065- Corporate Wellness, Research, and Marketing with Kevin Christie

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Hello and welcome to the Evidence Based Chiropractor. I AM your host, Dr. Jeff Langme. This week we have a awesome episode with Dr. Kevin Christie. He knows marketing, he knows research, he knows corporate wellness and I guarantee on this podcast you will find something to add to your practice. We have a nice healthy long meaning 20 minute conversation. So I'm going to jump right in with Dr. Kevin Christie. So Kevin, thanks for coming on with us.

Oh thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity.

You got it. So I talked a little bit about what you are about in the intro, but I'd love to know a little bit more in your own words of who you are, what are you into and what can we expect to talk about today?

Yeah, absolutely. I'm a chiropractor down in South Florida. I have an office in BOC Raton, also in Miami, but live more in the Boca Raton area. From this area originally I went to Logan College of Chiropractic and then moved back down. So just been practicing for 11 years now owning my own business. Seven years actually April 1st will be seven year anniversary and really just focusing on sports chiropractic and our evidence based chiropractic kind of model within both of our offices we have a really good athletic patient base and so it makes it fun and just I'm really still grinding and working you know, Monday through Friday treating patients and in addition to that we have our Health Fit corporate wellness company which is all about on site chiropractic and also ergonomics. And we're basically in six locations now providing on site and then we're doing a lot of ergonomics. I was actually just in Kansas City doing physical demands analysis in Fuel Truckers. So I had to do ride alongs from 5am to 5pm and it was 20 degrees outside just assessing how these guys work and then generating a pretty detailed report for them. So really combining the corporate side of things with the very active lifestyle athletic patient base. So that's where I'm at.

That's awesome. And it's, that is definitely very, very interesting. And you and I know connected through Ed Osborne and really, you know, when, when we connected one of the things that struck me was the corporate wellness. It's something that to be quite honest, you know I'm kind of a Little bit unfamiliar with. I'm sure that a majority of the chiropractors out there listening right now are, and you know, ride alongs at 5am are certainly not in most chiropractors wheelhouses. So tell us, tell me and tell us. I'm interested in learning a little bit more about like what does corporate wellness mean? How do you get started with it? You don't need to, you know, go into super minutia, but what's, what's kind of the, what's the gist of it?

So corporate wellness has many faces. You know, it could be everything from a fitness center to blood, you know, blood pressure screenings, flu shots. So it's a very catch all term. But what we've done is really with the tagline, the corporate chiropractor. And so we're really trying to find our niche. And it just started for me five years ago. I got lucky. I had a patient came in, they were developing this new building down the street which was ADT security, which a lot of people have heard of. And they, you can kind of picture it, they, they built a main street on the inside of the building. It's all cobblestone, it's, it's lined with Starbucks fitness center, it had whole beauty salon, healthy eating section. It had chiropractic massage, had primary care doctor. And she came to me, she's like, with these floor plans, she's like, oh, would you like to have an office inside this corporation? And I was like, yeah, what's the catch? And there was no rent, there was nothing. They just did a survey to the employees and there was 700 employees at this particular company. And chiropractic was one of the services that a lot of people voted on and so they wanted to find one. And I was the lucky person to get. And it really developed well and so I just knew that if I could do it one time I could do it more. And so we tried to document our processes as we did it. And one led to two led to four. And now we're currently on site providing chiropractic only. We do stretching and things like that at six locations. That's my version of corporate wellness as it pertains to on site care. And then we just, all of my doctors, there's four of us total within my group, we got certified from the back school on the ergonomics. And so we went through their whole program and that gave us the ability to implement some ergonomics as well.

Nice. That sounds very busy.

It is. We got a good Team. We have a good team.

That's awesome. And I know you and I were chatting kind of before we got on. I know you're heavily interested and know a heck of a lot to say say the least about marketing a practice as well. And it sounds like, you know, you've really taken multiple things and spearheaded some new endeavors in your area. And again, probably a lot of things that many chiropractors are unfamiliar with. So one big question I'd have for you is what's this is a very broad question, but what's the kind of a key procedure or app or product or marketing strategy that you see going across all of your business endeavors that you really couldn't live without?

