How Teledentistry Can Lead to Better Case Acceptance – Episode #337

Teledentistry uses online video interactions to make it easier for patients and dentists to communicate—and it’s seen mixed results. With a more personal approach, virtual consultations can dramatically increase case acceptance. On this episode of the Dentist Money™ Show, Ryan welcomes Joe Chickerillo and Tom Brown from Your Virtual Consult to explain how your teledentistry experience can be enhanced to make a real difference.

 

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Podcast Transcript

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, hello there everybody. Welcome back to another episode of The Dentist Money Show sponsored by Dentist Advisors, a no commission, fiduciary comprehensive financial advisor, just for dentists like you all over the country. Check us out at dentistadvisors.com. Today on the show live from Voices of Dentistry, Tom and Joe, from Your Virtual Consult, talking about some of the new leading technology in dentistry to get higher case acceptance and make more money. And those are all things that put smiles on our faces. And we talked about all the details in the show live at VOD this year, Scottsdale Arizona. It was really cool to sit down with these two and just hear about all the cool new innovations in dentistry that are making, running a practice and educating patients and, increasing collections and higher profitability and case acceptance and maximizing time efficiency, which is really important to me.

Ryan Isaac:
Really cool stuff here. My thanks to them and, for spending time with us. If you have questions for us, you can post them in the Dentist Advisors discussion group on Facebook, post a question, we’ll post an answer and we’ll use it on the podcast later. And if you wanna chat with us directly, just go to dentistadvisors.com, click on the Book Free Consultation. And we’d love to hear from you, we’d love to have a chat with you. And thanks for being here everybody, enjoy the show.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome to The Dentist Money Show where we help dentists make smart financial decisions. I’m your host, Ryan Isaac. And I’m here with two guys that just walked up to the booth at Voices of Dentistry. And I was like, we need to talk to you guys because you are making dentists more money these days. And that’s what we mostly care about, that’s what we’re caring about. So we’ve got Tom Brown and Joe Chickerillo, although I wanna say Chico Rio. And he says, when you’re in Texas, you say Chico Rio, like Amarillo.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah, the closer you are to the border, that’s…

Ryan Isaac:
Chico Rio, I like Chico Rio, Chickerillo. Tom. Tom and Joe from Your Virtual Consult, YVC as the cool kids say.

Tom Brown:
There you go.

Ryan Isaac:
How are you guys doing? Thanks for being here.

Tom Brown:
We’re fantastic.

Ryan Isaac:
Are you enjoying Voice of Dentistry?

Joe Chickerillo:
Always.

Tom Brown:
We’re having a blast, actually this is my third time here.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And no matter what’s happening or where we go, you run into just a lot of fun people because they’re out there people.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, it’s cool. Yeah. Yeah. This is a fun, if anyone’s listening and doesn’t know what this is, you probably do. It’s just all the nerds in the podcasting world…

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
In dentistry are here.

Tom Brown:
The fun people.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And we’ve got our tables and our microphones out and you know, it’s funny is like, we’ve been coming here for a few years, too and before, like all this equipment is now it’s accessible, it’s not as expensive as it used to be. It’s easy to use and operate. It seems complex, but it’s like super easy. But three years ago it would be people with a laptop and a white pair of Apple headphones recording podcasts.

Tom Brown:
Yes. I remember that. I remember that.

Ryan Isaac:
I remember when our podcast started five years ago and I remember thinking like, man, the quality of audio is really bad in podcasting and no one cares. Because everyone just wants to listen to some good content and no one cares.

Tom Brown:
Authentic. Authentic, genuine staff.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, it’s like real. That’s what’s cool about it.

Joe Chickerillo:
A lot of that with the whole COVID, with the lockdown crisis, it was like everybody upgraded their…

Ryan Isaac:
Bought stuff.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah. All the streaming and podcasting equipment. Honestly, it was like, it became a lot more accessible.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s cool. It’s cool, man. I’m like this is a little like Uncle Rico moment for me. But I used to be in a punk rock band when I was younger.

Tom Brown:
Cool.

Ryan Isaac:
But this was before no social media, no YouTube. There wasn’t even MySpace wasn’t even around yet. And there was no digital technology. So we literally had a four track recorder. So it was kinda like this thing. It had four mic inputs and we would mic up the instruments, but it would record on cassette tapes. Like we would make our first demo tapes. I mean like how old am I? That this is…

Tom Brown:
That’s cool.

Ryan Isaac:
You know what I mean?

Ryan Isaac:
And like to get like…

Joe Chickerillo:
We’ve come a long way.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Dude to get like shows and to get booked on bigger shows, we’d have to record these tapes and then go to shows and then try to sneak behind and give them to famous people, and be like “Hey, when you come to town, can we play with you?” And now I’m like, dude, basic programs that come with a MacBook, like GarageBand and all of this equipment is cheap, it’s easy to use. You can upload your stuff to like all these social media spots and like people can know you and it’s just, it’s a cool world we live in to produce stuff and then get it out to the world. It’s just cool. I love it.

