How Review Velocity Drives Fee-For-Service Growth

0:00Welcome to the Foundation Dental podcast. I'm your host, doctor Jim Arnold, and today's guest is doctor Len Tao, known across dentistry as the reviews doctor. Len's one of the rare leaders who didn't just talk about digital trust. He built a category around it. As a fee for service practice owner, he earned over 16,000 reviews, a 4.9 star rating, and more than 40 new patients a month, all without relying on ad agencies. And that's pretty amazing. He later founded I Social Reviews, which was acquired by BirdEye, where he now serves as general manager of dental and advises more than 11,000 practices. He's the author of Raving Patients, host of the Raving Patients podcast, and the person who proved that trust, not advertising, is the real growth engine in dentistry.

0:44Doctor Len Tau, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. No. No, man. It's my pleasure. I was on your show about six months ago and just really enjoyed the conversation. And I've been looking forward to having you on my show, kinda turn the tables, ask you a few questions this time around. Well, I'm excited to, I'm I'm excited to be here, and I'm excited to inform like to say, inform the conversation because I can drop a lot of pearls and really make the audience wanna take action after they listen to the podcast. Awesome. And and, Lynn, I have no doubt that they will. You are a wealth of information, and, you've got a a loyal following. And you've just created so much value for so many docs out there over the years.

1:23And and just so many things for the dental profession. And by the way, you've been incredibly kind to me and generous with your time and and advice, and I've I've really appreciated that. But, you know, let's just jump right into it. And I I wanna talk about something that you talk about quite a bit. Analyzing the recency and velocity of reviews in dentistry. Before we jump into dental side now be honest. When you're ordering a pizza or booking a hotel, are you ever able to shut that part of your brain off? No. I'm always on. It's it's it's to a fault sometimes, but I'm always on. Whatever I'm doing, I'm always something's always ticking in the back of my brain to figure out the next best thing or to figure out how to help somebody or it's it's always I I never stop.

2:07And it fuels me. It it it drives me. It keeps me going, but I don't really have downtime, I guess, can say. I was I was diagnosed probably over twenty years ago with something called hypermania. Really? Yes. You know, there so you you there's it's literally I'm I don't have a I I I I'm always high. I'm hypermanic. Yeah. Hypermanic, which is interesting because I don't ever really have a downside. I don't I'm always looking at the the cup being half full rather than half empty. Yeah. I love that. You know, I I I don't stress about things. You know, it's just kind of how I I live, and I'm unfortunate in some extent. But to the extent that I I never turn off, that's that's something that, you know, my family has to deal with every so often.

2:46I got a call I got a call last night at, like, 09:15, and I she asked me to they wanted to ask some questions about BirdEye, and I was like, great. We sat on the call. We spoke for about an hour. So, I mean, it's just what I do. Yeah. Well, you know what? I I think that's part of what makes people really like and respect you so much because you are always available. You know, it reminds me of my dad, actually. He's a real estate agent. He's 84, and he still does real estate. But doesn't matter where we are. We could be out to lunch. We could be out to dinner. We could be doing anything. Maybe I haven't seen him in a couple of months, and he gets a call.

3:17He answers immediately, and it's why he still gets tons of referrals at his age because people really appreciate when you make yourself available. And I'll be honest, I am not that available. I just I just can't. I I'm pretty I'm pretty high energy as a general rule, but I need that downtime too just to, like, shut the phone off and sort of sort of veg a little bit. Yeah. I just something I've always decided to do, and I and I I got a lot of things I do, and I got my hands in so many things. Yeah. And if if I if I don't do those things right away so I'm very I'm I have a very systematic approach the way I do things. Mhmm.

3:54And, you know, you were an attendee at Supercharge. But, I mean, even the way I communicate with the vendors and the speakers, there's a way I I do it, and I I'm that's why my events run really well because I am I cross every I and I dot every t. Excuse me. Yeah. I dot every I and cross every t. So Yeah. But, like, if I'm talking to somebody and I need to send an email to somebody, I don't wait till the end of the Do it right then and there because I'll forget to do it. Absolutely. When you're a busy person, it's just so hard to stay on top of everything unless you really act in the moment whenever you can. But, you know, I wanna go back to kind of a a night or a moment that changed everything.

4:28And I I not gonna lie and say that I remember this or anything like that, but I read about it because I did some research on you. And the night that demand force Google integration collapsed, wiping out thousands of reviews. So what did that experience reveal to you about dentists who, quote, unquote, rent their reputation instead of owning it? And how did that change things for you? So I remember I was sitting at dinner out with an oral surgeon friend of mine, and that news came about. And that's many, many, many moons ago. Yeah. And I basically I was very big I was fond of dental DemandForce back then because, like, I always when I went to trade shows on their behalf, I would say they put you on the map because they did.

5:05Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. When you search for somebody, they would have, like, a thousand reviews because Demandforce had a a way to get the review showing up on Google. But, also, they had Yelp reviews. They had Demandforce reviews. That's what Google did then. And then all of a sudden, they said, we're not doing anymore, and that was the end of that conversation. And overnight, you had dentists who literally lost their entire reputation. Jeez. Literally, they went from a thousand reviews down to 10 because they weren't getting Google reviews. I, on a matter of fact, was already getting Google reviews. So, yes, I lost reviews, but I still had a significant number of reviews more than the average practitioner. And that is when a light went off because that's how I started getting my patients.

5:46Ah, okay. And and being a fee for service practice Mhmm. And the Internet was very different back then, obviously. Yeah. When patients would come into the office, I would ask them how they heard about me, and they said, I I read your reviews, or I found you online, and I read your reviews. So something clicked, and that that that's when a light bulb went off that, I would say, forever changed my my career. Oh, that's that's so awesome. What a great origin story. And and I would guess that's the moment you realized, like, dentistry needed an entirely new playbook for trust and digital authority. I mean, is is that kind of the genesis of all that? Yeah. I mean, I I knew that reviews were driving business, which was a big thing.

6:25And and I started speaking on it, you know, I look back at my because I have all my decks from every seminar I gave going back to my one of my very first ones in in 2009. That's when I first got on the stage. Oh, cool. I've been speaking for sixteen years. I I have many lectures have you done in sixteen years? I know you've got a number, don't you? It's it's well over 600 now. Oh my god. Alright. Yeah. It's well over 600. Man, I thought I even that's not even including webinars and those types of things, but just getting on stage live in person, it's it's something I I really enjoy doing, and I people really enjoy what I talk about because it's not your typical stuff.

6:59I don't teach dental dentistry. I I teach business and marketing, case acceptance, those types of things. But, you know, I knew reviews were important, but there was really no great way to get them. And I literally, I still remember I I was driving home in my car, and I called my wife up, and I said, think I have an idea. She's like, what's that? I think I'm gonna create a a piece of software to help dentists get better reviews or more reviews online. And she was like, yep. Have at it. You know? Have fun. Good good luck with that. Again, lo lo and behold, you know, that was in 2013. So that's, you know, '12 11/11 plus twelve years ago. And, that's that I never expected it to do what it did.

