So, last week I got to spend two days workshopping in the basement of a house in Atlanta.
And you might be asking, what the heck would bring an Australian to Georgia to spend two days locked up in a basement doing anything let alone workshopping?
And what exactly is that?
And in a basement?
Well, the basement did have a full floor to ceiling window that overlooked a woods that adjoined a golf club, so it was a very pleasant outlook.
And I was already in the USA anyway heading to Orlando for a conference, so my travel to Atlanta was a minor detour and the benefit of the workshop was immediate.
On the evening of the first day our host organised a chauffeur driven stretch limousine to drive the four workshop attendees to dinner at one of Atlanta’s best restaurants.
It was a very nice touch from our host, and I know that the workshop was not inexpensive to attend, so there was plenty of wiggle room for him to *share the love* and shout us some dinner.
The meal was superb.
Our workshop host specifically chose the waiter that he wanted to look after our table for the evening, and we were not disappointed by his attention to detail with our food, and our service.
The food was exquisite and the wine pairings to each course were superb.
A very pleasant and memorable evening was had by all.
So, what’s my point and how does it relate to dentistry?
Firstly, although our dental practices are being squeezed by corporates and insurers, we do know that there is considerable profit in owning a dental office because otherwise the corporations would be taking over some other industry.
As practice owners we do have a considerable advantage over the corporates because we have our hearts and our souls invested in our dental business.
What this truly means is that for our customers, they are receiving service from someone who has the commitment to the business, rather than someone who may only be operating from an employee mindset.
The business owning dentist is the one who chooses what materials and sundries are used on his patient. He can make it as fancy or as no-frills as he likes. And this is what happened at my workshop.
The owner of a dental business can decide how much of his profit he needs to remove from the business, and how much of his profit he is able to reinvest in his business in the form of luxuriating gifts for his valued customers.
I know, that with my workshop, if we the attendees had been shipped off back to our hotel on that night, sure we’d have most likely not been bothered.
But for the sake of maybe five to ten percent of our tuition fee, we were treated to a very fine dining *experience*, and it will be the memory of the experience that evening that will last long after the workshop and keep us as attendees more likely to recommend this type of boutique event to others.
And isn’t that what we want to have as patients in our dental office?
We do want customers who are happy to pay for a premium service, and who are grateful for the extras and the attention to extra details.
Remember, author and blogger Jon Acuff said:
“Customers will always remember your generosity; they will never forget your greed”
So make sure that your clients and customers do get to *feel some love* from you. It need not be a limo ride, but think of ways, and gifts, that you can give a little back…
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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I had the pleasure of playing two rounds of golf this week at Pinehurst North Carolina with a retired dentist from the Boston area who now lectures to dentists.
Well actually I played four rounds of golf at Pinehurst, but only two with this gentleman.
The beauty of his story is that he was, or is, only sixty-four years old, and has been retired from wet-fingered dentistry since he was fifty-one years old.
And that’s not a miracle.
It’s simply because he knew his number.
Do you know your number?
He often asks dentists who attend his lectures if they know their number?
“What’s your number?”
What is your number?
What is the amount of money that you need to have saved, in cash and real estate and stocks and bonds, that will allow you to retire and live to the end of your life in a manner that you see as being comfortable?
What is that number for you?
Do you even know your number?
Do you know what your number is now?
Are you on track to reach that number?
And if so, by when?
So many dentists out there don’t know when they want to retire and with how much they need to retire at whatever lifestyle they wish to choose.
And guess where those dentists will end up?
Nowhere.
Omer Reed told me seven years ago that ninety-five percent of dentists who reach the age of sixty-five cannot afford to retire because they have not reached their magic number…. the amount of money they need to have saved in assets to fund the lifestyle that they have desired.
And so those dentists continue to keep on working.
Have you worked out what that number is for you?
I hear you say:
“Why should I have a number at all?”
And I say:
“Why not?”
You studied for all those years and you invested all that time into yourself to learn all these great skills, and then you invested in your Dental Office and your facility, and all up you’re probably starting your career from a number that’s close to negative $1.2Million….
