7 Lessons I Learned Building a 7-Figure Spinal Decompression Practice

Hey, welcome to the channel. My name is Dr. Vince Leone, founder of Specialized Practice, and we help doctors grow their practices utilizing spinal decompression. And our goal is always to hit that $100,000 a month, that, that mystical, wonderful plateau to hit their first $100,000 or their next $100,000 if you're already doing $100K. Let's go to the next one. So, uh, in today's video, I want to talk about 7 lessons I learned building a 7-figure spinal decompression Practice. And so, um, when we started, I was doing neuropathy. My father had a decompression— one decompression table— and was doing chiro as well. Obviously we both were. And, um, so we had one table, one DRX, and in a short amount of time we built that up to 4 decompression tables. Uh, they're consistently full, 7 figures in annual revenue, and predominantly a cash-based model. So The lessons below are the biggest things that I learned along the way, and I want to share them with you, and hopefully they'll help you get to that $100,000 a month mark. Now, no income claims. This is a rare feat. I think maybe top 3% of practices in the US hit this mark. So, that may be a little off, but not much, right? Top 3%, top 5%, something like that. So it's not, you know, anyways, no income claims. Always got to say that on YouTube. People are thinking they're going to learn how to make $1 million watching a 10-minute video. Does that happen? Yeah, not really. But point being is these are lessons I learned the hard way and I want to share them with you. So now, why did I shift to spinal decompression? Well, one, obviously my dad was doing it, but My, uh, I had a coach. I was struggling in practice. He said, Dr. Viens— he's Austrian, some of you may know who he is— Dr. Viens, you're dying on the vine. I'm like, yes, I know, what do I do? And he's like, go learn neuropathy, go talk to my, you know, my friend Dr. Joe. So I did that, wrote a check, didn't— couldn't afford it. But, uh, anyway, so my practice started taking off going into neuropathy, so I was all in on the cash services. Um, and then, you know, the parking lot was full. My dad's like, what the heck are you doing? He's like, let's merge, we'll do decompression neuropathy. I'm like, great, I'm all in. And so, and, and at the time, you know, his decompression table was up and down. You know, one time, you know, one month his chiro practice was strong, the other month, and, and the, uh, decomp was slow. And then the next month, the vice versa, the decomp was strong and chiro goes down. So it was a mess. It was this yo-yo effect, right? I'm sure you guys have experienced that. So, um, but I had leaned really into marketing anyway, so we merged. And, um, uh, but before that, right, I was an associate for 2 years. And this— and chiropractic was a second career for me. I came from the film industry. I worked for Ron Howard, Quentin Tarantino, um, and was on the, you know, the big, big movies. And so I was used to the kind of business Right? And, um, you know, they always— they would always say, hey, if there's no butts in the seat, we don't get to keep playing the game, right? So I knew marketing was always very, very important to just business success. People needed to know about what you did. Um, but on top of that, you know, it was like this high-volume, low-fee, heavy insurance. It just— to me, it was like a grind because it's like, well, the more we do The, the worst effect it has on our body, right? And then on top of that, the patients, you know, they're kind of just slammed through in a, in a mill. Now look, if you, if you are doing like high-volume wellness practice, great, good, good for you. I mean, look, it did not work for me. That's all I'm saying. So if you enjoy it and you're doing great, awesome. You're serving a lot of people. Love that for you. It wasn't for me. To me, it's a broken model. So, and I think we can see it because we have the most default rates on loans across our industry. And the average chiropractor makes between 10 and 20 grand a month. Now, I did not go become a doctor to make 10 or 20 grand a month. That, you know, just wasn't in the wheelhouse for me, not when I walked out with $250,000 in debt. So I looked at a different model and I was like, hey, I like these cash services. You know, I like the lower volume, high fee, all cash, don't have to worry about insurance. By the way, I got a check from an insurance company for $1.89, something like that. Really pissed me off. So, um, I felt that the traditional model was broken. I felt that we could specialize and essentially command the fees that we felt we deserved, and spinal decompression was the perfect fit. Now, neuropathy, great niche, but I always got the question, why is a chiropractor treating my feet? And hey, that's a great question. Well, because I learned how to do it and no one else has a solution. But decompression aligns perfectly with our scope of practice. That's why, you know, I'm like, it's just like the perfect niche for, you know, our industry, in my opinion. So I'm going to pump this up a little bit so you guys can see this better. And really allowed us to obviously specialize in severe disc cases. We could deliver life-changing results. We use staff and technology, which creates leverage, could build a scalable business, and we get paid like true experts. I