7:36And, you know, at that point, I I launched I Social Reviews Mhmm. And started I went to my very first trade show as a Yankee Dental in in twenty in twenty thirteen. And I remember calling them up on the phone and telling them, the person who who I didn't know, obviously, I just said, hey. I have a product I wanna bring to the Yankee Dental meeting. I don't have any money. Put me in the remnant space where they have the, you know, the bamboo sheets and the the knives and those types of things. I didn't care where I was. I just wanted in I just wanted in. And I had a friend of mine design the artwork for the banners and stuff, and I look at it now, and it's a joke what we did.

8:08And I couldn't and I was still practicing dentistry, of course. So the meeting starts on Thursday. I wasn't leaving my practice, so I had a friend of mine go and set up. I showed up on Friday, and I sold I sold nine licenses the very first meeting I went to, and I was like, we've got something here. Wow. And then I then I and then we were charging back then. I think it was, like, 400 plus dollars a month with a, like, a thousand dollar setup fee. And so it's significant. And then I actually came home, and I said, okay. When are we gonna go to the next show? So I went to Chicago Midwinter And I went to Hinman, and then we went to the AACD, which I think was in Orlando at that time.

8:42Mhmm. After four meetings, it was like, this is something really effective. And I said, you know what? I'm gonna further into this. And, you know, little did I know in a year and a half or a little under a year, had a 180 offices using the product. And and that's that's kind of how the the journey began. That is fantastic. I love that story. You know, e like, even before that, I mean, you were kind of an outlier. You had, like, 1,600 reviews, 4.9 star rating, which is, I think, pretty much unheard of to have that many and all that high. What was the first, like, system or habit you developed to get that kind of a result? Well, it was asking patients. Okay. You know, it was literally just saying I wanna go back for a second because I still talk about it now is that I think each and every practice, in order to go deep into reviews or make reviews a priority, which it should be 100% Yeah.

9:33You have to create a reputation culture in the office. And that's something I talk about a lot is that if you don't have a reputation culture and what what I mean by that is your team, yourself know that every patient who comes in is going to get some communication, whether it's a survey, whether it's an email, a text, whatever it is, where they're basically gonna grade you on your performance. Okay? And if you have that culture where you deliver a five star experience Mhmm. And make yourself different and make yourself stand out, that's how it will take your practice to the next level. So I I kind of set the stage for that. And once that happened and I made my team aware of how important it was, there was different rules back then, of course.

10:13I mean, you were literally able to get someone to write a review in your office. Right. Right. I would literally walk into the computer. I would open up Google and say, hey. Write a review for me. I mean, that's what it was. You can't do that anymore. The direct approach. Yeah. You well, I'm very direct for those that don't know. You know as soon as they go home, they're not gonna do it. They're busy, and it's like, oh, yeah. Yeah. I'll do that tomorrow, and they never get around to it. I mean, I've done that before. So that's A 100% so. And and I but being direct, I asked them and they did it in the office, and it was great. And, you know, back then, they had anonymous reviews Right.

10:45Where they didn't have to have a name now. And a lot of those reviews, I was so deep into it that there's times I lost reviews because anonymous reviews were eliminated because I was such an early adopter out there. Right. But it it literally starts by just recognizing the fact that you you've gotta do it and then creating this culture and then asking. And once you start doing that and getting the team behind it, I think that's a very big step that practices take because it the way you know it's working is when patients show up at the practice and you ask them how they heard about you, and they said, well, I read your reputation. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I I love that. And it's probably part of the reason why you're known as the guy with 85% case acceptance.

11:20I mean, Dennis would freaking kill for that. Like, what what would you say is the most overlooked variable that leads to high case acceptance for Dennis? So I think when it comes to case acceptance, I think tracking is really important. Most practices, if I ask them, so what's your case acceptance? They look at me like they have no clue. Right. No clue. They have no way to track it. Absolutely. They think it's good, and they if they think it's good, it's usually not. But I say, do you actually track it? And they go, no. Well, I think you have to track it. So and I think you have to understand the definition of case acceptance. Mhmm. Because there's two really ways to define it. So one is you'd present treatments and the patient accepts one part of the treatment.

11:57Mhmm. Or is it you present a a whole treatment plan and they accept the whole treatment plan? So which which definition? My goal is when someone comes when when someone came into my practice is to get them to do at least one thing. Because if they come in, they're a new patient, they you do an exam and you do it take some x rays and you present them something, and then they say, I'm gonna think about it. You have nothing, and they may not even come back again. Usually, if they're gonna do one thing, they will remain with you, hopefully, and that will continue to improve that case acceptance. But I want them to say yes to one thing, and I'm very happy with it.

12:28I I I agree a 100%. It's almost like they they do that one simple thing, and then they feel more comfortable. You know, they've had a couple of visits. Everybody knows them. They like the culture. You didn't hurt them. And it's like, alright. Well, this is my dental home. I trust you now, and I'm gonna do do more. Whether they do it all now or do it over the next two years, they're probably never gonna leave you with that kind of experience. And and so that's a big part of getting case acceptance is understanding what it is. Yeah. But it's really learning a lot of the things and I teach a class called the art of the sale, is a very different type of seminar.

13:01But it talks about the the things you need to do to separate and differentiate yourself from other practices. It teaches, like, the the behavioral techniques, how to what we call disarm the patient, which, again, is not something everybody never nobody's ever taught to do. How to use your your body language and your eye movements and your head nods to basically get them to say yes to treatment. Yeah. It talks about how to use third party financing, which is a very important way to make patients treatment affordable to the patients. Mhmm. Because, obviously, people think that's the reason they say no. It's it's not always the reason financial. There's other things. Right. You gotta create value. You've gotta you make them understand how urgent something is.

13:39And if they see value in it, they're going to buy it. Very infrequently, if someone who sees value, they're gonna spend not spend the money. So the money part of it is is such a different type of factor in the whole sequence of things. So my case acceptance, I was very successful in the practice because I had a lot of new patients coming in because they found me online, and I was able to get them to say yes to treatment even if I didn't take their insurance. Yes. And that comes to one of the things I always like to talk about is if you're a fee for service practice, you should always have a membership plan. And I was a very early adopter in a lot of things.

14:09One of the things I was a very early adopter in was having a membership plan we call the oral health savings plan. And it was it started in 2010 because I was the very first dentist in Philadelphia to do a Groupon deal. Now back then, Groupon was very different than it is now. Right. Absolutely. And overnight, I think I sold 500 deals in one night that that that enabled me to accept or get up to 500 patients. A lot of them didn't come. Right. Right. That convinced me I needed to find a way for them to become loyal to my practice. A lot of these Groupon patients didn't have insurance. So I that's why I started this membership plan before membership plans existed. You know?

