Practice From Abundance

Hey, it's Dr. Vince, and before we jump into today's episode, I wanted to give you a little bit of context. Every week inside Specialized Practice, I do a short micro-training for our private clients focused on helping them build stronger, more successful practices. Now, normally these stay inside our private client community, but today I wanted to give you a peek behind the curtain. This one is called Practice from Abundance, and I think it's a message a lot of doctors need to hear. Let's get into it. So let's go ahead and jump into our micro-training today. And this is called Practice from Abundance. And this is going to be part 1 of 3 and definitely part 1 of 2. But I think there's going to be a third part as well. And I was— it was interesting. So I was talking to Dr. Burkhardt after the summit. And he had brought this up as well. I was like, you know, even with our clients, I still see this, you know, a little bit of a scarcity mindset. And so I think, you know, this is something that I've always been very interested in— mindset, abundance, avoiding scarcity mindsets. Like, how do we do it? What does it look like? It can feel a little woo-woo. So this part 1 is really just about recognition. It's not so much about tactical advice. It's more like, hey, How do we know if we are in more of a scarcity mindset versus an abundance mindset? If you're, you know, if you really want to dive deep into this, Peter Diamandis, who I can't— he runs a seminar series called Abundance 360. I've never been, but he has a great book called Abundance. That'd be something someone to look into. He's really at the forefront of, you know, this whole kind of Mindset. But, but not only that, I mean, his massive company, um, and, uh, that he's driving, and he's a medical doctor. So very interesting man. But the point being is, let's dive into this. So part 1, it's really recognizing scarcity to start. So one of the biggest shifts we can make as practice owners is learning to recognize when we're operating from scarcity instead of abundance. So it doesn't always look like fear. Um, it may sometimes sound practical. Uh, it may sound responsible. And it may even sound like we are protecting the practice, but over time, scarcity and a scarcity mindset can quietly influence how we price our services and products, how we market, how we recommend care, how we hire, and how we pursue growth. So again, first step is just becoming aware of it so that we know where to focus energies to improve. So what does it look like? So here's some examples of how a scarcity mindset can show up. Will people in my market really pay $3,000 to $5,000 for care? I hear that all the time. All the time. Are there enough decompression patients in my area? I hear that all the time too. And I'm like, excuse me? How many people in your city? 200,000. Yeah, yeah, there's plenty. There are already too many chiropractors around me. Very common, especially amongst chiropractors. I don't know why. I do not want to recommend too much because the patient might say no, right? This is the old, well, they, they need the 24, but I'm going to recommend 12, right? I cannot afford to hire another team member. What if I spend more on marketing and it does not work? Maybe my practice has reached its ceiling. So most of us have had thoughts like this at some point. Again, no one's in trouble here. That's not the point. The goal is recognition. And by the way, I'm just like you and have these thoughts as well. Are there enough chiropractors that want to offer decompression? You know, so this affects everybody, top to bottom. And the— so this is not a, you know, hey, you're, you're doing something wrong. This is we can all work on this together. And we can all improve this aspect because the benefits from doing that are enormous. So the goal is not to judge ourselves, right, for having them. The goal is to recognize when those start, those thoughts start to influence our decisions, right? That's, that's the key is because if you have a scarcity mindset, just think of this little box. And you're keeping yourself in that box with these thoughts, because in reality, there is no limit. There's no limit on anything that we can do right now. If you're 5'5, can you go play in the NBA? No. Although there was one guy that was 5'5 and he was a pro basketball player, something Scruggs or something. But the point being is, I remember very early on in my career. My dad said, look, you think of your practice and the patients out there as the ocean. You can go to the ocean and you can bring a thimble or you can bring a dump truck. The ocean doesn't care. It's up to you. Right. And so that has always stuck with me. Um, so moving on, scarcity, it changes how we operate, right? So when we believe, um, there is not enough opportunity, we obviously become more protective, right? We hesitate, we reduce risk. We pull back, we may market less, we may avoid hiring, we may under-recommend care, right? We're trying to save that patient. We may lower our fees. Don't do that. We may stop investing in growth, right? So instead of asking, hey, what could I create? We begin asking, how do I protect what I already have? And by the way, there is a time to go into protection mode. But for the vast majority of doctors here, we're not at it. Typically, protection mode is when you are at the end of your career and you've, you know, say you have $5 million in the bank or $10 million or whatever. At that point, and by the way, if that sounds like a lot to you, that would be a scarcity mindset. Why can't you get to $5 or $10 million? By the time you retire. Why not? Tons of people do. There's more millionaires now in the United States than has ever been in the history of the country. So, um, but point being, when you get there, right, and you're, you're moving into retirement, like retirement is within like 1 to 3 years, well, actually