Episode 818: Hold Strong in a Tough Economy

 Are you the master of your circumstances or the creator of your life? This question guides the episode as Kiera talks about how to stay strong and positive in a challenging economy. She talks about managing emotions, communicating with patients, and intelligently considering what to keep and what to shed for your practice’s long-term benefits.

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Transcript:

Kiera Dent (00:01.426)

Hello, listeners. This is Kira and welcome to the Dental podcast. I am so excited. You guys are here with me I'm so excited that we get a podcast today and today is gonna be a fun podcast episode for you I hope you're ready for it. I hope you guys are just enjoying your day today. Honestly, I hope you remember life is so good and Really we get to be the creators of our life. So I love a quote by Tony Robbins I think it's a good one to kick off today's podcast

the master of your circumstances or the creator of your life? Like, are you mastering, like, are you just like taking on whatever comes to you or are you actively creating your life? And I think that it's so important for the podcast topic I wanted to bring to you today because I think so many of us are blaming the economy. We're saying things are tightening up, inflation's hard. Well, you're just managing life, you're not creating it. That can be true, but couldn't it also be true that businesses are flourishing?

Why isn't some of the best businesses take off the most when things seem tight and hard? I just think you guys should really think about like, are you creating your life or are you managing it? I would rather be creating than managing. And so I just had a client, they reached in and they're like, you know, things are getting so tight. And I'm like, they are, but also let's make sure we're looking at things realistically. Consulting is always gonna put money on your books. Always, always, if they're a good consultant.

You can cut other things, but can you actually grow that business? So make sure the things that we're cutting actually are the things that really will move our needle forward. Could we cut some Netflix subscriptions? Could we cut other things that aren't moving our business forward? I never liked to cut things that are putting money on my books for me. So really look at that. And with that, it's going to tie into how you guys are also treating your patients. I honest to goodness believe that we find what we're looking for. And so if you're saying like, Oh my gosh, patients are tightening up because the economy, you're going to find ways to make that right.

The greatest need of the human being is to make themselves right with what we believe we are. The greatest need in the human, like all of us being a human, is the need to prove ourselves right. It's not if it's actually right, but it's to prove ourselves right. So if you say, oh my gosh, the world is falling apart, you're going to look for ways that it's falling apart. I can have two people sitting in the exact same room. One thinks the world's falling apart. One thinks the world is flourishing and they're both right. How is that true?

Kiera Dent (02:25.686)

What's real? Reality is perception. And so if you're sitting here all day long saying, oh my gosh, patients are tightening up, well then what are we doing to innovate, create and make it to where that's not the case for us? How is it that I have some offices that literally freaking grew and tripled during COVID and others who almost went out of business? They weren't doing anything radically different. It's just what they were looking for. And I know it seems crazy.

but I wanted to tell you like, let's put out the good vibes. Let's look for the reality we want to. Let's create our own reality instead of managing what's coming our way. You can absolutely create it. You can prepare for it. You know, things in the economy might change. Honest to goodness though, it's an election year. It should be a freaking fantastic year. Yes, people are tightening up, but guess what? There's so many more ways to make money in today's day and age. There's Uber Eats, there's Uber, there's Lyft, there's...

ways to do things online. There's so many different things that people can be doing. Let's not fool ourselves into thinking that people are tightening up unless you want that to be the reality for your practice. So I just wanted to give you guys number one, let's get the mindsets right. I believe that going through quote unquote changes in the economy really come down to you managing your emotions. Manage your emotions. Can you manage those emotions? Can you create what you want it to be? You guys, I could be scared out of my mind.

Dental A team is in full-blown bulk mode because I know there will be more dentists out there needing help. Dental A team has created group consulting as a more affordable option of consulting for those who may be a little afraid to go into private. Private freaking kills it every time. I have never once not paid for ourselves. Never once, not once have I not paid for ourselves. And I am so confident that you will get 10X like by just doing a reduction of supplies and getting your life back and all these different things. But make sure that you are also managing your emotions.

I know it can feel scary, but I'm like, look at that. If I need to pay for this, it's one more crown. How can I get one patient to say yes and serve them, not because I'm trying to do a sell, but serve them? Am I giving my patients the best experience? And I'm not saying anything extra, but do I care about them? Am I providing the best dentistry? Are we doing the best customer service? Making an experience that patients want to come back to? Because you got to get all those things right before you go and say it's the economy. It is so easy to blame an economy for poor business ownership.