Tom Brown:
Because you’re sharing who you are with everybody.

Ryan Isaac:
You are sharing it, man.

Tom Brown:
It’s just so easy to do now. Communication is so much easier now.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s so much better and it’s cool. Okay, so YVC.

Tom Brown:Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
I just wanna make sure I keep getting that right.

Joe Chickerillo:
You are.

Ryan Isaac:
Your Virtual Consult. I’m getting that right.

Tom Brown:
Yes. Nicely done. Nicely done.

Ryan Isaac:
You guys… Everyone listening will probably know you guys began as kind of like an internal company with the Wonderist Agency, a product built inside the Wonderist Agency.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
Is that the right way to say it?

Tom Brown:
That’s exactly what it is.

Ryan Isaac:
All you know…

Tom Brown:
And they spun it off last year.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes. Spun it off. Like officially spun it off for a few years it was like incubated inside.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
Nested in the Wonderist Agency.

Joe Chickerillo:
Sister company now.

Ryan Isaac:
The sister company. So let’s just talk about… I think people will be familiar with what this is.

Tom Brown:
Okay.

Ryan Isaac:
But it’s like it’s futuristic and explain it. What are we talking about? What is YVC, Your Virtual Consult? I keep wanting to say consultant. I keep wanting to say that.

Tom Brown:
A lot of people do, so it’s interesting, but you’re saying it perfectly every time.

Ryan Isaac:
Your Virtual Consult.

Tom Brown:
So, Your Virtual Consult creates an opportunity for the patient to get to know the doctor in a genuine and authentic way prior to coming into the practice.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes. Can I just pause there and say our company’s been around for 15 years, hands down, not even close. The best thing that’s ever happened was having a podcast where people could do that exact same thing. Before engaging in what people might feel like is an expensive process, a long-term process. Maybe a relationship that’s a little intimidating, they can go listen to my stupid voice for like six months and if they’re still hanging on, they’re like, “I get that. That’s my people. I get that. I relate to that.” So, I just think that’s the coolest. It’s a chance to get to know somebody before you go engage in something that costs money, that’s intimidating and maybe hard to engage sometimes.

Tom Brown:
And it was perfect that you said it was incubated at Wonderist, because it really started off as teledentistry, and that really kind of took off during COVID, and then there was a discovery that teledentistry wasn’t as popular because dentists were kind of getting stuck on the video for longer than they wanted to. And then when the patient wanted to see the doctor, they didn’t get to… They still wanted that personal relationship. So when Michael and Laura and we partnered with them at our past company for five years, they’re awesome. They tapped me and Joe go, “Hey, you wanna come in? We’re gonna spin this off.” We’re like, “Yeah.” We start doing our due diligence. We discover that teledentistry isn’t super popular. But there are a number of…

Ryan Isaac:
Like the concept, there’s something… It was like, this is almost it, but not quite it.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yes, exactly.

Tom Brown:
And that’s what we’ve kind of figured out. It was the clients that were using this actually in a way to allow the patient to get to know them, and it didn’t have to be in real time, that was having a dramatic impact on case acceptance when they came in the door. Case acceptance now nationally is 41%. When a patient goes through these three simple videos, they’re only 30-60 seconds long each, case acceptance is jumping all the way to an average of 89%.

Ryan Isaac:
Gosh, that’s insane.

Tom Brown:
It’s insane how… It’s so simple how it is, and honestly, what I get… Especially you talk to doctors now, they’re like “All right, come on. That just seems unrealistic. You’re gonna more than double it by looking at… ”

Ryan Isaac:
It makes sense to me. Yeah, Yeah.

Tom Brown:
“Is it a Jedi mind trick or something?” It’s really not. It’s the 41% is really because people are focusing on what the doctor does and trying to get them to explain the treatment better. And it’s really not the issue. The issue is what’s going on with the patient and they come in and they’re afraid. They don’t know what’s happening.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, what to expect.

Tom Brown:
They don’t know if it gonna be fixed, what’s it gonna cost, oh, and the intimidating relationship you talked about, they’re all afraid of the doctor, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, exactly.

Tom Brown:
So we have kind of like pivoted a little bit with Your Virtual Consult in the last six to nine months, and we’re focusing on making the patient feel comfortable and confident with the doctor and the practice before they come in. Are you familiar with the Maya Angelou quote “People forget what you said, forget what you did, but they always remember how they made you feel?”

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Tom Brown:
When you go… And it’s hard to explain it. You have to actually see the videos ’cause they’re scripted out and they cannot be marketing productions, because nobody wants to look at a commercial.

Ryan Isaac:
No, no, no. A person, a human.

Tom Brown:
They just want to… Like you and I are just talking. And if you talk to me for a few minutes and you don’t like me, which is probable…

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, it’s fair, 50:50. [laughter]

Tom Brown:
Then we’re not gonna vibe. You probably don’t come into the practice, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Move on, yeah.

