Latest / Zero Friction / Redefining Urgent Dental Care Through After-Hours Access with Jeff Ludlow || Zero Friction Podcast

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Redefining Urgent Dental Care Through After-Hours Access with Jeff Ludlow || Zero Friction Podcast · Zero Friction

• Terry Coutsolioutsos/RevRx AI: People would get a toothache at night, they'd go to the emergency room. Dentists are scheduled out and they sure as heck don't want to come in at eight o'clock at night. Leave a message, we'll come back to them. Kind of a really professional, real dental office. Not just kind of one of these things where you feel like you're going into, you know, a little sketchy area to get a tooth pulled out. We're not gonna steal your patients. We're gonna treat them and send them back to you. There's two game changers in my mind that you're g you're giving to the marketplace. One is the whole concept around yeah, urgent dental care and actual hours concept. If we're talking about business, there's a little side thing that we've done too on the business side is we've set up insurance capital. You have a good product and nobody knows about it. In MedTech, the difference between a good quarter and a great one isn't always the product. It's the friction standing in the way. Broken sales cycles, misaligned teams, deals that stall at the finish line. Every leader feels it, and the best ones know how to remove it. Welcome to Zero Friction, the podcast where we go inside the minds of MedTech's top commercial leaders to uncover the real barriers they face, the decisions they make, and the systems they build to keep the revenue moving. I'm your host, Terry Cucaluchis. Let's remove some friction. Welcome, Zero Friction Nation. Terry Cuchiluchis here with another podcast. I have a great guest today who is in the process of disrupting how dental care is delivered, when, where, and how. Jeff Ludlow, DDS, is with us today and he has a dental practice, but he also has a brand new concept he's bringing to market around urgent dental care. So welcome, Jeff, to the podcast. Love to learn more about you, your personal journey. And where you're heading with this new concept of urgent dental care. Well, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. And yeah, we'll see where where this new model takes us. So give us a little background on like, you know, stepping into the dental arena. Like you you have a practice today that you're operating, but you know, where did the concept come up with? Well, first let's just start with your personal journey. Where where where did it all start? You know, wanting to be a dentist and becoming a dentist. Well The the wanting to become a dentist is actually a funny story. I originally thought I was gonna be a teacher and a basketball quote coach. Loved playing basketball growing up, but you know, I'm five foot nine, so we knew I was never gonna make the NBA. And but I loved teaching. I thought I was gonna be a math teacher. And I sat down with a girl I was dating at the time and she was like, Hey, are you sure you wanna raise a family on a on a teacher's salary? And that a lot of people do that, and there's nothing wrong with that, but it kinda hit me a little bit. So I started thinking and a kid I grew up, his dad Grew up with his dad was a dentist and he had a boat. And I'm like, ⁓ well, maybe I should be a dentist so I could get that boat. So I it I didn't go into it with the love of teeth. But ⁓ actually once I got into dental school, man, I found out I had a really passion for it. I loved learning. And then I love dentistry because it's this blend of you can you can have this bend of ⁓ blend of being a business owner and a healthcare provider. So it really scratched a couple itches for me. I've always kind of wanted to be Little bit of an entrepreneur, a little bit control my own destiny. But then I also loved working with people and helping, you know, change their life. So it ended up being a really, really good fit, even though I didn't start out as I just I love teeth. So anyway, about twenty years ago, longer than that now, but twenty two years ago, I graduated from dental school. I worked as an associate for about a year and a half, and then I branched out and started my own practice. It was in a small town in North Texas. Was the only provider there. We were just trying to figure out how to make it happen. Didn't even really do the demographic search like you're supposed to. I just jumped in and got lucky. It was great area, lots of growth. We worked really hard to make people happy. And so that practice really started to grow. I said, Okay, I can do this. So then I started five other practices in small towns and tried to be the first dentist there, tried to kind of grow one of these DSOs like they talk about now. This was you know, fifteen years ago before they became ⁓ common knowledge. Right. Didn't love that. I figured I could actually do better if I grew one big practice instead of five others. Because then you have less staff to manage, you got less things to do, ended up selling those five and just sat and worked on my practice, my main practice now where we have five providers, seven hygienists. So it's a it's a big, it's a big dental practice. Then I got the other itch of and I gotta I gotta do something different. And that's where this we call it after hours dentistry idea came. I realized that that pain was a motivator for people. I realized that people would get a toothache at night, they'd go to the emergency room. The