The New Rules of Dental Growth: Why Patient Experience Beat Marketing with Dr. Addison Killeen

Welcome to the Navigating Dental Insurance Podcast where we [music] don't take from insurance companies. Here are your hosts, Mr. Jordan Comtock and Mr. Ben Tuy. [music] This podcast is sponsored by BoomCloud Dental Membership Software, www.boomcloudapps.com [music] boomcloudapps.com and veraritoss [music] dentalresources www.veritass dentalresources.com. Enjoy [music] the show. What's up everybody and welcome to another exciting episode of the Navigating Dental Insurance Podcast. I am your host today, Jordan Commtock. With me, a special guest and friend, Dr. Addison Khen. What is up, Addison? How you doing, man? >>

Hey, good. Thanks for having me on here, man. >> Yeah, it's been a minute. I know you've been on the podcast with me before. We've done a few of these, so I It's been a minute, so I wanted to bring you on and hang out for a little bit. [laughter] >> Yeah, totally. Well, we got to hang out in cool different places and different fun dental conventions and meetings. So, yeah, glad to jump on here with you. >> Yeah. So, for people listening uh today, tell

tell our audience who you are and how you got involved in running a practice. Well, so you know, typical rags story like you know, you always start from the the hero is supposed to have like a, you know, a come up journey. So early on in my career, I made the mistake to try to open multiple practices and I made it up to six practices >> before I hated my life. >> And so yeah, sold down to that in 2018. >> And you know, took a

little time uh actually joined forces with Dr. Mark Kostas and we co-founded the Dental Success Network. Um, basically trying to get other people to not start six practices in six years. >> Yeah. >> Um, you know, if you don't if you don't want to see your family, it's great. Uh, if you'd like to have a life and Yeah. then maybe you should stick to like one or two or three or something. >> So, uh, yeah. So, we founded Dental Success Network, which is the, you know,

we have buying buying group discounts. We have kind of online coaching community. Uh, just great group of people. I love it. Um, so we did that for a couple years, but then, you know, you get to that point where you're like, well, I'm a dentist. I'm trying to coach other dentists. I need to have a test kitchen. So, um, my one buddy, uh, Brandon and I started up, uh, a startup back in August of 2019. Ran it for six months until we closed it March of

2020 for about 45 days >> during the whole co thing. Great time. >> Yeah, that's not stressful at all. >> Not stressful. six months in you're like okay we're just getting profitable and then zero. >> Oh man. >> Uh so it was good though. Um so yeah the uh you know but ever since then you know it's been great. Uh so yeah coming up on our seven-year anniversary here. Um yeah we've grown to now have five doctors uh 14 operatories. Um yeah it's it's been great.

It's a great test kitchen to like try out ideas you know. Um, I get to try different softwares, you know, different >> Sure. >> management techniques, like what works, what hasn't. Granted, I learned a lot in my six practices, like learned a lot of stuff not to do. Um, and a startup, you know, you think you've done it a few times. Any like startups are the most they will turn your skin to steel because after you've done one, you you've seen it all. Like whether it's

>> sure equipment that doesn't work, you know, >> the amount of stress, the to-do list that you think like, oh, I worked my to-do list down to one page. And then you wake up the next morning and somehow it like, you know, did that biological like mitosis or whatever. [laughter] >> Yeah. >> The cell split and you're like, how did that to-do list grow twice as long again? So, >> um, but yeah, I got a great team. Um, you know, we, uh, we have a great

organization, so I love going to work every day. That's that's awesome. And are are you like are you practicing or are you mainly managing? Yeah. Or both? >> Uh yeah. I mean I still practice three days a week. So and I you know I pulled the short straw in the office so I have to do a lot of molar endo. Um [laughter] my two of my guys uh two of my doctors do a lot of sedation wisdom teeth implants um full mouth implant type stuff. Um

