In today’s blog I discuss the three models or ways in which you can grow your practice.I also share;
- why one doesn’t work (this is the one that most vets are using right now)
- which one works the best but is far too ‘intense’ for most practices
- the middle of the road option which works really well and why you should get on board with that one.
When you decide that this 3rd option is the right choice for you.Then here’s the link to check it out. http://veterinarybusinessacademy.com
Click Here to listen to the PodcastSee below to read the Transcription
Enjoy
Warmly
Diederik
TRANSCRIPTION:Hi, it’s Diederik Gelderman here.
Are you happy with the way your practice is going?
And, I mean that from all points of reference or points of view. Are you happy with your work hours, your work-life-balance, the practice profitability, and all those other sorts of things?
The fact is that so many practices are still only making a 9% profit, 7%-9% profit. The better practices are making 12% or 15%, and that’s about it. However, I know plenty of practices that are up well and truly over the 20% profit mark, and it’s quite easy to achieve 23%.
- The target I suggest you aim at is 20% plus.
My question to you is, are you at that level? Are you over 15%? Are you at 20%? And do you have the work-life-balance that goes with that?
If not, my next question to you is;
- Are you implementing the material that you receive from me on a weekly basis?
- Are you implementing the material that you received from other CE events?
And, when I talk to practitioners, the face-to-face or on the phone, or at conferences, many of them say, “No, I don’t implement stuff because let’s face it, life gets in the road. I’ve got all these great ideas and don’t have/make the time to implements, shit/nothing happens.”
For things to change, YOU need to change!
Realistically, there are three things you can do to solve this — if what we’ve mentioned above is happening to you, if you have all these great ideas and great things you want to do, and you are constantly finding yourself at the coal face working in the practice rather than being back from the coal face, an hour or two a day, or a day a week or whatever that time is, working on the practice…
If you’re at the coal face all the time, you’re going to get nowhere, and your work-life-balance is going to be crappy. Your profitability is going to be exactly the same as it is now and it will never change (your Q of L or your profitability.
You need to step back and work on the business.
There are three ways that you can do that.
- One is a one-for-you scenario.
That means that you hire someone external to come in and do everything for you. They would do your social media. They would do your marketing. They would train your team. They would just do everything for you.
I don’t do that for practices. That’s not the way I like to do things. There are some consultants, some coaches, who will do that. But that makes the business, your business, your practice totally reliant on that person, on that external business assistance forever, and I don’t think that’s a really good way to be.
It’s also VERY expensive.
- The other extreme to the ‘having-it-done-for-you’ model is to do it (everything) yourself.
This is probably where you’re at the moment.
The problem here is – do it (all) yourself, and what happens is you really do very little.
- You do enough to get by.
- You do enough to make ends meet.
- You do enough to keep your life percolating along the way it is, and that’s about all.
This just doesn’t work for 95% of vets like you. You go to marketing events, read stuff, etc. – say that you’ll do ‘X’ – but shit happens and ‘X’ never gets implemented/done.
For some people who are really rigorous, doing it themselves can work, but they’ve got very strict abilities to get in, to implement, to strategize and make things happen.
And for most of us… life gets in the road, as I said earlier.
- Oh – most practices, most Vets choose this methodology – because it’s VERY cheap.
Remember – monkeys and peanuts and all that.
- Next, there’s a ‘middle of the range’ possibility which is ‘Do-it-with-me’.
I do three forms of do-it-with-me.
- One of those is my high-end coaching. That’s where I talk to a practice every week for 12 months. We have projects, we have deadlines, we have accountabilities. I do staff training through Skype or Zoom, etc.
This 12 months of coaching is a very, very intense process. It works really, really well. We will get practices to 20% net profit form wherever they are within 12 months.
If that’s the sort of thing you’re interested. Let me know, we’re going to have a talk about it. I can give you lots and lots and lots of references about that.
