I just finished reading Grant Cardone’s The 10x Rule: The Only Difference Between Success and Failure, and let me tell you…it is a game changer! Today we are going to cover 5 key takeaways from The 10x Rule, however, every chapter has an abundance of advice. You can apply the philosophies, hard rules and strategies laid out in the book to any business or profession. For our purposes, we will focus on how the information applies to our real estate businesses.
First, let’s go through a little background on Grant Cardone, for those of you who are unfamiliar with him.
I first learned about Grant Cardone when I signed up for his sales training at Cardone University. I learned many specific techniques on improving my sales skills, which furthered my interest in learning more about him. Cardone is a world-renowned sales training expert. He runs multiple businesses, and is the best-selling author of 5 books, including Sell To Survive, The Closer’s Survival Guide, If You’re Not First, You’re Last, The 10X Rule, and Sell or be Sold. He was the star of a reality tv show called the “Turnaround King,” in which he helped struggling businesses get back to profitability. While all of his accomplishments are extremely impressive, I saved the best for last…he has built up a $375 Million real estate portfolio, with a goal of having a BILLION dollar portfolio before he’s done!
Now that you have a better understanding of the author, let’s get to the 5 key takeaways I pulled from the book.
1) Success Is Your Duty
Cardone talks about how “one of the greatest turning points in his life occurred when he stop casually waiting for success, and instead tackled it as a duty, obligation, and responsibility.” He goes on to say most people treat success as if it is an option, which is why most people never truly create success for themselves. His belief is that if you don’t consider it your duty to reach your true potential, you simply won’t. How many people do you know who don’t treat success like it’s their duty, so they spend their entire lives making excuses as to why they are struggling? How about yourself? I, for one, know there have been times I have gone on a listing appointment or buyer consultation and half-assed it. My excuses most likely included one of the following: I’m tired, I’m not feeling well, the potential client seems like they will be difficult to deal with, etc. In truth, I was not focused on making my success my duty, and left the outcome up to “luck.” Cardone goes on to say that luck in nothing more than the result of someone who takes massive action. If you start to look at success as if it is your duty, you will begin taking massive action. Thus, you will find yourself becoming more “lucky” each day.
2) Average Is A Failing Formula
Here is an eye-opening statistic right from the book: “The average worker reads less than one book per year, and works an average of 37.5 hours a week.” The average real estate agent sells less than 10 houses a year. That is less than one house per month. What do they do with the other 350-355 days of the year? You need to 10x your actions so you can create more success than you could possibly ever need. By doing so, you will protect your downside when outside factors start to crush the rest of your industry. Think back to the real estate bubble of the mid 2000’s. Most of the average agents were wiped out, while the extraordinary agents grew their market share. Cardone goes on to say that any undertaking that includes accepting average will fail you sooner or later. Average is the acceptable level of activity for the middle class. It is my belief, that the middle class is on its way to extinction. The new “average” will be the poor. So do you want to be average, or do you want to be the top 1%? I know what my answer is.
3) 10x Your Goals
“One of the reasons most people don’t stick to their goals is because the fail to set them high enough from the beginning,” according to Cardone. The theory here is if you think small, you will never act big. Donald Trump is known to have told his children when they were young that if they are going to think at all, they may as well think big. It makes a lot of sense. The other issue with setting “manageable” goals, is you may have a feeling of being let down once you obtain them. It’s what I like to call the “post-wedding syndrome.” There have been many a bride who have put the effort into planning and executing the perfect day. Once they achieve their “perfect day,” they feel let down after. Don’t believe me? Check out this article. If a manageable goal is selling 24 houses this year, and you 10x it, your new goal is to sell 240. Even if you only hit 25% of your goal, that would be 60 homes! You would have crushed your “manageable” goal by almost 3 times, and practically tripled your income.
4) Expand-Never Contract
This concept is a difficult one for me. Common business practice is to reduce expenses during times of uncertainty. I have even wrote about that in articles on this website, especially when talking about shifts in the market. While the reduction of expenses is sound advice for increasing profits during any economic cycle, I believe Cardone is implying not to stop growing. Using market down shifts as an opportunity to expand your market share from those that are tightening up their positions allows you to come out exponentially ahead, when the market shifts in your favor. Cardone stated a quote in this chapter that was my favorite one in the book…”I’d rather die in expansion, than die in contraction.” I plan on capitalizing on this upcoming shift by growing our team, and taking my unfair share of our market.
5) Customer Satisfaction Is The Wrong Target
Cardone states that one of the first protests he hears from people to whom he promotes the concept to 10x their actions is concern that customer satisfaction will suffer. They are afraid that being too aggressive will turn off customers. I hear this from a lot of real estate agents who are afraid to prospect, or (even worse in my opinion) prospect but won’t close more than once or twice. Think about it this way, say you make a call, ask if it is okay to follow-up, you follow-up once or twice, but then let it go because you don’t want to be to pushy. That seller then goes and lists with your competitor a month later. Not only did you lose out on your commission, but you wasted all that other time you spent on the seller as well. But guess what? That’s not the worst of it…you most likely did the seller a disservice because, if you are a true professional, you most likely would do a better job for them than the agent they picked! The goal is to get as many customers (clients) as possible. Cardone says you should be more worried about non-customer satisfaction, rather than customer satisfaction. As long as you over deliver on your promises, you should be less concerned about customer satisfaction.
While all of Grant Cardone’s books are great reads, I purchased The 10x Rule as an audio book. I highly recommend you do the same, as Cardone himself narrates the book, and his conviction and passion is immediately apparent. Hearing him speak on the subject is motivating in and of itself. To learn more about Grant Cardone, and to see what other products and trainings he has available, go to www.grantcardone.com.