If your office has a qualified retirement plan like a 401(k), chances are you’re paying fees you didn’t know existed and taking on liability you didn’t know you had. Matt Bradley and his company BenefitGuard help dentists fix their 401(k)s by lowering costs and offloading risk associated with compliance. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Matt explains where the fees are hiding, how to evaluate your existing plan, and the most common reasons employers get sued for mismanagement. He also lists the people you should have on your 401(k) team.
Show notes:
matt.bradley@benefitguard.com
www.benefitguard.com
IRA? 401(k)? Profit sharing plan? Pension? Mosts dentists know that choosing the right plan will put them on a faster track to retirement. But deciding which plan is best isn’t always straightforward. In this episode of Dentist Money™, Reese & Ryan discuss the most important factors to consider when choosing a retirement plan for you and your employees. They also describe how TPAs, advisors, fiduciaries, and custodians can help you optimize your plan and protect you from compliance violations.
Lisa Knowles opened her dental practice in 2005… two years before the recession... in Michigan. With economic conditions stacked against her, she built a thriving practice on a model of “making things right for patients no matter what.” Driven by her passion for communication and coaching, Dr. Knowles started Intentional Dental to help other dentists grow referral pipelines using a more mindful approach to patient interaction. In this Dentist Money™ Show interview, she cites five keys to successful dentistry, offers guidance for living in the moment, and compares a dental office to a Broadway show.
Show notes:
Website: http://beyond32teeth.com/
Email: intentionaldental@gmail.com
Dr. Mike Abernathy, founder of Summit Practice Solutions, joins the Dentist Money™ Show from his ranch outside of Dallas where he reflects on the most valuable lessons he’s learned as a practice owner and consultant. Mike’s approach to business management and personal finance allowed him to retire ahead of schedule and become a mentor for dentists all over the United States. In this interview, he talks about the one statistic to watch in your practice, what it means to embrace consumerism, and the pitfalls that keep dentists from reaching financial freedom.
Show notes:
Website: http://summitpracticesolutions.com/
Remember the personal bio you wrote for your practice website? You probably started with a paragraph about where you grew up, the schools you attended, and your involvement with dental associations. Then you added a couple lines about your family and personal hobbies, and emailed it over to your web designer. Now it sits on your website like a relic etched in stone. And in today’s content-charged world, it will never be enough to drive traffic to your business. That’s where video comes in — not just video, but great video. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Collin Kartchner of Tooth Media explains why dentists need to engage patients with better video content. He also describes the difference between videos that get results and those that harm reputations.
Show notes:
Website: www.toothmedia.com
Email: collin@toothmedia.com
Article about video performance versus text content: http://www.fathomdelivers.com/blog/seo/videos-seo-more-likely-to-rank/
Morgan Hamon lives dangerously. He started his career as a fighter pilot and then became a tax accountant. The fight against taxes is real, and Morgan’s firm, HDA Accounting Group, is the first line of defense for hundreds of dentists across the country. Because he works exclusively with dentists, Morgan has a deep understanding of tax issues faced by practice owners. In this Dentist Money™ interview, he answers the most common tax questions asked by dentists, explains the tax implications of owning a building, and specifies how much you should spend on staff and overhead to maintain sufficient profitability.
Show notes:
Website: www.hda-dental.com
Email: morgan@hdagroupdental.com
Dr. Mark Costes is founder of the Dental Success Institute, Horizon Schools of Dental Assisting, and author of Pillars of Dental Success. He runs multiple practices, speaks at dental forums around the world, and coaches over 50 practice owners to help maximize profits. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Dr. Costes talks about the bumps and bruises he’s experienced while acquiring multiple practices and expanding his entrepreneurial reach. He also offers a fresh take on work life balance, the truth about getting rich, and the personality traits that succeed in dentistry.
Show notes:
Website: truedentalsuccess.com
Email: horizondds@yahoo.com
Is your website doing its job? Does it really drive new patients, or does it just sort of exist? Mike Pedersen, founder of The Dental Boost, helps hundreds of dentists showcase their practices with powerful websites that make it easy for visitors to find what they’re looking for. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Mike explains what it means to build your website with the user in mind, how to incorporate video content, and the best way to layout your homepage. He also describes the kinds of images you should never post on your website.
Show notes:
Website: www.thedentalboost.com
Email: mike@thedentalboost.com
Perhaps nothing in dentistry is more important than surrounding yourself with the right people. It’s also one of the most difficult things to do. Hiring is never an exact science, firing is no picnic, and outsourcing can feel like a crapshoot. So how do you put together a winning team? In this Dentist Money™ interview, Pat Rosenzweig, co-owner of Mosaic Management Professionals, discusses the process of elevating your human capital. Drawing from her 30+ years in the industry, she explains the mindset you should cultivate within your staff, the value to place on technical versus people skills, and how to maximize each person’s contributions.
Show notes:
Website: www.mosaicmanagementpro.com
Email: Pat@mosaicmanagementpro.com
When Joseph McGregor was a young attorney in Cleveland, his friends in the Case Western Dental program started asking for advice about practice buy-in agreements. The questions kept coming, and before he knew it, Joseph had a side job through which he met several players in the dental industry. His experience led him to open a dental-focused law firm in 2009. (His desire to make it big led him to Texas). In this Dentist Money™ interview, Joseph highlights two of the most costly mistakes made by dentists during transition. He also offers a word of caution about the employee handbook that’s been gathering dust at the bottom of your file drawer.
While working with his endodontist father, Chris Tayler became all too familiar with the inequities imposed by insurance companies on dentists. Seeing an opportunity to help other practice owners, Chris put his MBA and finance background to work and started a company called Cobalt Analytics, which specializes in optimizing insurance plans for dentists. In this episode of Dentist Money™, Chris explains the right way to factor insurance write-offs into profitability and how to make sure you’re getting the best rates.