one of my doctors is really great at Invisalign. So I'm like more power to you buddy. like I'll give you all those Invisalign cases. Um I'm mostly just restorative and uh I do take on those moler endo cases. So >> and then so you you you ran six locations that was a nightmare, sold out of it, did a startup which I know how that goes. I started BoomCloud from scratch and that's cra it's crazy, right? It's it's so crazy but it's worth it if you can

figure it out, right? >> Yeah. I mean, once you get to a point where you're not scrubbing toilets, like it's great. >> Yes, it's great. Um, and then what? Tell me your journey. You you met Mark Costies, became uh a client of his maybe. I don't know. Um, >> well, how did you meet Mark? >> Uh, we met Mark at the ADC facility. We were both looking at buying a bunch of equipment from Adex. So, Adex's like, "Hey, come on up." But we you know then

you know you sit at a winery in beautiful the Portland hills there and uh yeah became friends instantly. So um yeah then I I joined him in his kind of coaching group in 20 late 2018 2019 started coming to meetings um you know started helping him coach uh as the as his coaching group grew really quickly um he needed more people to become black belt coaches. So, um, I was one of those black belt coaches and have been ever since then. Um, granted, we have a

great group of of folks. You know, we have coaches all over the country and all different styles of practices. So, you know, so DSN is more for the um, you know, if you want to do it yourself type of style. Yeah. You know, that we're going to give you all the tools, the scorecards, everything. Um, DSI is more like, okay, let's hold your hand and like you get more personal access to the coaches, like phone calls every month, um, you know, group coaching calls, stuff like

that. So, yeah. So, that that's kind of um how that story's gone. But, you know, it's it's fun to be able to teach and talk with people. Like, I talked with actually someone from Portland and New Jersey this afternoon. So, just different areas. >> Just coaching. Yeah, just coaching like you know what should I do? This is the situation you know whether it's hygiene front desk whether it's like new uh new location construction or where should I buy or you know stuff like that. So it's

fun to get to like coach um people who are hungry, smart, just ready to go take on the world and like that's it's a fun group of people to be around. Yeah, I've I've been I mean right when I was starting BoomCloud is when I met Mark and I think in my like the early days I went to a couple of the you guys' like mastermind meetings and I was I loved it. It was so cool to see how how Mark and I don't know if

you were there. You probably were. We just didn't know each other. [clears throat] >> But I just sat and kind of watched and and uh I've always enjoyed what you guys do over there for practices. So let's get into it. Man, I I've got some questions. There's dentistry's changed a lot it seems like uh since we've all started >> in in the industry right like I started >> I started in dental what in tw 2008 I joined my dad's dental lab and I ran my my

dad's dental lab for about eight years so like it started in the recession it was crazy time to to um >> be in dentistry around that time >> and then uh I think maybe eight years later I got so sick and tired of insurance companies um because you know we had all the practices calling us like hey can you discount your fees because I'm in Utah and everybody has every pu under the sun I think. >> Yeah. >> Um [laughter] I'm sure you've consulted with people

here. >> Um and I got so fed up uh with with that. So I'm like well let's figure out a solution to you know do less of that which boom cloud was born right. And now today, like I was I was reading um I was reading uh an article by the ADA and it it got me to stop and think a little bit and I've been asking this question on on pretty much every podcast episode this week because I'm curious about it and curious, you know,

what people are thinking in the industry. But the the ADA says basically the the industry is essentially in a stagflation type situation, right? Where revenue growth over the past 5 years has been like 1.4%. And expenses and and costs are growing by like almost 5% like a three and a half time difference or or like you can [clears throat] look at it like a a 1 to4 ratio or something like that. >> Yeah. >> Like what is that? Are you feeling that owning your own practice?