now at that point you are in protection mode because you've already built it up. And now you got to look at, okay, well, if If I'm, say, 65, I don't really like this arbitrary, hey, we're going to retire at 65, but I'm just using that. So, if we're at 65 and on average, we're going to live another 20 years, well, yeah, you need to go into protection mode because you got to look at, okay, if I have $10 million, what is that going to generate per month in passive revenue to cover my lifestyle? And then, it's just math, right? Or $3 million. I mean, a lot of people say, or wealth management people say, hey, if you can get to $4 million, That can cover the vast majority of anyone's lifestyle on a monthly basis with just passive income. So, so at that point, it is about protection. But the most doctors on, you know, in our group, they're not in that mode. They're not retiring in 1 to 3 years. So it's all about growth, right? So not, you know, we want to move away from that, you know, how do I protect what I already have? So do not spend— this is the next one. Do not spend the patient's money for them. We've talked about this a lot. We are not their banker. We are their doctor. So, uh, this happens a lot. Very common is, uh, discussing investments with patients. So a doctor may look at a $4,000 care plan and immediately think— the doctor— that's a lot of money. Um, and this is tough, right? That— and by the way, I'm not saying this stuff is easy, like we just flip a switch. This is something— this is like a muscle. Right. This is something you need to work on, uh, on a regular basis so that you can train your brain to look for opportunities versus, you know, the, the lack thereof. So if it's hard for you to write a check for $4,000, your immediate instinct will be, well, they can't afford it either, right? That's a lot of money. Um, but that's our relationship with the money entering the conversation. The patient, on the other hand, may be asking a totally different question. What would it be worth to finally solve this problem? I'll tell you a quick story. When I first started with neuropathy, this is 2010, I did not have 2 nickels to rub together. I was making about $7,000 a month. You know, wow, really, really crushing it, Dr. Vince. So it was a sad state of affairs, you know, had a fam— a little family at home that— anyways, so I Went into neuropathy. My coach said, price it at $3,500. I said, I don't have $3,500 anywhere. He was like, he's like, it ain't about you, Dr. Vance. I'm like, okay, that makes sense. That week, I'm gonna call him Mr. Seinfeld. That's not his name. Um, he comes in. His name sounded familiar to me. And I didn't know why. Um, and he came off a, a killer ad that I wrote for the newspaper. Um, and he was like the easiest quote unquote close in the world. He's like, look, I read your ad. I've been suffering this from this forever. Everything you said totally makes sense. I've tried everything. Do you think you can help me? And I said, yes, I do. You know, based on the Toronto Clinical Scoring System, I do believe that this is going to help you. He's like, great, let's go. And just wrote a check for $3,500, right? Turns out he owns 3 of these massive furniture stores. But you know what he looked like? Any other guy. Didn't drive up in a Rolls-Royce. You know, I think he came out in a Toyota. And just had khakis and a sweater on. He was about 72 years old, you know. So, um, that was my aha moment of not to prejudge people, right? It's not about us whether we can afford it or if it seems like a lot of money. Um, we're not their banker, right? We're their doctor. Hey there, it's Dr. Vince, and if you're getting value from this episode, please Please make sure to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And if you know another doc who's ready to grow their practice, share this with them. It might be exactly what they need right now. Thank you in advance. And now back to the show. So, um, and when you think about, you know, someone's been dealing with this pain for years, they can't sleep well, they can't exercise, they can't golf or do any of the hobbies that they want to. You know, they're worried about obviously surgery. They're going to view that problem much more, much differently than us. So our responsibility is not to decide what another adult can afford or not afford, right? Our responsibility solely is to make a recommendation that we genuinely believe is appropriate, right? Clearly communicate that value and allow the patient to make their own decision. Uh, this is why we lean so heavily into the clinical side here at S— at Specialized Practice. It's because that's where it all starts. That's where you're going to get your confidence to recommend 24 visits at $5,000 or $4,000 or $6,000 or $3,000 or whatever the number is, right? The number changes based on the market. I'm not saying that the markets don't and shouldn't dictate Your particular care plan price point—it should, right? If you're in small town Ohio, well, you shouldn't most likely be charging seven thousand dollars, right? Just like Dr. Pankinen, very small town, knows his market very well. He's at like three thousand five hundred. But Dr. Vinny is in Southern California, and he charges six thousand or six thousand five hundred. Different markets will bear different prices, but it starts with the clinical confidence. Can I help this patient? And if so, what is going to— if they were my brother or my mother, what would I recommend for them outside of price, right? That's really what it comes down to. Okay. Next, you probably need fewer patients than you think. So sometimes we look at a community of 50,000, 100,000, or whatever, and somehow convince ourselves there's not enough patients, right? Just talked about this, but think about the math. How many decompression starts would significantly change your practice, right? For, for most doctors