Staying motivated when working from home can be a challenge
for home-based travel agents, says Kammy Thurman, a former home-based agent who
now is a copywriter and travel marketing consultant based in Montana.
Thurman, who provides training support to the Travel
Institute, has several recommendations for success for home-based agents,
collected over 18 years of working from home.
One is to develop good habits that move you toward goals.
“I take a few days each year and look at my goals and make
changes based on where I want to be,” she said. “I've got it broken down in
five-year goals, monthly, weekly and daily goals. I sit down for 15 minutes and
set out tasks to meet important goals each day. I've found it's better to break
them down to smaller bites to get them done.”
Thurman uses an egg timer, set in half-hour increments, to
focus on particular tasks. She's used timers on computers but prefers the egg
timer “because I can hear it running down and it creates a little bit of urgency.”
She uses the timer for Internet research to make sure she stays on track and
not veers off her research, which anyone will tell you is easy to do when on
the Web.
Thurman also advises staying motivated by finding another
agent to hold you accountable, to help you keep your perspective and keep you
on track.
“I recommend networking with other agents and set up an
'accountability group' to hold each other accountable with a telephone call
once a week,” who now operates Anchor Marketing Consultants from her home. “In
Internet marketing, people use 'accountability groups' to encourage each other
and track goals. It's an opportunity for encouragement and to share ideas. I
meet with mine by Skype or videoconferencing.”
Inevitably, there are times when the spirit lags and you
feel you want to close up for the day, she said. Thurman suggests taking just
one step more when you feel like stopping. If you're calling prospects and
ready to call it quits, make one more call, she says.
Finally, she recommends starting each day with a fresh
attitude.
“There's no question that building your business can be hard
work, and it's easy to wake up thinking about all the things you didn't get
done yesterday. So take a moment each morning to start the day fresh. Focus on
the positive achievements of the day before. Sure, there may be things left
over that are nagging at you, but try to release those emotions, let yesterday
go, so that you can tackle them in a fresh, positive way today.”