14:48Now you have software to do it. Okay? There's many companies that can do it automatically for you. I I developed it and then managed this plan in my practice to get these patients who are loyal. And literally that was 2010 and we're in 2025 now. And there are still patients who original who from that original Groupon deal are still patients in the practice. And every single year they buy this membership plan to remain loyal to the practice. Fantastic, Glenn. It's really cool. You know, you have always been a guy with a million things going on. I know you've mentioned hypermania earlier, and you just never need a down moment. You just go, go, go. But, I mean, let's be honest. When you were doing iSocial reviews, you're podcasting, writing books, speaking, consulting, all that stuff.

15:32I mean, did you ever face burnout? Or if if you did, did you just kinda power through it, shrug it off? So the time I had burnout was when I first bought my practice in 2007. Mhmm. I bought it from a dentist who committed suicide, unfortunately. Bought the practice, bought the building, cutted the building, worked on the side that wasn't being worked on, so we had a split office. So once I was getting construction, I was working on the other side. Oh, nice. And built the practice of my dreams, but I wasn't living the life of my dreams. And the practice is beautiful, high-tech allure, but I was burning out. And I I was working my tail off more on the business than actually doing dentistry.

16:07I only was doing dentistry twenty five hours a week. So and that really never changed throughout the time I was doing my own practice. But I was working on the business. It could be thirty or forty hours a week just from the business side. Absolutely. And which is why I'm I'm on the business side now because I really enjoy that part of it. Not that I ever did not join in dentistry. I love doing dentistry. But the point of it is that, you know, when you have these issues that you're dealing with and and patients and and team members and you're working your butt off, I started to get burned out from practice, and I needed to I knew I was not going to be 80 years old and wanna be a dentist anymore.

16:42Yeah. And I had been meeting some people on the road who were in their late seventies, early eighties, and they were still practicing because they and I said, there's no way I'm not gonna ever let that happen to me. Yeah. And that's part of the reason why I went to the direction I'm in that I did go in because I wanted to find not a way out. I never thought at 49 years old that I'd be retiring from dental practice. Right. You know, that was not in the cards at the time. I do the same thing at 50 for the same reason. It's like, you know, life is short. And I thought at 40 at 35, I loved being a dentist, but I felt like, man, I don't wanna live the rest of my life without having another career.

17:15It could be in dentistry, but I wanna do something else. And do you feel that way too? 100% agree with you. Yeah. 100% agree with you. And, you know, people always when I talk to dentists, they're somewhat envious of the fact that I no longer practice. They wish they could do the same thing. Yeah. I always tell people, you know, a lot of it was luck. I mean, I got lucky. I I picked the right thing to go into. You know, I never expected in 2010 or '11 that reviews would be even more important now than they were then. You who knows that? But Right. You know, versus some other things you can go into and then it it dies and nothing's around anymore. So I picked the right thing, but I always work hard.

17:50I earned everything I've ever done. You know, I've been working honestly since I was about 13 years old. I started a baseball card business when I was 13 years old. Oh, that's cool. Going to going to trade shows. I worked through college. I worked at a computer store selling computers. So I've never stopped working, basically, either from the time I was able to because I just enjoy that. There's there's a thrill from doing that. There's a thrill from making a sale. There's a thrill from having a patient take us to treatment. You know, there's a thrill from doing you know, selling a practice, one location, a $3,000 bird eye software. So that that's what is the dopamine hit that you need, and that's kind of how what I'm driven by.

18:25Oh, that's awesome. You know, when when you did retire from clinical and I like I said, I retired from clinical at 50. But did you miss, like, actually putting down the drill more or more the identity of doctor Tau, the clinician? Like, which was which was harder for you? It was funny. I've never been someone who who loves being called doctor Tau ever. That's never been a thing. I'm Jim. I'm Jim everywhere I go. It's it's my you know, my dad was doctor Tau. My dad that's my dad used that a lot. I very rarely, unless I need to use it, use that. Yeah. In fact, now I want everybody to call me Len. I don't like being called doctor Tap. Yes. I appreciate the recognition, but I prefer Len.

18:58That's what people know me as. And that conversation all the time. Everybody wants to call me doctor Jim. And then, you know, it's fine, but it's like, hey. You can just call me Jim. It's okay. I I don't need that. Yeah. No. I agree. 100%. And even people in there were doctors in the industry who reach out to me because of Bird Eye. Mhmm. And they're doctors. They say, hey, doctor Tao. I'm like, it's Len. You know? It's I just think it's interesting. It is interesting. When I decided to hang it up, so just so people understand. So in in 2020 prior to 2020, I had thought about putting my practice up for sale and moving to my wife and I were in Florida in Thanksgiving of twenty '19.

19:33So literally six years ago now. We were and we were on the beach in Delray Beach. And I said to my wife, how would you think about moving to Florida at some point? And she was like, are you serious? I'm like, yeah. She goes, definitely interested in it. So I went home and spoke to my attorney, my accountant, my my advisers, and we said, let's put a five year in place. And in five years, when my son's in college, we'll look at moving to Florida. And then COVID hit. In February, I put my practice up for sale in January because I decided it was better for me to be the associate and just be making money rather than running the business. At that time, I was working two days a week in the practice.

20:06Perfect. COVID hit and forgot forget about the sale at that point. And after COVID ended, my associate left, and I was working full time for the first time in since 2017. And I hired an associate who turned out to buy the practice about a year later, But I was already living in Florida at that point. So we moved to Florida in 2020 because COVID hit, and I was sick and tired of just being up in Philadelphia. So I literally woke up went to bed one day and woke up the next day and said, how would you like to move to Florida? And she was like, we already talked about this, like, five years. I'm like, no. No. Right? Like, right now. She goes, you're not serious.

20:41And I said, I'll show you how serious I am. So I literally went to Google, and I typed in the best realtor, you know, South Florida, found the first person listed there, called them up. I said, I I would like to move to Florida. If you can call me back as soon as possible, I would appreciate it. And the person called me back five minutes later. I told her what I was looking for. It had to be a new construction. She said, when can you come down? I'm like, I'll be down tomorrow. Oh my god. Then that's crazy. And we we looked at the property. We we didn't like it. And she found out that there was a house in another in the in the same community that was coming up for sale as a resale, but brand new.

21:14And we contacted the person. We made an offer. We bought it. And three months later, we were living in Florida. Unbelievable. And I was commuting back and forth for from October November 1, we basically moved in from November to the following year as the owner, and then I sold in October '21. And then for the following year plus, I was working as the associate, and then I was commuting till December 2022 when I Okay. When when I hang it up when I got So you commuted over a year back in the work? Two years back in the Oh my gosh. So Monday I would fly up Monday morning at 5AM. Yeah. I would land in Philadelphia around 08:39, and then I would drive to the office and stay at a hotel.

21:54I would fly back either Tuesday night or Wednesday morning depending on what the schedule allowed. Okay. And and then I would come home, and I would be on the road again because I would be somewhere usually at a trade show on Thursday or Friday. So I lived I lived a very nomadic life during those times. But it prepared you well for your life today. I mean, because every time every time I open up social media, you're flying somewhere. And, you know, and that look. I I love to travel. I I don't mind the airports and all the all the stuff at all. As long as you enjoy what you're doing and the people you're doing it with, I just I don't have any problem. Do you do you feel that way too?

