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The Delivering WOW Dental Podcast

Founder of Dental Boss Academy and the Dental Boss Platinum Coaching program, Dr. Anissa Holmes helps practices grow by focusing on leadership, effective case presentation, systems optimization, and implementing high return marketing. Dr. Holmes is also dentistry's leading digital marketing expert, having trained over 5000 practices to leverage social media to effectively grow their practices. Dr. Holmes has been named one of Ultradent's Female Icons of Dentistry, Dental Product Report's TOP 25 Women in Dentistry, and has been featured in top publications such as Dental Economics, Dentistry IQ, Dental Products Report, and Entrepreneur Magazine. Dr. Holmes is also the author of the bestselling book, Delivering WOW: How Dentists Can Build a Fascinating Brand and Achieve More While Working Less. In addition to coaching and being an International Dental Speaker, Dr. Holmes has been a featured speaker at Social Media Marketing World and Funnel Hacking Live, and her Delivering WOW Dental Podcast has listeners in over 125 countries.
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Aug 11, 2020

Hi guys, and welcome to another episode of the Delivering Wow dental podcast. We're talking all about startups today and how you can launch your startup without spending a ton of money. So what brought me to create this podcast is, recently, I was actually in a forum in Dental Town, and one of the marketers that was there made a really good point, is that a lot of times when we have startups, a lot of times people are not thinking about their marketing. They're budgeting for their equipment. They're budgeting for their supplies. They're thinking about costs for their team, but many people are not actually budgeting for their marketing. And they actually made a recommendation that dental practices put in between 20 and $25,000 in their budget to launch their startup.

And what was really interesting is that a lot of times I see those numbers, and because I've seen so many startups launch with a thousand dollar budget, or even less, I know that there's actually another way. And so today what I'm actually going to be doing is sharing that framework and how we're able to get startups to be able to get to success. And what I've seen happen so many times are startups that are coming in and they are typically being able to fill up one or two months of their schedule. I've seen startups follow the framework and become fee for service. I've seen them hire an associate within six months. I've seen startups go to a million dollars. And so the framework actually absolutely works, and so super excited to be able to share.

To give you a little backstory, how this actually started was, about maybe three or four years ago, Ashley [inaudible 00:02:07], many of you guys know her, she is the founder of the Startup Facebook Group. She actually reached out to me and she said, "Anissa, I was listening to your podcast, and I heard you talking about the power of Facebook Live. And I've never done a Facebook Live before, but I actually went onto my personal page and I did a Facebook Live, and so I wanted to share it with you." And it was actually her and it was really, really, a really great video. She was at the site of her startup. She was in her car and she was making a huge announcement that she was leaving her associateship and that she was going to be creating this amazing dental practice.

Now, when you look at the office location, it didn't look so nice. Like it was old, it needed a lot of work, and she said, "Isn't it beautiful," right? And she says, "Well, not yet, but it will be, and I'm going to have you to follow me and to be able to see what we're doing."

So she reached out to me and she shared that video and I said, "Oh my gosh, this is amazing. Let's go ahead and create your practice's Facebook page right away." And she said, "But I don't have any patients yet." And I said, "No, let's go ahead and do it and we're going to document the journey." And so through that process, she started to document her journey, and between documenting her journey and some strategy with Facebook marketing, she was able to get about a 1000 or maybe 1100 people following her practice. By the time she opened, she had over 50 patients booked, and it really led to a lot of success and people in her community knowing what she was known for.

Now, if we fast forward three or four years, what's been really exciting is how many startups who have come to me and said, "I saw what you did for Ashley. Can you help me?" And the answer is yes. And so, what's been really cool is being able to utilize this framework on practice after practice after practice, and it works every single time. It's almost like a principle or almost like a principle which is gravity, which is if I drop my pen on the ground, it's going to go to the ground. Why? Because it's a principle. It always works.

And so when we start looking at learning how to grow our practice through frameworks, whether it's going to be a marketing framework, a startup framework, whether it's going to be how can we hire our

team, case acceptance leadership, once we work in frameworks of proven processes and systems, it's going to be pretty simple to be able to get the same result.