Tom Brown:
But if you do look at that and you’re like, “Hey, this is a guy I’d actually… ”

Ryan Isaac:
I like this person.

Tom Brown:
“Go out and have drinks with. Oh, and he does know something about dentistry.” It’s not clinical really. It’s a little… It just doesn’t go that deeply into it ’cause I’m not a dentist, and if somebody starts telling me how they’re gonna do an implant, okay, first of all, you’ve scared me ’cause I don’t wanna know that. [laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, I know.

Tom Brown:
But now I remember you in that first impression, and I was scared of you.

Ryan Isaac:
What are the three videos you’re talking about? What’s the… Why three and what are they? What’s the series here?

Tom Brown:
It’s a welcome… I’ll let you take this, Joe.

[laughter]

Joe Chickerillo:
All right. So you get… Basically it’s…

Tom Brown:
So I can give my voice a break.

Ryan Isaac:
Chickerillo.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yep, it’s…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, we’ve all been talking basically like nonstop with this thing.

Tom Brown:
For two days. [chuckle]

Ryan Isaac:
Like interviews, interviews, interviews, and yeah, we all sound terrible.

Tom Brown:
And it’s fun.

Ryan Isaac:
But it’s… We’re having a good time.

Joe Chickerillo:
I’ve been eating cough drops [laughter] like nobody’s business for the last 48 hours.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, man. The throat’s sore. Yeah, yeah. It’s all good. Okay.

Joe Chickerillo:
Seriously. But yeah. So the way that it works is you actually get an interactive widget that goes on your website. It can also be tied into anything you’re doing marketing-wise, like Facebook, Google, Instagram, text and email reminders, recall campaigns, anything that the practice is doing.

Ryan Isaac:
So I’m a new patient. I go to your website. That’s where it begins?

Joe Chickerillo:
Yep. Exactly. So you see this interactive video widget. It’s like a little animated thing that you click on and it’s a popup of a video. That’s the doctor talking directly to the patient. We call that the welcome video. Thirty to 60 seconds. “Hey, I’m Dr. Joe. I’m the founder and owner here. I’m really excited to meet you. Why don’t you send in a couple of pictures, tell me your story and I’ll send you a personalized video consult back.”

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. Cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
That’s the welcome video. Every single patient sees that. They then click get started and they have an option of what it is that they’re kind of interested in hearing more about. So for instance, do you want… Are you looking into aligners or dental implants or veneers, teeth lining.

Ryan Isaac:
Got it. Just generally, what are you thinking about, yeah.

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly. They click on that and the second video comes up, also a prerecorded 30-60 second video, and it’s a little bit more context around that specific thing. So what does Invisalign entail? What is dental implant? What does it cost? How long does it take? That kind of a thing.

Ryan Isaac:
A little explanation.

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
What to expect. Setting up expectations.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yes, then they fill out… The patient fills out their contact info.

Ryan Isaac:
So real fast, the doctor has probably prerecorded a series of videos depending on what gets clicked. That’s what gets…

Tom Brown:
For each for treatment, he actually records a different a video.

Ryan Isaac:
A different video. Sure. Okay.

Tom Brown:
Exactly.

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly. So then the patient fills out their contact info, gets to send in a couple of pictures, tell kind of like a little story or why am I inquiring?

Ryan Isaac:
So cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah, and then they get a video back the next day from the doctor that can be personalized or it can be automated, but it feels like the doctor is sending a personalized recommendation to that patient, telling them a little bit about what they actually recommend.

Ryan Isaac:
Got it.

Joe Chickerillo:
So it’s going into, how long is this gonna take? Is insurance gonna cover it? What’s it gonna cost? It’s got some before and after pictures you can attach to that consult.

Ryan Isaac:
More expectations, more details.

Joe Chickerillo:
And a call to action, something where, “Okay. Do you want them to call and schedule with the practice or do you have a online scheduling tool like LocalMed or Flex where you can tie that directly in?”

Ryan Isaac:
Got it.

Joe Chickerillo:
Whatever your call to action is. So it’s a fully automated middle of the marketing funnel tool.

Ryan Isaac:
Shout out to LocalMed.

Tom Brown:
Yes, that’s what we just did. We did that shout out.

Joe Chickerillo:
We were just on their podcast a minute ago.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s where you came from, Tom?

Tom Brown:
Yes, that’s where we came from, both of us actually.

Joe Chickerillo:
Both of us actually.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, both of you were there? I didn’t know that. Okay. Cool.

Tom Brown:
Yeah. But all the while when they’re looking at these videos, they’re getting an idea of what that doctor’s like and they’re feeling more comfortable and confident, and the key to sending that response video the next day is two things. One, the passage of time from the first couple of times they see these first videos and then the next day, so in the brain, it’s like, “I’ve seen this person on multiple occasions.” So they feel like there’s a little bit more of a relationship there. The second reason is we created… When you onboard, you’re not only creating the welcome video, and then each service video, you’re recording a response, a standard response to each one of these that looks like it’s a personalized one. So the only thing you’re not using is their name, but you feel like it’s directly to you based on the background and stuff like that.

