In eight short years, Athena went from being an avid interior designer to a real estate agent closing $22 million in real estate sales—all while battling serious health issues. She’s created a career in real estate by being clever, creative, and learning to love the art of helping people. Her business is based in Denver, Colorado, and she’s proven herself as a wealth of information and a skillful coach.
Growing up, Athena grew up being around real estate. Her dad was a residential developer, and she wanted nothing to do with housing or real estate. Instead, she went to school for interior design—a profession that allowed her to work closely with people with a creative outlet. After several years in the interior design business, she realized she wanted to push herself more. To do more, and to create a larger impact. Athena catapulted herself into real estate, which was the perfect fit for her skills.
Athena is a people-person. She keeps in touch with her clients, no matter what! Even during times of serious health issues, she spent her hospital time writing letters and messages to her database, but also writing offers! She became unstoppable.
She asks questions—lots of them. Why? Because she cares. It shows you (the Realtor) is invested and are genuine in your guidance and answers. As an interior designer, Athena also works with her clients (for free!) on their interior design, giving guidance, bringing up things to think about, and sharing ideas.
The CORE’s Greatness Tracker is one of the important tools that Athena uses to track her business, and to stay motivated—the excel spreadsheet she keeps lets her visualize and correlate the long hours she spends writing notes and posting on social media, with the business and referrals she receives. When business gets chaotic or too large to mindfully manage, the simple task of organizing your progress and wins makes a world of difference.
Athena’s business is set up for the long-haul. Anyone can learn from her skills and processes!
The Neighborhood Realtor is proudly sponsored by Treadstone Funding and Neighborhood Loans. For more tangible tips in real estate marketing, check out Matt's book, The Tangible Action Guide for Real Estate Marketing available on Amazon.
In eight short years, Athena went from being an avid interior designer to a real estate agent closing $22 million in real estate sales—all while battling serious health issues. She’s created a career in real estate by being clever, creative, and learning to love the art of helping people. Her business is based in Denver, Colorado, and she’s proven herself as a wealth of information and a skillful coach.
Growing up, Athena grew up being around real estate. Her dad was a residential developer, and she wanted nothing to do with housing or real estate. Instead, she went to school for interior design—a profession that allowed her to work closely with people with a creative outlet. After several years in the interior design business, she realized she wanted to push herself more. To do more, and to create a larger impact. Athena catapulted herself into real estate, which was the perfect fit for her skills.
Athena is a people-person. She keeps in touch with her clients, no matter what! Even during times of serious health issues, she spent her hospital time writing letters and messages to her database, but also writing offers! She became unstoppable.
She asks questions—lots of them. Why? Because she cares. It shows you (the Realtor) is invested and are genuine in your guidance and answers. As an interior designer, Athena also works with her clients (for free!) on their interior design, giving guidance, bringing up things to think about, and sharing ideas.
The CORE’s Greatness Tracker is one of the important tools that Athena uses to track her business, and to stay motivated—the excel spreadsheet she keeps lets her visualize and correlate the long hours she spends writing notes and posting on social media, with the business and referrals she receives. When business gets chaotic or too large to mindfully manage, the simple task of organizing your progress and wins makes a world of difference.
Athena’s business is set up for the long-haul. Anyone can learn from her skills and processes!
The Neighborhood Realtor is proudly sponsored by Treadstone Funding and Neighborhood Loans. For more tangible tips in real estate marketing, check out Matt's book, The Tangible Action Guide for Real Estate Marketing available on Amazon.
Matt M. Welcome to the Neighborhood Realtor podcast. With me, your host, Matt Muscat. This is a podcast for real estate industry professionals who are doers. Each episode will feature an interview with a top producer or someone who is doing things differently in an exciting way. For those who already know me or have read my books or blogs, my brand of marketing is tangible and repeatable because smart salespeople don't need to reinvent the wheel.
Matt M. My promise to you is that in each episode you'll leave with one tangible idea that you can take to the bank. Hey, everybody, thanks for tuning in. And as a reminder, the podcast switched from being marketing in other markets to the neighborhood realtor. So we're super excited about this name change. We're going to have the same mission. Singer Guests.