on this, on this call, in this group, um, 5 to 10 cases a month would be phenomenal, right? If your care plan's $4,000 and you got 8, right, just the average, that's $32,000, uh, in additional revenue. And, you know, to, to service that, maybe you need to add one more team member. Maybe you need to add another table. In our model, we can easily serve 7 new patients a month. Dr. Reynolds still has one table using our model, does 10 new patients a month. So really, if you max it out, you can get in our model one table to 10 starts a month. Um, it gets tight at that point. You know, so we typically talk about, well, when should I get a new table? Usually at about 75 to 80% capacity. How do you figure out your capacity? Take your total number of available slots, and then you take your average of what you average decompression visits per week, and then you divide that by your total slots. Does that make sense? So say, and I'll just do a quick tangent here so that we can— I can show you how this works. So say you have— 80 available slots. And how do you determine that? Well, say you're in practice, your work week is 40 hours, right? And you can do 2 patients per hour, right? So you have 40 hours times 2, so you're 80 available slots. So say you have— you're currently doing 15. Oh, the man, the myth, the legend, Dr. Pankin, joining. So say you have 50 On average decompression visits per week, then you would take 50 and you divide— Dr. Pinkin, uh, welcome. Oh yeah, uh, I was just gonna tell you to mute. But anyways, um, so you have 50 visits per week on average that you use, you divide it by 80, so you're at 62% capacity. Does that make sense? So once you get to 75 to 80%, That's when you start to think of a second table. Okay, back to the training. So for the new doctors that just joined, this is called Practice from Abundance. Um, but anyways, so 8 new starts, $32,000 a month, right? So you don't need everyone in your community. Um, you just really need a relatively small number of the right people who have the problem that you can solve with spinal decompression. You, uh, They understand the value of your care. This is where communication and education comes in. They trust you. This is where world-class exam comes in, and they're ready to take action. This is where your patient selection as well as your ROF comes in. So the better question becomes, how can I become better at reaching and serving the people who are already out there? Jim Parker said this in the '70s. Why do I know this? I was barely alive because my dad went to every Jim Parker seminar and credits Jim Parker for saving his career. Um, but he would always say, the more people that know about your practice, the bigger your practice will be, right? That's marketing. So how can I become better at reaching and serving the people who are already out there? So now we're not just talking about money. I think this is key. Abundance is bigger than money. So building an abundant practice, it's not just about increasing revenue. A healthy and growing practice can create abundance in many different directions. One, for your patients, right? You can help more people move better, feel better, return to activities that they love, and improve their quality of life, right? So the, the better your practice is, the higher level of service you can deliver. Right? The better equipment that you can invest in, the better team that you can invest in to serve the patients. That's where the vast majority— like, our doctors, you know, they're at the upper end. They're not buying Lamborghinis. They're putting the money away in retirement to protect their family. They are reinvesting in the practice so that they can serve at the highest level, and they're retaining their team and compensating them properly so that they will stay. Um, so Next, for your team. So a successful practice creates stable jobs, right? Better compensation, opportunities for growth, and a great and healthy work environment. Obviously, for your, your family, right? So a profitable practice can create greater freedom, security, time, experiences, and choices. And then for your community. So a strong practice can become a trusted resource and positively impact hundreds Maybe even thousands of people. So financial success and patient impact—they do not need to compete with one another when done ethically. It's actually a positive feedback loop; they help fuel one another. So next, growth expands your impact. So imagine two versions of the same doctor: one remains cautious; they are inconsistent with their marketing; they're afraid to charge appropriate prices; they avoid hiring and building up their team; they hesitate to recommend copy. Comprehensive care, and ultimately they help a limited number of people each year. Now, on the flip side, imagine that same doctor. Now they become a better and stronger communicator, marketer, leader, and business owner. They build a strong team. They can confidently communicate the value of their care. They consistently put their message out into the community. They create systems that allows the practice to grow without them being the bottleneck. And instead of helping a few hundred people, They impact thousands, right? So it's not like growth and abundance is not simply about making the practice bigger. It can allow you to serve at a much higher level, which, oh, by the way, is going to be more impactful for you personally, right? You will feel better about yourself. You will feel more confidence. You will feel more energy. You will be operating at a higher level and you will be more attractive. to patients and team members and your community. Now, here's the key. Abundance does not mean ignoring reality. That we're— this is no— if anything, I'm a realist, right? I consider myself an optimistic realist. Um, but the point being is that we're not throwing caution to the wind here or ignore reality. So it's