Tom Brown:
But at the end of the day, when you look at your leads, if you wanna do a personalized one, it’s a simple click of a button, and now you click, because you’re recording this off of your cell phone or on the laptop, whatever, and it takes 30 seconds to do it, and now you can have a personalized one. But I’ll tell you, over 90% of the ones are now automated because the doctors are so busy during the day. They don’t have time to stop and then sit down, do a video. Now, with the automation in place, it’s really a set it and forget it system.

Ryan Isaac:
Can I ask… I imagine you could have made it 12 videos. You could have broken it… How did you arrive at three… Those categories, like those stages, how did you arrive? Not two, not 12. Like how did that come at three?

Tom Brown:
The original…

Ryan Isaac:
It can be overwhelming. Right? But it’s gotta be enough.

Tom Brown:
Yeah. Exactly. And so there are other virtual consult platforms out there.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
But they focus on the clinical and all they have is the one video after you put in a bunch of information, then they send you a video back.

Ryan Isaac:
You submit some stuff. Okay.

Tom Brown:
And some of those can take like 8-15 minutes to do.

Ryan Isaac:
So more time consuming, significantly, more automation.

Tom Brown:
Way more time consuming.

Ryan Isaac:
We’re just talking about like moving through a funnel of potential patients.

Tom Brown:
Yeah. And even with this though, it was important to get to know the doctor right away. That’s why the welcome video.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally.

Tom Brown:
Just something and maybe before you leave today, you can stop by and see the video because…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I’d love to. I think I have on the website, but yeah.

Tom Brown:
It makes a difference. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
I wanna go check that out again.

Tom Brown:
If you see that it’s just so casual and like that Maya Angelou thing.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally.

Tom Brown:
It makes you feel a certain way.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, haven’t we learned that in the last… I mean, it’s… This whole podcast thing and videos. We were just talking about that with the Wonderist people, younger people, newer generations are the, like putting themselves out there in content, showing the world who they are, dancing, singing.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
Like acting, lip-synching whatever. It’s like a normal thing.

Tom Brown:
Everybody expressing themselves.

Ryan Isaac:
Themselves authentically. Like you don’t have to be someone else. You’re kind of just like doing who you are and it’s becoming, it’s a very natural thing. And it’s a good connection tool. It’s pretty amazing.

Tom Brown:
Yeah. And so why the three videos? Well, we wanna have a welcome, now you’ve gotta explain the service.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And then you get your response.

Ryan Isaac:
A response. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
To us it was the least number that would accomplish what we needed to accomplish.

Ryan Isaac:
Still do. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
But because each patient, when they do this and you send ’em a response, YVC creates an individualized microsite where you can now communicate back and forth. So if you want to send them more videos…

Ryan Isaac:
You can.

Tom Brown:
You actually can and now they are personalized.

Ryan Isaac:
So if you as the doctor, you’re like, “Oh, this is a pretty big case. I really want explain some more things.”

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
You can jump on and…

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s really cool. Okay.

Tom Brown:
And the platform was originally made to do teledentistry. So the times that we’ve seen people are happy about it is usually in these post ops, especially if you live far away from the dentist, you don’t need to come in, for every three weeks to check on the aligners. Sometimes you can just do that on a live video consult. Now you’re both saving time. And in a lot of states you can charge for that. And even insurance is now starting to pay for that.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. That’s so cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
Texas was the last state that, to get on board with that. But as of last year, they finally legalized that as well.

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Wow. So walk me through, I’m a dentist, I own a practice, and I wanna incorporate this. How does this, how does this work? What’s the process? And I was talking to Laura from Wonderist Agency. And she was telling me how one of these steps can be a challenge for some people, which is getting a dentist to put themselves out there in the content, be authentic. Don’t climb up. Yeah. Like just make a video of yourself and talk. And it’s a little, it’s weird for people to do that.

Joe Chickerillo:
They’re not… It’s not something that a lot of people in dentistry are used to doing.

Ryan Isaac:
Are used to doing.

Joe Chickerillo:
Like you said, it’s kind of a younger generation thing.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally. Putting yourself on content.

Joe Chickerillo:
But here’s the cool thing.

Ryan Isaac:
Unscripted sometime, but these are scripted. So yeah.

Joe Chickerillo:
I was gonna say, that’s the cool thing is we actually give you all of the… Or a doctor. We give you all the scripting. We can have a teleprompter feature in there. So you can be looking basically…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. She was talking about that. Cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
Right at the camera and you’re just reading your own… Now you can use our scripts entirely.

Ryan Isaac:
Very cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
You can use ’em not at all. Or you could just kind of pick and choose a little bit, but the whole thing is kinda pre-written for you.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. So here… And be yourself, read this. Okay. So I see. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And the process is 45 minutes client success manager, we send you the scripts in advance of that call. You get to choose the time that you wanna pick, 45 minutes. And now you’re gonna record those videos on that implementation call. And it’s really just to see how it works, but the reality is, you do it really well the first time, because you’re, you know you can re-record it. So there’s no pressure on you to do it.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. It doesn’t matter.