emergency room wouldn't do anything other than, hey, here's some antibiotics. Let's charge you 600 bucks and send you home. And then the patient would have to find a dentist, have to figure out where to get the actual treatment done. And I looked at that and I was like, dude, if you're gonna pay me 500 bucks, I can get you out of pain. I can get you on the right step. Like let's stop wasting the time in the in the healthcare system that especially in the emergency healthcare system, that's broken in a lot of ways, in my my personal opinion. Sure. And so we tried to meet that that niche there is to help people that don't normally go to the dentist or that work all day and don't have time to go to the dentist. And so we started this concept and we're open from six to midnight, Monday through Friday, and then ten to ten on the weekends. And and it's turned into we do urgent care and we do a lot of comprehensive care from crowns to cleanings to whatever because I think there's a little bit of a need there for, you know, dentistry. Yeah, it's really interesting because ⁓ certainly over the past ten years we've all seen on the the health care side of things, not the dental care, but the healthcare side of things, the explosha the explosive market and urgent care. I mean, you can't can't drive by a, you know, a a grocery store plaza you know, without seeing some sort of urgent care facility, you know, in a metro market anymore. And it makes perfectly good sense why you would not want to have an urgent dental care practice, whether it is something that actually happens urgent accident, you know, athletics, weekend soccer, you know, somebody's head hitting somebody's mouth. I mean, all those kinds of things. Or people that are busy professionals that don't have time to go to the dentist during the day and, you know, The only time so they can go is on the weekend or they can go in the evening and you know, what a what a great way to make it easy for the patient. So you talk about like, you know, the podcast is zero friction and the concept of this urgent dental care concept is really removing f the friction of, you know, urgent care around the dental arena because even if you do get a hold of your dentist, they might tell you to wait three or four days. And who wants to wait three or four days if they're in pain, right? Absolutely. You know, dentists are scheduled out and they sure as heck don't want to come in at eight o'clock at night, especially if you're a new patient, right? If you're just some guy they don't have a relationship with, then they're like, ⁓ yeah, leave a message, we'll come back to you. In fact, most people's messages say, Hey, if only if you're a patient of record, call this number. If you're not, leave a message and we'll call you back in in the morning. So you're right, there's a ton of obstacles that the patients have to go through in healthcare and especially in dentistry. A lot of dentists and myself included, you know, we start to think that we're so good that we only need to work three days a week and we schedule our patients from nine to four throughout the day. And that's great for the provider. But on the other side, from the patient or the consumer, well, that's start starting to really limit the access. ⁓ and I also think the access to like good providers, because oftentimes those that are on the weekends are kind of working because they have to. And they haven't built something. And so maybe there's a reason why they haven't built it yet. Either it could be timing or it could be they don't have the skill set yet. And so, with our after hours concept, what we really strive to do is to make it kind of a really professional, ⁓ real dental office, not just kind of one of these things where you feel like you're going into, you know, a little sketchy area to get a tooth pulled out. It's, hey, let's bring quality of care, let's bring great providers and give the access to the people that are desiring it. You know, it's a great concept too. And so I'm guessing as you're trying to create an easy button and removing the friction for the patient, what kind of friction has it caused in terms of running an operation and building a practice around after hours and weekends? I'm sure that's not easy for you as an owner operator. You know, what are some of the challenges that that you face in making it easy for the customer, but it's hard to run from a business perspective? Well, yeah, it's interesting. We've learned a ton doing One of things that I was actually surprised about is to the public, we've had to kind of change the paradigm for them because most consumers or patients aren't used to being able to see a dentist at night. So sometimes they're not looking for one at night. They're not looking to actually schedule ⁓ their dental appointments around their schedule instead of the doctor's schedule. So we've actually had to do a little bit of public marketing directly to the consumer as well to say, hey, this is a viable option. So that was surprising, is that we had to change the the public's perception of what it means to go to the dentist. And that was harder than I thought it was gonna be. Yeah. And then and of course hard about it. What was let's dig into that? What was hard about it? Well, I think just because like the only time people are looking for a dentist at night is when they're in pain. And so that was the easy market, right? Is ⁓ they we we could get to top of Google, we could pay ads, we could, we could advertise all that type of stuff for