not pretending that like every decision will work out, right? It does not mean spend— and by the way, I know this for sure. Uh, recently I don't even want to tell you how much I invested in this coach, but it didn't work out. And that is okay, right? It is okay. I did get some valuable pieces out of it. Did it help me in all aspects of what I was anticipating? No, but that's okay, right? That is okay. Because I know that it was more for me, it was the fact that I did get some value out of it. And I'm always, always searching and looking for who can help me get, you know, help me grow SP the fastest, the most, with the most predictability, so that I can turn around and serve our clients at a higher level. Do you know what I'm saying? Because a lot of times, like the coaches I'm looking at, I'm always like their models and paradigms. I'm always thinking, well, how can I take that and have my clients use that? For patients. Do you see what I'm saying? Because people are people. In other words, whether you're trying to get more like coaching clients or more patients, it's all the same. Psychology is all the same. So that's why I'm always— I always have a coach and I'm always looking to invest in that because that's how I then turn around and use that information to help you convey to the patient the value, right? So Again, doesn't mean we're going to ignore reality. It's not spending irresponsibly or ignoring numbers or taking unnecessary risks. That's not the— that's not the point here. It's believing that opportunity can be created. I think this is— if I leave you with one thing, it's believing that opportunity can be created. It doesn't have to be, I hope this comes along. Do you see the difference? It's I can make my own reality. That's the goal, right? There are patients that you have not reached yet. There's relationships that are— have not been built yet. There's skills to be developed, team members that can be added, improvements that you've not made yet. And there may be an entirely different version of your practice that you've not built yet. How interesting is that? A practice that is bigger, more profitable, more efficient, that gives you more freedom of time, energy, and wealth. So scarcity protects and abundance creates. So here's the difference. Scarcity would ask, well, what if I lose what I have? And abundance would say, what could I create from here? Scarcity would ask, are there enough patients? And abundance would say, how can I reach more of the people who need what I do? Scarcity would ask, will they pay for this? Abundance will say, how can I clearly communicate the value of spinal decompression? So that they will invest if it's the right thing for them. Scarcity would ask, can I afford to grow? Abundance would say, what would need to happen for growth to make sense? So these small changes in the questions we ask ourselves can lead to very different decisions. So challenge this week, don't try to change anything yet. Again, there's going to be a part 2, which will be more tactical next week. Um, But for now, let's just start paying attention, right? Ask yourself, where am I potentially operating from scarcity? Is it pricing? Is it marketing? Is it hiring? Is it recommending the proper care? Is it investing in the practice? Is it thinking about competition, uh, belief in your market or belief in yourself? So when you notice one of those thoughts, just write it down. Again, this is— this next week is just about recognition. Write it down in your journal. Then you're— then ask yourself one additional question. What might I do differently if I believe there was more opportunity available to me? You know, how would that affect your decisions if there— if I— if you knew there was more opportunity out there? So again, don't— and you don't have to necessarily take action on it. I would recommend you do not take action on it yet, right? Again, this is just right now is the goal is recognition. Because we can't change a pattern that we don't see. And again, this is like a muscle is recognition and seeing these patterns. So first we see it, then we make a plan to change it. So final thought, there's tremendous opportunity in what we do. You know, we have the ability to build abundant practices and create financial abundance for ourselves and our families and our team members, frankly. So I think most importantly, we have the ability to positively impact an enormous number of people in our communities. And those goals, they don't have to compete with one another. When your thoughts and actions align, they can grow together. So next week is Practice from Abundance Part 2. This is a tactical where we move from awareness into action. And we're going to look at some practical daily and weekly habits that will help you operate from abundance more consistently. Here's some, you know, examples: how to make decisions from opportunity instead of fear, how to stop projecting your own financial beliefs onto patients, how to create more opportunities through marketing, referrals, follow-up, and relationships, how to use simple numbers and data. to challenge your scarcity thinking, how to build confidence around investing in your team and your practice, and how to create a weekly rhythm that keeps you focused on growth instead of protection. So the goal is to turn abundance from a mindset into a way of operating your practice, right? And that is a wrap on Practice from Abundance. I hope that that was valuable for you. Hey, it's Dr. Vince again, and hope you enjoyed that episode. And if you're ready to grow your practice fast with high-value decompression patients, then the Decompression Accelerator could be a phenomenal option for you. This is our 90-day sprint to help you scale with proven systems, staff-driven protocols, and full marketing support, and it's all guaranteed. Spots are limited. Head to www.decompressionaccelerator.com to learn more.