22:28I I 100% agree with you. Yeah. 100% agree. Oh, good. Definitely do. So that's that's kind of the story, you know, of of kind of how I how things have happened, I guess you can say would be a good a good way to describe it. You know, in terms of your mindset though, like, when you went from managing one practice to all of a sudden kind of influencing 11,000, like, what what did that feel like? I mean, was there a made mindset shift, was it just natural? Very natural for me. You know, I remember, I've been doing it since 2000 and, you know, '13 to some extent. That's true. Yeah. When when I when I first when I first started, I was doing it all myself.

23:05I was doing the onboarding and the training and the support and everything else. And and then, obviously, when BirdEye acquired me, I really became just the head of the sales department in the dental side and the trade show side. But over the years, we've acquired a lot of clients, and I do I'm the only one at BroadEye that sells into the dental space one to nine locations. So once it gets over nine, it goes to an upmarket team. But I'm you know, it shows you the power of what happens when you sell a product that does what it says it does and does it well. And and that's why you know, that's what what continues to drive me every day. You know? You know, if so no.

23:39Go ahead. Sorry. I was gonna say when I have a day when I have three, four, five, six demos on a call or on Zoom, it's you know, and you get the like I said, dopamine hit when somebody says I wanna move forward. That's what that's what drives me, I guess, you can say. Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. And that boy, that leads right into my next question about a a quote from Peter Stoylov who said, without Len Tau, BirdEye wouldn't have a dental division. How do you how do you process a a statement like that? I mean, does it give you a sense of pride or pressure, gratitude? How how do you feel about that? Well, it's certainly appreciated. Peter worked for me at BirdEye, and he was one of my traveling trade show partners at at these various meetings.

24:16And so he knows the effect I had, and he knows the trust I I I basically brought to BirdEye. And so I it's greatly appreciated. I don't think I don't think BirdEye would be where it was without me, and I've been here a long time. I don't own the company. I am a full time employee. They pay my expenses. They I get commission for my sales. Mhmm. I've got stock in the company, which obviously is a good thing. Really? But but no. It's nice when look. It's nice that I get recognized wherever I go for anything I do. When someone hears my voice, because I have a unique voice, and they say, do you have a podcast I listen to? Which is happening in the line in in in various places every so often.

24:50So it's still it's it's nice to be recognized for anything. You know? When you when somebody says you did a good job or, you know, I won the the Peers Choice Award two years ago for my podcast. It's nice that someone recognize you for your contributions to the industry because even though I'm not a dentist anymore, I'm still very a part of the dental industry. Yeah. No. Absolutely. And, you know, Len, the way I look at it is, you know, when you're a dentist, you're seeing patients, you've got a practice or even a couple of practices. Yeah, you can do a lot of good. But when you're able to hang up the handpiece and have an impact on the whole industry, I think, you know, that's a real force multiplier, and you can impact a lot more lives that way.

25:27And and it doesn't really matter whether you're talking about clinical or business or, you know, reputation management. It's just like creating value in your lane, and you've done such a good job of that. And by the way, when you bring other great speakers together who get up and talk about the things that you don't necessarily wanna talk about, I mean, there's kinda something for everybody, which is what I really noticed at Supercharge this year. It was just a a great lineup and some some speakers I had never heard before. I enjoyed it a lot. Well, I appreciate that. You know, Supercharge is is an idea I have had for a very long time. Know, You one of the things I've done over the years is I've waited for the opportunity to do something.

26:02I didn't just jump in and do it. Yeah. So I met back in 2019, 2018 with Mark LeBlanc, and, you know, he said, Glenn, you you need to write a book. I've written two books. You need to have an event. And I I I I I do I wanted to wait till a certain point to launch the event, and that was actually timed with me getting out of practice so I can devote my time there. Yeah. And, you know, just like I do everything, I'm very methodical. I'm very I have I'm very strategic in the way I do things. We just had year three. Year one was in Derry Beach. Actually, on the beach, it was that when I first decided to come down to Florida, which is interesting.

26:33And then year two was in Scottsdale, which was in 2024. And then this year was in Fort Lauderdale, and we'll be at the same venue for two more years, at least probably forever because as you know, that that hotel was amazing. Honestly, I have to compliment you, Glenn. I know I think I even said on your podcast that I'm kind of a travel snob. I like things to be really nice. That was really nice. I was I I hadn't heard of it. I wasn't expecting that. And I walked in, was like, you know what? This is this is really sharp. And then you've got that bar at the top, you know, with the three sixty views. I mean, it's just a the whole place has a great vibe about it.

27:06I've told everybody who who I mentioned the event to that it is and I travel a lot, obviously. Yeah. It is, like, the nicest hotel I've ever been in. People are like, yeah. I'm right. I travel a lot. I'm sure not. And they all come to me afterwards and tell me how amazing how amazing the the the venue was, and that's that's great. I mean, I I I found a home. My wife and I went to that venue when it was still being built back April. We went for the first time Okay. In 2024 before even second year Supercharge took place. And I had a vision I saw their vision. I said, we we only looked at one venue down here, that's where we picked.

27:37And it was the right choice. And so that that's a big reason why I I think the event was successful. But in in you know, you had no idea where you were coming into with Supercharge. Just like even though I I let speakers know what what to expect I mean, Rich Maddow was a big time speaker. He gave me he goes and Steve Rasner too, who you know very well. They came to me. So when I've never imagined it to be such a big spectacle. You know, they expected, like, a study club type of atmosphere. This is a big event that I put on. You know, it has a very large budget, cost me a lot of money, and, you know, it it it let this year you were at, in particular, was absolutely phenomenal.

28:11The worst thing that happened was you ran 15 late. That was it. Seriously, that was the worst thing that happened the entire time. I think I complimented you on just the fact that everything did just run like a well oiled machine, and I was blown away that, like, you hardly have a team. Like, you're doing everything, which I know how hard it is for a small event, but for a bigger event like that, that's a that is a lot of effort. And you've gotta be really well organized and, like you are, high energy to actually pull that off. And you did it with flying colors, my friend. I appreciate that. And and my wife definitely has a say in things because I bounce most things off of her.

28:46And then I have a I have a team that handles logistics side of things with the hotel. Mhmm. And so I'm not on the hotel side for other things. But other than that, it's all me. The speakers, the sponsors, the the ticket sales, that's all me. And and when it comes off as flawless as it did, it really makes me feel good that everybody everybody had a great time. Yes. And even better, we had 52 vendors, which is a lot of vendors. And they were great vendors, by the way. I mean, every one of them was was just a a really high end, great vendor, just good people. I I loved I loved that whole atmosphere. Yeah. It was like I said, the the the event I don't know how I can top it next year, to be honest with you.

