Dr James: 0:41
Fans of the Dentists who Invest podcast. If you feel like there was one particular episode in the back catalog in the anthology of Dentists who Invest podcast episodes that really, really really was massively valuable to you, feel free to share that with a fellow dental colleague who’s in a similar position, so their understanding of finance can be elevated and they can hit the next level of financial success in their life. Also, as well as that, if you could take two seconds to rate and review this podcast, it would mean the world. To me, what that would mean is that it drives this podcast further in terms of reach so that more dentists across the world can be able to benefit from the knowledge contained therein. Welcome, welcome to the Dentists who Invest podcast. Welcome everyone to mine and Barney’s Q&A and discussion on integrity. Whilst being a seller Exciting one, we’re looking forward to it, and this is so, so important because this is relevant to with relevance to SideGigs month, of course because the lifeblood of your business is being able to convey your message to your audience, whoever you’d like to sell to. And, by the way, selling is something that’s taboo. Selling is something that has a bad name. I feel no one likes the caricature of the greasy salesman. But we’re talking about elegant selling tonight. We’re talking about conveying your message. We’re talking about selling to people when you know you can help them and being able to explain yourself as well as possible so they understand your message and they want to come on your journey with you. Whatever your product is, whatever your business is, whether that be dentistry, whether that be elsewise and we’ve got a money’s more than qualified to speak on that tonight. It is my pleasure to present Barney Barney Alton, who’s come along to talk to us today. Barney’s background is in dentistry, but he has various, various SideGigs, various side businesses, so he’s an inspiration to us on both fronts as a dentist and as someone who has a SideGig. Barney, it’s our pleasure to have you on the show this evening. How are you? How’s your day? How have you been?
Barry: 2:45
Thanks, mate. I’m very grateful for you having me. I’m really good. I’m really good. I’ve had a cracking weekend down at the beach yesterday with the boys, and then I’ve just been chilling. Today I’m cooking. They call it Wagedaddas. I do a ramen soup. So yeah, it’s been great, mate, and thanks for having me. It’s good to see you again, mate.
Dr James: 3:09
It’s my absolute pleasure and Wagedaddas is probably something every father can relate to A restaurant on demand. I’ve also heard of Mam Tandair. Do you know? If you’re from, if you’re Jordy and you’re you know? It’s like Mam and Santander, Portmanteau and Maltenator together, but I haven’t heard of Wagedaddas. That’s a new one for me, William. I think it would be tremendous, Barry, if you could tell us a little bit about yourself and your background, just for anybody who doesn’t know you, hasn’t met you, so that they can get to know you before we jump into selling, etc. Etc.
Barry: 3:43
Sure. So I am 26 years qualified. I’m a Leeds grad, leeds, leeds, leeds. As you know, you and I both love Leeds. I miss Leeds a lot, actually. My journey was so Brunham Bread, on the Wirral, which is near, is between Wales and Liverpool we’re in this little peninsula and I went to Leeds Uni and then I went back to the Wirral to do my VT year and after that I met a girl and moved down south. But in the meantime of moving down south I then met my first wife, and so for five years I worked in a whole array of different practices, wanting to discover what sort of dentistry I wanted to provide, what sort of environment I wanted to work in. And I had a great mentor for 12 years basically, who mentored me in private dentistry, and then I set my own practice up. So at the age of 25, I bought my first practice and that’s the one that I still work in. I work 29 hours clinical a week and I’m based in Hazelmeyer, which is about 15 miles south of Guildford. So if you were to look at a map at London and the South Coast, we’re halfway down the A3. And my story into why I’m lucky enough to be spending an hour with you. Mate is happily married, running my practice, doing really well, two young daughters. And then I found out that my wife at the time was having a two-year affair with a mate of mine and literally I kind of lost the plot. It was a really bad time for me Three years. I slept on the floor of a mate’s flat for six months trying to be a single dad. It became a single dad. I had the girls 50-50. And my youngest was. Both of them were struggling, but my youngest in particular, and so I needed to get myself out of the hole. So I went and did some personal development training and this was three days total immersion. We walked on hot coals and there were certain things that we did in that training course that blew my mind understanding how we all process information and the fact that for 29, 30 years of my life, or however long it was, I thought that we were all the same. I thought we processed information in the same way, and so I found out that this one thing that happened during the course. I ultimately then found out that it was something called NLP Neurolinguistic Programming, and I decided there and then that I needed to go and learn it. It took another three years, or four years I think, to go and learn it, because at the time you had to go fully immersive seven days and I couldn’t afford to do that because my ex would have strung me up because I wouldn’t have had the girls. So I became a practitioner, then a master practitioner. Of the back of that, became a master hypnotherapist, then got coach certified and qualified. And two years after the divorce I then met my wife, chloe. We met in Hamburg. She was the second TCO or PCC, patient Care Coordinator, treatment Coordinator, that kind of thing. She was the second one in the UK and she was working for a friend of mine up in Scotland, an amazing dentist called Elaine Halley, past president of the BACD, of the BACD. Anyway, chloe and I, I knew on the first day I met her that I’d marry her and subsequently she became a master prac of NLP and we took what we learned in our training and we enveloped it into our business and we took our practice within three years from a quarter of a million turnover to a million pound turnover. And that was me working clinically three and a half days a week and a hygienist and that was it. And so, wow, it’s interesting, isn’t it? Because I don’t know people’s turnovers, but my accountants were saying, gee whiz, you guys are a cream in it and no implants, no ortho, just really good quality family dentistry. I’m in a normal town, my fees are not. My fees are normal, everything’s normal. But we had extraordinary turnover and that’s because of the patient journey that we developed and the system of delivery. And fundamentally, the biggest shift was Chloe being the TCO, which meant that I didn’t do any of the explanation. So I designed the system of how we have the conversations and then Chloe would execute that and so would the rest of the team members. We also trained our team to do as much as they were possibly legally allowed to do. In other words, I did as little as possible that other people could