Like what are you seeing out there? Are those stats correct? Um especially with your coaching and and and your network like what are you seeing? >> Yeah. So I guess I I look at it there's a couple different data sets like >> sure >> the the ADA has a really interesting that's a good data set of short-term picture. >> Sure. When you actually go back to like 2008, per se, >> and you look at what did dentists make as their take-home pay back then >> versus

what they make now, they've gone up and it's great. Okay, like you're making more now than you did 20 years ago. Actually, the best data I saw was like a 14-year retrospective study. But >> yeah, >> so you're making more, but then you look at inflation >> and you're down by like 19%. So if inflation kept up with your wages, you would have been 19%. You've actually dropped by 19%. So rather than making 100,000, now you're making 81,000. >> Yeah. >> So >> So there's a

weird psychological thing is like the numbers are higher, so you're thinking like, well, I'm doing better, but why am I not feeling better? >> But the purchase power is declined. >> It's Yeah. So, it's like, wait, I'm getting pinched from every direction even though it it says I should be making more money. Now, um I did a much deeper dive, you know, in DSI, the Dental Success Institute, we take everyone's profit and loss statement, normalize it onto a a sheet, and send it back out to

those members. Like, you don't get to see other people's me numbers, but you get to see your own. >> And it's great because it's just this is how we do things. This is how we set up the P&L, this the cash flow statement, everything. Um we have really really thorough data um for about a hundred practices from 2425 where we had every one of their months P&Ls. Um those members were like really good about getting us their stuff and so we have really good data. Um

it was about 5050 of thriving versus struggling. Now the thriving group um they had revenue growth of a little bit. it was like uh 1.1% of like revenue growth. Um they had 6.5% more new patients. Their staff payroll like they became more profitable. Um their their overhead dropped from like 61% down to 56 but like 5% more profit which was great. >> Um yeah staff payroll actually shrunk. So they were doing well. So you have those thriving groups and that was about half of the the

group. The other half of the group was the profit margin shrank by like 9%. Um, their overhead went up by about 9%. Like staff payroll actually went up by about 3%. So 3% of that was like just payroll. New patients still went up. So they still saw like new patient growth. They actually saw a lot of revenue growth as well, but most of these practices were in parts of the country where yeah, wages went up and ate up a lot of your stuff. Um, supplies went

up, like fixed costs went up, um, electricity, gas, like a lot of these costs just ate these practices lunch. >> So, yeah. So, it's I mean it's tough because um you know the overhead you you see one group of people where the overhead is going down and you're like, "Oh, I'm making more money." The other group, it's going up. Um staff costs are probably the single biggest determining factor. Um the new patient volume favored the thriving group. So, the thriving group saw more new patients. So,

new patients generally are a pretty good revenue source. Um >> Sure. them. >> And then, >> oh, go ahead. Go ahead. >> And then the other, >> one of the things, the group that was thriving actually spent less on marketing. >> That was going to be my question. >> Yeah. And the group that was struggling was spending more. So, so you're like, well, how can that be? You just said the thriving group got more new patients. And I think here's the the thing that I think

out of that >> is that it's patient experience. It's like making a good connection. I mean, it's things that don't cost money. >> So, it's like making a good connection, having real conversations, having clear financial conversations. Um, just asking for, you know, playing the systemization of your office correctly, like, hey, did you ask that mom if she wanted to schedule the rest of her family? Um, did you ask that patient for a Google review? Um, did you make sure to follow up on that treatment plan?

So the offices that did really well are the offices and and these are the same size offices like there wasn't a well oh those thriving offices were the above a million and a half to 5 million range. No it wasn't it they were actually split like revenue size they were all about 1.6 to 2 million like the median numbers were kind of in that range. So you had those offices that were small at 500,000. you had the offices that were even big in that group to

like 2 and a half, three million. Um, and that was equally and even when you subgrouped those, there was an equal amount that fell into every like thriving and struggling category. So, just super crazy. That's really interesting. >> So, they spent less on marketing and the other the group that was struggling spent more, which you'd think the opposite. Why do you like why do you Well, you said patient experience like >> are are are any of these practices that you like are coaching right now or