urgent. I'm in pain, I need a dentist. Now who's open at 10 o'clock. So we kind of dominated that for a while. We still do, but right. But finding the patient that is like looking for a dentist throughout the day and say, ⁓ I need to go to the dentist, and then having us rank with other providers and then benefit, then our cost benefit is hey, coming at night after work. Got it. So the general public, the general dentistry is taking a little bit longer for us to grow, which is okay because the the urgent the urgent care is is It's an easier sell. It's an it's an easier, you know, closing for hey, you're in pain, let's take care of the pain. And and usually that means that's a little bit higher priced ticket. So that's okay, but to try to build a practice that also sees comprehensive dentistry at night, that's where a lot of direct consumer and a lot of, you know, unique selling is that's a really interesting concept too. I I think there's a lot of ways to get to consumers. Just everybody, you know. is on Facebook or Met is probably a good way and and you know, convenience. That's where I just speak to. Like we all live in this push button society, you know. You know, I I'm talking to a lot of healthcare models that are becoming more telehealth, more more push button like triage kind of concept. And, you know, in pain, convenience. Scheduling things, making it easy to schedule those are all, you know, phenomenal concepts. And I'm sure like you have I've seen photos of the office too. It's it's a nice looking office. It's corner bound. You know, you probably get a lot of traffic, you know, yeah in those clouds that are driving by every day. So those that's probably a really good way to to create some awareness too. Yeah, absolutely. We're on one of the major highways there in Dallas, and so a ton of traffic and and then it it would It requires us once we get the patient in there, we'll say they call for they need a tooth extraction or whatever, then we got to be good about winning them over and say, Hey, let's schedule you back so that this doesn't happen again. Like let's let's have good price points. Let's have, you know, how we work with your insurance, let's have available hours so that then we can start working them and building that relationship to grow that long term practice as well. Like we don't really wanna be just the practice that says, ⁓ we take you care of. Take care of you and and send you down the road, which we do if they have a another provider. So we work with a lot of dentists as well to say, Hey, we're not gonna steal your patients. We're gonna treat them and send them back to you. But if that patient doesn't have another dentist, we don't wanna just leave them hanging so that then they they're calling us every you know, three weeks 'cause they got tooth pain. Let's work to prevent it so that maybe it saves them money in the long run and they actually care. So we have to blend both those models. 'Cause that's another challenge that we had is how do we get dentists to trust us to send them to send us their patients what that they don't want to handle at midnight. Right. And so we have to balance that. And we we want to do both because there's a need for dentists to be able to have urgent care that they don't need to come into the office for, but also trust us not win their patient over and and steal them. Games are sticky that way, you know. They're they're they'll everybody's sticky that way. Nobody likes walk customers walking out the door, you know, nobody wants that. So, yeah, that's a really interesting concept too. And that's probably something that, you know, you have to really, you know, balance and understand who your referrers are and you know, making sure that, you know, re you're reporting back to the referring physician, building that relationship so that bridge continues because that's probably a nice pathway too for you from a company stream. Absolutely. And and and we've actually talked with a couple of providers about putting together like a little ⁓ subscription plan for them. So they can pay some monthly fee, then they can send their patients and that patient will get looked at for free, or we'll put the temporary on for free, or whatever. So they can kind of trust us that way. And then if they want us to do a little bit more treatment, we'll talk to the provider and say, Hey, you want us to take out this tooth or you want us to send them back to you? You know, we're happy to manage the care. And what I found is is providers that are good, that know what they're doing, that trust themselves, that are confident, they love what we do, right? Because they know that we're good, but we're not as good as your, you know, primary care doctor that you've had a relationship with and all of that. And so working with those type of caliber dentists makes it even better because they're high quality dentists, they know what they're doing, they they trust us, we trust them, and they know they're gonna get their patients back because of what they do. And they just and they're putting their patient first too, which is an amazing concept. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. First that's a great marketing thing for them. Cause to your point, exactly. They can go to their patient and say, look, I can't be there tonight, but we've partnered with After Hours Dentistry. I know they're going to take care of you. We want to get you taken care of. And absolutely it it builds value for their practice as well. Great point. That's awesome. And so I guess there's probably another couple other pieces of friction. I would guess staffing after hours on weekends is is a is like a bit of a headache too as a business owner operator as well. You know. Especially when you want to provide that high level care. You know, you're white loving it no matter what situation it is. So it's it that's probably a challenge for you. Yes, that that that's the hardest part actually is because because we want like and you know how it is these days. Everything's about reviews and Google and and all that. So we can't We gotta work really hard to make people happy. And if we're just throwing providers in there that don't care because that's all we can find, that's a big that that's a that's a challenge. And and I care about what people think about me. So if my name's attached to it, like I don't want people you messing with that. So we've had to work really hard to find the right providers. Fortunately, they're they're out there. And we found two kind of providers that fit really good for us. One it's the it's the guys that are maybe starting their own practice. where they have little bit of ambition, they know they don't want to take good care of people, and but they're still growing. And so they need a little extra money. They're in the hustle phase of their life. And so they don't mind working at their practice throughout the day and then maybe come work a couple nights for us to pick up a little extra money. So we love those guys because they kind of know what it's like to run a business and they're figuring it out and and they can they can help grow ours. The second one, and we stumbled upon this, right? Like this was a growing area, right? Like you think it's just gonna all work out. And and sometimes as a a business owner, you you learn on the fly a little bit. And then the other a avenue that we found, there's a there's a dental school in Dallas, a Texas AM dental school. And so we've been able to use ⁓ dentists that are doing their residency. So these are guys and girls that are are ch training to be specialist, so periodontist or orthodontist endodonist. They're going above another level of general dentistry then. Correct, right? So they're licensed dentists, they have a license and but they got to go to school throughout the day to get their training. And so then they can moonlight and pick up shifts for us on the weekends or at night. And it's a great way for them to pick up some extra money and kind of starting to learn what it's like to actually do real dentistry. And so And they're they're high quality people because they're getting accepted to these training programs. So they're not, you know, they're not at the bottom of their class or at the top of their class already. So Exactly. And so that's been a great little niche for us. And it's been fun because some will leave and then we'll get others that come in as the next ⁓ group comes in. And ⁓ that was a little fun avenue that we found that is has been working really, really good. 'cause you a lot of them are single so they don't have family and they're just like, hey, I just need to get some money and get my training and learn more. And and then there's been some where we've, you know, talked about the business side of it and what it looks to to run a business and what are the finances behind this. And so that when it if if they go start their own, they're they're starting to see more of the real world while they're still in school. So it's been fun that way. Probably Good pipeline for you too for talent if you're building your practice out too. But you know, I've always you know those fellowship programs on the healthcare side are always, you know, a great avenues and f on both sides for for those looking for work and for those seeking to find really talented people. It's always been a really good thing there. So we got the the the the staffing piece is figured out, you know, you're still working on trying to figure out the how to get the people in the door the right way, you know, I guess. The convenience. Yeah. And it's I think, yeah, like I said, there's a paradigm shift. I mean, we spent a lot of money in Google. We get we get good flow. We we do okay, but like I'm the type of person that just wants to like blow this out of the the water, right? And so we've built this office with ⁓ ten dental chairs in there. And so our goal is to get all ten of those just working all the time. And so so we're moving there. But to to get all of those filled, it requires some different levels of of marketing, right? And so that's where Changing the public a little bit and getting those in house referrals from dentists is is our next big push. So we've kind of really grow the side of that. You mentioned something to me when we had our first sort of initial conversation around a subscription or like like more like a concierge plan that you th you've you've you've are actually in the process of putting together and delivering, correct? Yeah. So talk a little bit about that because that's a that's a really interesting concept too. Yeah. So this was This was a concept based on I had a conversation with one of my my patients in my main office where I see patients there two to three days a week. And they were getting frustrated because they're teachers and the school district changed their insurance and they felt like they couldn't use their insurance at our office. And I was like, Well, how much are they charging you? And they said our premiums are about a hundred and fifty dollars a month for