And so, what we have in terms of startup framework is really looking at, first of all, being willing to step out of your comfort zone. There's a lot of time spent in going to dental school and in building our startup and then having our dream, and there are so many people out there that need to hear our message. They need to know about us so that we can help them.

And so, what's really interesting is that the first episode of this podcast, if you go back and listen to it, it was terrible. My office manager said, "Dr. Holmes, it sounds like you're reading." And I said, "It's okay because I have a calling and I have some way that I can help people. And so I know that once I continue and I'm consistent, I will get better, and people will hear my message and I'll be able to help them." And so that's the first thing that I encourage all of you to do as you're looking at building your startup, is to be willing to step out of your comfort zone, be willing to stretch out and say, "You know what? This really matters."

From there, what's really important is showing up. And I always recommend that you do your first Facebook Live as a video to come on and let people know what you're doing, why that community matters, why you're launching your startup, what your practice is going to look like when it's open, how your patients are going to feel when they come to your practice, right? Those are the key elements. And from there, you're going to want to be consistent. What's been really cool, and we have evolved over the years and we've seen things that have really worked very well, such as, every Thursday, coming on, even when you're not open yet, and doing a Tooth Talk Thursday, talking about dental topics, talking about why it's important to go to the dentist, what's the difference between cleaning your teeth at home and in the practice, talking about three different ways that you can replace missing teeth, or what's the difference between a veneer and a crown, right?

These are ways that you can start building a following. And once you do that, what will happen is that people will start to look forward to what you're doing, taking people behind the scenes of, "We are getting our sign and I'm so excited. Let me show you our sign," and they will see your excitement, right? Getting on and sharing your story is so powerful.

One of the startups that we had, Dr. Paul Win that we work with in New Orleans, his second video had 15,000 views. And what's really, really special is that he came on right before he actually opened his practice and he did a video and he talked about what it really took to become a dentist, that he had tried multiple times to get into dental school and he didn't get in. And he was wondering if he was good enough. And he went through the dental school, he got in. And over the last few years leading up to opening this practice, he's been given an opportunity to work in a practice where they've done very advanced dentistry, and this is his calling and he's there to serve. And he's so proud of what they're building and what they've built and how they're going to be able to help people. And it's so powerful.

And so the first thing is showing up, taking people behind the scenes. Now, there is a second step and this is where a lot of people, they can do the first step, but they get stuck on this second step, and it's really understanding the power of Facebook marketing. What's very special about Facebook is that Facebook has some very unique features, where once you're getting on and you're doing your videos, where you can actually start to accumulate what we call a retargeting audience. So anyone who's watched your videos, anyone that's commented on your videos, now you can actually start grouping them in an audience, so that when you're boosting future videos, and ultimately when you start running ad campaigns for your high value services, your implants, your Invisalign, once you open your practice, now you will be able to show those future posts to people who have already seen you, people who have already connected with you.

And so that's one of the most powerful features of Facebook marketing. And so a lot of people will ask me, "Anissa, well, what sort of audiences should we set up with startups?" And it's typically going to be, because many people don't have a website, you don't have patients yet, right? But what you do is have the ability to keep showing up and doing your videos. And so you have your video views audience, you have your engagement audience, right? All of the people that have commented and shared.

And then from there, what you can do is you can actually build what we call lookalike audiences. And so you can go to Facebook and you can say, "Facebook, give me a group of people that are just like people who have commented on my videos. They like similar Facebook pages. They have similar Facebook friends. They live in similar locations, and let's get that expanded." And so that's the strategy of how we're able to get startups to be able to have this audience of loyal followers.

Now, there are some other little tips that you can utilize such as, on your Facebook Lives, you're going to want to ask people, "What part of town are you watching from?" And those comments will increase the number of newsfeeds that Facebook actually puts it into. There's some strategy there, right? Also, letting people know, "It would mean the world to me if you share this with everyone that you know. We are so excited about being in this community and this message that we're sharing today," especially with your Tooth Talk Thursdays, "this message can be very helpful. So if you can do us a huge favor and share." And so, what happens is that, again, you start to build this following.

Now, there are some additional things that you can look at. One of the things that we put in place with Ashley, and one of the things that we've done for the other startups that we work with, is starting to actually create an opportunity to collect emails. And so, as we start getting closer to opening, one thing that we love is actually integrating in what we call a funnel. And it's something that takes honestly about 30 minutes to an hour to set up. This is something that we show our startups how to do, and it doesn't take very long. We actually give them the template.