do. So I don’t do X-rays, I don’t do the chats anymore, I don’t do post-op instructions, impressions, scans, anything like that. My team take care of that, which is why my gross income goes up. But also, chloe developed this way of treatment presenting where we treatment present and we present three plans and it’s color coded and so on and so forth. So we developed this great system. I then decided that I really wanted to pay it forward and pass it on. So I developed a training course, a two-day communication and sales course. Ultimately, selling for me it’s purely just communication. We all shy away from the word selling and I used to think my as a child right, I knew that I would never be a salesman. We thought that selling was a really dirty word, that salesmen were bar stewards, sales people were bar stewards, I believe, that they ripped people off and so on and so forth. So I never wanted to be in sales. And when I entered dentistry I thought I would never be in sales. And then I learned that the word sell comes from a Norwegian word, selje, which means to starve. And along my journey of doing loads of extracurricular kind of studying and outside of dentistry I had business mentors and all sorts, both here in the States I began to understand that unless I was serving, unless I was selling and providing all of the options, I wasn’t actually truly serving. Plus, I then discovered that the biggest barrier to me making my patients happy and ultimately making money, the biggest barrier was me. With my own limiting beliefs about what selling is and with my poor then language skills, I would talk people out of choosing the best options. And so, once I began to learn influential language, I’ve studied with Robert Chaldini’s Institute on human influence. You know the six principles of influence, and I’ve utilized those in our business as well, and so I decided I wanted to take this and teach other people, and so that million pound turnover, by the way, was achieved without we’ve not done any marketing for 15 years. There is zero spend on marketing, it’s all internal and it’s all crafted in a way that appears to be spontaneous. And there’s an element of spontaneity, but we ask in a certain way and we tap into reciprocity and we tap into all sorts of other things that enable my patients to support me in the way that I would like them to. So we get constant recommendations, referrals. We’ve only got five star reviews. I’m thinking I’m up to 90, odd again. We had 80, and some reason Google deleted them and we’re back up to 80, and they’re only five star, and that’s because we ask for five star reviews. So we’ve developed systems within our business that I’ve then enveloped in a two day training. We call it influencing smiles, because we’re influencing people to choose better quality dentistry and make better choices, and it’s been hugely successful. And so, yeah, that’s where I’m at now is bringing it into dentistry. Sharing the ideas and the feedback that we get is phenomenal because it’s more personal life changing than it is professional life changing, because I teach you how, at best, you’re communicating with 30% of the population and then I’ll share with you how you discover how other people process information, which, by the way, is where their eyes go, which is amazing. So from my eye scan patterns. Then I’ll use certain words. Let me give you an example. So, going through the divorce, I wanted to be the best dad that could be. I’ve always wanted to be. People said when I was a kid, what do you want to be? When you grow up? And I went, a dad, they were like, really, you don’t want to be a fireman. And I was like, no, I always wanted to be a dad. So I’ve got four of them. All of them are amazing. When my eldest daughter was about nine, I’d say to her look, I’m going to teach you to Guilford. I’m going to teach you to Wagamomas. I’ll teach you to Urban Outfitters by your top. How’d you feel about that? Emily would go oh, don’t know how I’ll feel Now. In that moment when she said that, I jumped to the conclusion that she was ungrateful and I jumped to the conclusion that I’ve just offered to do this, this and this, ask you how you feel, and you’re like don’t know how I feel. Then I learned NLP and what I discovered was that my eldest daughter who I mentioned you earlier on, has just finished her art degree, got a two one in fine art. She’s highly visual, she has feelings and yet she doesn’t need to process the world through her feelings to understand the world. So when I learned this and I learned how to communicate more clearly, if I had the same conversation I’d say Millie, we’re going to Guilford Wagas Urban Outfitters, do you like the look of that? And she’d be like, yes, now imagine if that was a patient James for a 10,000 pound treatment. And I go Mrs Smith, we’re going to do this, this, this and this. How do you feel about that? And if she’s not kinesthetic like me and she’s visual like Millie, she’ll go oh, how do I feel? I don’t know. I would have jumped to the conclusion that she didn’t want it. Does that make sense? It?
Dr James: 13:50
does. It’s so interesting. So you’re making it all on board.
Barry: 13:55
Yeah. So I mean, this is what you’re going to learn when you’re coming on the two-day training. Right, I am, I am. So this is what you’re going to learn is, when it’s not landing, it’s not because I used to say things like my God, I’ve told him three times, doesn’t get it. He’s clearly a dickhead and we’ve all been guilty of that. Let’s be honest.
Dr James: 14:16
We’ve all been guilty. So how people process information is so true and there’s definitely a disconnect there and a breakdown in communication, just like what you said. Definitely, I’ve been there.
Barry: 14:28
Right, so the skill is. I mean I’m ultimately. I start the first, I start the two days by saying I’m not going to share anything with you that you don’t already know. It’s just you’re not consciously aware of it. And I’ll give you the example I give. Right, do you remember your undergraduate training of the gait theory of pain? Do you remember that Most people go oh, kind of, maybe not.
Dr James: 14:55
So I’ve developed an idea.
Barry: 14:58
One of the biggest practice builders is the fact that for me, my patients have no idea they’ve had an injection, so I give an injection and people just don’t know that it’s happened, and part of the thing that I utilize is the gait theory of pain. So every parent on the planet knows the gait theory of pain. If I said to you that you see a little child fall over and bangs his knee, mum picks him up. What does she do to his knee?
Dr James: 16:07
She rubs it right.
Barry: 16:09
Rubbed it. Yeah Well, that’s a subconscious understanding of the gait theory of pain. The reason she rubs it is she stimulates mechanoreceptors that get through the dorsal root ganglion and close the gait to pain. When it comes to communication, anything I share with you, you actually already know. I’m just going to make you consciously aware of it so that then you can utilize it on purpose to get a better result, and that’s simply what it is. All I’m doing is unpicking how the brain works, show you how it works so that you can use that to your patients and your best interests, but, more importantly, your personal relationships. That’s the biggest feedback I get.