And after all of that head start you’ve given other careers and professions, I still hear dentists say that they’re not focused on money.
I’m here to say that dentistry is a wonderful profession if you focus on the right customers out there and the right sort of dental business that you need to build to attract those customers.
And here is the secret….
Getting to your number is easy when you work out the way you need to do it.
But you have to know what your number is.
You need to be focused on achieving your number, at a specific time in your life, and not just some day.
My golfing friend retired from dentistry at age fifty-one.
I’ll be retiring from wet-fingered dentistry next month at age fifty-seven.
You owe it to yourself, for all of that time and money that you’ve invested in yourself, to set your number and then do what you need to do to reach that number.
And of course, if you need advice on how to get there, then ask for the advice.
There’s no prizes for trying to work it out on your own.
How do I earn it, and how do I save it?
We know that Dental School doesn’t teach you dental business and strategic savings and the business skills necessary to build a successful profitable business.
Don’t be part of the ninety-five percent who never get there….
You don’t need to be there.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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And yes, I know it is the most expensive real estate on the planet, but I like the way that I am treated and looked after when I fly up there.
It really is the little things that make the big differences.
I have friends who say they can’t see the value of paying extra to fly Business Class, or First Class, because, as they say, the back of the plane arrives at the destination at exactly the same time as the front of the plane.
And I see their point.
I’m writing this blog now as I wing my way across the USA from San Francisco to Chicago.
And I know when you read this blog I’ll be in the middle of a few games of golf at the World-Famous Pinehurst Golf Resort in North Carolina.
But this trip has so far just emphasised my belief that, if you can, it’s better to travel at the front of the plane.
I was impressed with my Qantas flight across the Pacific and with the attention I received at all times from my cabin crew, but what really impressed me was the courteous way that the Head Steward made a point of coming around at the end of the journey and thanking each and every customer personally for travelling with Qantas.
Now I’m not sure that he did that for every one of the 400+ passengers on the flight, but I know that he did so to all those who travelled in my business class cabin.
It’s a nice touch.
And it takes very little time and costs nothing to do.
And it only goes to prove that it is indeed the little things that make the big differences.
Because other airlines don’t do this.
Other airlines that I’ve used simply shuffle you off and shuffle you on.
When I arrived at Sydney airport for this trip there were queues as far as the eye could see of people waiting to check in.
But for Qantas passengers with loyalty, there is a “fast lane” to avoid those queues, or at least reduce them.
There’s also an express entrance to Customs and Immigration at Sydney airport when leaving Sydney, for those whose tickets qualify.
And, there was a Priority Line at San Francisco airport when passing through security there for those who qualify.
Not having to wait and wait and wait in line is a big, big bonus, I feel. I don’t know about you, but who likes waiting in line these days? The less wait time the better….
When you fly priority it allows you access to certain lounges at the airports where you can relax and sometimes dine in comfort before embarking on your journey, as opposed to simply having to wait at the gate.
When you fly priority you find that your luggage appears on the carousel earlier when you arrive at your final destination.
So what’s my point?
My point is not to boast.
My point here is to simply say that in any market there will always be a certain percentage of the population who are more than happy to take the “premium” option as opposed to the regular ordinary option.
And that applies in dentistry.
If you can offer your patients a “premium” experience compared to the regular ordinary common garden variety vanilla experience that all of the other dental offices in your area are offering, then there will be a percentage of the population who will seek out your services because they feel that your Dental Practice is going to be where they feel that they would prefer to belong.
And those patients who choose that option will be happy to pay extra for that service.
How do I know?
Because I did it.
I built a high grossing, high fee dental office in a very average part of Sydney, where people lived in average sized homes and earned average wages…..
And I’m just your average dentist…
But, I was able to charge considerably more for my fillings and for my crowns than what my competitors were charging.
Because I provided my customers with an experience…..
A good friend of mine used to say,
“There are no pockets on shrouds and no roof racks on hearses”.
You can’t take it with you when you go.