29:22Yeah. But 52 vendors, then we're in it's November 26 when we're recording this. And the 52, 40 have been confirmed coming back. And I've only heard from five of them that they're not coming back mostly due to budgetary reasons. Yeah. Yeah. Again, to to have that type of response from all those vendors, I just want as many people to show And and the the most difficult thing for me over the years is really to to gain much attendance even though it's such a great event. I want more people to show up. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. And I I have no doubt that it'll continue to grow from here. But I'm gonna switch switch tracks just a little bit and talk about reputation management versus reputation marketing.

30:03And you kinda draw a sharp line between the two, calling one a defensive cost center and the other a growth engine that makes competition irrelevant. Like, how do you how do you define those two? So reputation management was a very old term that I was really annoyed with because when you manage something, it's like getting the negative reviews off of page page one or worrying about the negative reviews. You're managing something versus you've got these amazing five star reviews. It's obviously gonna help bring in more new patients. I want you to shout from the top of the mountaintops that you're you you have a five star reputation and literally use that to get more new patients. So that's the biggest difference. One is really worrying about negative reviews.

30:41One is getting more five star reviews and using that power of your people to get patients to come into the practice. That's the difference between management and marketing. And if you're using a company or a company calls you up and they say, we have reputation management, I would just hang up the phone and leave them or leave or leave them because they're not with the day this day and age. This day and age, you simply wanna market your great reputation, and that will have a huge effect on bringing new patients into your practice. Absolutely. And another line that you like to use is when patients become your marketers, competition becomes irrelevant. And that's a really powerful idea, and it's so I mean, honestly, it's pretty brilliant.

31:19Do you remember the first moment that idea actually clicked for you? Like, when did that light bulb go on? Well, in particular to that, there is a a moment that Google defined back in 2011. Okay? K. And that moment is called the Zemot, z m o t. I never heard that. And feel free to look it up because back then in 2011, it was a big time story. And I used to teach it at at seminars, and people were like, I've never heard of this, and it really made people think about things. But that ZMOT is called the zero moment of truth. Okay. And that zero moment of truth is when a patient decides it's at that moment when a patient decides to inquire or research about a particular procedure.

32:01So I I wanna get my teeth fixed. I'm gonna go look up veneers. And they start looking up veneers. When they actually make that decision, it's called the zero moment of truth. And you have to be in order to be the selected practice, you have to be that in in the right place at the right time there, and a lot of those driven by reviews. So I realized that when you if you get reviews, now it's more about visibility as well. You need both of those now, but back then it was simply the reviews. When you had those reviews, it helped drive new patients to the practice, and that's really how you made your money. So that is why this has always been at the forefront of what I talk about because when you can separate yourself from the, you know, the lower end practices or the practices down the street that are don't practice high quality dentistry, you eliminate all the competition, especially Absolutely.

32:48A food service practice. Oh my god. That's where that came from. Yes. And, you know, that's what I talk to doctors about a lot. It's like, you know, if you set up the culture and you create the value and you have that great Team that makes everybody feel like they're going home. I mean, it it doesn't come down to cost anymore. It comes down to that relationship. And when you're a relationship based practice, you you really do kinda transcend competition. And and I remember I never felt like I was competing with my my main practice, Len, was in a town of 11,000 people, and there were 14 dentists. And we always had more patients than we could handle. And then my my second practice was in a town of 35,000, and there are about 40 dentists.

33:27And you know what? We just we just did things our way. We we had our put our heads down, did our things our own way. We didn't worry about anybody else, and and we did feel that way. Competition was irrelevant. There are plenty of patients for everyone. We do our things, and people will stay and and be loyal. A 100% agree with you. 100% agree with that. So when you have that understanding about what it developed, what it does for you, and you Yeah. See the effect very early on in your career, it can have massive effect on your the future of your career If you're behind so many patients who are out of network, they'll stay with you too. They'll pay probably double out of pocket because they know they're in the right place.

34:04Right? Yeah. One of the things I I recognize too, and it's been proven by surveys done by American Express. If you treat a patient right and you do good dentistry and you provide a really good service, they will stay. They will spend money. They will they will buy something from you, and then they will tell their friends and family. So that has a lot to do with it, but it has to it all revolves around this patient experience, which is something I talk about as well. Because if you don't provide a great patient experience and wow the patient, none of the rest of them happen. Absolutely true. You know, I wanna talk about marketing for just a second. You know, what what's I mean, there's a lot of, like, fluffy marketing talk out there.

34:39What's what's one piece of, like, fluffy outdated marketing advice Dennis still follow that just drives you crazy? So it's interesting. You know, it's this this marketing moves so quickly nowadays. Yeah. True. You know, websites are important even though people are saying they're not. I think there's gonna be some change in how Google AdWords are thought of, especially with the advent of of of AI and search. Yeah. I think if you are ignoring artificial intelligence right now, you're you're ignoring these large language models. Yes. I think that's that's super important to to get on that bandwagon because I guarantee you in two, three, four years, nobody's gonna be using Google really anymore to search. They're gonna simply go on to ChatGPT and say, I'm buying a toilet.

35:22Tell me what the best toilet is. And team, they can tell I'm going to a dentist. Give me a list of the top dentists in my area and the reason why I should choose one or the other. And Yep. That they're taking data that's driven or or given to these engines by patients, by you, etcetera, and you have to be at the forefront there. So, you know, nothing is dead when it comes to marketing. I'm not a fan of traditional marketing, of course. But Yeah. You know, SEO is super important still. So be very careful what road you go down in, but you can't ignore you cannot ignore AI. But also AI is, right now, not the end all be all as well. Right. I mean, you really have to appeal to both.

35:58And I I have to admit that when I write any kind of content, I make sure that it's it's not only SEO optimized, but it's also GEO optimized. I mean, it's so important. But, you know, let's talk about review velocity. You know, what what actually really matters to Google today? Since we're still we're still in that that crossover point between SEO and and word GEO, AEO. But in terms of Google, is it star rating, recency, quality, frequency? And how often should practices be getting reviews? So the reason this comes up in conversation now is because there's been always a discrepancy in the industry, and that discrepancy is is that I have a lot of reviews I'm not ranking. Or I have a lot of reviews and my competition is ranking above me.

36:41So it's not only about the reviews now. There's other things that go into that that go into the the process of of gaining visibility. You need both visibility and credibility Yeah. In order to really get the patients to see you and come in. Mhmm. So there are practices that out there that have a lot of reviews, but if they're not visible, that's a problem. Okay? Yeah. So you need both of these things. And when Google looks at practices to determine whether they should rank them or not than not, obviously, the number of reviews is is a very important factor, which honestly, right now, 200 to 250 is really the average, and that's where the minimum that you really wanna have, which, again, if you're a new practice, it's harder.

37:15But you if you have 75 and you've been in business twenty years, it's just not enough. Okay? But regardless of that, even more important according to these Google ranking local ranking guides is the velocity reviews. And the velocity reviews, how often you're getting them. Yeah. And a practices that gets one or two every week versus the one that gets one a month. The one that gets one or two week generally ranks above the one that gets one a month. Interesting. Ideally, in an ideal world, I would love a practice to get, you know, two or three every week. If that's not possible, at least one to two every single week, which I think is very doable. Because if you think about it, if you get one to two every week, you're getting, you know, four to eight maybe.