dental insurance for their family. And I was like, Wow, that sounds like a lot by the time That the dental insurance doesn't cover anything. You know, they'll cover a maximum of fifteen hundred bucks a year or something. And I'm like, okay, so you've paid them almost two. They're only going to pay you back fifteen hundred. Well, I see who's I see who's making the money on this, and it's not me and it's not the patient. So as we know, the the dental insurances are in it to make money. And so so I started thinking about that. And I said, you know what? I think if you paid me 150 bucks a month, I could give you some pretty high quality dentistry. And so we built out our own little we call it an all-inclusive membership plan. And so we charge patients now $149 a month. And whatever they need as far as their dental health care, we do. So they they get all their preventative stuff included in that plan. If a patient breaks a tooth and they need a crown, we actually do the crown for them and there's no extra copay. So we've capped their dental health care spend. Whatever that is, eighteen hundred bucks a year. And it's great. It's great for like people that have retired that are on a fixed income. Fortunately, I have talented providers in my main office. So we can do implants, we can do this stuff in house. We don't have to send it out. And so we can give them full concierge comprehensive care at a base price on that. And and we built it kind of with the idea, like I said, well, if the insurances are doing this to make money, we could probably do it better than them. And still make money in the process. And it's been great. So we have about we have over a thousand people on that plan. We launched this about just a couple of years ago and we've we've slowly built it. And so as a provider, it's awesome too, because now I'm getting a little bit of subscription income that I can bank on. And it's just like any other insurance plan. The person that comes in and they need the work, they take advantage of it, but have, you know, 800 people that aren't coming in that month and their help. supplementing those people. So when it's their turn and they need help, we have the the ability to fix it as well. It's a really interesting concept, you know, and it's again you're you're just taking the middleman out of the the ball game, the insurance provider who's really not adding any value to the conversation at all, by the way. No. And in fact to your podcast, it's just bringing in friction. Right. Right. Because now we either have to work with the insurance company, we got to wait, we got to see what they're going to pay. Once they shortpay everything, then we got to go talk to the patient. The patient's mad at us, even though it's not our fault, it's the insurance's fault, but it's just it's just friction in the way. And so I go to my patients and I'm like, look, we we eliminated that. And now the incentives are the same. I want to keep you happy so you pay me 150 bucks a month for the rest of your life. So I'm gonna take you, give you the very best care that I can. We're gonna do all the preventative stuff. If something breaks, we're gonna fix it the longest time because I I only want to fix that tooth once. If I got to fix it over and over and over, then that's dumb. So I need to fix it right first. ⁓ Exactly. So I gotta eliminate the friction in my life on that, right? And so so I have to treat my patients right. I have to. And then we've eliminated the friction for them on the feet. They know they're not gonna have to come to the dentist, and now they need a crown and it costs $2,000. Well, that's just included. ⁓ I need an implant. Well, that would have been five thousand dollars. Well, that's just included. So we've eliminated the money side of that. And I just need them to come in and take care of themselves, get their preventative stuff done so that that we have this long-term relationship. And it's aligned the incentives. It's been awesome. And if we're talking about business, there's a little side thing that we've done too on the business side is we've set up a an insurance captive. So so my dental office now. Pays a premium to this insurance captive. So a lot of these subscription membership goes into my office tax-free because it comes out as a premium and we based it in this insurance captive. So there's a huge tax advantage play for the business side of this, for the dentist, that kind of makes up some of the difference that sometimes you feel like you're losing because, ⁓ man, this patient only paid me 150 bucks and I'm giving them a fifteen hundred dollar crown. In my mind, I'm like, ⁓ that that doesn't work. But When it's over time and you have enough people on the plan, then then of course it works. Because, you know, if we have a million five in subscription revenue, I can do a lot of dentistry on a thousand people for a million five and and still make money. So you have to have a different paradigm shift in that as well. But it's been a really fun concept that I think is is could be a game changer for for providers. About to say there's there's two game changers in my mind that you're you're giving to the marketplace. One is the whole concept around, you know, urgent dental care and after hours concept. What you know, number one is twenty-four-seven, you need a dentist and you're there. The other aspect is, you know, finding ways for people to actually take be more proactive about their dental care, subscribe to the dentist versus the insurance. You know, work directly with