Dr James: 16:48
NLP. You might have explained without acronym, meant, but for anybody who missed it, like me, what does that stand for?
Barry: 16:55
Okay, so it stands for neuro linguistic programming. Let’s break those down. Neuro let me put it really simply. Okay, neuro is your nervous system, it’s basically your five senses by which the information of the world comes into you. Okay, linguistic is the language of how we process that and how we then connect with that in terms of our thoughts and our feelings. And we do that with what we call internal representations, where we have pictures, sounds, movies, self-talk and feelings, little voices and our feelings, and then programming. Neuro linguistic programming simply means behaviors it’s how we take the information in, how we process it, and then our resultant behaviors, our strategies, our programs, and so the best definition for NLP for me is it’s the user’s manual for the brain, simple.
Dr James: 18:00
Real quick, guys. I’ve put together a special report for dentists, entitled the seven costly and potentially disastrous mistakes that dentists make whenever it comes to their finances. Most of the time, dentists are going through these issues and they don’t even necessarily realize that they’re happening until they have their eyes opened, and that is the purpose of this report. You can go ahead and receive your free report by heading on over to wwwdentistunevestcom forward slash podcast report or, alternatively, you can download it using the link in the description. This report details these seven most common issues. However, most importantly, it also shows you how to fix them Really, looking forward to hearing your thoughts. Awesome, and that’s the basis of what you can use this to overcome pain, because I know that that’s another kind of feather to your hat, isn’t it, barry? That you also have your injection technique, which is painless, etc.
Barry: 19:02
And yeah, I was reading.
Dr James: 19:04
There was something really interesting I was reading and it was patients. Patients taught five reasons why they’ll return to their dentist, and being painless was number one. Not even the quality of the work, but being painless was number one. Yeah Well, from the dentist point of view, we always tend to this is maybe another thing, just what you were talking about there. From the point of view of communication, a lot of us as dentists and I feel like this as well and you just tend to think to yourself yeah, it’s a little painful, but we just have to just get on with it. You know what I mean, and for that’s because you’re so, I suppose, you’re so normalized to it because you just see it every day. But from the patient’s point of view, to hear, to think that that might be your attitude just seems extremely callous. And yeah, that’s, I suppose, nlp, what you were talking about. There is something that we could all use, really, and to improve our injection. It’s paramount to the patient, isn’t it.
Barry: 20:04
So it’s interesting, you drew attention to what you read. The top two reasons why people don’t attend the dentist is number one fear of the needle. Number two fear of the pain. The top two reasons patients keep going back to the dentist is number one comfortable injection. Number two no pain. Money is number seven. It’s way down the list. Money is very rarely the reason that people won’t have the work done. It comes down to trust. It comes down to the journey, it comes down to the comfort. I tell you, the dentistry has to be good. Right, but it only has to be so good. Now, you and I would want our dentistry to be 10 out of 10. But no one has ever complimented me on my tertiary fishes on a composite. No one’s ever complimented me on the occlusal staining that I may have laid in. If it’s good enough, they’re happy. What they really care about is the way that they were looked after, the way that they felt, the way that their experience is way more important than the dentistry itself. So, for me, the dentistry has to be seven out of 10 minimum. Certain anterior work got to be a lot higher, but generally speaking, we’re judged on our trust, on our behavior and on the journey and the team and the experience that they get, and so it’s super important that we are taught how to communicate, and none of us are. What we do is we communicate in our model of the world, which is great for us and the 30% of the people that are like us. But think about my relationship with my eldest daughter, millie. For like three or four years I incorrectly thought she was ungrateful and that she, you know, I’d ask her about feelings and she’d go. I don’t know. And I thought, oh my God, this divorce is killing her. She’s not got any feelings. Of course she had feelings. I now understand she just didn’t run her life on her feelings. She had a different way of processing information. So once you find that out, once you step into somebody else’s model of the world, they just they love you. They won’t go. My patients genuinely love me. You know, I’ve worked in the same town and lived in the same town for 21 years. No one’s ever spat at me or given me a slap. I see my patients all day, every day. You know they’re my neighbors, they’re my friends and it’s because what I do is completely comfortable and the way that I use my language. So can I tell you I can’t wait for you to come on the course. By the way, language skills mega, really huge. Our words, in terms of our communication, are a tiny amount, like 7%, but the words that we use are so important. So when you say to somebody, I’m going to make sure that this injection is completely pain free, your subconscious mind can’t process a negative. So if I say to you and everybody else watching right now right, james, don’t think of a dental chair. What do you think of A? dental chair, yeah, even if it’s for a nanosecond, right, so you can’t process a negative. So when you say to somebody, right, I’m going to make sure this is not painful, it’s going to be completely pain free, they have to think about what painful is to know that it’s not going to be painful. So we eradicate negative. So I’ll say to you, james, I’m going to look after you, to everything I do for you today, james, I’m going to make sure is completely comfortable. If anything I’m doing isn’t completely comfortable, you’re in charge. You give me a little flick of the hand, I’ll stop. I’ll find out what isn’t comfortable and I will make sure it’s comfortable. Is that okay? Now, I don’t mind what your internal representation of comfort is. It could be floating on a Lilo in a pool, or it could be in a big fluffy bed, it doesn’t matter. But I do know that it’s much more positive than pain, or your reference to pain Makes sense.
Dr James: 23:57
That is really clever. I’m taking notes. That’s good. So the power of suggestion, yeah, you’re quite right. I mean that is something that I’ve, no doubt inadvertently, done a million times. You talked about limiting beliefs, about selling back. This is something, anecdotally, I used to have major qualms. I would almost talk myself or talk to the patient out of treatment because I never, ever, wanted to come across as someone who was salesy or even give them the tiniest little hint that I was in any way selling. Also, the point of my own it would detract from my turnover, detract from the number of patients that would come back to see me. Massive limiting beliefs is something I wasn’t doing. Right. There will no doubt be countless people who watch this, who figure the same. What were those limiting beliefs that you spoke about, barry? How did you overcome them as well?