No. >> Uh oh. Yeah. Yeah. I know all. >> Okay. Yeah. >> So, what what's the uh when you when you when you say, "Hey, I think it's patient experience >> like >> what differences do you see within the practice?" making I think that's making like a big statement about the macro picture because it has to be that >> because you know how can you be spending less like you you'd be like wait you're spending less money but getting more new patient growth like that's just

>> that doesn't drive rightal >> it's just a like those thriving practices must be executing on everything else inside the practice the systemization better >> than the practice who are struggling. >> Yeah, that's really interesting. So, they're they your assumption is that okay, they have a better patient experience and that probably creates a flywheel of referrals and >> uh growth that way where where if you spend too much if you spend money on marketing and you don't invest equally into patient experience, then you're going to

struggle. It's a it's a they kind of go hand in hand is what you're saying. >> Yeah. I mean, it's kind of like you think you're sticking money in the new patient slot machine and you keep pulling that wheel and you're like, "No, I should be getting more new patients. I should be getting more new revenue." [clears throat] >> But that just stops working as much. And so, yeah, like pulling on that lever just doesn't work. Um, whereas that's I think in my mind that's the

wrong lever to be pulling. Like you should be focusing on your systems inside the office. And any good marketing company will tell you that is that you know [clears throat] a certain number of your new patients maybe 40% should come from internal referrals anyway. So you're really only you're spending that money out of your P&L statement on advertising and marketing to just buy the 60% of new patients. And but like for the practices that I think are doing well, they realize, okay, well, if I just

spend more time and energy on marketing, I can decrease my advertising spend and still get the same or better new patient growth. Yeah, I would imagine that like that even like that's how my mind thinks as well with just even with my business is if I spend more money on so our patient experience is called customer success in the software world >> which is essentially like our our people helping and and making sure our our clients are successful right within BoomCloud. So, it's like if I

if I spend no money there to improve those systems and I just be like and I just hire and and I've done this before. That's why I can say this. I've hired sales and marketing people because you know we want to grow and that's where you think growth is is in sales and marketing people or just marketing in general, right? And you do that, but you're you're not you don't have the systems. You get real lopsided real fast. That happened to me early on years ago

when I started BoomCloud and I realized that okay customer or patient experience is the growth engine of any business whether it's a dental office or a a software company or a coaching company what whatever choose your company if if the customer experience the patient experience is not there and you don't have you don't have that systematized ized, that's when a lot of problems show up. So, I guess um I I hear this a lot on podcast, right, where we everyone talks about patient experience, like h

how do you define it and how like how do you know how to optimize it in inside of a dental practice? I would imagine like some of our listeners listening, they're like, "Okay, well, yeah, I keep hearing patient experience I got to do, but what is it and how do I how do I know how to optimize that?" >> Yeah. I mean, I think it's it's thinking about every patient touch point in your practice. And I I would back that up, not even in your practice,

back it up to the website, to the phone call. >> Yeah. >> That you're online scheduling, you know, like like you're online scheduling. Um I use a vendor, Flex, like they're great. Um but there's a few things in the decision matrix of how you make a Flex appointment that just make sense. And there's others which I've evaluated and the others would be like, "Well, before you I show you your Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday availability, you got to put in your name and phone number." >>

It's like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. >> You're asking me for marriage before you even take me out to dinner. So, don't do that." So, whereas Flex offers like, "Oh, well, here's your available appointments." And then you click on it and you're like, "Okay, do you are you sure you like this appointment?" Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, then you get to then go to the next stage and like okay, put in your name or whatever, existing patient, new patient, whatever. But like it shows you all those um appointments

before you know you put in personal information. That is a user experience. >> Yeah, >> that is good. Um similarly like your website, does your website answer everything that a typical patient wants to know? Um or the phones like does the person answering the phone start with like energy, empathy, and edification? Like do they smile? Can can the person calling into your practice for the first time that doesn't really want to come to you like they they're going to tell you they hate the dentist anyway?