Matt M. Speaking of which, today's guest I'm super pumped for because I feel like I want to hang out with her every time I'm in Colorado now. We did a better week and I had a great time. So everybody welcome that Tina Bronson to the show.
Athena B. Hello. Hello. Thank you so much for having me on. The neighborhood realtor, I could not be more excited to be here.
Matt M. Well, it's super funny, because for those of you who don't know us both super well, when we did our phone call, we found out that we had, like a million friends in common. Because you were part of the same coaching program as half of my colleagues, the core coaching programs. So a lot of great coaching programs out there.
Matt M. But we seem to do a lot of the same people in a lot of the same ideas. So I'm really excited to chat with you today because I think a lot of the things that I've been professing for the past couple of years on this show are a lot of things that you have actually put into practice. So I think it's a really great example for people.
Matt M. You know, for those who aren't familiar, the course system is just do the work, trust the system, do the work, count like trust the process, do the actions and the results will follow, count the actions. And you know what kind of results you can predict. So I'm pumped that you're that kind of person.
Athena B. You know, I always say it through interviews and different conversations, but I am part of the core and there's a very select few that are familiar with the program. So when I saw you when I heard you say that you are also, you know, in the core, I couldn't be more excited because I think it's a really special program in the way that it takes this crazy industry that we're in that can be extremely chaotic.
Athena B. And there's so many things out there that we could all be doing, but it really simplifies things and I'm excited to chat with you more about it.
Matt M. Absolutely. So just to clarify, I personally am not in the caucus. I'm not a realtor or a lender, but all night all of my colleagues.
Athena B. MG.
Matt M. Clients are so so I feel like I've been inundated with it for about the last ten years and I don't have the official secret tattoo. I don't go to the meetings with the hoods on. I'm just kidding. That's not.
Athena B. Brand. Year later, when you come visit in Denver, I'll brand you with with our cult logo and just kidding it all.
Matt M. Well, so tell us. So we know you're in Denver because he said that already. But walk me through how long you've been in real estate and what kind of production you did in 2021.
Athena B. Absolutely. So I like to preface with I grew up in real estate and my dad was the residential real estate developer. But because of that, I don't think anyone ever grows up saying, I want to be a realtor. I mean, I don't know about you, but I've never heard that. And I think being in real estate from a young age, I wanted nothing to do with it.
Athena B. Honestly, I went into interior design after college. I absolutely loved homes and I loved design and I loved working with people to create their vision, but just felt like I wasn't pushing myself as much as I could be. And it wasn't the career path that I wanted to go in. So a good girlfriend of mine a little over eight years ago, one of my mentors now an incredible agent up in Bozeman, Montana.
Athena B. She said, Athena, you like people a lot. You love homes. You love being able to be a pivotal person in transforming lives. Why don't you go into real estate and it's really something that I just had never thought about. So eight years ago, I took the plunge. I quit my job the day after for having that conversation with her, got my real estate license while I was rehabbing my ninth knee surgery.
Athena B. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Definitely should get a world record for that. And I haven't looked back since, but my dream job I sold, say, last year, I was able to sell up a little over 22 million and I also spent about three months of that year in the hospital. I've got a lot of chronic health issues, so I like to say I had my best year ever, so in a lot of homes, helped a lot of people.
Athena B. And some of the offers I wrote were from a hospital bed.
Matt M. Which I think like that might end up being the title of the episode, like Best Year Ever From the Hospital Bed. And I think it's fairly easy, like we're going to get to the systems and stuff, but when you have your system so dialed in and when you come at your clients from a place of honesty and you have true personal connection with them, it's totally possible to do that.
Matt M. Like this is one.
Athena B. Of the.
Matt M. Few industries where you can only continue to make an income, but you can really continue to grow it even when you're laid up due to medical issues, hurricanes, a lot of people in the country are going through stuff like that right now. And our industry is unique for that reason, not for everybody, but for those who have processes, systems, teams, etc..
Matt M. So I'm pumped about that. So in your in your neck of the woods, you know, like what's your average price point? Like, you know, I'm sure there's agents in Colorado who are doing the high end, the low in the middle, and like where you are, your people.