Barry: 24:53
Okay, I love the fact, James, that we’re having this conversation before you’ve been on my training course, because every question you’re asking, I have a section in the course that is about to answer it. We deal with limiting beliefs based around wealth and based around finance. Some of my limiting beliefs were and forgive the language I used to believe that rich people have asked us and they got rich by crapping on other people. If I shout it out to you, money is the root of All evil. Right, that’s a limiting belief that has been passed to us. It’s not actually our belief. It’s pointless going back and going oh, do I believe? Don’t I believe, Because actually there’s six simple questions that can blow out any limiting belief. I won’t share those with you now because you’ll do that on the course with me. I’m actually part of your day. One homework is there are 72 limiting beliefs around wealth and finance that I get you to fill out. I’ve actually got my linchpin manual here.
Dr James: 26:04
Here we go.
Barry: 26:06
Here they are. It’s called the wealth mindset discovery 72 questions. Then what we do is we pick one and I talk you through how to get rid of it. I got rid of it in 30 seconds. It was doing that exercise that enabled me to take the business from a quarter of a million to a million, because I also use different language and I got out of my own way. Can I give you an example? Yeah, I’d love to hear. So I used to say things like let’s assume that Mrs Smith has broken her lower left six and that 40% of the tooth is missing. There’s hairline fratches in the remaining enamel and tooth substance. We know from evidence based dentistry that the best solution for that is an indirect restoration, something like a crown or an inlay on lay or something like that. I had a limited belief that nobody would buy private dentistry off me. If they’re on the NHS, they want the cheapest. No one’s going to pay me 600 quid for a crown. I can’t do that. So I would say I would present it like this I’d say look, james, you’ve broken that lower left six and it’s missing a lot of tooth and I know that the best treatment for that is to put a crown on it, but I could fill it and that’s a lot cheaper. Now I spoke the truth. The crown is the best option. The word but negates everything that came before it. So all you subconsciously here is I can do a filling and it’s cheaper. What did every patient choose? A filling? I became a self-fulfilling prophecy because nobody bought a private crown off me. Nobody spent 600 quid. That fed my limiting belief. Then I did this exercise and I learned the language skill of removing the word but, or actually using my but on purpose, and I changed my presentation. So look, james, you’ve broken that tooth. I could fill it and that’s a cheaper option, but In order to keep that tooth for the next 20 years, the best option for that, which I genuinely believe is true, is to crown it. My crown sales went through the roof. I earn an extra 75 grand If you think about the number of patients that a dentist sees on a daily basis, that they would genuinely benefit from having a decent crown on teeth. There’s at least one tooth in most patients, right, and there’s probably multiple. When I genuinely present it in that way, my crown sales went through the roof. What did you use to charge for a crown, james?
Dr James: 28:36
Uh well, $650 for an E-Max Right, let’s just let’s round it down to 500.
Barry: 28:44
Four days a week, even one a day, two grand a week at 46 weeks a year, what’s that? 92,000 pounds additional gross just from getting out my own way. It was crazy, man. So limiting beliefs we don’t realize we’ve got them. You know there are statements that we can’t Well, that’s why you don’t even realize they’re there.
Dr James: 29:08
That’s the thing.
Barry: 29:09
That’s why we do the exercise is because it helps us uncover some limiting beliefs. I had a coaching session on Saturday morning with a group I’m working for a corporate at the moment and there’s a young lady there where she said she’s young and she’s NHS but she’s struggling to be able to present her private treatments. And she said look, I just feel I don’t want to deny anybody their NHS option. And I said you know, can I come back and coach you on that? Do you mind doing that publicly, because we’re in a Zoom room of 20 people? And she went yeah, so we started to unpick that she has a limiting belief about if she’s not providing NHS to NHS patients. She is. She was preventing them and she was using these fairly heavy words to add into the fact that it prevented her from offering private treatment. So I said to her look, it is all about serving. You know I talk about the analogy I use. Mate, is you’re in leads, right? Let’s say we need to go from leads to weight field. Yeah, motor transportation you could walk that long way, but you can walk it. You could ride a bike, you could get a bus, you could drive yourself, you could be driven in a Ferrari by a chauffeur, or you could get a private helicopter and overwhelmingly I say, if that was dentistry, which mode of transportation is NHS? And everybody says the bike or walking. And I go. When I was a kid it was definitely the bus. It was good quality, it was caring. You know dentists were funded adequately and well. And I now agree with the majority of my delegates I think it is on the bike or it’s walking. Then I say what do you think private dentistry is? And they all go the Ferrari or the private helicopter. Would you agree with that? I don’t know.
Dr James: 31:07
Yeah, I think I can see where you’re going with this. It’s like private can be a car, just you know there’s scope. It doesn’t have to be the extreme is what you’re saying.
Barry: 31:15
So here’s what I say to them For me, private dentistry is all six Private dentistry. Private dentistry isn’t the things that cost more. Private dentistry is the explanation to the patient of everything that’s available and then, based on finding out that we call them deep drivers, as there’s emotional drivers it’s really easy to find out, and there’s one question that gives you all the information you need about a patient, which I’ll share with you in a minute. The key is to present all of those options and then to help them make the best choice for them. Invariably, when you present all of the options, they will usually go for something that is better than is available on the NHS usually, like almost always. So private dentistry for me is about being in rapport, offering solutions, giving advice, giving pros and cons, explaining everything and then facilitating the patient making their best choice, whatever that may be.