But again, that is not for most people. It’s too intense, and there’s too much involved, it’s too high-speed, it’s too high-pressure. It’s for those that are highly driven and wants outcomes like [snaps finger] yesterday.
- The second ‘do-it-with-me’ type of thing that I do is my Mastermind group.
As you know, if you have been watching these videos, we have just had this year’s 6 months of Mastermind in Melbourne. There were 15 practices involved, they’re still in it. We have three weekends together every two to three months for three meetings. And we have accountabilities to the group. We do trainings. There are all sorts of things that go on there. Now, these guys are really, really good practitioners.
A Mastermind like that is quite expensive, but the end results are unbelievable.
About half the group in the room are taking home more than a million dollars from their practices and these are 4-5 vet practices. Don’t you think that’s a good take home wage? And the others are taking home well over half a million, somewhere around $750,000 for the 2-3-4 vet practices.
That mastermind model works really well as well. If you’re interested in that, give me a yell, and I’ll put your name forward for next year’s group.
- But, what I really wanted to talk about today is the third of these. This is the ‘Let’s-do-it-together’ model; which is the Veterinary Business Academy.
- In the Veterinary Business Academy, you and I work together on growing your practice.
What I provide every month is a module. I’ve taken all my high-end stuff around one particular topic, and brought it down to just the skeleton, the nuts, the bolts, the stuff that you really need to know and really need to implement.
You can knock that module over, implement it in probably 2 hours.
You can take all that material and get it implemented and get it working in your practice in about 2 hours.
I provide you the scripts, I provide you the templates, I provide you the spreadsheets, I provide you with whatever you need for that module, you get it, and then you implement it or you train your team, whatever it happens to be.
Then, at the end of the month, you and I have an accountability session. We get together on Tuesday evening, 7:30 Australian Eastern Standard time, and we get on a webinar for an hour, and we to and fro, and we chat and we discuss ideas and I hold you accountable to what you’re going to do, and it’s really, really useful for you.
If you can’t attend live, you can email questions in beforehand, and everything is recorded and you can get to watch that in your time/anytime.
So far, in the Business Academy, we have got well over 60 modules up on everything, from marketing, to finances, to practices management, to leadership, to communication.
There are a HUGE number of modules up there, and as well as there are modules on dentistry and a whole heap of clinical topics as well.
- That’s just $35 a month.
I mean, for $35 a month, you get a concentrated essence of a particular topic, you get all the implementation materials you need. You get a webinar at the end of the month, that’s recorded if you can’t attend.
And… you get access to me as well.
If you need me at all during the month, you get one-on-one access to me. I’m not going to talk to you once a week for an hour every month like I do with my one-on-one coaching clients.
But if you’ve got a one-off problem relevant to that module, or EVEN something totally out of left field, I’m happy to sit down with you on the phone or Skype or Zoom or whatever, and talk through that particular issue for 10 minutes, or even an hour, and I’m happy to do that as often as you need me to do that.
You may ask, “Why Diederik would you do that if you’ve got a lot of people in the VBA,” which we have.
You may thing – isn’t you time going to be used up talking to everyone?
The fact is that a lot of people discuss ideas and challenges and problems with me each month, but they’re really cognizant or aware of my time, and they’re relevant, they’re pertinent, they’re timely, they don’t waste my time nor theirs, and they’re really, really great, and that’s why I’m happy to keep continuing as no-one is abusing that system.
The VBA—Veterinary Business Academy—is open for enrolment right at the moment. And, I’d love you to have a look at it. I’d love you to come on board. $35 a month…
I mean it’s less than a couple of cups of coffee a week.
I think it’s a really, really useful ‘let’s do it together’ model that will work at growing your practice steadily and profitably.
It’ll make you take time away from the coal face.
It’ll make you accountable to the group at the end of the month, and to me
And it’ll make sure that you spend time (1-2 hours a month) working on your business, growing your business, and developing the lifestyle that you’re after.
If you’re interested then here’s the www.veterinarybusinessacademy.com to come on board and check out VBA