Tom Brown:
But once that 45 minutes is over, you’re pretty much up and ready to go.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s ready. How many in like an average, maybe this is too general of a question, but I’m just curious in an average size practice, how many people are hitting this video in a day? Are there any stats around?

Tom Brown:
It’s really… It’s so all over the place.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I bet.

Tom Brown:
Because it really depends on who’s coming to your website.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Who and where, where are they coming from? What your market is like.

Joe Chickerillo:
What kind of marketing are they doing?

Tom Brown:
Exactly. And you can put this on Facebook, Instagram, Google my business, even on Yelp. And the more you, let’s put it this way, do you wanna work with four out of 10 people that come to your practice or nine out of 10? So why not have your marketing kind of instead of end up making a call, why not have it directed to this welcome video and this funnel that pre…

Joe Chickerillo:
That qualifies the business for you.

Tom Brown:
Dentistry is the only place where you have the highest paid subject matter expert qualifying leads, the dentist, nowhere else in any industry I’ve worked have this.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s really rare.

Tom Brown:
This is why this works so well and why the case acceptance jumps so much.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. That’s really rare. And I mean, again just going back to this, you… As the provider of the service, I can relate to this. You want to talk to people who are already familiar with you.

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Because maybe this is just my own pet peeve, but I kinda don’t like getting on the phone when someone’s like, “I just found your number and I got in your calendar, but I don’t know anything at all. And I haven’t… ” Like, what do you even do? I have no idea. And I’m kind of like, we’re both gonna waste our time here.

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You know, because I’m not, I’m not gonna pitch someone something, like go learn.

Tom Brown:
You’ve not done your homework yet. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Go learn what you even want.

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And then here’s some stuff to learn about what we even do and then let’s connect and let’s see how those match up. And so I can relate to, I bet that’s just really refreshing in dentistry. A patient… They know what they want and then they can kind of get to know the dentist first and go “Okay. I think we have something here.”

Tom Brown:
So we’ve got stats on the 41-89% and we have an analytics component that’ll tell you how many people, how many impressions, how many people click on it and all that. But anecdotally, the doctors are really excited because they’re saying, it seems like if a patient goes through the YVC video funnel, I vibe better with them.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly.

Tom Brown:
And it’s two reasons really, one, if you really are not gonna connect with this person.

Ryan Isaac:
They won’t go. No, they won’t go there.

Tom Brown:
They probably won’t go there which everybody’s happy.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Tom Brown:
But the other reason is, have you ever had a conversation with somebody who’s afraid, they’re not really listening to you and they can come off rude or whatever else.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, they’re thinking, yeah. They’re afraid of one thing and they’re probably afraid of the pain or the cost.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
Our industry’s really similar, like engaging with a financial advisor is a long term thing. It costs money and it’s intimidating. And there’s a… Like there’s a skepticism factor involved and rightly so, it should be that way. So yeah, when you get people who are really scared, there’s like, there’s this wall.

Joe Chickerillo:
100%.

Tom Brown:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s really impersonal.

Tom Brown:
And you have to get beyond that.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, you gotta get beyond that. And like, as humans, what we do when we’re scared is we revert to like kind of rudeness or like, we’re like really abrupt.

Joe Chickerillo:
Real standoffish.

Ryan Isaac:
Standoffish. You’re like, this isn’t helping anybody. Like, just get past, like, what’s the problem. Let’s move on past that. And it totally. It gets past that right away.

Tom Brown:
And it really is. And nobody wants to be rude.

Ryan Isaac:
No. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
But when they’re insecure…

Ryan Isaac:
Some people do.

Tom Brown:
Some people do.

Ryan Isaac:
Some people do.

Tom Brown:
And those are the people we want to opt-out.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Like just don’t even call, let’s not do this.

Tom Brown:
But I could definitely see it’s interesting. ‘Cause we’ve talked to some consultants in the dental space too. And they’ve asked us, are we gonna expand this to be on dental? And honestly we are because even as I hear you talking about what you do, wouldn’t it be great if you had this series of videos where people actually got to know you personally.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And now they don’t waste an hour or two of your time.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly.

Tom Brown:
And they think, “Oh, you don’t do this for $10.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, or asking questions that can be explained before anyone gets on the phone.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
Then we can talk about the real stuff. Like the real stuff isn’t pricing. It’s not even like a service model overview, that stuff can be learned easily. Like let’s talk about the real stuff, the personal stuff. Like that’s what you want to get to, the walls are down, there’s trust, you know? There’s a rapport being built. That’s what matters.

Tom Brown:
And I really feel YVC and the reason why Joe and I chose this is because it gives the doctor an option to define success for themselves, some want just more revenue. And they want to grow, grow, grow. And guess what? 89% case acceptance is gonna help you do that. But other ones are like, I’d rather have a better work-life balance. I wanna work less hours while working with nine out of 10 instead of four out of 10, you’re more efficient.