Dr James: 32:17
Awesome, beautifully put. Beautifully put. We were talking earlier Well, yes, that was what I was going to say just about reframing the mindset. Yeah, becoming someone that can sell. The best thing that someone ever said to me was they said when you feel like you can genuinely serve that person really, really well, by not giving them all of the options that you should do, not offering them that correct private crime, not offering them your service effectively and being able to communicate it clearly, you’re actually doing a disservice to them in a way, because of the fact that they might go to someone else, get an inferior product, when you know yourself that your hands are good and you can do a really great job for that patient. It made me become a lot more confident in selling. It made me become a lot more willing to do it, because it reframed it totally from me from being the slimy salesman, the greasy salesman, to something just a mere communication thing and being able to articulate that clearly and effectively. When someone buys from you, it’s because they believe in you, they trust you, they agree with what you’re saying, so it comes from that. That was interesting. I don’t know if that’s something that you’ve come across, barry, or anything you’d like to add to that?
Barry: 33:37
Oh no, I 100% agree with you, unless you’re providing all of the options and giving some advice on the pros and cons, because we’re dealing with biology, right, and so a post-core crown on one person may be a much better choice than a post-core crown on another person or an implant or whatever. Whatever my job is. So I talk about sales being it’s got to be integrity-based. For me, it’s integrity-based or evidence-based industry and if you are true to yourself in what you’re recommending and you’re presenting it in a way that is within the best interests of the patient, you can learn to do that from a place of rapport. When I, 21 years ago, when I attended a sales training course, we thought that rapport was finding common ground. That adds a level of rapport, but actually rapport is being more like the other person. People like people who are like them. People trust people that they like. People buy from people they trust. So I will be more like the person I’m communicating with. That increases the level of trust because I want to serve them. Why? Because I want them to make their best choice and if their best choice happens to be the cheapest, because it’s right for them right now in their circumstance, then I’ve served them, but I’ll still chat to them about look, absolutely, we can do this for now and know that if your circumstances change or anything happens in the future that allows you to invest more money in your teeth, I’m ready for you. And so it just creates this never ending reservoir of treatment with patients that when they’re ready, they come back.
Dr James: 35:15
Awesome, awesome Guys. Barry and I are having a wonderful conversation here. I hope everybody is learning an absolute tonne. We’re getting close to the point. We’re going to move on towards the Q&A aspect of this webinar. Can I say something? Yeah, no, we’re not going to go there, josh out. Barry, we’re not going to go there, josh out, be free.
Barry: 35:36
Just to let you know that, because there’s so much about language that I love. What I said is I put a PDF together for anybody that wanted it. So when we get to the end, I’ll give you a QR code and they can go and get a free download, which will give them some information about the negatives and so on and so forth. Just to let you know.
Dr James: 35:58
That’s right, that’s awesome. So the thing to do is I’m going to post. This video is going to go on the group, it’s going to be uploaded natively because it’s a Facebook live, of course, and the very first comment on that post will be from me and it will be that QR code that Barry is speaking about. So that will be up very, very shortly after this video. There is normally a chat feature on these videos. For some reason, the chat is a wall tonight, or else I would put it in there, but that is where you’ll be able to find it, guys, and that will be up ASAP, very promptly. Also, guys, we are, oh, there, it is, hey, boom. Okay, feel free to scan that. Guys, if you’re interested in Barry’s PDF, which deals with selling, which deals with freshing out a little bit more what Barry was saying earlier, this QR code will also make an appearance in the comments. So that’s clever, but I didn’t think of that Cool. What was it going to say? The reason why, the reason why I wanted to just jump in just now, was to say that no doubt there’ll be those people watching who have questions. There is a one minute delay between Barry and I speaking and this reaching your screens. So I’m just asking people to send in their questions to me now. Send them in via private message to my personal Facebook and I will ask Barry, because there is no chat feature on this webinar, as we know. And, barry, what I wanted to say, you know another thing about selling, and this is something that everyone can relate to. When I used to another limiting belief in my head was I used to believe that X amount of money was too much, x 450 for a crown was too much, 550 for a crown was too much. And before I had even said the price out loud to the patient, I’d give them a discount or I’d say the price really quickly. I’d be like 550, but we can do this and if we do this, we’ll take it down to 450, it’s fine. It’s for you, mrs Smith, and I know you and I like you and blah, blah, blah. That is something that is so detrimental to our profits. Because that 100 quid that comes off if your profit margin is 50% let’s say it’s 50% just for the sake of argument and your total gross is 400 to charge for a crown, your profit margin is 50%. Therefore, you’re making 200 quid profit. You’re actually having your profit margin because your overheads are still the same. So you’re only making 100 quid in that crown because you’ve taken that fee off. So even though you’re taking a quarter of the price off, you’re taking away half your profit margin, which is a really nice way that somebody explained that to me. Barry, that’s going to be a limiting belief that those people can relate to. I have no doubt in my mind that you perhaps went through that process yourself and you’ve overcome it. Would you like to say anything on that or share?