Kiera Dent (04:39.762)

It is so easy to blame the economy for poor systems. It's so easy to just blame in general rather than take ownership and accountability of what we need to do to change. So I'm here to say like, let's look at it and let's prepare for it and let's plan for it because patients are saying like, oh my gosh, well, what happens when we're presenting treatment plans and patients are tightening up their funds? Well, then maybe we've got to find a way to teach these patients that dentistry is not like an optional thing. If I was told I had cancer, I don't think I'd be like,

tightening up the funds, I'm not going to go do chemo. We'd find a way. All of us will find a way to pay. We'll all find a way to meet our needs. We will. Every person will do it. And it's crazy because when push comes to shove, we all find it. My husband and I did not think that we could pay off his student loans when we got out of school. It seemed so overwhelming. And yet in one year, we came up with all the money as two people to pay it off. We didn't change. We didn't get new jobs.

We just changed and made different things a priority. And that's for your patients too. They have money. You guys, like we sit here and we say, oh my gosh, the economy. And I'm not here to say that it's not, but I'm also here to say they're not. It's like things are there. Wages have gone up. Life things have gone, but they're not at the equal. Things are changing, yes, but also we live in a very lavish world. There's a lot of things that people are paying for that they might have gotten more comfortable with that aren't necessarily needs. So how can you help patients realize

that treatment plans and dentistry is a need, not a want. How do we make it to where like they deserve this and they need to take care of themselves because guess what, if we can fix their teeth today, they get all these years of benefits from it, as opposed to like Starbucks or different things that have short term longevity. How can you present it to your patients in a way that helps them realize they have 100% got to be able to say yes to this treatment, and we're going to find a way to do it. I think people oftentimes like the way we present dentistry is like, well, you know,

We know it's expensive. Why are we even saying those words? It's not like for me, I think, okay, if a crown costs, let's say $800, that's $800 for me to have the next X number of years to be able to chew and to be able to feed my body. I think that that's a very small cost. Like, okay, let's just say that crown, most crowns have an average five year lifespan, right? So five times 365 days. I have 18, 1825 days. Are you guys following my math? We have one crown.

Kiera Dent (07:03.446)

It's going to like, it's usually a five year is how often it can be replaced. So let's just get that five years worth of use out of that one crown. That's 1,825 days that I get to use that crown as a minimum. Okay? So then if I take that and divide that by, that's how many days, divide that by 800. That's less than $2 a day to feed my body, to take care of my body.

to be able to do like all those different things. To me, that just seems like that's a no brainer as to a hundred percent yes, I get 1800 days of enjoyment. That's just days. Now, if you wanna break that into hours, that's 43,000 hours that I get to enjoy this tooth. And if I divide that by 800, that is so cheap. So 800 divided by 43,700, the hours, that is less than a penny an hour. If we go back to our 1825,

and do that one divided by, let's see, 800 divided by 1825, that's 43 cents a day. So we need to realize that 43 cents a day, I think people could find 43 cents, do you? Absolutely, they could. They 100% could. So we have to help them realize, like you get at least five years of being able to feed your body, take care of your body for this one crown. I think that that's definitely something I would invest in.

I think so often again though, like do you believe that things are expensive? Yeah, guys, I saw a box of crumble cookies was like, you know, 60 bucks, one box of a dozen to like deliver it to someone. I was like, wow. But guess what? Everything has increased. Wages have increased, things have increased. I hope all of you in dental practices have increased your fee schedules. To me, it's one of those things of like, this is life. This is life and we're gonna create it and we're gonna manage it and we're going to create what we want in our practice.

I want patients saying yes to me. I wanna help them find yes. Patients might not do all of our elective, they might not do ortho or different things, but they're definitely gonna do general dentistry that needs to get done, especially if we present in a way of, this is not a like, I would like to, it's a we need to. And I think so much of it is how we present it, how we tee it up, how we talk about it, and not ever planting seeds of like, I know things are expensive, why are we saying those words? To me, 43 cents a day for the next five years.

Kiera Dent (09:26.946)

feels like a really, really low commitment. When most people are spending, you know, Starbucks has gone up, but I don't see people not buying Starbucks as much. Like it's like 10 bucks for a drink, but they're willing to do that. Let's just use some quick math, all right? Let's say that someone gets Starbucks and let's do it. I'll go cheaper. I'll do $5 and let's say they go five days a week. Okay, that's $25 a week. Doesn't seem too bad. Times 52 weeks a year. That's $1,300 that they're willing to spend on Starbucks.

And yet oftentimes a crown with insurance is less than that. And that's Starbucks. It doesn't have long-term lasting effects and enjoyment and ability to eat. And we have to make dentistry a need and not a want. And so for you guys, present and communicate to the patients, these are things that they need to do. And I want to remind you that no matter what, no matter how much the economy has ever changed, dentistry has held strong. Even through COVID, guys, we still had all those emergency patients.