Joe Chickerillo:
Be more efficient, man.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly, yeah. Be more efficient.

Tom Brown:
You get to kind of set your own expectations and set your own goals. And it’s gonna help you either way.

[music]

Matt Mulcock:
Hey Ryan, tell me what happens during our consultation.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a great question, Matt. The first thing we’d like to do is just get to know more about you and your practice. What are your career goals? What are you doing in your practice, in your business? What kind of big decisions are you making in your personal financial life? Then we talk about how hiring a comprehensive fiduciary dental-specific financial advisor can help you make better financial decisions in your future, help you grow your net worth, get more organized and get more peace of mind around your financial situation.

Matt Mulcock:
I mean, so you’re telling me it’s that easy and painless.

Ryan Isaac:
I am telling you it is that easy and totally painless. Exactly, Matt. Just go to dentistadvisors.com, click to Book Free Consultation button. Do it right now and talk to a friendly advisor today.

[music]

Ryan Isaac:
I’m just curious. Are there metrics you guys track with changes in like production or collections or profitability and overhead that come along with this kind of the… That’s like a side benefit? Or, you know.

Tom Brown:
So we told you we were kind of rolling out some of the different features. So one of those was the analytics that just got rolled out a couple months ago. But one of the things we wanna look at is how much time are we really saving because…

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Tom Brown:
If people are coming in and now they’re moving forward, those six people that didn’t come in, how much time did it save at your practice? And now you’re only working with people that are predisposed to move forward, there’s a huge time save. Matter of fact, I did a Facebook live on the Full Arch Masters and I was explaining this and saying “Hey, when they come in, why would they come in after they knew all this,” and a doctor was “Hey, wait a second. Does that mean people don’t come in after seeing these videos?” I’m like “Absolutely. Isn’t that great?”

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah. Thank goodness. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
Thank goodness.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Oh yeah.

Tom Brown:
And he was still a little concerned, and another doctor I didn’t even know was on, Dr. Jess, and he said “Hey Tom, do you mind if I answer this?” I had not met him yet. So that was kinda scary. [laughter]

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah, you’re like…

Tom Brown:
Do I…

Joe Chickerillo:
Open mic? I don’t know.

Tom Brown:
Exactly. And he said, “Hey, I’ve gotten 101 leads in the last, like six to eight months.” And because everything he does is full arches. So it’s $25,000 to $50,000. So he goes, only 18 of them came in, but 16 of them moved forward. Over 400,000 in production. He goes, but I’m telling you doctors right now, if they didn’t give us any production and we spent 299 a month, which is what it costs to do this. And it self-selected those 83 people out, he goes, that’s worth it.

Ryan Isaac:
Dude, time. What is the time?

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly.

Tom Brown:
He goes, the return on investment in that alone is off the charts let alone the $400,000 in production when you’re paying a 299.

Ryan Isaac:
I think about this all the time. Like, especially nowadays when we need to move beyond the pitch. Right? Like an engagement with my dentist or an engagement with a financial advisor, it can’t be about the pitch anymore.

Tom Brown:
No.

Ryan Isaac:
Like dentists can’t spend their hours pitching people, things they’ve never considered. They’re not even thinking about, that they don’t even know how…

Tom Brown:
They’re not invested in it.

Ryan Isaac:
They’re not even there. And the dentist is spending time, like pitching. You know, like, ah, no. You need to have people coming in who have already determined somewhere with somebody they gotta get something done. Which is beyond like, I don’t know, pitch me. You know? And like buying that time back is… It’s huge. It’s everything.

Tom Brown:
It’s why it’s so interesting when you step out of dentistry and you look at other industries. Like I said, why would your highest paid subject matter expert be the one qualifying the leads?

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, jeez. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And that’s what happens in dentistry. And this is the first actual software that addresses that specifically. So not only does it make it convenient for the patient to actually get a hold of the doctor “virtually at night,” even though you’re not really talking to them. But it’s gonna help qualify those patients as well. So now the doctor’s not doing that. And it’s just a waste of time.

Ryan Isaac:
We talk about this all the time. Like financial freedom, financial independence is so much more than just a number, meaning you’re rich.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s like along the way before you are rich, right?

Tom Brown:
Live your life.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s quality of life like.

Tom Brown:
Yes.

Joe Chickerillo:
Well, that’s exactly what Mark Costas was talking about yesterday when he was doing his podcast.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Joe Chickerillo:
You know. Like he had this whole goal in mind of getting to a million dollars in production.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah. Yep.

Joe Chickerillo:
And he finally made it with 10 practices and he’s like…

Ryan Isaac:
Now what.

Joe Chickerillo:
I’m miserable.

Ryan Isaac:
What did I miss along the way?

Tom Brown:
He hated his life.

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I mean, we see that play out all the time, like for years and years. It’s so much more about what’s happening along the way, because I mean, none of us know if we’re actually gonna have the future, you know. It’s not promised, you know.