Barry: 38:49
Yes, yes good, I’ve gone through it, we’ve all done that Right. We’ve all done that Mental fiscal drag. You know, dentistry is a funny thing. I think there are aligned professions and aligned service industries that are linked to this. When you go and buy a car, you know what you’re getting right. If you’re buying the identical car from a different garage and it’s £1,000 cheaper, you’ve got what you think is a fair comparison between the two things. Dentistry is a very unusual thing to compare because in my map of the world my patients are not coming to me for a crown, they’re coming to me for me. They’re coming to me for my knowledge, my expertise, my love, my care, my consideration. They’re coming to me for the whole journey and the post-op journey, the way that I look after people. We phone everybody up the following day. We do TLC calls. You know I’ll see patients that have passed seven in the morning before work. If they have an issue or a problem, they’re paying for the service, they’re not paying per se for the product. I think that it’s people beginning to understand that if they’re in a practice where maybe the journey outside of their room is not what they want, then they can influence that. They can make the journey inside of their room. If you’re in a studio or a surgery, you can make that journey for that patient phenomenal. You have to believe in your own self-worth as well as the value of the product that you’re providing, which may be a crown. It’s about understanding that it ain’t just the crown. When they say, look, I can get a crown down the road for £100 less, the answer is are you comparing like for like? The way that we look after you, the way that we do that, the service and everything else that we’re providing is something that we’re incredibly proud of. We can’t diss the other practice, but what we can do is draw attention to the fact that we care. We care more than I know others do. We will look after you and we will do our absolute level best to ensure that everything that we do for you is fantastic. We’ll make it comfortable, we’ll put you in charge, we’ll make you relaxed and we put you at the forefront. So, yes, almost everybody I know has been through that, and actually to come out the other side of it is really quite cathartic and freeing, because you begin to know your worth. Let me tell you a very quick story. Right, fedex has its own airports and loads of planes because they’re a huge courier company, right? And this one time they’ve got this hangar where these conveyor belts take the packages and, depending where they’re going, they go off in a different direction to go in and be loaded in the particular plane that’s flying wherever it’s going. So the organization and the logistics of this operation is paramount, as based on these conveyor belts working right. This one time conveyor belt stopped working. Oh my God, it caused mayhem and havoc. They phoned up the conveyor belt engineer and they were like, because people spent like two hours trying to fix it, they were like just get the guy out, get the guy out. The guy came out, had a little look around, checked it. He opened a box on a pillar, turned the screw, closed the box. Everything started working. The foreman says okay, can I have your invoice please? He pays his invoice and he goes $1,000, $1,000, really. You were here for two minutes and he charged me $1,000. And the worker goes you’re absolutely right, I’m terribly sorry. Took another piece of paper, wrote out another invoice, gave it to him. The foreman looked at it, smiled and went can you pay him $1,000, please? And people were like what the hell? Hang on a minute. What’s going on? He passed the paper to somebody. The piece of paper wrote time to turn the screw, $1, knowing which screw to turn $999. It’s not the turning of the screw or the fitting of the crown, it’s the care, the love, the attention, the journey, the understanding. It’s the communication that is what will get you your worth, not the product. Does that make sense?
Dr James: 43:25
It has to be good.
Barry: 43:26
But it’s the journey and it’s the care, and it’s the way that I talk to people. It’s the way that I step into their model of the world. I found out what’s important to them. I asked them the killer question, which you haven’t got time for now, which which serves me for the next 20 years with them.
Dr James: 43:43
Awesome value, creating value, communicating value. It’s all about value. What are people value? 100%, that’s. That’s awesome. What a great analogy. And I am just going to throw one more thing on top of that, which by I’m sure you’ve come across this before. There is a well-known Sales coach in the dental world and he says that there’s only three reasons why someone will say your price is too high. The first one is Because they genuinely don’t have enough money. But those people are actually fewer and far between. Then you think, generally, money is used as a smoke screen Because someone doesn’t believe that there is enough value in your product generally. And if you poke, if you, if you Go in, if you go there, and you say to them oh well, if money wasn’t a problem, would there be anything else holding you back? That is a really good way of disarming them and that’s something that I use from time to time. The other person who might invite me and say your price to the eye is someone that’s perhaps Irrational again, few and far between, but those people are out there. There’ll always be people that you don’t click with, and that’s fine. And the third person, which is 90% of the time, yeah, is the person who hasn’t had enough value Created and the number of times when you realize that it’s there that person, you can go back. You just have to say what resonates with them so they understand why your product is so much better than everybody’s else, everybody else’s and is worth the fee. And remember, in dentistry if you can do a bang-and-fill in, you can do an incredible job. Because it’s surgical that you’ve only got one shot to do that right Really, or else there’s going to be some sort of Iatrogenic damage there, the fillings going to get bigger, the tooth is furthered on the restorative cycle. So that being able to do that well and do that the first time is a huge thing for that patient and for the longevity of that tooth. And that’s why you should never understand yourself in dentistry, barry, what you look like. You have something to say.
Barry: 45:51
Yeah, to me there’s a number of. There’s some additional things to that. Everything you’ve said I agree with and I think the number one thing it’s it’s not the money, it’s trust. So it’s there’s. There’s the value of the service that you’re providing and the journey, but actually the number one reason is trust, and Trust can be gained very easily but also can be lost very easily. And if you are not Congerant in your message, if you’re, if your message. So we use words, we use tonality and we use our physiology to explain things right, and if we’re not careful, our tone of our words can let out our inner feelings, where our words are trying to demonstrate something else. If I say, yeah, james, thanks ever so much. This has been really great to talk to you, mate, thanks. The words that I’ve used tell you that it’s been really great. But you’re like lying get is tone, it’s like you’re all right stone, if you do have a limited belief and you go well, yeah, this, yeah, definitely this crown, 600 pounds, definite, definitely the best choice for you. I Just questioned my own advice and my patient would go. There’s no way I’m having that off him because he doesn’t even believe himself. So one of the things to be aligned with is to ensure that we have congruency, ensure that our tonality in our Physiology matches the words that we’re coming out with. James, this has been absolutely Fantastic. I’ve loved it, mate, spending time with you and spending time with the people in your group wonderful, loved it. I’d love to do it again. That’s genuine, the words are genuine, the tone is genuine, the physiology is genuine and you’re like beaming like a Cheshire cat Because you know it’s genuine. It’s all subconscious. Subconscious Influence is how we buy and how we sell. It has to be based on integrity there, has to be based on evidence-based dentistry, and that’s one of the unique things about me. In the market places, I’m a job in dentist. I’m three days a week. I do this day in, day out and the evidence is. I Solved my practice three years ago. I work three days a week and, out of 600 dentists in the corporate I’m in, I’m the highest alley grossing dentist, apart from implants and ortho specialists. It works. It works because it’s coming from a genuine love of dentistry, a love of people and a belief that I’m serving, and so when I pass that on, everybody that I share with their income starts to go up and up and up and up, because they get out their own way and they give Patience the opportunity to buy rather than put them off.