And so now, they can actually go ahead and collect email addresses, giving people an opportunity to be able to be able to register to become a VIP of the practice, to be able to register to have an opportunity to win a $5,000, sorry, a $1,000, that would be a great 5,000, a $1,000 gift card or free teeth whitening for life. And so, you give that opportunity. You also give them an opportunity to get a special bonus gift, to be notified when you are opening, are taking appointments, to be notified when you have your VIP grand opening party. And again, they get a bonus gift.

And that bonus gift can be something like when you schedule within whatever time if you are already making appointments, then we will be able to give you special pricing off of your first visit, maybe a $50 off, right? So it won't be every visit, but maybe that first visit, and there's a timeline there. So that creates that urgency for them to go ahead and schedule.

And so between, like I said, showing up, between understanding how to boost and use Facebook and implement Facebook ads correctly, understanding on that next step, again, how to be able to collect email addresses. And that's very powerful because as you are opening now, you can eat email everyone and say, "We're open." And if you have an online scheduling link, you can go ahead and send it out for them to go ahead and book your appointment.

And so, in this last 12 minutes, hopefully this has been super helpful for you to share. It doesn't take a lot of money. A lot of times, people are spending on mailers and Google ads and all of these things that are incredibly expensive. And to be honest with you, the problem there is that, a lot of times, people don't know who you are. And so you have to now not only spend a lot of money on marketing, you know, mailers, you're looking at sometimes $5,000 for a mail drop, but they don't know you, which means that a lot of times now you have to put in discounts.

And for me, that's not the way to get started with your career in dentistry. You want to be able to attract

the right fit, people who are looking at you and saying, "You know what? I know you're the expert, I know you can help me and I'm ready to come in." And that's exactly what you're able to do with Facebook.

So hopefully this helps you. I love working with startups. What's been really cool over the last few years is seeing so many of them grow. Now, we actually have a startup mastermind where startups are coming together every month, which is really cool, sharing what they're doing, what they're working on, coming together to discuss where they are in their marketing journey. And it's really amazing to see. And typically, people will ask me, "Well, how soon before we open should we get started? How soon before we open should we contact you and get started with our marketing?" And typically, it's between three and four months of opening is what I would typically recommend. We do have people contact us ahead of time and I say, "Just wait until three or four months. That's a sweet spot."

And what's really cool, and I'll share this quick story, is does this always work? And I'll share the story of Cassandra. Cassandra came to me and she said, "You know what? I've seen you work with Shana Home. And I've seen what you've done with Tiffany and Tiana. I've seen what you've done with Ashley and so many people. And so I knew if it's worked for them, it'll work for me." But what was really interesting is that she started doing her posts. She started showing up and doing our Facebook Lives and, well, the engagement did not come.

And she came to me, she said, "Am I doing something wrong? Like what's going on? I'm really getting frustrated." And I said, "You know what? The only thing is that we haven't given it enough time. Like you've been doing this for three weeks, four weeks. So just trust the process, trust the framework." And sure enough, when she opened, she had two months of patients there for her. Within two months, she actually decided to go totally fee for service. Within six months, she's now looking at bringing on an associate and she's actually saved cash out of profits to be able to equipped new operatories for expansion. And the only marketing that she's done is social media and Facebook marketing, implementing the framework.

And so, if she can do it, if others can do it, you certainly can too. So one of the most common questions I get is, "Anissa, Can you help me?" And the answer is yes. And so whether you have just purchased a practice and you're ready to get patients, or you're building a brand new startup, our framework is here to help you. I'm here to help you and to lead you so that you too can have the same level of success as so many startups that we work with. Feel free to reach out to me on Facebook, Facebook Messenger, or reach out through our website. I'd love to be able to have a chat.

All right, guys, I hope this was super helpful for you. We look forward to seeing you inside of our Dental Boss Movement Facebook group, where we have dentists that are coming together for support and action taking. And again, thank you so much for listening to the podcast. We'll chat soon.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Delivering Wow podcast with Dr. Anissa Holmes. We'll catch you next time.

 

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