As President of ReminderMedia, I’ve worked with tens of thousands of real estate agents—helping them implement marketing that will lead to more closed deals.

In working with all those agents—not to mention all the top producers I talk to on our Stay Paid podcast—I’ve noticed some trends among the most the successful agents.

I’ve also noticed some pitfalls that savvy agents need to avoid.

Keep reading for the three biggest mistakes real estate agents can make this year (and what you should do instead).

Not devoting enough energy to social media

Believe it or not, this is still a really common mistake I see agents make. In the digital age, having a social media presence is essential.

I’ll go a step further. If you’re not consistently posting on multiple platforms and offering valuable content, you’re missing out on so many opportunities to connect. Like it or not, social media is one of the best ways to build trust and maintain solid relationships with your client base.

So, how do you do it?

If nothing else, use Instagram. Over time, Instagram will become your digital business card. Follow people and get them to follow you.

But don’t just post a photo and call it a day. Invest your time in Instagram Stories. This will allow your followers to see the real, authentic you—which means they’ll be much more likely to want to work with you.

When you’re creating content, you should focus on what I like to call the 3 Es:

• Educate
• Entertain
• Endear

Everything you put out there should accomplish one of those three goals.

On the business end of things, you could talk about what you’re doing that day. Are you showing a home? Planning an open house? Making cold calls? This lets your audience know more about you, as well as the process behind buying and selling.

You might be a little more deliberate about educating by talking about the local market. Create a call to action by encouraging people to DM you for a free CMA.

Another thing you can do is interview people in your community. Stop by a local coffee shop and talk to the barista. Interview security people or a mortgage broker.

Don’t forget to show off your personal life, too! Share photos or videos from sports games, hanging out with your kids, or your hobbies.

Put yourself into a position of trust by checking in regularly. When you don’t, you’ll lose out to all the other agents who do.

Not knowing where your deals are coming from

If you want to be successful this year, you have to make your business mathematical.

What I mean is that you need to reverse engineer your goals.

It’s not enough to say “I want to make more money” or even “I want to close 30 deals”—you need to have a clear path for getting there.

So many agents grasp blindly for anything that might earn them business. Even if they’re successful, they’ve put themselves in the position where they don’t know how to replicate those results.

How do you avoid that same fate?

Simply put: you need to keep track of everything.

If you’re cold calling, know how many calls it takes to get an appointment, how appointments it takes to get a listing, and how many listings to get a sold property.

If you’re running Facebook ads, you need to consistently monitor your results and figure out what gets you the best results.

We had a great conversation with Tom Ferry on Stay Paid (which I’ve linked below). Tom talked about the importance of tracking your performance, and how powerful it is to be able to predict where your business will come from.

You must track the math of your business. You won’t survive if you don’t do this moving forward.

P.S., if you need a little extra help with all that tracking, we have a real estate leads calculator that you can download for FREE.

Failing to follow up

The third, most critical mistake I see agents making is simply not following up.

If a doctor or dentist hasn’t seen a client in a few months, you never hear them referring to that person as a “past client.” That’s because their relationship is ongoing—every time a need arises for the medical services that person provides, they’ll get the call.

Too many agents are unable (or unwilling) to view their business the same way.

If you’re ever going to get off the hamster wheel of real estate—and into the life of freedom you actually want—you must follow up with your database consistently with things of impact that are branded to you.

This is the number one mistake people make. According to the latest NAR data, 64 percent of transactions come from your sphere. If you have 100 deals, 64 should come from referrals and repeat transactions.

In other words, the key to success in real estate is building relationships.

How do you do this? You do it by staying in touch consistently with something that promotes good feelings and not annoyance. Again, you want to use the 3 Es: educate, entertain, and endear.

The need for this kind of marketing is why we created American Lifestyle magazine. It’s a branded, 48-page publication designed to keep you top of mind with the people who matter most to your business. It puts you in a likable, memorable space in the minds of your recipients—triggering feelings of gratitude and reciprocity.

The real reason why this is so powerful is because of the customization features. You can showcase listings or “Just Solds” on your back cover. In your inside cover letter, you can share a story of a client you helped on their home-buying journey.

Want to see how American Lifestyle works? Click here to get a free PDF sample delivered to your inbox.

I’d love for you to try out American Lifestyle and see the power of consistent connection with your clients. But, even if you don’t use American Lifestyle, I hope you take the lessons from this blog to heart.

Make sure you’re focused on what really moves the needle in your business. Focus on building relationships. Follow up consistently with your sphere.

When you do these things, I promise you’ll have an amazing year in real estate.