Okay, so the answer, and I'll expand a little bit on it, is content marketing. And there's actually something called the Content Marketing Institute. And I went to the Content Marketing World event last year in Cleveland, it was in September. And it's just all about education based content as your marketing strategy. There's a lot of different marketing strategies out there and we use multiple for sure, but it's just a really, really good way of not only growing your patient base, but also if you're kind of in the business to business marketing space like I am as well, it helps with that too. And so it sounds like I've kind of maybe spread myself a little bit thin in what I'm doing because I have my private practices, I have the corporate wellness, and then I also am working with a group called Leverage Media to where we essentially become that marketing department for people. And what I've done is over 11 years of growing my business. I've learned a lot about it, and then I've kind of formally been studying a lot over the last few years is I just take that strategy, apply it to our leverage media company, but then also to our other our practices and our corporate wellness. And to me it's the most ethical and it's really the most effective and sustainable strategy for marketing because you really can position yourself as the expert, whether you're just trying to be the expert in treating conditions in your community or if you're trying to look past that as well into maybe some other endeavors. That would have to be my answer is content marketing.

Cool. I'm going to drill down on that a little bit with you for the docs out there listening. Do you find and I know there's different modes of thought and everything else, but do you find that that really is applicable in a chiropractic website blog? Do the Chiros be sharing the content on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, all of the above. Long form, short form. What are some of your favorites there?

Well, absolutely, I really believe in and I've seen the results in my own practice. About two years ago, I turned my website into a content platform versus just essentially a lot of people's websites are an online business card. We add everything from a blog that we update regularly and when we add it, we make sure that it's got a certain amount of valuable content to it. We also have a media section on there where our YouTube is uploaded onto our site and, and we try to shoot regular videos. Obviously Google owns YouTube and Google also really searches out some really relevant, good content. And so the more you can produce content and put it on your website, the better your Google presence will be. There's other variables as well. There's definitely what we call white hat SEO versus black hat, which is kind of trying to trick the system. Google's got all that figured out now. So if you can do those things, you can really increase your Google presence. But then also you really want to take your content and share it on, especially Facebook. There's other ones. A lot of people do really good on Instagram. For me personally in my private practice and my corporate stuff, I've done a lot better with Facebook. My Facebook business page, which is healthfit, chiropractic and sports medicine, it's been, we have a really good audience there. We run Facebook ads and boosted posts that will, you know, direct them to the article, which will then just take them to our website, which obviously is a captive audience. And so I'm really, really big on that and making sure that your content is not only valuable, but it's also got to be consistent. And there are some things like SEO wise Google likes stuff that's 700, 600 words or so. They don't like the short ones, 150 things like that. So definitely think it's vital to sustaining someone's practice in this digital age.

Nice. Love it. And tons of really, really good pieces and bits of wisdom. So thank you. Thanks for breaking it down.

I could talk for about an hour on that. So stop there.

You and me both. I think we'll be chatting again for sure. So one of the big things I know and again you and I were kind of talking about we're both going to a mastermind later here in April this year that we're both super psyched about. But what else is on your 2017, obviously you got a lot of on your plate you got a lot of awesome things. As they say, if you want something done, ask the busiest guy in the room. But what else do you have coming up in 2017?

I'm really looking forward to 2017. I'm doing a lot of traveling. I got about 15 trips this year. What I'm really excited about is we developed a digital based ergonomics platform for companies. A company called World Fuel Services. They came to me in December 2015 and they had a problem with scalability of the ergonomics because as their name implies, they have locations all over the world and They've got about 6,000 employees and ergonomics was just becoming too expensive and cumbersome and just frankly not effective. They came to me with an idea like what can we do for it? I proposed them a multi part office ergonomics initiative and also a truck driving ergonomics initiative. They liked it, they actually paid for it ahead of time and I had all of 2016 to develop it and we did finish it in about August of 2016 and now it's completely rolled out. Part of why I was in Kansas City for the truck driving ride alongs was part of their truck driving ergonomics. But essentially it's a digital based ergonomics to where I don't really have to go anywhere for the office workers. And it's a complete platform that a company can purchase on a yearly subscription and then have it from there. And it does a lot of things. It also covers some of their requirements like if an employee, a lot of these employees keep on going up to them and you know, I want this type of computer screen, I want this type of keyboard, I need a stand up desk, I need a varidesk, I need all those things. And I think a lot of those things are very helpful. But it's become so expensive for these companies. They can actually now use our digital based ergonomics program as a justification legally that they don't have to provide the latest and greatest technology for their employees. It just has to be very, you know, it has to be up to standard for sure. But now they have something in place that can actually save them money on having to purchase a lot of equipment. So that's my big excitement for this year.

Cool, that sounds in depth. Cool. Well, you know, we've got a good feel for kind of where you're at with things. I'd love to know how you got here with a few questions. So what's. Who's been kind of the biggest, your biggest influence within chiropractic or just in personal life, who's been one of the biggest influences on you and kind of where you're at today.

