, and submit offers to close deals.
Happy Negotiating!
Kimberlee Frank
Kimberlee Frank is a Master Negotiator who has closed over 600 deals since 1998. She is a Mentor, Trainer, Author and Real Estate Broker teaching Investors and Realtors how to creatively purchase and sell short sales with her Step-by-Step System. She has helped Investors and Realtors earn hundreds of thousands of dollars.