Athena B. Yeah, absolutely. So in 2022 or excuse me, 2021, I don't know what year it is. Apparently my average price point was about 671. So far this year, my average price points closer to 800. And obviously some of that has to do with just market appreciation. And but I think my clientele is around my age in general and it's kind of moving up into their next home and I've been fortunate enough to be able to help with that.
Matt M. And would you say so in our market, like 600 is just approaching luxury. It's like a couple of years ago it was definitely luxury and now it's kind of like 500 up. Is that kind of like it's expensive? 750 more is more luxury, but it depends. Like for you, 600, is that low end in Colorado or is that like super middle.
Athena B. Of the.
Matt M. Road? Like.
Athena B. It's pretty middle of the road. You know, we our price point, the average price point in Denver for a home is right around 700,000.
Matt M. Okay. So you're operating at or at or just teensy weensy below in your previously the median price point exact. I love to hear that.
Athena B. I'd say 900 and up goes luxury.
Matt M. Got it. I see that just for all the listeners out there in different markets where your average price might be 300, I want them to understand that you're selling to the common man or woman just like they are. We have agents, you luxury. We have agents that do foreclosures. But it's it's I always like talking to people and figuring out what they're doing is the strategies that we're going to discuss today are what got you to where you are.
Matt M. And that's what is going to help get others to people of that same, you know, middle of the road place.
Athena B. I love that.
Matt M. You mentioned you were an interior designer first. And I feel like we have to get a little harder because one of the things I always say is that everyone starts in real estate somewhere. But most of us started in real estate with at least a couple of years of experience in a different industry. And your industry was highly related because, number one, you were already in houses all day.
Matt M. Number two, when you understand interior design, you can sell a house better or you can help someone select a house better. So walk us through like what extra value you sell to your clients today, because of that extra experience you had. And I know not everyone out there has that interior design, but this will give people some different ideas of how to take their past experience.
Matt M. And it really catapulted into a sales technique.
Athena B. Absolutely. And I think as an agent, especially as the market is shifting, it is so critical to be able to offer a you know, a wide range of services to your clients, how to be able to really assist them in any of their home needs, you know, from prior to purchase a property to ten years down the road.
Athena B. I want to be that, you know, I want to build such a strong relationship by being a valuable resource for them that if they need design and help three years after purchasing a house, that I'm their first phone call. So I was fortunate to go into the world of interior design. I, I love art. I was, you know, one of my majors in college was art history.
Athena B. And being able I was trying to figure out how to create a tangible career that could use that creative outlet and use my love for architecture and art and design and interior design really was that starting place for me. And I didn't I of course, didn't realize what it was teaching me at the time, but it is something that I use with my buyers and sellers every day that I'm working with them.
Matt M. So now how do you get more specific? Yeah, how do you how do you use interior design with your buyers? How do you use it with your sellers? Because I think for those of us who aren't who don't have an eye for design, it would be great for them to know what they can hire someone for and kind of what they should look for in design help.
Athena B. So absolutely. And I think that there are, you know, a couple of the tips that I'll go over are things that even if you don't have a design background, are learned skills that any broker can pass out. And being able to guide your client with those is paramount. And so if I'm working with a buyer, oftentimes, you know, we've all been in so many properties that are either completely empty and very, very hard to imagine what your life is going to look like in them or they need to be renovated.
Athena B. Maybe some walls need to be blocked down. Why can't I talk knocked down, not blocks down. Or maybe a seller has also, you know, way too much stuff in the home and the buyer, you know, isn't really able to imagine what the home could be for that. And so it's really our job to be able to help them understand what their day to day life is going to look like on a property.
Athena B. You know what? How can we use the space? What walls can be moved? What design concepts can we bring to the home to make it feel more like there is, you know, even just simple, as simple as, okay, where's my couch and my TV going to go in this empty room because I can't even envision it. So I really believe that as agents, we need to be able to help our clients paint a picture of what their day to day life is going to be.
Athena B. And it can be as simple as I said as helping them understand where their furniture is going to be, or it can be really getting diving in with them and helping them redesign a kitchen or redesign, you know, maybe an entire floor rearranging walls. So I love to be able to do that.
Matt M. But I have to start I have to stop you right there. And really, for everyone listening, that might have been a write this down moment, because I think for so many of us to write down what types of design elements we should be asking our customers about, like what things are important to them. Because like I'm thinking about like every property I've bought for myself to live in, I know is the buyer.