like that. So here's the lessons. Lesson number 1, buying a decompression table does not build a practice right now. My dad was very successful from a chiropractic standpoint, had the largest practice in Washington State, like during the '80s and '90s, had 5 or 6 associates. So he was very successful. And now when he was in decompression, he had sold that whole thing and he just basically went into a solo practice. And that's when I joined him. But still, you don't buy a table and all of a sudden money sprouts and people rush. I need to get on that table. It just doesn't happen in 98% of the Now, I do have a client who's like, hey, I just got my table, it's over there, patients are asking all about it. Love that for you, okay? Really, that's great. By and large, if you have a table, and we had the DRX, right? So that was this big, fancy looking, we had 4 of them obviously, but point being, if you buy a table, in the vast majority of cases, patients are not gonna climb all over themselves to get on it, okay? So this is a big misconception. Doctors feel like, hey, I'm going to invest in this table and boom, I'm going to start, you know, seeing all these new patients and making all this money. Without the clinical confidence, effective marketing, strong report of findings, proven systems, it's just— it just gathers dust, guys. So key takeaway here, success comes from systems, not equipment. Okay? And those systems, again, we'll get into this— clinical report of findings, marketing, all that type of stuff. So lesson number 2, clinical confidence is absolutely critical. Now, Specialized Practice, like our whole, like, um, principle number 1 is clinical excellence, right? We turn our doctors into true experts. We have world-class exam training for neck and back and flow sheets and all that type of stuff so that the doctor can have total confidence that yes, it's a decompression patient, or no, it's not a decompression patient, this is a chiro patient. We don't need Point being, that is then translated to the patient. If they have a world-class exam, um, your ROF becomes so much easier because you are demonstrating expertise. You are developing trust and rapport with the patient in the exam, in the consult exam, because you are so darn good at what you do. So clinical confidence is mandatory for a highly successful decompression practice, in my experience. So And patients will feel one or the other. They'll feel your certainty, your confidence, or they'll feel your uncertainty or a lack of confidence. And if you're like saying, hey, I can't close, look at day one, right? What, what does your exam look like? If you're doing a 5-minute exam, guys and gals, um, you're gonna have a tough time closing because it just doesn't feel right, you know? Oh, this doctor's kind of rushed through my exam. He wants me to pay $5,000 for this thing. I, I don't mean not Quite sure what it even does. So clinical confidence, key, creates trust and rapport. And again, if you are unsure, your patients will be too. Not to get woo-woo on you, but there's an energy thing, right? And so there's— I always say the patients have to borrow your belief, and they can't borrow your belief unless you have it first, right? So Just remember that patients need to borrow your belief, and so you need to have that first. All right, lesson number 3, master the report of findings. Now, if you're doing the 5-minute report of findings that you do with your chiro patients, you're probably going to have a challenge unless you are, you know, just a total stud and you've been doing this for a long time and you're like, hey, you know what, I can absolutely help you. You know, insurance doesn't cover it. It's $5K. It's going to take about, you know, 20 visits. And Susie at the front desk will take care of you. You know, and then you rush off to the next patient. Like, maybe that'll work. Never worked for me. But in my experience, you need to master the, master the report of findings. Because here's the thing, patients will not— if they're confused, they will not say yes. They will not buy what they don't understand. And so the report of findings We have a very structured report of findings— front half, transition, back half. So it's, uh, all geared to, um, help the patient understand what is going on with their body, why other things have failed or probably will fail if they try them, what spinal decompression does, and how it's going to essentially create that transformation for them. And that's, you know, that's— and we'll talk about that in a second. Point being is that Report of findings. Very different than throwing up some extra. Oh, Miss Jones, you know we got a you know subluxation here at L five. No, we we need to you know just like we need to be a clinical expert, we need to be a communication expert in the ROF so that patients have clarity and certainty about what they are investing in. You know if someone came to you and said, "Hey, I have this real estate deal. It's amazing," and da da da. But but you don't understand real estate, well, you're not going to dump 6 figures into an investment that you don't understand, right? Because you just won't do it. It doesn't, it doesn't feel safe, right? So same thing. Patients won't invest in something they don't understand. Um, okay, so that's number 3. Lesson number 4, marketing matters, right? Our biggest breakthrough— so we formed Sound