Does that person that answers the phone, is it going to make that patient feel like, oh, you made the right decision? Because the patient's not sure. The patient's like, well, you're the first person that popped up on Google, whatever. um they don't know you from a hill of beans. So when they call you, you need to confirm that they are making the right decision. So like the phone call, the scripts and when I say scripts, I don't train my people to be robotic, but it's just

the general flow like are you hitting these top points type. I have a I have a funny story about scripts cuz same thing we right we were on the phones and we we trained people on verbage skills just like a dental office would here and uh you know one day we we were working on a script of what to say and um same thing like it's more like frameworks for us right versus scripts like um but we were working on like an example script using a

framework that that we were taught and one of my salespeople said I I don't I don't want to do this because you you're going to take my personality away. And I kind of chuckled and I'm like, "Hey, dude. Pretty pretty sure I don't know how to do that." And and this is a framework that's helping you to succeed when you're talking to customers, not taking away your personality. I'm sure I'm sure you've you've probably heard similar types of stories. >> Oh, yeah. Right. >> Totally. Happens

all the time. Like they're like, "Well, >> yeah. Yeah. I don't want to like Yeah. You're going to remove any of my like you're going to make me sound like a robot, right? >> Yeah. Yeah. You're going to take my personality. You're going to make me sound like a robot. Whatever they may the little objections, right, that that team members may have, which is like, no, no, this is a framework or a script that is designed to help you, not hurt you. It's designed to help

the patient as well. It may make them feel like, you know, they're going through a great patient experience. One thing that you said that that actually like I had >> when you're talking about like the online booking an appointment and like you the subtle detail of uh it didn't ask for the information at first. It just showed like the availability. I have a perfect example um my of this exact moment. My wife uh we just got back from a trip so our backs are hurting you

know all that stuff. So, she's like, "Let's book some massages." I'm like, "All right, sweet." So, I hop online, right? And I go, "This this a dental patient is going to do something like this, too, right? My tooth's hurting. Hop online." Um, and I'm I'm looking, right? And I'm I'm getting frustrated as I'm looking cuz some people have booking links on their website, other people say call. I'm like, I don't want to call. I just want to book and just show up. Mhm. >> And there

was one that uh clinic that I went or uh spa that I went to and it was trying to ask me all the information first like the my email and my phone number and all this stuff and I'm like I just want to see if there's availability and >> as you can imagine I didn't end up booking with that one cuz it was too hard. I actually went to the one that I could easily click, see the availability and the services, see who who is is

gonna give me the massage and then book and then put all my information in. Right. Yeah. >> That's the one I ended up choosing. And uh I don't know why, but that is it. It's just a seamless experience. I don't want to not know if they can even book me, but they're collecting all my information so I can get text and spammed. Right. [laughter] >> Yeah. Patience. >> Go. Go ahead. >> And the crazy thing is that uh Ryan Gross over at CMOS Share, he has

some data point that like 8 to 12% of um people will check your online scheduling and then call. So they'll look to make sure you're, you know, got appointments, but then they don't use that link. >> Yeah. >> And I'm like, well, I don't know how you know that, but that's creepy. It's cool. >> There's ways. Yeah. [laughter] >> So, but like I'm just like, that's >> crazy because yeah, they they want to know that you're available and you're working on a Monday or whatever and

then they will call you and say, "Hey, can I have that Monday appointment?" I don't know how you knew that, but whatever. >> Interesting. Um, so yeah, like yeah, it's just like you don't don't ask all these deep questions. Like we're very guarded with our information. I think in today's age, like all of us are. >> So we're not going to give you my phone number and then only to see like, oh, you have no availability like okay. >> Yeah, it's waste. Yeah. >> I mean,

just some some of those things, you know. >> So would would you recommend like mapping out every point? uh like I know I do this for our own software product. It's a little bit easier when you're a digital company, you know, like like mine, but I would imagine you map out the whole patient journey within your practice starting with online and then what are you looking at friction points and and and like you said like making sure your team has scripts in certain areas and frameworks