Matt M. What items of furniture in my house I want that I'm definitely going to move over. And I know for a fact, like as soon as I get to that new empty space, I'm like, I know that true. I need the perfect place where my where my nice Eames chair that I've had for ten years can face the TV where it will be in the middle of the room.
Matt M. It needs to have, like, a little corner. I want to know, like, oh, my gosh, my, like, special, you know, my big painting or my photo thing or my kids bunk beds. Like, I need to be able to visualize the things I'm definitely taking in my new house. And so if I'm the realtor and I'm really trying to, like, make a perfect match with less showings, I want to know from that person what furniture items and what elements of their life are moving into that new home.
Matt M. So on every single showing from number one to number, whatever, I'm able to have those conversations. And I think the fact that you're doing that is so huge because you can probably save yourself a lot of time in not showing clients homes that, you know, aren't going to be worth it.
Athena B. Absolutely. And one of, you know, a really tactical strategy for understanding what your client's what their taste is, what they like and what, you know, what elements of their home are going to come into the next house, take the initial buyer console in their own home. You know, I think we it's so often that as brokers, we're only doing that as a listing agent.
Athena B. We're doing listing presentations in someone's home. But it's just as important to see how the buyer is living currently, whether it's in an apartment and you're helping them by their first home or whatever the case may be. We need to understand what their day to day life in their current property is, what those specific you know, do they have an Eames chair that needs a special location?
Athena B. Do they have, you know, two bunk bed sets that need to go in because they have four kids? What are what are the items that are really, you know, going to have to have a place in the new home? And if I'm previewing a property for them, if I know that, you know, it doesn't fit what or it doesn't have the ability to be transformed into what they want because it might not on the you know, at the surface, it may not be perfect, but there are, of course, adjustments we can make.
Athena B. But understand who your client is. And I think by being in someone's home, you really learn a lot and then going into, oh, go for it.
Matt M. Matt So one of the other things though is like asking all these questions doesn't just help you learn what your clients are looking for. I think one of the other pieces is it shows them that you're interested, and I think there are some really basic basics psychology there, because if your client, the more questions you ask, the more answers they give you that are more than just yes or no answers, the more invested they're going to feel in you.
Matt M. Because if they're thinking at that point, still are interviewing other agents, that they've already poured out their heart and soul and explain everything to you psychologically. They're already invested in you. Whether or not they've signed your agency agreement yet they're like connected with you because you ask them all their questions and they're not going to want to go through that again.
Matt M. And then even if they do interview someone else, if that person isn't asking them as detailed questions, they're not going to go with them.
Athena B. And it's so true. And, you know, it all comes down to relationship based business, which I know that we share that belief system that, you know, I want to be the the agent that you call when your family's growing and you need a bigger home. And I wanted to be a part of your lives, and I don't believe that that happens in doing transactional business.
Athena B. If you're just asking surface level questions that are giving you, you know, basic answers just to sell a house, you're not doing it right, in my opinion.
Matt M. I will jump in. So I know that's on the buy side. So when you once someone has closed on that home, I know that like the design piece is huge because like people get stressed, like we bought our new house and it was bigger, not a lot bigger, but we had two more rooms to fill. We had a little bit more square footage in every room.
Matt M. And now we had kids where before, at our old house, we really didn't have to think about kids because they were babies. How it could be stressful to think of like, how are you going to fill the house if you just spent all this money on a house? You don't want it to look like a college frat house anymore.
Matt M. I know for most dudes like yeah, if we didn't, if we don't be intentional, our houses end up having like liquor bottles mounted everywhere with blue lights and they look like frat house. And so like, how are you helping your clients make the most out of things after blows? Like what extra value are you adding that you think a lot of other agents could consider adding as well?
Matt M. Because, you know, I think most people realize that we're making a pretty decent commission of them and they want to hear about all the value that they're going to receive.
Athena B. Absolutely. And they should be receiving that value. You know, I think it's it's crucial not to just end your relationship with a client after the transaction is over. So I love personally, I've got a moving crew that I have an extremely close relationship with. So I love to be a part of my client's moving process. And as my my movers are moving, their pieces and helping them to position them in a way that really is the best possible use of a space.