Pain Solutions with 2 other clinics in the area. That was the name of it, Sound Pain Solutions. I'm pretty sure I came up with that name, but the point being is, um, it just rolled off the tongue. Anyways, um, with 2 other great doctors, they're still practicing. Um, I'm not gonna mention their names. I don't know if they'd want me to or not, but point being is, um, we had a cooperative marketing arrangement and we did TV, radio, newspaper, digital, um, and, uh, invested, you know, significant. capital into that to really dominate our niche. If people don't know about you, they can't come and see you. It's very simple. And so it goes back to the movie thing, right? It's like if people— if butts aren't in the seat, we don't get to keep playing the game. And so I knew, okay, if we're going to do this kind of high-ticket thing, we need to reach a lot of people. And in fact, we reached, um, people that would come in and they don't— they didn't want chiropractic. They didn't want to have anything to do with chiropractic. They did want decompression. So we need to rethink, like, how we view marketing, in my opinion, as chiropractors, because a lot of doctors are like, uh, you know, I don't like marketing, or I don't— you know, Facebook agencies have burned me in the past. It's like Okay, let's put on the big boy pants though. Marketing works, right? The biggest companies in the world all market, every single one. So why would a small business be any different? It wouldn't, it's not. The only reason it's small is because they don't market. Okay, so everyone has to market. And so if you are the business owner and you want to achieve that $100K a month or your next $100K a month, you need to lean into marketing, you need to embrace it. And I'm not saying you need to go push the buttons on Facebook or, you know, whatever platform you're choosing or the multiple platforms, but you do need to strategically drive the marketing, right? You need to— well, okay, this isn't like how to market your practice. There is another video on my channel. I think it's about an hour and a half long. I go deep on how to absolutely Dominate your market. So go check out that video. I'm not going to go into that here, but the point being is if you want to grow your practice, you've got to market. The more people that know about your practice, the bigger your practice will be. Very simple. I was taught that early on. I don't remember who taught me that. Point being is that is the case. Lesson number five: Patients buy transformations, not visits. Now, Dr. Pankinen, my co-host on the Practice Builders podcast. Just did an episode recently, so you can check that out. But that's the point is patients, they don't buy decompression visits or laser visits or supplements, right? All they want to know and all they're going to buy is a transformation. Can you take me from here to here? I cannot work, I cannot play golf, I cannot, you know, I don't have a love life, I can't play with my kids. This is their current situation and they're trying to get to their desired situation of, You know, now I can play 18 holes without being in pain. I can go back to work. I can sleep through the night. Like, that's what they buy. They buy that outcome. And so you first got to recognize that, right? And then you need to tailor your report of findings to that, right? Sell the outcome, not the treatment plan. Another way to think about this is like if you wanted to go to, say, Tahiti. And now I know there's very few, if any, travel agents anymore, but if you went into a travel agency and sat down with an agent and said, hey, I want to go to Tahiti. And the traveler's like, all right, so here's what's going to happen. You're going to get on that airplane next to that fat stinky guy, and then you're going to get these little cocktails, and then they're going to give you some nuts along the way. It's going to take you 5 hours. And you're like, dude, talk to me about the beach. Talk to me about that fruity drink that I'm going to have on the beach. Talk to me about the blue water. Like, talk to me about the destination, not how to get there. Does that make sense? So anyways, outcomes, not, not the minutia. Okay, so that was lesson number 5. Lesson number 6, systems and staff will set you free. That's— this is the beauty of this model, right? Because we do not have to do all the adjusting. The table is going to do the treatment. The staff is going to put them on and off. The technology, whether that's laser or shockwave or whatever, is going to You know, provide adjunct therapy, care, etc. And all that is essentially what's going to happen on a daily basis. So what you get to do is focus on your highest value activities, right? Evaluating the patient, enrolling the patient, and managing care. So this is why I love decompression so much, is because it, it really does set the doctor free. And then if you grow high enough, right, hit that $100,000 mark, then you hire an associate. They do the bulk of your adjusting and you, you know, still treat a few patients that, you know, oh, you know, they just love you, they've been seeing you forever, but you're really focusing on those high-value cases, right? And then, but, you know, chiro's still going strong, you just have someone else doing that. So you're building, you're duplicating yourself so that you can grow the practice and focus more strategically. That's