to use like what do you recommend people to look at like to optimize that with? Um yeah, like I use Lucid Chart or chart app. >> Um maybe you guys do too. >> Can I use Canva, which they have a Lucid uh type uh it's like a digital notebook that you [clears throat] can sketch things out like I do that. >> So like literally I'm looking at it right now and you know once the new patient is on the schedule, the next step is the patient

receives welcome text plus links to paperwork. >> Yeah. >> But the welcome text is automated to have a video in it. And like when I click on this video, it's a one minute 55 second welcome video. So it's like welcome to Capitol Dentl. These are the doctors you'll be seeing. This is the hygiene team. You know, these are the kind of procedures we do. You've made the right decision. And it's, you know, it's only for people who are already going to be patients but have never

walked in our doors. So it's like a drone shot of coming in from the outside like >> Yeah. Yeah. this is where our building is and parking and kind of front door like all those things. And then it kind of goes through of like once the patient is uh you know the appointment's on the books they're going to get put into the you know uh text reminder email reminder system you know there's a lot of automated pieces but like you know just I the whole patient

experience leads to so many good downstream things >> and so it's a little bit tough to make these datadriven decisions around what should I change like should I tweak it >> but like My default is like it should be better, you know? >> Yeah, sure. Like, >> yeah. >> Once I see someone else who has a great idea, I'm like, we should implement it. >> And they're like, well, we already do okay with Google reviews. And I'm like, yeah, I don't care, but like we should

be better. Like, I want to be the best. >> Um, so like in our front office, we have a coffee machine. You know, a lot of people have coffee machines. Yeah. >> A lot of people have cure eggs. Like that's great. >> Yeah. Um, I have a $40,000 fully automated espresso machine with milk. [laughter] >> I'm going to your office. >> Yeah, exact. So, it's like, do you want a like like the other day I a patient was checking in, a female patient, and her husband

was her driver. She was getting sedation. And I basically uh I was like, "Oh, yeah. Okay, Chris." Like, "All right. Well, um yeah, like I'm actually I'll be seeing you next here in about five minutes." Um, and then I'm like, "Oh, are are you her husband or the the driver?" She's like, "Yeah." And the the husband says, "Yeah." I was like, "Can I get you a coffee?" And he's like, "Well, yeah." I'm like, "Well, I'm standing in front of the espresso machine because I'm getting myself

a a latte before we go into this sedation." >> But, and he's like, "Yeah, do you just have coffee?" And I'm like, I spin the little menu and I'm like, "No, we got lattes, cappuccinos, mochas. We got chocolate mocha, vanilla mocha." Like, >> whatever. really? And I'm like, "Yeah, I'll have the girls, you know, make it up for you. We'll bring it over to you." He's like, "Yeah, I'll take a latte." And like >> he's like, "Oh, I didn't know I was going to go to

Starbucks, too." >> And and it's literally this machine is like the level of Starbucks. So, I mean, it's you see them in airports, like places where they they can turn out 100 drinks real quick. >> Um, but like that's the level >> and the downstream effects like how do you measure that? Well, the I mean revenue is one place to measure it, but >> Sure. >> Google reviews I think are my >> how many people are talking about it. Yeah. Yeah. >> And so our wild

mildly important goal like wig goal is to get 450 Google reviews this year. And so it's like if we do everything right on the front end, we will hit that goal and it'll be great. Um, but it's just all these little pieces that help out, you know, that like a it's fun to I mean it's kind of fun to create those magical moments to be like, "Wow, you're going to get me a latte." And they're like, "Yeah, like it's fun to be giving of that." Um,

but yeah, that's that's the level of patient experience that I like to dig into. >> So, you and I think very similarly because similar because I'm I'm kind of the same way. So, but from a digital like customer experience standpoint, so when somebody when somebody like logs into BoomCloud for the first time, >> it's they they see a video of me with confetti cannons and I'm like welcoming welcoming them to the to our application. And then one thing that we're getting ready to launch here is