Athena B. So I love being a part of that. But then when if a client needs help with purchasing furniture and designing rooms, that is when I just get really excited and I think of it as more of like me than being a part of work that just has to get done. I love being able to kind of bring in some idea, you know, walk the space with them, maybe go furniture shopping, even help them find what is going to really make the best use of their new home and what it's going to make it pop.
Athena B. And I'm really good about doing it on a budget. I am an estate sale junkie and usually you hear, hear the term estate sale and you think all old furniture and kind of antiquated. But most of the large homebuilders that are out there, they have estate sales almost every weekend selling off the furniture in their model homes. That's never been used.
Athena B. And you can get these beautiful pieces in your clients homes for a fraction of the price, but it really. Yeah. So I love going, you know, helping provide resources like that, helping pick out different, you know, designing their home for them. If they give me creative freedom, I promise them I will make them look good and I will make sure that it's functional and doesn't cost too much because they just spend so much money on the property.
Matt M. And what mean for all the people listening like think about how you have simple. This could be the ads, your strategy when you're interviewing a client on the buy side, you could ask them like, hey, like do you plan to do all the design work yourself on where on placement of furniture, artwork, etc. or do you need help?
Matt M. You either do it yourself or you get them to develop a relationship with an interior designer who can do an inexpensive design console for you that matches their style. For you to even add that question in to your initial buyer console, it's going to make you seem so much more valuable special than anyone else. They're going to talk to you.
Matt M. And then when you actually follow through with that afterwards, that you'll be able to go in and take photos afterwards, which will be further stuff that you can use in your marketing portfolio. And it's a great reason to reach out to your clients efforts to make sure that they love their house because you're still in touch with them.
Matt M. The longer that you as a salesperson can increase the amount of time that you're in constant communication with the client, that that's the referral cycle. You can get great referrals all throughout your active communication with a client before you just, you know, flip them to the Hey, I'm going to get ask for an email a couple times a year.
Matt M. So I think I absolutely love that. And I. Right, go ahead.
Athena B. One more tip. I want to throw in there. And I think it's you know, it's something that many brokers might have. But I think the value and importance of having a preferred vendor list that you you know, a reliable list of contractors, movers, designers, anything that is home related, you should have a go to for so that when your client closes, if they need someone for back or they need someone for design, work or painting, you have someone that you've worked with for years that you know is reliable, going to do a great job and then you can provide that value to them because it's hard to find good work these days.
Athena B. I swear I, I hear horror stories left and right. So if you can provide someone that you trust that is invaluable to your.
Matt M. Client, well, I feel like we have to double down on that right there, because there's the one side is providing the value to your client. But on the other side of it, you you're making yourself a go to person for this client and especially if your client is moving to your city from somewhere else where they don't have a lot of relationships.
Matt M. You are now their closest personal relationship, even though they've hired you and they can, if they know that they can, that you're an expert at everything, they can come to you for referrals like realtors should be the lenders should be the best connectors out there. So if I'm a realtor and you just you're moving to Michigan, I don't know why you would ever do that.
Matt M. I'm just kidding. Michigan. It's fine. It's it's nice out right now, but you might snow tomorrow. Who knows? But if you're coming here, you might need a place to go for your hair and makeup. You might need a babysitter. You might need a lender, a title agent, insurance agent. Those are the obvious ones. Roofer You might need a place to buy kitchen appliances or a certain type of kitchen appliances.
Matt M. Me As the real estate professional, I need to let you know you can come to me for any referral need possible. That's number one. But number two is if I is the person making all the referrals, start tracking all the referrals that I'm giving out. I can now hold all of those people accountable at the end of the year to make sure that like, Hey, are you somehow feeding my business back?
Matt M. Whether that's me business or it could be, you know, maybe it's chipping in for a client appreciation party. It could be anything. But I mean, these are relationships and being a connector and all that social capital is invaluable. So it's sort of shock that you're doing, you know, 20 plus million dollars when you're employing that type of strategy.
Athena B. And, you know, it's all triangle of trust, but just something we talk a lot about in core as having being able to introduce someone that you trust to another person that you trust, and then they automatically know that you're connecting them with someone you trust.