37:52To get eight a week, you're getting almost almost a 100 a year. And that's that's really good velocity. I mean, that's for a single doctor practice. I mean, I practice with with five doctors who are getting, you know, 30 or 40 in a week. That's great too. Okay? Right. But you have to you can't rest on your laurels and think I have enough reviews because you don't. And if you are getting them and then you drop and you start getting none, you will drop in the rankings. There's I can guarantee you that. And that's why that's why the velocity is a very big ranking factor. But even more importantly from a ranking factor, which you didn't ask about this, but I'm gonna tell you Yeah.

38:23And it just came out in in white spark's 2026 Google local ranking guide, which came out, I think, November 6. And you can just Google WhiteSpark Google local ranking, and it'll list the the ranking factors. The number one ranking factor is, believe it or not, the primary category of the business. Now how does now how does someone determine the the primary category? And Google's so limited with regard to categories. Correct. It comes to dentistry, especially. It's just awful. Correct. So how does someone determine the primary the category? If they look at their Google business listing or they type in their if they type in just Dennis near me and they come up, it will say something in a town or something in a county. So, obviously, if you're a if you're a dentist, you wanted to say dentist.

39:04Yeah. Okay? Not a dental clinic. Okay? You wanted to say dentist. If you are 95% cosmetic dentist, it's okay to say cosmetic dentist. If you do general dentistry and like doing cosmetic dentistry, you still want your primary category to be dentist. So dentist is a is a is an important ranking factor. I just spoke to a periodontist in in Louisiana, New Orleans area, and their primary category was medical clinic. And they're a periodontist. So that when people are taking periodontist and they're not showing up. Okay? Yeah. Yeah. My wife my wife, a year and a half ago, had was looking to have some plastic surgery done, and we got some referrals. We also were looking online and reviews. And the one person we went into his practice and we chose it was not a a Google search.

39:46It was a referral to his practice. I started speaking at his event. He does a plastic surgery event. I was showing him talking about this at his events, and he looked himself up. And he was listed as a nurse practitioner. He wasn't listed as a plastic surgeon. My god. Say, who set that up? Right. So the primary category is very important, but you also this I think it's number eight on the list. Secondary categories, and you can have up to nine of them. They are also very important ranking factors as well. Okay? So you have to this is putting your Google Home in the right order. This is the baseline. This is the foundation for everything you're gonna be doing. If you do not set your Google Home up for success, you'll never be successful online and be found locally.

40:22Oh, man. You know, I like, I don't necessarily wanna be found locally, but I remember when I was picking my category, it was it was challenging, you know, because I'm doing I don't think consultant is one. Yeah. There's no No. It's not. Yeah. I honestly, I think I ended up picking dental school. I think that's what what AI recommended. It was, like, the closest and best thing. And, you know, I don't know whether that's been effective or not, but I know how important that is. So Yeah. Primary category is secondary category is always seems to be a struggle as well. Just to make it clear to those listening and reviewing, secondary categories, if you do cosmetic dentistry, cosmetic dentistry is a really good secondary category.

41:00If you place or restore implants, dental implant provider. If you take teeth out, can do oral surgeon. It's not saying you're an oral surgeon, it's you do oral surgery. Right. If you want to do aligners, you need to have orthodontics as a category. So you need to understand depending on what you wanna promote or depending on what you wanna potentially rank for, you have to add these secondary categories. And it's not it's very common to see only one or two or non secondary categories. So it's a very important step you take. Well, that's that's really valuable, I think, for the listeners. I mean, I think it's everybody needs to go in and actually look at that tonight or tomorrow, figure it out. And if you're not in the right category, change it immediately because it makes such a big impact.

41:39You know, and another thing that that could make a big impact, you know, are negative reviews, except when you're Lentau. And you say negative reviews are the 1%. And that kinda goes back to the whole idea of, hey. Just flood it with, you know, as many positive reviews as possible, and then you don't have to worry so much. But so what's your protocol for handling a one star review without losing your cool, your dignity dignity, or your algorithmic standing? Because I gotta admit, like, the few times I got, like, a poor review, I I internally, I would lose my mind. Because every time, it was just like, this person wasn't even a patient, or they they came in or they they missed their appointment. And, you know, there's always some kind of weird misunderstanding.

42:26But what's what's your best advice to a doctor who gets a one star review? So first of all, if you've never gotten a one star review, you're not a you're not a real dentist. Okay? So you just like if you you haven't done a Fender, if you haven't broken a file Yes. You haven't you haven't been a dentist long enough if you haven't got a bad review. It's just gonna make you you're say you're a cosmetic dentist, but you've never had a veneer break, you're not a you're not not a dentist. You're just a liar. Correct. Correct. So if every dentist is going to have a bad review at some point. Yeah. And like you said, the best defense is simply to generate more positives.

42:57That is the best defense against a bad review. Now for every bad review, 15 positives needs to overwhelm the the one review to kinda bury it. So keep that in mind. Yes. But you should have bad reviews for your practice. It's good for business to have bad reviews. Being a five star rated business is not good from being from a patient's perspective. They wanna see that there's some negativity that potentially is there. Yeah. It could be anything, but to be only five star rated, there's something that seems very fishy there. So You know what? Good point. Yep. Yep. And I I ended my career with 91 negative reviews. And if you think about it in in twenty three years or let's say 16 to one positive.

43:36Yeah. Let's say let's say it's fifteen years as when I was the as the owner of the practice. Fifteen years, 91 reviews, that's about six reviews a year that are negative. But compared to the thousands of positive reviews I had, there are so many patients who came into my practice because of what I looked like online even though I had negatives. Okay? That's that's wild. And you know what? It does give you that credibility. I do look at reviews for any business, and I'm not as sophisticated as you are about it. But I do look at all of that, and I can tell when they're fake reviews. There's they just stacked up a bunch of BS. You know? And and I've seen even, like, physicians have that.

44:10It's clear they hired somebody who just put in a bunch of reviews all on the same day. And then there's not a single review for, like, six weeks, and then there's a review. And and it's just it's to me, it's so transparent and so obvious. So I I think that's brilliant. I never thought about that. The fact that a few negatives give credibility to all the positives. 100% so. That's exactly how it's been ever since I first started getting it. And a lot of my lot of the way I evolved in the reputation space is because I've spoken to patients about it. So I went right to the I did the market research with those who were mostly affected by it, are those patients who had, you know, came in or did not come in for a specific reason.

44:49I asked them, you know, why don't you write reviews? What what about negative reviews? Why do you go to Google to write a negative review? And the answer was because the pay practice has never given me a way to leave feedback to them. That's why in BirdEye, we have green and red buttons where green goes to Google and red goes back to the practice. So this is a feedback form that we developed simply because patients will who want they wanna leave you feedback, but you have to give them the ability to do that. And if you don't do it, they go to Google. That's the only place they know to leave you negative feedback. Brilliant. I love that. That that that kind of I mean, oh my gosh.