Tom Brown:
Well, and that’s your specialty, you’re helping them with their personal finances.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And is it just the dollar amount? No.

Ryan Isaac:
No.

Tom Brown:
It’s what do you wanna do. Somebody might wanna travel and somebody might wanna just be happy off of a golf course or whatever. And once you know those, you’ve got success to find.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Like along the way what’s happening in your life because that really defines, like Mark’s story. I mean that that’s…

Tom Brown:
The journey.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s… Yeah. It’s like along the way, like, did you have time in your life to do the things outside of work that mattered a lot to you, right?

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And if you didn’t then who cares about the money?

Tom Brown:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Like who cares if you arrived at the place where you’ve got all the money in the world, if you missed it, then you can [0:26:05.7] ____ back.

[overlapping conversation]

Joe Chickerillo:
So many people forget that it’s not about the money. It’s about how you get to spend your time.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. So I love the example of that doctor saying all these people didn’t come in and what a blessing that is, because I didn’t have to waste the time on it. Like pitching how many people? That…

Tom Brown:
It was 101 and 83… Now keep in mind. He only does full arches, 25,000-50,000. So if you’re talking about implants, you’re probably gonna get 70-80 to come in out of the 100.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly.

Tom Brown:
But the 20-30 that don’t…

Ryan Isaac:
How many hours is that?

Tom Brown:
Yeah…

Ryan Isaac:
You can either move on to other productive things or just not be working.

Tom Brown:
Or just not, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Don’t be working.

Tom Brown:
It’s really nice. I think we saw, we were at a conference where they defined success as doing what you want when you want with who you want.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, cool.

Tom Brown:
And when we heard that we both high-fived because we’re doing what we want with who we want and when we want.

Ryan Isaac:
When you want to.

Tom Brown:
We get to meet great people like you podcasting.

Ryan Isaac:
Love it.

Tom Brown:
And we’re having a blast here.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s so fun. What’s adoption rate with the people… I mean, it seems like the price point and the benefit is kind of like a no-brainer. I mean, it’s like, what’s the…

Tom Brown:
You get one case and you’ve paid for our system for a year.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s the… Yeah. Okay. So what’s adoption like? Are people… Is it just a matter of hearing about it and buying into it? Is there hesitation for people saying like it makes total sense, but I’m just too scared to make video?

Tom Brown:
I have a stat on that. So 67.8% of all the doctors that see our demo and see the videos purchase our product within the month.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Okay.

Tom Brown:
So it’s ridiculously high. Really most people think we’re teledentistry, so they think they already know, but once they find out what’s happening, they’re like “Oh my gosh, I love… ” Dr. Allen Mead, you know Allen?

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Tom Brown:
We’re doing his…

Ryan Isaac:
The guy Allen? Who doesn’t?

Tom Brown:
We’re doing his podcast. And he’s like…

Ryan Isaac:
He’s like, wait, what?

Tom Brown:
This is like way different than I thought. This is pretty cool.

Ryan Isaac:
Exactly. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
He goes, I had no idea this was out there.

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause it seems like it would be teledentistry basically.

Tom Brown:
Exactly. And it started as teledentistry.

Ryan Isaac:
And it started that way and it’s kind of morphed into something more efficient. Way more efficient. Yeah. That’s really great. Okay. So people are adopting this, it’s growing a lot. It’s a differentiator in the marketplace. And I think a lot of people would hear that and be like, oh, well, if too many people adopt that in my community, then it’s like not different anymore, but that’s not, it’s not true. ‘Cause everyone’s unique and you’re just telling your unique story. That’s the whole point.

Tom Brown:
You can personalize it as much as you want. As a matter of fact, Joe, do you wanna tell the story of the pediatric dentist Martha and the autistic children?

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So we got this pediatric dentist who’s really great, and she deals with a lot of special needs kids. And the system that we have, the YVC platform, it’s fully customizable. The dropdown options that you get when the patient’s picking out what they’re interested in, again, we were talking about, you can have like aligners or implants or whatever. Well, for a pediatric dentist, it’s oftentimes more like, okay, new child zero to three and then like four to 12 and 13-17. The patient or the, in that case, the child gets to kind of meet the doctor, but she dealt with a lot of special needs kids, specifically, a lot of kids that have autism. And one of the things that comes with having autism is needing routine like…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, for sure. Structure, predictability.

Joe Chickerillo:
Yeah. Structure and routine. Correct. So what she has is actually took a video, a walkthrough of her office and herself, her therapy dog, what it’ll look like in the office.

Ryan Isaac:
Very cool.

Joe Chickerillo:
And it’s specifically so that kids that are gonna come in can watch this video 15, 20 times before they come in.

Ryan Isaac:
And not be surprised with anything ’cause that’s kind of a shock, yes.

Joe Chickerillo:
Game changer.

