Your Mission Statement Redux

As we head into the holidays and rainy weather (I won’t mention the “S” word!) and you review your stats and progress for the year, it’s a good time to fine-tune your unique Mission Statement for your personal business. 

The purpose of your Mission Statement is to, first of all, reflect what you are passionate about in your business and in life, and, second, to give your clients, and especially those potential clients, a solid feel for not only the “what” you do but also a bit of the “why” and the “how.”  The textbook elements of your Mission Statement can be viewed as:

1    .     Who is your target market?

      .     What is your contribution, ie, the features of the service you provide

3    .     What are your distinctions or benefits, ie, what makes you unique or the “best,” and why        should someone consider using you?

 My own Mission Statement is:

I help people with some of the biggest financial decisions of their lives, using highly personalized services focused on making their experience a rewarding one.

The elements of the Mission Statement can be seen as:

Target Market:  people wanting to buy or sell real estate and who are looking for a highly personalized service approach.  Thus, my mission statement will probably not appeal to the REO division of a bank or a flipper looking for low priced bargains.

Contribution:  the features of helping those people with financial decisions through services provided during an “experience” or process, not just a transaction

Distinction or Benefits:  highly personalized services focused on making the experience rewarding.

There is no mention of “selling houses” but there are two echoes of money in the references to “financial decisions” and to “rewarding,” yet the emphasis is on service.  In other words, this Mission Statement not only hopes to appeal to those who look for excellent service, but it also is intentionally not all that attractive to folks whose primary goal may be to win every point of every negotiation or to bottom feed.  Yes, you can and should be selective in whom you want to serve, and recognize your own strengths as well as those areas where you might not thrive.

So, what’s your own passion in our business—and what kind of clients do you want to serve?  Be sure to take some review time to refine that passion and tap into it for your own unique Mission Statement—and a shorter “tagline”—as part of your Annual Business Planning for a strong 2014 and beyond!

David M. Hassler

Director of Coaching