Matt M. So let's go to that because we to talk about a lot of a lot of the stuff we've talked about, like I hit a little bit on other podcast, but we've never discussed the triangle of trust. So I think for everyone out there and I'll give my explanation of it and then I'd love for you to pepper pepper step in.
Matt M. But if I'm referring you like I'm a lender, you're a realtor and there's a client, you know, we're two pillars of the triangle. And then the clients, the other pillar, I'm going to the client say, Oh, my gosh, you're moving to Colorado. You absolutely have to talk to Athena. She's the best. My other clients, John and Susie, just used her.
Matt M. They were raving about her. I think you guys are going to love her. You guys have a very similar personality and she actually lives in the same general area that you guys are hoping to buy. I'm going to connect you with her today. Let me know if you don't hear back by tomorrow morning and then you like what happens when you then get that referral?
Matt M. What do you then do?
Athena B. I get that referral? I say, Oh my goodness, you know, I'm so grateful to have been able to work with Matt over the years as I always have such an amazing time assessing his referrals. I know that work, if they get along incredibly, I would love to take great care of you, show you all around Denver everything that the city has to offer and really help you get comfortable and familiar with the city.
Athena B. But you're going to find a home and so.
Matt M. Important me she just did is I pumped her up. She pumped me up. So both pillars of the triangle are really stood up, stood up tall. What happens is if you have a if you have a referral where they just say like, hey, I call three people or I don't know, like the governor refer you to so-and-so, but you don't tell them that they're great.
Matt M. The other person doesn't say you're great, neither of you are great. Like this only happens if the tribe, if like all pillars are strong here. So that's why the triangle of trust is so big. It's such a.
Athena B. Great.
Matt M. Market. I don't think it's ever been more important.
Athena B. 100%. And I firmly, you know, I do a lot of referral business and it is with agents. But I have formed really incredible relationships with all over the country through, you know, different means and being able to do, you know, if I know that agent and I have a pretty good idea of their clientele, it makes it so much fun to do business with them.
Athena B. And it's so fun to be able to, you know, call that agent that referred me. It called that lender that referred me and kind of share stories of how I'm getting to know their their clients and how I'm assisting them and making Denver their new home and what their life is going to look like. So it just further deepens that relationship on on all angles of the triangle.
Athena B. And it's, it's the best way to do business, in my opinion.
Matt M. I love that. And, you know, give a shameless plug really quick. But for any real estate professional out there, whether you're a lender, a realtor, title professional, if the people that you're referring to most are not pumping you up for a fact, every single time they start talking to one of your clients, email me, dummy, I'll find you someone else you can work with.
Matt M. There's a million great realtors out there, probably like 500,000 great realtors out there. Now, I know there's like some big little.
Athena B. Lenders office area.
Matt M. There's like a couple hundred thousand great lenders out there that I can connect you with title people to insurance agents. You need people that you're pumping up that are pumping you up back. But so, Athena, I want to skip to a slightly different, more personal topic now because this is fascinating to me. But you you went through some medical medical stuff and not go to crazy, crazy deep on it.
Matt M. But you were in the hospital for a couple months out of your best year ever. So probably not your best health, your ever or your worst healthier ever, but your best year ever. You spent you told me you spent three months plus in a hospital bed. So I know that the only way you could possibly hit those kind of numbers is by having some crazy systems, patterns of business, prospecting time, obviously support of clients.
Matt M. But walk me through what your or your week looks like when you're in the hospital bed and what business activities you were able to do really from anywhere. Because I want people out there to understand that, like whether they're at home, at the office, at the hospital, on the beach, doing whatever, maybe outer space we all have, we find out things like what what type of systems do they need to ensure that their business grows anywhere?
Athena B. Absolutely.
Matt M. So you're I'm glad you're doing better, by the way, because it doesn't look like you've ever had this in your life.
Athena B. I appreciate that you're not seeing the parts of my body right now. But yeah. So, you know, I've I've had health challenges over the last five years. I got Lyme disease catapults it into a lot of autoimmune diseases. And because of that, I've had to really look at what, you know, what I'm able to do at all times that day, regardless of if I'm in a hospital or if I'm getting a plasma transfusion.