45:22You're much less likely to get a negative review if they can just give you that direct feedback. I mean, they may complain that they can't complain to somebody. So 100%. Right. Exact right. Now going back to what we were talking about originally, again, the best defense is more is more positives. I would urge you to take a deep breath before you respond. Oh, good. You respond in a way that's problematic, it can have ripple effects that'll last a long, long time. Yes. I I am not a fan of responding online. Mhmm. I will make that very clear. Okay? I do not want in most cases, I do not want you to reply online. I'd rather you try to take it offline, figure out who it is, potentially call them, reach out, correct the problem.

46:04That's always gonna be the best way to do it. If if you correct the problem, there's a pretty good chance that you're they'll take the review down. Yeah. Okay? So I always want you to try and reach out to them to do this. If you then can't reach out or you can't get them on the phone, a very generic response is fine. But I'm overall not a fan of responding to the negatives in most cases because I think it can get you into into problems. Absolutely. I mean, one of my favorite things on the raving patients Facebook page is, you know, when you post a negative review and everybody kinda pitches in, and they say what they really wanna say. You know? And then somebody will say the voice of reason, and, well, have you thought about this?

46:42Or you'll step in and and moderate. But but, yeah, you know, the knee jerk is always like, who the hell do you think you are? What what are you even talking about? Blah blah blah. So no. I think that's great advice. It's kind of like when you're upset with somebody, it's like, write the letter and put it in your drawer. You know? It can be cathartic just to write it, put it in your drawer, and in a couple of days I think Abraham Lincoln did that. In a couple of days, it will have worn off, and you just throw out the garbage. So 100100% agree with you. That's exactly correct. So, you know, I wanna talk about Yelp for a second. I mean, most dentists just don't really even like Yelp or wanna deal with it, but you kinda you lean into it.

47:19You you help dentists get better at it. Why is that? And how does that impact dentistry? Yeah. Well, you know, Yelp is a a never changing beast. Yelp has lost its its flavor in a lot of places. If you're in California, they think it's important. I don't think it's important. And I even though I give a class called help on Yelp, it the the end result is you don't have to worry about Yelp. You wanna worry about Google, and you need to dominate Google. So I've learned how to deal with Yelp because it's such a game you have to play with them. But I wanna make it very clear. I'm not a fan of Yelp. I never use it in my practice. I don't want you to pay for services because they will ultimately try to get you to pay for their services.

47:56But they're also not running an extortion campaign where if you don't pay them where if you don't pay them, they post your negative reviews only. It's there is a true filter there. So there's a lot of things that people misunderstand with Yelp, but I am not in favor of Yelp just so you know. Okay. Alright. Well, that makes sense. Just to make it very clear. Thank you. So, you know, with all the practices you oversee at BirdEye, what's the single biggest behavior or pattern that you see in practices that really dominate their markets? Interesting question. Well, it's it's obviously for those who dominate, it's going to be getting their their name, address, and phone number consistent, which is a big a big thing nowadays is having that consistent presence online.

48:34But it's also obviously having a decent velocity of reviews or a decent number of reviews. And there's an area in the country, I don't wanna too specific, but I had four practices in the area that were using BirdEye, which is kind of rare. But, anyway, one of them decided to drop BirdEye, and I told them, I said, look. For me, if you leave, it doesn't do anything to me at all. It has no effect on me in any way, shape, or form. Mhmm. But I said you have to be very careful because if you leave, you need to maintain that same velocity reviews they were getting before. If not, you're gonna drop in rankings. He goes, okay. I appreciate that. But he never he didn't take my advice.

49:04And he left bird eye, but he never never kept the same velocity. And what do you think happened to his rankings? His ranking take. And he reached out a couple of days ago to me to try to come back. But the point is is that if you understand how these algorithms work and you have this dramatic change, you lose your ranking. So Mhmm. I I think the the thing that stands out amongst the officers who use BirdEye is they get a consistent flow of reviews at a very nice velocity, velocity. They should have corrected their categories if they've spoken to me about it. And then we we add that extra flare, which is making sure their data is consistent online. And then what's happening is they they really are visible online.

49:38And when you're visible and you have credibility, you bring in more new patients to the practice. So I think that's a a common denominator between between a lot of these practices. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. You know, we touched on just briefly a few minutes ago generative engine optimization, GEO, and we're kinda bridging from SEO to GEO. And I know I had a conversation with a with a web designer earlier this year about that. And I said, hey. You know, I quit using Google basically in January. And I think at the time, only 3% of Americans were really using ChatGPT as, like, their search engine or whatever. But I I was convinced that 20% of people by the end of this year would really be, like, moving over to more AI based searches.

50:19But when you look at that and think about ChatGPT or perplexity, and and they're deciding which dentist to recommend, what's gonna matter most in this new world with regard to getting them on your side or searching well for them? Yeah. I I think reviews play a huge role in that. In fact, I do some test search down here where I live in Parkland, Florida, I go, who is the best dentist in Parkland? It just happens to be a bird eye client. So reviews are definitely playing a role in there. Your website content definitely plays a role in there. The areas that, you know, Reddit, believe it or not, Reddit has a big influence on these AI engines. So you gotta put you gotta put yourself in positions where these AI engines are are looking at what you're the content you're putting out, your patients are putting out, and that's that's part of the things you have to pay attention to.

51:02And that's why I said if you're ignoring AI, you're gonna be left in the dust because that's the way people are gonna be searching. And and then I don't think anybody I you may have 10% doing it now, but in the next two or three years, I think you're gonna have close to 50%. I still remember when I used to give seminars, and I used to talk say, you know, if you ask Siri who the best dentist is, it uses Yelp reviews. Okay? Now I never I know that. I never spoke to Siri. Okay? I never I typed emails out and typed text message. Now I voice text to voice email literally all day long when I'm doing stuff so I don't have to type.

51:33So I think that there there's going to be a shift in the way we do business, and this is one of them in that case. Well, I I totally agree. And, you know, I've really gotten into I mean, back in 2004 when I built my first website, I got really into SEO. And there were people talking about content is king. So then, like, I included so many internal links and external links, and I was putting in so many keywords and all that kind of stuff. I mean, I I just I dominated. I kinda dominated the Midwest on, like, six or seven key terms and even in Chicago. Got a couple things on page one. So I'm a firm believer, but, like, the tide has turned.

52:10And, you know, GEO, AEO are so important also. I I've really been leaning into that heavily, and I'm excited to to see that process. And the people who are early adopters who get out there in front of the curve listening to people like you talk about GEO, I I think that they're gonna be in a really advantageous position. Again, I agree a 100% with with what you're saying. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, dentistry has always got trends, and sometimes they're overhyped, sometimes they're underestimated. What's, like, the over the most overhyped trend in dentistry right now? And is there anyone that's just totally underestimated at this point? The overhyped trend in in dentistry right now? That's a tricky one. There's so many various ways to to take that question into consideration.

