As a busy agent, it’s easy to get so wrapped up in your business – answering emails, writing offers, hosting open houses – that you don’t have time to work on your business. But if you want to increase your production volume, you need to take a step back, take a look at the big picture, and develop a focused strategy.

We met three experts who help agents do just that. As business leaders at Side, Sunny Magner, Ryan Murdoch and Mitch Stever work one-on-one with some of the country’s top producers to streamline and grow their businesses.

Part strategic consultant, part success coach, these business leaders help their agent partners to create personalized business plans to achieve an average growth of 50% year on year. Success stories include House Real Estate (the No.1 team in Sacramento, which has grown from $ 65 million in 2018 to $ 125 million so far in 2021), District Homes (has grown from $ 85 million in 2019 to $ 170 million so far in 2021) and Real Estate Experts (has grown from $ 148 million in 2018 to $ 745 million so far in 2021).

We asked these business leaders to share with us some of the strategies they rely on to help top producers grow their businesses. Here’s what they had to say:

Prioritize your business plan – and never stop refining it

For predictable growth, you need a business plan that outlines your main goals and the steps you are taking to achieve them. This document is the foundation of your business, so it should be tailored specifically to your unique situation.

“I like to start with the why,” said Magner, describing her process of working with agents on personalized business plans. “Towards what goals are you working? When you set clear goals, it keeps you focused on productive and achievable goals as opposed to hypothetical ones.

And it’s not just rookies who can benefit from a business plan. Veteran agents have just as much to gain from writing and reviewing their goals regularly, especially when they are focused on growth.

“Sometimes people hear ‘let’s make your business plan’ and think they have to start from scratch,” Murdoch said. “But I like to throw gasoline on what works, rather than building a whole new fire. I want to magnify the ways in which you have already been successful.

Too often, agents prepare a business plan that ends up at the bottom of a drawer after a few months, never to be referenced again. But this defeats the purpose.

“Your business plan is a map that you can refer to,” Stever said. “It is a living and breathing document that is destined to be revisited. It helps you stay responsible on the path you have blazed for yourself.

Save time with thoughtful automation

Your business plan helps you identify the tasks you need to focus on to meet your growth goals. Once you have your plan in place, you need to find time in your day to accomplish these tasks.

“Once you have your roadmap, we take a look at the activities you need to perform each day and find ways to automate them,” Stever said. Examples include setting up your CRM to automatically follow up on prospects who have visited an open house so you don’t have to contact each one individually, or identifying high frequency, low value tasks that can be easily done. outsourced. “The overall goal is to give you more time, but also to make you more productive.”

Contrary to what some might think, automating a business task isn’t about blindly throwing technology at the problem. It’s about protecting your ability to focus on your core business by finding ways to reduce the repeatable peripheral tasks that occupy your daily life. You are best positioned for growth when you have the space to focus on what you do best.

“Automation is a hot topic right now,” Magner said. “I think of automation as how we solve problems in your business. We bring in the technology or we delegate to solve these problems. “

Murdoch emphasized repeatability as the cornerstone of automation: “If it isn’t systematized, it doesn’t really exist. You can do one thing very well, but if you only do it once, it’s a wonder. You need strong systems in place to grow in a sustainable way.

Focus on recruitment adequacy

Many agents see recruiting new team members as the key to growing their business. This can be a very effective growth strategy, as long as you prioritize crop fit.

“I always encourage my partners to have culture-based talks,” Stever told us. “It’s not just about finding someone who has a license. It’s about understanding your exact need and finding the best person to deliver.

Magner advises its partners to develop their own unique value propositions to use when recruiting. “You have to understand what you have to offer before you bring someone in,” she explained. “This will help you identify the type of team member you want to add and be upfront about the opportunity that lies ahead. “

For Murdoch, it all goes back to the business plan. “If you’re looking to get out in the next five to ten years and want to give someone your business volume, you have to recruit with that in mind. Or if you’re looking to mentor and train someone who will treat your clients the way you do, that’s a different tactic.

Find a supportive community

For long-term, sustainable growth, strive to surround yourself with experts from whom you can learn and who are committed to your success. The form the support takes can vary: you can find it through a coach, your broker or team leader, a brain group or fellow agents at your brokerage.

At Side, each partner agent is supported not only by their individual business leader, but by the community as a whole. Because Side only partners with a limited number of top agents, each partner brings a wealth of knowledge to the community – and agents are eager to collaborate through peer accountability groups and community events.

“For such a competitive industry, I see so much of a split between agents,” Murdoch said. “I see the best players hand their entire playbook over to another agent and say, ‘Run with it, and if you find better tactics than I have here, let me know!’

Remember that collaboration and innovation go hand in hand. If you are striving to increase your production volume, getting the support you need from your community will be a key part of your growth.