it's very similar to your your espresso machine. Um, but when they like um I just designed this whole thing recently. When they like set up their uh they'll have a checklist of things they need to do to set up in BoomCloud to get it launched and um when they complete like [clears throat] one of them, we'll give them a a Starbucks gift card digitally, right? >> Because it's like the coffee thing like you're doing, right? It's like it's like, "Okay, cool. when we get the the

office managers in BoomCloud, she has a task listed, you know, a few things to set up. Um, if she does it, she gets a gift card. And then the we have a a big thing that we're doing right now is so I own properties in in Hawaii in in uh in Kona on the Big Island. And so right now we have a quarterly um uh challenge or contest that we're doing. Whoever signs up a certain amount of membership patients in in this quarter gets put into

a raffle and then I'm going to send them to I'm going to send them the office manager or whoever grew the the membership plan for the practice to our Hawaii condo for free. They don't have to do anything, right? So that that like >> I'm big on when it when it comes to experiences with with customers or patients like that is so fun to design for for me. It sounds like you too. It sounds like we're coming from the the same boat there. >> Um, but

if you can if you can break it down and really be uh uh if you can focus on every little element of of a patient or in my case a practice using my technology like what do do they get joy when they go through the process? Are they leaving that in the reviews like oh my gosh the espresso machine was amazing. Right. You see that? >> I mean yeah it's awesome. Well, it's it's just great. I mean, my I go back to our mission. Um, and

our mission is to make people feel better about dentistry, like make a positive impact. >> And so, like our tagline is relax dentistry is different here. >> And we see that in the Google reviews, like when people say like, "Oh my gosh, I've never been treated that nice." >> Um, or I've always been judged about my teeth, but when I walked in your doors, I didn't feel judged. Interesting. >> Yeah. So I mean it's like when you go back to your mission is like we are

here to serve and this is like what we're what how we serve the world. You know people want to join you. People want to stay for that. Um you hire the right people. You know, it's um I I kind of go back to like when Ernest Shackleton was like I don't know, he wanted to go visit the South Pole or whatever >> back in the 1800s or whatever. And >> the group of people he he got into it. There was some early winter ice and they

like the ice crushed the boat. They had to go into little three little like lifeboats and took them two years and not a single person died like in that whole like they could have gone to cannibalism. They could have all died. But like when he was putting out a job ad for his uh endurance was the name of the SS Endurance or whatever, >> the job ad basically said like >> um dangerous trip like return doubtful, you know, but if we succeed, glory and honor to

those who make it through. And so like his job ad his mission was like, "No, this is going to be tough as heck. We're going to the South Pole. You're going to freeze. you're going to like this is not going to be fun. But if you're the right kind of person that follows what I believe, we will have fun. And I mean I think when you have a mission, you know, like for BoomCloud is to like help practices rely more on their own patients, you know,

>> not insurance. Like that's absolutely >> when people get behind that mission, like you hire the right people, it makes it easier to know when someone's not fitting in, you know, that sort of thing. Interestingly enough, yeah, with with our mission at BoomCloud, you know, help practices reduce dependence on PPOs and become self-reliant is is our mission. >> Um, the best team members have been in dentistry and uh have seen kind of >> what the insurance industry has done and they buy into to that vision,

right, that mission and vision uh in the the company. Like everyone I've hired that was outside of dentistry, they they don't it's it's just not they don't connect with it as much, I've noticed. >> Yeah. >> So, but no, that that's really important. And you you've written you've written a couple books like on leadership and >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I've got so like I've written 12 books. Um >> you're a writer. Yeah. I like it. like I don't know eight or nine of them are the