Dr James: 48:38
Awesome, awesome words. Thank you so much, bar. You’ve mentioned your program and, of course, a few times. I know that it’s coming up in September. Would you like to talk a little bit about that, just for anybody’s interested?
Barry: 48:49
So two-day live it’s always. Obviously I’m a dentist and Taking time out of work was tricky, taking time out of family was tricky, so I’ve always operated them on a Friday and a Saturday. It’s two days fully immersive. I can tell you now it’s 16 hours of coaching and teaching that will give you the perfect 10-minute conversation that will transform your relationships with your patients and I love it phenomenal. And what I haven’t told you, sir, is that through you, anybody through you. On the next, I’ve got a date in September and I’ve got a date in October and your crew in Dentists who invest can have 25% off the fee.
Dr James: 49:34
That’s awesome. That’s quite the discount. That’s brilliant.
Barry: 49:38
I’ve got to tell you that but yeah, so they can have 25% off the two courses this year. It’s influencing smiles, though. What you, what I’m gonna ask you to do, is to post the discount code. It’s really simple post the discount code into your group and then they can utilize that. When they go to influencing smiles and they put themselves on, they can use a Discount code which will bring 25% off the fee for the two-day live. I also run my online training is the dental linchpin, and that’s 12 weeks. They’re also welcome to have 25% off that as well. All I ask in return is, if they join up and they take 25% off, that they will allow me to speak to them afterwards and a few weeks afterwards to talk about a Testimony of how they’re getting on and how it’s working and the impact that it’s having for them.
Dr James: 50:35
Seems reasonable, barry, and that’s a very kind offer. Thank you so much for that. So just to be just to be clear, that’s on wwwinfluencesmilescom. Is that? Right when they sign up, use the code.
Barry: 50:48
So go and have a look, but then we’ll give you the promo code.
Dr James: 50:51
Cool, I actually didn’t know that before we got on this call, so yeah.
Barry: 50:56
I.
Dr James: 50:58
Very kind, I’ll post. I’ll be sure to post that promo code in the comments or if anybody would like to know more, feel free to reach out to me or reach out to barry and we can absolutely help. Brilliant Bye. You’ve been a tremendous speaker today. So much value, so many nuggets, so many. Have you heard of GPM? I love the expression GPM. No, what’s that? Gems per minute knowledge. Gems per minute. The higher the GPM, the higher the rate we learn at. I love that. I often say that very high GPM, gpm number, awesome, brilliant. Without a few questions floating in, what I will do is I will keep these questions anonymous, just out of courtesy, because some of them are about clinical. Well, there’s vaguely about a clinical situation, is this one? So I’ll do that. So, first of all, they said that they’re loving the Q&A with Barry Oten and they love Barry’s energy. So there’s a compliment for you, barry. Thank you, that’s very kind of you to say that anonymous messenger. Now on to their question. Could you ask Barry if I should give a patient who is having a full, more three-habit this point on his request? I said I would ask the principal, as I An associate this Barry’s. Yeah, that’s the first part of the question, and then there’s there’s a second part of the question too, which we’ll go into just a second. What do you think, what’s your policy on this? Can’t spy.
Barry: 52:23
Okay. So I love the power of how we provide discount. Right, everybody’s after a deal and the bottom line is that if you are purchasing from me right now, I am an associate and I have the ability to Offer you friends and family discount, and if I think that by offering you a 5% discount, for example, is going to get you over the Over the edge to agree to it, then it’s within my remit to do that. Previously, when I owned the practice, we offered a 5% gratuity if they paid up from. So if they were, because if they take out finance as an associate now, if they want to spread their treatment over finance, I have to pay for the finance. So I’m not going to give a discount Because I’m already. I’m already discounting what I’m getting, although they’re not getting a discount, they’re not paying the interest. So I’m quite careful about it and I you know there’s a number of ways of doing this. If you have the permission from your Principle to give a discount and you think it’ll get it over the edge, then why not if you? If they’re paying by by Interest-free credit, then I’m assuming you’re paying for it. So I’d be reluctant to because, as James eloquently said earlier on, if you take 10% off. Actually, most practices are running at 24 to 32%, mate. So if you, if you take 10% off, you’re cutting your profit by a third to a half, and so a 10% cut is huge 5% gratuity because they’re paying up front. As a business owner, I’m happy to do that, and what I often do is say look, as an associate, I it’s not within my capabilities To be offering a discount, I’m afraid, because the fees are set by the mother ship or the fees are set by the boss, or whatever. What I am really comfortable in doing, though, is offering you and the tooth whitening Complementary, and never say free, it’s got to be complimentary, because that’s ads value or something else. So I would never just turn around and flatly say no, unless, I don’t particularly like the patient, if I’m honest. But yeah, I think there’s an element of being flexible Whilst remaining professional, and it not necessarily affecting you. So talk to your boss about what their policy is, because you want that discount to be swallowed 50-50. You don’t want it to come off yours, and unless you’ve got that agreement and you just discounted they might have, they have the right really to come back and go look, you took 10% off. That’s coming off yours, not mine. Does that help?
Dr James: 55:21
Certainly does. It’s always a sticky one, is that? And so I know that some of the the hard cores out there in the sales world they say never, never, offer any sort of discount because it devalues what you say. I’m not as strict as that. I would be more along your lines, barry, but it needs to be done in a very careful fashion, and I think you just explained it very nicely there. Tremendous. And then the second one from this anonymous Person, individual ha. They’ve asked Barry, does your training work for dem plan or other payment plan practice? Oh Gosh 100%.