And there is a significant proportion of the population out there who are more than happy to pay a premium price for better service and attention.
Are those people worth finding?
Is it worthwhile trying to be the dentist for those people?
What you will find is that those people will be the percentage of your dental practice who are less stressful to deal with and are, as Pareto said, part of the twenty percent of your practice who provide eighty percent of your income.
It’s a nice part of the world to do business in….
And all it takes is a tiny little bit of effort on a consistent and regular basis.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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One of the benefits of being in business, or should I say, one of the advantages of being a business owner, is that you have the ability to choose.
Because it is your business, because you are the owner, you are in the position to choose who you will do business with and who you won’t do business with.
Yes.
You have that choice..
But I hear you say…..
“David, what do you mean?”
I hear you say….
“But David, don’t I have to keep my customers satisfied?”
And I’m here to tell you….
“Yes…..”
“But, no…..”
You cannot be every thing to every person.
Full stop.
So why try to do that?
Why try to be everything to every person?
It just makes no sense…..
You see, here’s the rub….
“There’s enough business out there without having to try and chase ALL business.”
Yes. It is true…. You do not have to be everything to everybody. There is sufficient available business out there, that you do not need to chase it all.
You only need to obtain a percentage of it….
You do not need to own it all.
That’s the problem…
In business, a lot of people think in terms of domination…
Rather than thinking in terms of percentage of market share…
You see, it makes more sense to capture a small share of a big market, and ride the wave, rather than try to be the only player in any market, and try to eliminate any other competition…
That makes no sense….
It’s all about position.
And posture.
You see, I’ve seen dentists who chase after every dollar.
Every single dollar.
Yes.
Every possible dollar….
And I wonder why….
One of my private clients was doing the same thing…
He was chasing after the low fee dollar, not realising that the low fee dollar was actually not profitable, was actually costing him, was actually causing his dental business to run at a loss.
Yes.
Because he was under the allusion that busy-ness was actually good.
Whereas busy-ness was an allusion, was actually a ghost, a furphy, that was meant to be perceived as good.
When it was not.
When it was indeed a loss.
Yes.
You see, sometimes in chasing the dollar, we fail to realise that we are in fact spending more than the dollar to achieve the acquisition of the dollar….
And why the heck would we do that?
Why the heck would we work hard, to make less profit than if we were to do nothing in the first place?
To me that makes no sense whatsoever….
You need to value your time….
You need to put a dollar value upon your time, upon your expertise, upon your experience…..
If you do not value your time then nobody else will.
People will take advantage of you.
There will always be people who will take advantage of you, so don’t provide those sorts of people with opportunity.
You know the types…
They promise you the world, but never deliver.
All Hat. No Cattle.
All talk and no action sorts of people.
“Look after me doc, and I’ll refer all my friends/all my family/ all the people who work for me….”
“Look after me doc, and I’ll refer ABC celebrity [whose cousin is married to my next door neighbour’s boss’s wife’s old school friend’s cleaner’s cousin] to be your patient”
Have you ever had a patient like that?
Don’t fall for the blowhards. There are plenty of them.
Hold your line.
Every time I’ve had my arm twisted to do someone a favour I’ve lived to regret it.
I’m much happier to do business on my own terms rather than on the terms of others.
Set the terms by which you want to do business and maintain your stance.
You know what a fair price is for your expertise and your work. Stick to that price.
Do not waiver.
When you buy concert tickets, do you receive a discount for buying more than one?
When you buy airline tickets for your family, do you receive a price concession for buying more tickets?
Both of these transactions take exactly the same effort by the seller irrespective of the number of tickets sold.
So why do some dentists reduce their fees when they do multiple restorations at one appointment?
When you buy six jars of vegemite at the supermarket they don’t reduce the price for buying more than one at a time.
I’ve seen some dentists reduce their fee when they are treating large families.
And that’s not quite logical too.
Don’t be persuaded to waiver from your intended line.
Stick to it.
You’ll sleep better knowing that your work is appreciated for what it is, fine work, rather than for any other lessening factor.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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