Ryan Isaac:
That is so cool. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
Think of the hours that that saves trying to get that child to be comfortable and the resources necessary to do that. And now all of that’s automated.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, from an efficiency standpoint, no question. And then think about the level of patient care for the, especially in that situation where the parents of the special needs children already probably have an anxiety going into a doctor’s appointment anyway. This is like…

Tom Brown:
Huge.

Joe Chickerillo:
It’s also big for them to be able to meet. I mean, you think about even not just special needs, but just for a pediatric dentist, like the parents want to know kind of what the doctor’s like before they bring their kid in there.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s going on. I wanna know.

Joe Chickerillo:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
I’m a grown man and I hesitate. [chuckle] It’s funny that we always joke and we always talk about this kind of stuff. And then I’m always like, “Well, my dentist listens to the show and I haven’t been for a while.”

Joe Chickerillo:
Sorry, buddy.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s the process like if someone’s hearing this and like, “Okay, like I gotta get on board with that. I didn’t know what it was. Thought it was teledentistry, duh I gotta start.” How do they reach out? Where do they find you? What’s onboarding like?

Tom Brown:
They can reach out to us at yourvirtualconsult.com.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. You’re passing cards along the table here right now, right?

Tom Brown:
Yeah. So I was just gonna read out the telephone number.

Ryan Isaac:
Good. Okay. Yeah. Do this.

Tom Brown:
So 858-939-9338. A demo takes 12 minutes, so it’s not a ton of time.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh my gosh, yeah. Easy.

Tom Brown:
And then it’s a… What happens when you sign up is you’re gonna get an email from our client success manager and it’s gonna have the scripts, that you’re gonna have so you can get to be comfortable with them. And it’s also gonna have our calendar link, so you get to choose the 45-minute time that you’re free. And then you’re gonna record the videos, the welcome video, the service videos, and then the response videos. And take you through the system, 45 minutes you’re up and running.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And it’s implemented on the website in… Yeah. Fast.

Joe Chickerillo:
Putting it on the website and all the different marketing aspects is as easy as copying and pasting. ‘Cause basically what you get as a doctor is a custom landing page that we’re building that has your welcome video and those options on there. So you take that landing page link and you can tie it in again with not just Google, Instagram, Facebook also if you use a Lighthouse, RevenueWell solution, where it’s like recalls and reminders. You wanna reactivate patients you haven’t seen in 18 months. “Hey, we haven’t seen you in a while. Look at our… Look at this new… ”

Ryan Isaac:
Check it out.

Joe Chickerillo:
“System we just put in and you could do this in the comfort of your own home.”

Ryan Isaac:
I Imagine it maybe gives a little bit of a kick in the butt, too when people invest in something like this. And then they’re like, “Oh, the website kind of sucks.”

Joe Chickerillo:
We’ve actually seen that a couple of times.

Ryan Isaac:
This tool is amazing. And then now they’re hitting my website and I’m like, I need a better website now. And it’s, which is cool. ‘Cause it’s time to think about the marketing.

Tom Brown:
It’s kind of why Wonderist actually was the one who created it originally.

Ryan Isaac:
It makes total sense.

Tom Brown:
But it was, it’s just such a different way to market a product between a marketing agency and a software.

Ryan Isaac:
Definitely. Yeah.

Tom Brown:
And so it was… It’s been great that it’s been separated, but we’re still linked ’cause they’re sister company.

Ryan Isaac:
It makes total sense.

Tom Brown:
And we get to benefit from all of their marketing knowledge.

Ryan Isaac:
All right. Well, thanks for joining me today. It was like, nice to see you.

Tom Brown:
Thank you so much. It’s been great.

Ryan Isaac:
I’ve seen you around Tom with where you were LocalMed before.

Tom Brown:
Yeah, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Dental Intelligence now.

Tom Brown:
We’re at the spot right now, I think with YVC that we were with LocalMed…

Ryan Isaac:
Okay, that growth phase.

Tom Brown:
Where the first few months we went from like 60 to a couple of hundred. And then the next two years we added 9,000 practices. And so this is… We’re excited about what the next two years is gonna bring.

Ryan Isaac:
Stoked for you guys. Nice to meet you too, man. Thanks for being here. I appreciate it.

Joe Chickerillo:
Thank you for having us. We really appreciated.

Ryan Isaac:
You have the cool like diamond lanyards.

Joe Chickerillo:
Oh yeah.

Tom Brown:
We gotta set them up.

Ryan Isaac:
I’ll grab…

Joe Chickerillo:
I brought one for you. Custom blingy lanyard. It’s actually got Dr. VC, our other mascot right on there.

Ryan Isaac:
I’ll check that out. I appreciate that guys. Thank you. Well, thanks. Thanks for being here. And everyone for listening. Thanks for tuning in. If you have any questions for us, too, go to dentistadvisors.com and book a chat, if you wanna chat with one of us. Thanks guys again for being here. I’ll catch you next time on another episode of The Dentist Money Show. Take care, everybody. Bye-bye.

Joe Chickerillo:
Thanks, Ryan.

Tom Brown:
Thanks, Ryan.

Practice Management