It is going to be okay. And I wanna remind you it's going to be okay. And I wanna remind you to put yourself in spaces where you're around people who are propelling you and figuring out ways and solutions. I'm not here to downplay the fact that the economy is changing. But I am here to say to create your own reality. And I'm here to say, let's start looking for the white cars instead of finding all the red cars. Let's start looking for the patients who wanna say yes. Let's find out who they are. Let's start marketing to those types of patients. Let's change it up what we're doing. Let's make sure our experience is amazing. Let's make sure we refine our skills so that way it's

costing us less time and we can see more patients. Let's make sure we're doing those little things to be able to make sure our businesses are taken care of right now. But when it comes to treatment planning, you guys, right now, let's make sure they're at least getting their needs done. And there will be some who want to do the once, but assume every patient wants to do all the treatment. You assume that first. Why would they ever say no to you? I'm gonna assume every patient wants to do the dentistry. If my doctor diagnoses it, my job is to close it and find a solution for how they're going to pay for it. That's my job. That's the standard.

People find a way to live to their standards. Every one of them, you guys, I have worked in so many different economies. I've gone through great economies. I've gone through hard economies. I've gone through all these different things. Guys, there's so much more money in this world and opportunities to make money than there ever have been before. There are also so many luxuries in life. And as a society, I think we've forgotten like what are true needs and what are wants and they're kind of getting fuzzy. Help your patients realize that dentistry, they deserve this.

Kiera Dent (11:50.69)

that they needed to get this taken care of, that will like, you can't ever re get your bone back. Like once it's gone and we don't take care of it, it's gone. When we have that decay, it actually infiltrates our entire body and it causes more problems. Like when we have perio, it gets into our bloodstream. That's something I don't want, something we need to take care of. And we just need to find a solution for it. If we make it a priority and we find out what their reasoning are, and we can present it in a way that they see this as a need, not a want.

people find a way to pay for their needs. People find a way, there are solutions. It might be a little hard, you guys, my mom had seven kids. My dad was a school teacher and he worked for the church teaching religion. And my mom had really tight funds. Like I think about my mom and I think of the things we did. I think about Jason's family, his parents, like they did well, but his dad was a school teacher as well. And they had, my parents had a side, we had a second job. We mowed lawns my whole life.

And I think about my mom doing dentistry for all of her kids. And she put our health and our dentistry as priorities. Other things could scrimp. You guys, I didn't always get the greatest Christmas presents. I had a lesser Christmas. I had different things. I had hand-me-down clothes. She found free things to do. We would buy things at the dollar store instead of at Target. There are ways. And I just want to remind you that there's so many ways, but we have to make it a priority for them.

and help them see this as a priority and it's a need not a want. So those are some tips for you guys of what to do. If you guys need help with your practice, reach out hello at thed You guys, I truly believe that consulting is the one thing that will put money on your books as opposed to an investment that is taking from you. Like there's really no other things. I mean, I'm trying to think of other things you could be investing in, besides coaching of someone who's been there, done that and done it successfully in all the different economies. I've helped people close cases no matter what the people's financial situations are.

There's always a solution and realizing that you and your team have a moral obligation to help these patients be healthy. At the end of the day, they get to choose what they want to do and what they want to spend their money on. But I would say, let's find a way that resonates with them, that connects with them and helps them see that this is a need, not a want. They deserve it. It's never going to be cheaper than it is today. And we're going to find a way to help you get this taken care of. Let's do it. Let's do it together. Ask them. They can get loans from the bank.

Kiera Dent (14:17.622)

They can get financial help from friends. There is care credit, there's lending tree, there's charity. There's so many different financing options out there that make it easier for patients. They could do Uber Eats, they could do Lyft, they could go, a lot of people have savings. They can pull on their 401Ks. There are so many places people can find funds. They can. And I'm not here to downplay, I'm just here to say that when things are a must, we find a way to do it. So how can you make your treatment planning and your exams a must? Do you believe? Because I believe wholeheartedly

that my teeth are one of the most important things in my entire body and I will always take care of them because I want longevity for these teeth. Because this is what feeds me, this is how I communicate. Literally what feeds me is my mouth and I wanna find a way to take care of that and to honor that and to make sure that I'm always putting the best dentistry first. It is annoying, I don't wanna have to pay for it either. You guys, I don't go to a free dentist, I pay for my own dentistry. It is annoying, but that's such a small cost for a life.

and for a mouth that's gonna last me for my whole life. And now I'd say all of us need to make sure that we're delivering that great dentistry that will provide them that mouth for their lives. Please, please, please change your reality. Be the creator of your life, not the manager of your circumstances. Create your life. Look for those patients, attract those patients in, have your whole team of that mindset. Abundance is everywhere when we're looking for it. And I would encourage you now is the time.

and reach out if we can help you in any way. Hello at thed I'd love to help you, I'd love to serve you. It is time. And as always, thanks for listening and I'll catch you next time on the Dental Team Podcast.