what's called actually working on the business versus in the business. So, um, so systems and staff will set you free. And it's critical, right, that you, if you're going to do this, you have a really well-trained staff and good systems, because essentially what that does, that creates consistency for patients and obviously reduces physical strain on you. So build a business, not another job. And then finally, lesson 7, focus on the long game. Okay. So if you think like adding $20,000 a month or $240,000, you know, quarter million a year is just gonna happen like no problem. I, I just, you know, it's an easy button type of thing. Um, just not the reality, right? It doesn't pass the sniff test. It's not logical because it doesn't happen. That's why you can't just buy a table and all of a sudden you're going to make an extra quarter million a year. You really gotta Think long term. Hey, I'm going to invest in this, um, this table. I'm going to invest in myself. I always say there's 2 investments, right? The first one in the table, second one in yourself. I'm going to become a true expert in decompression. I'm going to figure out how, you know, first how to, um, you know, qualify a patient. Then I'm going to know how to, or learn how to enroll a patient in a high-value cash care plan and how to speak effortlessly and efficiently and persuasively. And then I'm going to Build a team around that, right? It doesn't have to be a big team, right? We need one tech for 2 tables. So you don't— it's not like you need a million people in the office. Um, but, you know, and then I'm going to work on my day one and my day 2, and I'm going to build systems that efficiently processes patients so that garners trust and, and confidence in me. That's the long game, right? And that just doesn't happen overnight. Now, in the Decompression Accelerator, we get a lot done in 90 days, It's a 90-day sprint. We're going to go into clinical systems marketing. And the only reason we can do it in such a compressed timeframe is because I've done it so many times, right? We've helped multiple doctors hit that $100,000 a month. Dr. Buffy, Dr. Vinnie Cornejo, Dr. Pinkerton. So it's not going to happen overnight. But what I can tell you is the fruits of that labor are well worth it if you just put in the time and effort. And again, Maybe you can figure this out on your own. It'll certainly take way longer than 90 days. But point being is you could probably figure this out on your own, but it's just going to take time. But it is worth it, right? It is worth it because it is creating a more elegant practice for yourself that is going to eliminate— not eliminate, but reduce your need for insurance. It's going to reduce the wear and tear on your body. It's going to increase your cash flow. It's going to increase the value of the practice. And if I had to guess, it's probably going to increase the quality of your life. Okay, so here's some final thoughts. Equipment alone will not build your practice. We talked about that. Confidence is crucial, I would say. Conversion matters, obviously. Marketing matters, yes. Patients buy outcomes. Remember, transformation systems create scale. All right, and consistency wins. It's I've done— so I started the consulting business in 2018. I've been doing Thursday Q&As with our membership almost that entire time, right? And I've taken off one or two here or there, like if I'm on a family trip or it's Christmas or something. But that consistency Not only has it helped me develop my coaching skills, my consulting skills, but it also has just created the consistency in the business. So that kind of consistency, what it does is it builds momentum and it increases your skill set. So to grow Decompression, to kind of compete at that higher level, that consistency is key, right? And you will start to— you'll have a snowball effect. It'll be a little slow in the beginning. You know, I mean, it always is, but it's kind of like that, you know, that big ball in the Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, you know, that, that big— it looks like a massive pinball. So think of that like on a football field and you're trying to push it. Well, it's going to be slow in the beginning, but once it gets going, it now starts really trucking. So that's kind of what high-ticket niches are like. It takes a little oomph in the beginning, but once it gets going, Then it starts to really pick up steam. You get better and better, your confidence grows, patients sense it, and now, man, the floodgates really open. Someone that I think of like that, Ross Reynolds, Dr. Ross Reynolds. Mm-hmm. Um, man, he, he's— he had a table forever, uh, would, you know, sign up 1 or 2 patients a month forever. Joined our program, literally within 2 months was— had signed up like 20 patients. It was crazy. Just— and he's just off the races. Did another 10 last month. So, um, sometimes you just need the right model, the right system, the right coach, right? The, the right kind of path to follow to get you there. So if that sounds like you, if you are— if you have a table or you, or you're thinking of adding decompression to the table, go check out decompressionaccelerator.com. Very thorough training there. And then if it makes sense, you can set up a call. All right, so hope that provided value for you. I'm Dr. Vince Leone at Specialized Practice. We'll see you on the next video.