Athena B. Like what are the key things that I can be consistent at in my business that I know will bring me in a future business? And I've had to be really intentional about that. My past is in athletics, so I was a professional skier for a good ten years, and because of that I I'm a firm believer in coaching.
Athena B. We've talked about core. One of the activities that CORE has us do is what's called filling out a greatness tracker. Now your greatness tracker is almost like an Excel spreadsheet and it goes Monday through Sunday and it has at the activities that you should be doing to expand your business every single day and I think that anyone can create their own form of greatness tracker and key it to what are the activities that, you know, you're you're good at that are your bread and butter that if you're doing consistently all the time that you know you're going to get business from.
Athena B. So is that having face to face meetings, having break breads, a.k.a. eating, eating dinner with clients or lunch or whatever it may be? How many phone calls a day are you making? Are you making videos that you're blasting out to your sphere and putting on social media? Are you attending events where you're able to interact with other people in your industry or clients are use?
Athena B. One of my favorite things that I was doing consistently for my hospital bed is writing personal notes. You know, I write Our Greatness Tracker has are you writing four notes a day to people that are in your sphere? So that is, you know, these are things that you can be doing, whether you're, you know, in a hospital bed or on the beach or, you know, maybe just going through a rut.
Athena B. I think right now there's a lot of agents that are struggling with the way the market has shifted. And I think the more that we focus our energy on tangible items that we can be doing every day, it's a lot easier to, a, be engaged in your business, but be be positively engaged in your business. So you know that if your if you've got a list of items that your for me, the accountability piece is paramount.
Athena B. And that's why I have a coach. Sure, I can be doing the I can say I'm doing these items on my greatness tracker. But if I don't actually have someone to turn it into that I'm accountable to that. I respect, then I don't necessarily know that I'm getting those things done as effectively. So it really strips business down to the basics.
Athena B. And I think that it's so easy to overcomplicate what our day to day looks like. But when you're neglecting the basics and the basic tenets principles of being a successful realtor, you notice 60 days down the line that your business is going to take a huge step. But if you take your, you know, your guiding principles and the items that, you know are non-negotiable for allowing your business to be successful and you're doing them every single day, you're going to see so much more consistency in your business.
Athena B. You're going to feel internally that you are not as scattered. You don't feels chaotic in your business. You're not having such big ups and downs. You you can almost rest assured knowing that you're putting the work in. And I think that's that really is what it comes down to is are you putting the work in? Are you getting your calls made when you might not feel like making calls like, of course, there have been so many days, you know, over the last five years of my I have my help.
Athena B. I hate saying journey, but my health journey, where do I want to get up and and get dressed and go to the office so that I can make my phone calls and and really do all my touchpoints to make sure I'm staying close to my spirit. Now, there are so many days, but I don't want to do that.
Athena B. But when I start doing it a it makes me feel better. Like interacting with people makes me, I think, makes anyone feel.
Matt M. It's another.
Athena B. Thing. Yeah. Real estate can be very isolating. So, you know, making sure that you're really connecting with people in a genuine way and building those relationships is so fun. It's an upper, but it also is it's things. But I, you know, the only person responsible for success is you. And it's so easy to make excuse as to yourself, but but, you know, I'm sick right now and I feel horrible.
Athena B. So I'm not going to be doing I'm not going to get things these things done. But at the end of the day, the only person you're really letting down is yourself.
Matt M. When I think too, like when I talk to agents and lenders in this market and they say they're slow, what does that mean?
Athena B. I mean, literally put your foot on the gas pedal, your partner.
Matt M. Put your foot on the gas. But the crazy thing is when I then say, okay, what is your calendar filled with? What time blocked activities that you know will generate leads are you working on? And 99% of people have nothing to say. Yeah. And they'll try to come up with, like, a thing and they'll be like, Oh, well, I'm.
Matt M. I do social media B.S. Is it time logged in your calendar? Do you send out 20 messages a day? Do you post four times a week of these types of like it's.
Athena B. Your actions.
Matt M. That's like, what is your action stuff? Social media can be an amazing action step if it's time locked in your calendar with a certain type of message that's going to a certain group of people, and you're doing it on a consistent basis. Writing notes. Same thing. If you just send a note out after, you know, random things.