DSN manuals and we had >> for every situation like maybe your your office is growing super big and you need an associate. Well, this is the book on how to hire an associate associate dentist manual. >> Um if you need more help for an office like we have the front office manual, we have the marketing manual. Uh we have like everything. So, we even have >> like the [clears throat] dental supply ordering manual, which is the most boring manual, but it'll make you the most money

actually. Um, but then I have the a couple other books like By the Numbers is kind of the nuts and bolts of like some numbers to watch in your dental practice. Um, I've got The Shift, which is a fable. Um, and the Fable is like >> it's like a Patrick Lencion Jim Hunter story. Yeah. And so, um, kind of like the ideal team player, it's like, okay, you read the story, it's like, I don't know, what is it, 200 pages, 177 pages. Yeah. >> Um, >>

and it just follows the story of a young entrepreneur who just takes over a practice and realizes like, oh my gosh, I don't know what I'm doing. >> Um, and so all the problems and, you know, throughout the book, you kind of learn the systems. Um, which is that's that one was a really fun one to to write. Um, but then my next books, um, I've got one on, uh, like mission, vision, and core values coming out, uh, later this fall. Um, and then the daily

dental leader, which is daily devotional for like dentists and team members to kind of give like one thing to think about think about in the practice. >> Sure. What's your what's the most popular book? What are people resonating with? >> Um, by the numbers. It's been around since >> Yeah, it's [clears throat] like eight years old. Um, people just, you know, dentists are nerds. I I I would know because I'm very intimate [laughter] with that. Um, but yeah, like we're we're a nerdy group. We want

Yeah. >> We want the nuts and bolts. We want to know their numbers, >> analytical. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Research driven. >> It's like the top 25 metrics to help run your practice. And >> yeah, that one was a fun one. Do you think people like that one because they they I mean they don't learn about that in school >> and like it's it's like >> the weakness when they get into the industry and then they they learn it as they go. >> Yeah, I think

so. Um I mean it's also that once you get a flywheel, you know, it get keeps spinning and I don't know, it's been on the top of the Amazon chart in the dental practice management for quite a long time. Um, but yeah, like it's it's also just very approachable. I would say it's just like very simply written. It's not super complicated, you know. Uh, it offers all the documents, spreadsheets to kind of help somebody if they were absolutely new to dentistry and they just got out

of school, they didn't have a good practice management course in dental school, you know, it'd be like, okay, these like, you know, if you could write down 12 numbers on this side of the sheet, 13 numbers on this, like 25 numbers, and you would have a good health on how your practice is doing. Do that once a month, you're good. Um, I mean, granted, we could dig in, I mean, we could dig into numbers all day long, but at a certain point, like kind of like

Major League Baseball, there's only a few things that like if you were want to play moneyball, there's a few metrics that matter way way more than like, well, you know, what's his from second to third base running time? Like, well, that doesn't really matter. Like, we can measure it, sure. >> Yeah. >> But like, does it matter? And so these 25 numbers, those are pretty impactful. >> That's really good. So, uh, let's do this. Is for all all of our listeners hanging out with us today.

Where do you where do you get your books? [laughter] >> Oh, Amazon. >> All on Amazon, huh? They just they just search for your name. >> Yep. Search for Addison Khen and uh Yeah. >> And they can find all 12 of them there. >> And then [clears throat] >> Yeah. And uh and then if people are wanting to reach out to you because I don't know if they want coaching or whatever it may be like how do they do that? >> Yeah. Um just addison.com. So

add a disso n i len.com. >> Easy. Awesome. Yeah. >> Well, I really appreciate you coming on the show today, hanging out with me. >> Got to bring you on some others. It seems like we've got at least 12 topics to go into. uh and turn those books into podcast episodes so we can go into it. >> I think that'd be awesome if we did something like that. But with that said, everyone go check out Addison's uh website and grab his books. I think they're they'll

be really helpful. I've known Addison and for a while and I think he's really smart uh when it comes to running a practice and uh so check those out and we hope everyone has a rocking day. Amen. >> Thank you.