Barry: 55:55
So I don’t. If you know, I’m about to launch and do the practice plan tour. If you’re a dem plan practice, then you have the ability to upsell Other treatments on top of dem plan and you also have the ability to have these conversations with patients where they’re choosing things that aren’t necessarily going to be covered by dem plan. The way that we present our treatment is we present full mouth, three treatment plans red, amber, green. Red is diseased, so decay, perio, amber is anything that is previously restored that might, you might benefit or consider doing at this point in time. So, as a dem plan patient, right, let’s assume for a second that they’ve got the fractured lower left six, they’ve got an MO aldermal gum in the seven and maybe they’ve got a DO in the five. It may well be that, under the terms of conditions that the fractured six needs to be done. But, mrs Smith, whilst I’m there for a nominal fee which is outside of dem plan, it makes sense to consider doing the five and the seven at the same time because, number one, it’s one visit. You know what it’s two visits for the crown, but it’s one visit. Number two, it’s all done with the same injection. So you know at the same time. And, number three, I can craft a much better contact point between the five and the six and the six and the seven. Now, because it’s choice as opposed to necessity. There’s going to be a fee for it, but that fee is only so. Learning the skills to have that conversation Means that you have the capabilities, whether you’re in a dem plan or another planned sort of practice I’m assuming that question has come from somebody that’s in a capitation scheme, as opposed to just Like practice plan just covers exams and Exams, hygiene, therapy and emergencies. All treatment is then Charged for. But yeah, but this is not about dentistry. Let me tell you this today course, everybody’s feedback is my god, this is life changing. This is about how we communicate with ourselves, first and foremost, then how we communicate with our loved ones, our families, our team, and then happens to be how you communicate with your patient, so that it this, this, actually we’re white labelling this into vets, optometry Law consultants. I’ve got the confident vets, confident team, confident parent. It’s a communication training course, as just the last, probably 20% of it, we talk about dentistry. The bulk of it is how we process information.
Dr James: 58:28
Well, I’m glad you said that, because you and I have we’ve talked I mean, maybe about 70 80% about dentistry today. But really that was why I wanted to get you on as well by, because I know that your sales skills are applicable Well outside that dimension, well outside that realm. And obviously this month is side gigs month, and being able to convey your message about your side gig is something that goes hand in hand with being able to convey your message in dentistry. It’s the same skill set. 100%.
Barry: 58:56
Selling is communication, selling is serving, and so the the course that I’ve written Can fit into any industry, anything, because you know, we just remove the word crown and talk about Training course, or you know and it’s finding out honestly that the key is being in rapport and finding out somebody’s driver and there’s several questions that we ask to find out what’s going on with the client. The client is a driver and there’s several questions that we ask to find out how much information they receive, how much info. There’s things called meta programs that like personality. They are personality preferences and everybody has a preference within and it’s context, it’s context driven. So, within dentistry, let me ask you the question. I’ll demonstrate it now. James, when it comes to dentistry, if I was to, if you had a, something that you needed on the lower left when I explain it to you, how much information do you like? Do you like to know all the information? Dot the I’s, cross the T’s, or do you like kind of just broad stroke, big picture? Which do you prefer, or is there something in the middle?
Dr James: 1:00:00
Maybe something in the middle. For me I would say okay great.
Barry: 1:00:04
So when I explain this to you, james, what I’m going to ask you is if there’s any more information you need, would you just let me know Right now. Picture this you were a dentist. There have been times when you’ve been explaining something to somebody and you’ve seen them switch off and and you’re like I’ve lost them, I don’t know why. And then there’s been times where you’ve explained something to somebody and they’ve gone away and not done it because you didn’t give them enough information. They’re either global or specific. They want Bish bash Bosch be done, be quick, be gone, or they want eyes dotting T’s crossing loads of information. They want to come back three times before they make their choice. It’s important to identify where do they sit on this continuum so that we can serve that.
Dr James: 1:00:51
Totally, totally, totally, totally, and that’s a skill.
Barry: 1:00:56
It’s really it’s. It’s. It’s on the crib sheet in the manual and it’s super easy way. It’s, once you know what you’re like, are they make sense. I keep losing people Because we have dentists that want to explain absolutely everything, because in their map of the world, unless they explain everything, how can somebody make their mind up? Whereas in my map of the world, you start explaining everything. I am done. I’m like I’m giving Zed’s, just tell me it looks pretty, tell me it’s going to be comfortable, how much it is, and I’m in, whereas other people are like what now I need to know what it’s made from, how long it’s going to take, once you know what I mean.
Dr James: 1:01:32
You weren’t just speaking to me, because I’m not dentists. You over explain everything and I know I need to get better, but I still do it anyway and it’s a hard one. You’re stuck to in a rock and hard place because you don’t want to overwhelm someone. But it’s also a consent thing too. But it’s. It’s about explaining it clearly and I know that. I know that you’ll have all the eyes and all the T’s, double eyes, t’s crossed on the consent front too.
Barry: 1:01:54
But it’s a hard one to do.
Dr James: 1:01:56
Barry, this has been brilliant tonight. I have no doubt in my mind that lots of people have a newfound appreciation for how we can sell, but with integrity, just what it says on the tin. Tremendous, guys. If you would like to know more about Barry and what he does and how he helps dentists etc. Feel free to reach out to Barry. He is on the group, barry Alton. This video will be published on the group so everybody can watch it. Of course, promo will be the first comment on the video, promo code. And now, of course, barry has just helped flashed up the QR code for the free PDF that Barry offers on helping individuals, not just dentists, individuals, sales Tremendous, barry. Thank you so much for giving up your evening to come and speak to us at Dentison Invest. It has been my pleasure to be here.
Barry: 1:02:50
And thanks for those that have stuck with us for the last hour. Appreciate it very much.
Dr James: 1:02:55
Awesome, awesome, awesome, tremendous stuff. Barry, thank you so much Thank you very much. I hope you have a tremendous evening and we will speak again very, very, very soon. See you later, love you lots, James.
Barry: 1:03:07
Thank you very much.
Dr James: 1:03:08
Cheers bye, you, you, you, you, you, you you.