Show notes:
http://www.cobaltanalytics.net/
Consultant, coach, practice owner, professor, founder of the Thriving Dentist Show, internationally-acclaimed speaker. Dentists around the globe refer to Gary Takacs by a number titles. We simply call him The Legend. Having worked with over 2,200 practices, perhaps no one is better qualified than Gary to motivate and mentor dentists at every career stage. In this Dentist Money™ interview, he shares a collection of stories and experiences to illustrate how the most successful dentists thrive.
Show notes:
www.takacslearningcenter.com
Thriving Dentist Show with Gary Takacs: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/thriving-dentist-show-gary/id488260412?mt=2
Ben Tuinei, President of Veritas Dental Resources, has worked with over 6,000 dentists across the country to negotiate fair and reasonable reimbursements from insurance carriers. Using Ben’s 7 Steps of Negotiation, dentists gain leverage against providers to get the highest fee schedules available. In this Dentist Money™ interview, he explains what it means to build an insurance profile, how to overcome payment objections, the procedures most commonly downgraded by insurance companies, and the biggest mistakes dentists make during negotiation.
Website: www.veritasdentalresources.com
Contact: ben@veritasdentalresources.com
7 Steps to Negotiating Fees video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mt1R5UWTgm0
Jordon Comstock is founder of BoomCloud Apps, provider of in-house membership software for dental practices all over the country. Inspired by his deep knowledge of the dental industry, a passion for user interface design, and a book called The Automatic Customer, Jordon built a platform that allows practices to offer, manage, and track a variety of membership solutions for their patients. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Jordon explains how fee-for-service models can work alongside PPO plans to stabilize revenue, expand patient base, and improve retention.
Dr. James Anderson wasn’t wired to follow the traditional path of dentistry. Within a year of starting a practice, he hired his first associate and caught the entrepreneurial bug (or as he calls it, “A.D.D.”). Since then, he started nine successful practices, built one of the largest dental billing companies in the nation, and even opened an arcade. In this episode of Dentist Money™, Dr. Anderson recounts important lessons he’s learned about practice expansion, managing accounts receivable, and incentivizing staff.
If you enjoy the charming sound of a Boston accent and getting advice from one of the dental industry’s most experienced consultants, then you won’t want to miss this episode of Dentist Money™ with Nancy Kagan. Nancy was a hygienist for several years, then formed a temporary dental placement agency before managing two successful practices for over twenty-five years. In 2004, she founded Summit Dental Partners with a mission to make dental practices more efficient and successful. In this interview she talks about keeping your staff accountable, protecting yourself from embezzlement, and what it means to be an “ostrich.”
Social media marketing is an essential part of driving growth for a practice, but a lot of dentists struggle to understand the evolving digital landscape and how to implement a solid online strategy. In this Dentist Money™ interview, Seth Dahle of My Social Practice offers his expert advice for boosting patient counts using social media and other digital channels. He explains ways to improve your online reputation, the most common digital mistakes made by dentists, and how the best dentists get the most out of marketing.
CPAs (and father-son tandem), Don & Dave Mantyla, talk all things taxes and explain the most common mistakes that put dentists at odds with Uncle Sam. They discuss the primary tax problems faced by dentists, the ramifications of making extra debt payments, when equipment write-offs make sense, and how some dentists get caught in a downward cycle of tax avoidance.
Heather Colicchio is Founder & President of the American Association of Dental Office Managers — the largest association for dental business teams in the country. In this episode of Dentist Money™, Heather shares the philosophies behind her company’s mission to strengthen dental practices by maximizing the talents of office managers. She offers considerations to make when hiring an office manager, explains the types of training you should invest in, and gives advice for empowering office managers to lead successful practices.
Reese interviews Dr. Richard Engar, former clinical dentist of ten years, and current CEO of Professional Insurance Exchange. Dr. Engar draws from decades of experience to explain how dentists can prevent unnecessary malpractice claims from putting their wealth and reputations at risk. He also offers advice for dealing with malpractice threats, describes the most common (and most expensive) types of claims, and highlights the one thing you should never do in the face of a malpractice settlement.
Weston Lunsford, CEO of Dental Intel and self-diagnosed “data geek,” breaks down the numbers behind successful practices and offers a simplified solution for measuring progress. He also explains the meaning of proactive planning, four categories of money making, the impact of broken appointments, and why certain dentists struggle to reach standard benchmarks.
Practice transitions expert, Randon Jensen of CTC Associates, stops by to discuss the most important considerations to make before buying or selling a practice. Topics include managing expectations, structuring the deal, and getting proper representation. Randon also shares a few stories to highlight the most common mistakes he’s observed in his 17 years of working in the dental industry.
Jason Wood is a partner at Wood & Delgado and one of the nation’s premier attorneys for dentists. Having worked with thousands of dentists, he has become an authority on practice-related transactions. In this industry expert edition of Dentist Money™, Jason describes the role of a good attorney during acquisitions and transitions, the important considerations to make when buying a practice, and the monetary implications of a DSO career path.
Mike Alder, CEO of Unitas Dental, joins Reese for this episode of Dentist Money™ recorded on location at WRDC in Phoenix. Mike’s firm specializes in helping dentists sustain viable topline growth through managing third party payor relationships. In this interview, he explains how to keep your rates in check, benefit from insurance company partnerships, and set your prices.
Great Britain’s referendum to leave the EU triggered an historic week for financial markets and drove significant losses for some investors. There’s no shortage of speculation about “Brexit’s” long term ripple effect and the timeline for recovery. In this episode of Dentist Money™, Reese & Ryan share reaction from some of the financial industry’s top advisors and offer guidance for protecting your own portfolio against major downturns.