you and not deal with Do I get paid for this? Do I not get paid for this? Do I get reimbursed for this? Do I not get reimbursed? Can I how much is it going to cost me to do it this way? It's all sort of built in. And you really are taking this customer perspective and making creating easy buttons for them, you know, through and through. So, you know, I I love the concept. The question is, how do you go to the market and really find a way where these great concepts? How do you get people to like find out about them? That's that's the one, you know, the the the the interesting piece is finding that pathway. for the people that can really take value of these things because it's they are very valuable, whether it's whether it's saving time or money. They're those are two of the most hot commodities in the world today. Yeah. And it's just like anything, right? It's all it's all marketing and and awareness, right? If you if you have a good product and nobody knows about it, then that doesn't do you any good. So so much of it becomes how do we drive this to the the public and get them on board. The after hours has been simple. Like along the way. Even the experience. Once you get them, now you got to create the experience too. So they keep ⁓ yeah. You don't want to lose them. Absolutely. Right. Like if if I'm not in my subscription plan, if I'm not taking care of those people, then that's been a waste because I've done a lot of work for them to get them healthy. And then if they drop it, well, that was just a waste, you know, on my end, right? So yes, you have to develop the experience. You have to get the get it out there. And then once you capture them, you got to keep them. The internal marketing is huge. The how they feel about when they come to the office is huge. And so I do, I think if we're going to run good businesses, you have to do both. You have to get the product awareness out there. And then you absolutely have to take care of people, especially in healthcare. Nowadays, like, you know, you go to Walmart or whatever, you just expect some things not to work out. And you're like, I didn't that didn't work out. But in healthcare, man, like I still believe that we're taking care of people and we're not selling widgets. And so we gotta. we we have an extra level of ⁓ responsibility to to do it on both sides. Well that's awesome. Well Jeff ⁓ any other closing comments on on how you want to finish the podcast off before we before we put a wrap. I do have one more question for you. I'm gonna throw it out a lot at you. Yeah, bring it. No, I got I got nothing else, man. I'm just gonna this is my favorite question and I try to ask it to every guest. I'm gonna ask it really slow so I'll let your brain process it a little bit. But you know Current day Jeff goes back to twenty-two-year-old Jeff or 18-year-old Jeff. What is the one piece of advice you would give eighteen year old Jeff today? You know, I I think about that a lot. And and it's a great question because I think you probably get a ton of different answers from everybody because if they answer it honestly, it kind of speaks to kind of some of their insecurities or what what really gets down a different level. I would actually And I don't I don't know how people normally ask this, but for me, I would tell myself that one to trust yourself and it's gonna be all right. Because, you know, I went through had when I had all those multiple practices, long story, but it doesn't matter. You know, I had to go through some legal fights and all that, right? And that's super stressful, right? And but what I've learned 20 years later is that that if I trust myself and and I'm not afraid to work hard, which I know that because that's who I am. That you know what, it's gonna be okay. And so I can let a lot of that anxiety go. I can enjoy the journey a little bit better because even if it works out badly, it's gonna be okay. And so I wish I would have known that. I wish I knew how to trust myself a lot better when I was younger. And I think, yeah, so there you go. And you're right, ⁓ like it it like that whole question. you know, kind of comes from some of the things that I in my life as well, you know, haven't trusted myself and let fear kind of creep in its way. And and so those are what a what a great way to leave the podcast. And and Jeff, thank you so much for being here. Number one, and I just want to say like really truly revolutionizing two two different aspects of dentistry. One is just the whole urgent care and the after hour component, which is making it easier for patients to have access to dental care. And number two is, you know, helping patients find a different way to subscribe and maybe not use insurance, but subscribe to their provider where they're gonna have mu a much higher level service, long term relationship that is all beneficial. Yeah, thank you. That's what we're trying to do. And hopefully that resonates with some people. It does. It it resonates with me. Thank you, Jeff. Appreciate it. All right, thank you. That's a wrap on zero friction. The show built around one simple idea. Remove the barriers and the revenue will follow. If today's conversation was valuable, please subscribe and share it with somebody who needs to hear it. That's how we will grow this community. I'm Terry Cuchalucis, a revenue architect powered by AI. Come find me at my website, myrevrx.com, and let's talk about what friction is costing you and your organization. Until next time, keep removing the barriers and keep the revenue flowing.