You know, I have to say, it's gonna sound pretty cliche, but it's my mom, but it's really because she's the one that came up with the idea of me going to chiropractic school. She's the one that convinced me not to quit going down that path when I was at Florida State and wanted to go and just become, like, a cop or go into the military. And then she just. She's made some really good. I shouldn't say, decisions, but she's gotten me into some definitely good paths that really helped me stay along that course during those formative years 15 to 22, where a lot of people kind of get off course for obvious reasons. She kept me on that. So I definitely have to say her.

Nice, best advice you've ever received.

I'm going to go to the other parent. I've got good parents. When I was about a year and a half into my associateship, which was actually a very good associateship, I was learning a lot. I was getting paid, fair enough. I was getting good experiences. But I got an opportunity to kind of dive into a partnership in a. And it would be inside of a sports training facility. And I really wasn't too keen on my setup and the risk of it because I was getting paid a nice salary and I was going to go straight to a percentage of profit as my pay. But it happened to be in a training facility that was. They were treating a lot of professional athletes, a lot of NFL players, Major League baseball players. And my dad said, look, you know, you're single, you're 27, you don't have kids. Like, if you're ever going to take a risk, this is the time to do it. And just really had that taking risk talk with me and that he never did take one, and he kind of regretted it, and he knew I was in a position to do it, and so I did. And then to this day, I'll be heading to Indianapolis for. For the NFL combine in a couple weeks, actually in a month. And this will be my ninth one in a row because it all stemmed from that one opportunity. And so I've really developed a niche in the professional athlete side of things as well. So that was a vital decision and a piece of advice for me.

That's awesome. And I got one more kind of in that vein, and I'm going to take the heat off. So you don't have to say the evidence based chiropractor podcast. But what's an invaluable resource like a book, a podcast, a piece of tech, not an iPhone or a MacBook. That's too easy. But as far as a book or a podcast or some sort of resource that you heavily, heavily rely on, either rely on, love or feel like the other chiropractors out there listening should know about.

I like the podcast. It's called this Old Marketing. And it is, it's done by the two guys that are kind of spearheading that content marketing institute. So I'll keep it. I'll keep my answer congruent with what I was talking about earlier. And it's just a really good show on content marketing. Marketing. It really dives deep into it. You can extrapolate a lot out of it into your private practice, but it essentially tries to teach you to turn your business, your chiropractic practice, but they are obviously not chiropractic specific. But turn your business into a marketing and media company and all that really means is just be developing a lot of marketing and a lot of media and do it consistently. And it gives you a lot of good examples of that. And I just really have enjoyed. I've been listening to that probably for three years now. And it's one of the few that I've not fallen off on. And so it's been really helpful for me.

Cool. And thank you. I've never heard of that, so thanks for the tip. And is that a take on this is like this maybe this makes me sound like a real old guy. Is that a take on this old house like this?

It's actually, I don't think it is. But really what the theme of it is is that at the very end of it, it's an hour long show, it's back and forth between Robert Rose and Joe Polizzi. And at the end they give an example of old marketing. For instance, a lot of people don't realize, but like John Deere back in the late 1800s and early 1900s had a magazine called the Furrow. And they basically sent it to all the farmers all across the country for free. And all it was just was a publication on everything farming. And it wasn't like this big huge John Deere ad. They had stuff in there, but it was just pure content, pure information. And so then the farmers trusted John Deere indirectly because of that. And so that's one example of say this old marketing. And they just give an example like that all the time. At every show, but then they keep up with the weekly happenings of marketing and in particular content marketing.

Cool. So how can everybody listening get ahold of you? What's web address, email address, etc. Where can we find you? You mentioned your Facebook page, but I'd love to hear more and I'm going to link that also in the show notes for sure.

Yeah, perfect. You can find me Kevin Christie on Facebook. I do have a closed marketing and business strategy Facebook group called Leverage and it's LVRG and then Colon and then it's chiropractic marketing and business strategy. So you can request to join that closed group or you could email me@KevinOderndeskjockey.com and I'll definitely responsive.

Awesome, Kevin. I really appreciate it. You gave awesome content. You gave good content today and going full, full theme here and really some actionable stuff. So I really appreciate you taking the time and coming on. Definitely everybody out there listening. Check out what Kevin's got going on. Obviously he's got a lot of moving parts in his life, but he also has a lot of great things to offer because of those moving parts. So thanks Kevin.

Awesome. Thank you.

You got it.

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