52:55I'm not really sure what's overhyped. I mean, you know, I hear a lot about printed veneers, and I I know it's a clinical side of things. You know, printed veneers are definitely not the long term solution for people, and I was just in a course at I was at a meeting that David Holbrook gave, and I was speaker there. And David was David was I don't wanna say admonishing, though, but they were really a a temporary solution. Like I said, I haven't had my hands clinically in someone's mouth for three years, so I'm certainly not an expert in that. Right. But in in the marketing space you it's funny. I talk about how important AI is, but I also think that AI is overhyped still.

53:25K? Yeah. I really do. It's not the end all be all. It it's it's not And it makes mistakes. It's It does. In so many ways, it's really dumb. And if you don't have a a human at the helm, like, managing it and making sure that it's it's on track, you're not gonna end up with what you think you're gonna end up with. Yeah. I again, once again, I I agree with everything you're saying there. So, yes, it does make mistakes. Yeah. I use I use the AI AI stuff all day long every day. I'm always on these AI agents helping me do what I do. I do check it for mistakes. But like I said, AI is the next best thing, but I think it's also overhyped.

53:59Yeah. You know, I think Google Ads are somewhat overhyped. I think reviews are still underhyped, believe it or not. Yeah. But, I mean, that's really where I and I I think SEO I think people underestimate SEO. I think you still need to have do SEO. And there's so many people who are who don't understand it. There's no way to track it, but that's something that you need to pay attention to as well. It's part of the omnichannel marketing approach that you wanna Yeah. For sure. You know, and just talking about AI platforms, you know, I mean, ChatGPT was, of course, the first one that people are really familiar with and most people use, whatever. But I've really enjoyed Claude, Perplexity, and Gemini as well. And I found that they all have different strengths and different weaknesses.

54:35You know, I use them in different ways. Do you do you have a favorite between all of those, or do you have another one that you like? I love Chatuche beats tea. I mean, it's where I spend most of my time. I know, you once you prompt it right and you teach it right, it it really is your voice. And when I throw something in there, it it it knows what to do with it. And so I've I've really stuck with I've tried some of the other products that are out there. Yeah. I'm still I'm still a Chatchy PT fan. Yeah. I've been using it from the beginning. So that's that's really where my loyalty is. And when you you look when you when you go when you went to dental school and you used a product that worked really well, you didn't change it when you went when you got out of dental school.

55:09Yeah. Absolutely. I still use the same bonding agent when I was practicing. It's same thing when you start with something and you're successful with it, you keep using it. You're not gonna switch necessarily. Absolutely. You know, and I'll say this. I use all four of them, Len, but ChatGPT is always a quarterback because it's it does the most things well. Whereas, you know, Clive, I think, is really good for emotional resonance. Perplexity is really good at deep research and validating, you know, sources and things like that. And Gemini is great for for trends and and a few other things. But but, yeah, it's it's a it's a great tool, but you can't turn everything over to it, like you said. You gotta be there monitoring it as the the moderator of of the conversation.

55:51100% agree with you as well. So I just have a few more questions, Len, but one of them is around, like, photography. I know you really enjoy that, but you also enjoy speaking and hosting and being an entrepreneur, all those kinds of things. I mean, of all of those roles, like, which one feels the most natural and or is there one that, like, surprises you the most? So, you know, I I photography has taken a backseat. I enjoyed photography. I I enjoyed it more when I was in any gadget I liked when I was in practice. You know? I love technology. I don't do as much photography. I literally have an iPhone that I do most of my photography with just because it's easy. And it's so good.

56:28I mean, the the quality is so good these days. Yeah. So I'm I'm that's a tough tough thing to answer there. Mhmm. So, I mean, I'll tell you what. Did do get a chance to get out and just, like, take pictures like you used to? No. Not like you used to. You know, know, things come and go. You know, my wife and I were empty nesters. We now we my son, who is back from college right now, he was obviously a big part of our lives, and we became empty nesters. So we my wife and I adopted a puppy. Or when I adopted, we we we bought a Bernadoodle puppy. And Nice. The Bernadoodle puppy has been been taking up a tremendous amount of our our time, believe it or not.

57:02We we had a puppy when my son was, like, three years old, and I mean, it was a a Shih Tzu. And I I don't remember things being as hectic as it was when we had a three year old and a dog, and now we just have a dog, and things are very hectic. So a lot of a lot of the things that I I I enjoy, I I don't have time to do right now because I'm I'm busy taking care of the puppy with my wife. So Yeah. You know, it's funny. My we're empty nesters now for the first time, and all four of our kids are home now for the for Thanksgiving. And my daughter brought her puppy home. And she's looks like a puppy because she's a toy poodle, but she's, like, two years old.

57:38But tell you what, you're you're not lying. I mean, it's it's a lot of work. We have our two dogs, but having this one is like having 10 dogs, I swear to god, and she only weighs about three pounds. That's great. That's great. Yeah. So, hey, Len. If you were to give the 2005 version of Len Tau advice, you know, fresh out of residency, about to buy a practice, what bit of advice would you give that that new dentist that would have saved you years of stress, accelerated your success, or helped you, you know, avoid problems or challenges? Take as much c as possible. Mhmm. Listen to those you trust. Yeah. Okay? One of the things I do talk about is the 98% decision factor.

58:21That's one of the things I learned in in very early in my career. I was taking a class by Roger Levin, and he talks about this 98% of decision factor, which means that 98% of the decisions you make in life should can be made in literally two minutes. They will have they will have zero effect on your long term life. Whereas 2% of the decisions you make are would would would would be ones that have some ramifications that could have a a long ramification, such as do I buy a practice? Do I sell a practice? Do I move? You know, do I hire an associate? These types of things. Most of those decisions you make in life can be done in literally seconds and will have this zero residual effect on you long term with those decisions.

59:01And that's how I live my life. I'm very impulsive. I make decisions on a whim. It's just like when I moved to Florida, that was a big decision, but it took me more than two minutes to make. But I made a decision, just went with it. So I think that's a very big thing that I learned very early in my career that I I talk about during a lot of my seminars is is that 98% decision factor because a lot of people, they get stuck in their own analysis paralysis type of stuff, and then get nothing gets done. So and if you want a different result, you have to consider different behaviors. If you do the same thing over and over again, not everything's gonna be the same.

59:31Yeah. The definition of insanity. Right? Yep. Well, hey, Lynn. I wanna close out with a little rapid fire. Again, I'm just turning the tables. You surprised me with that six months ago. And so just give me the first thing that pops into your head for these. So Sure. Coffee order. Simple or complicated? Simple. One review you'll never forget, either good or bad. One review and I'll never forget. Bad. Bad. I mean, this patient ripped me apart. Thank god it was on Facebook, so it wasn't very visible. But I show it I mean, when I give my seminar, I'm real I'm real, and I showed it. And it's like scammer, unaffordable, unethical. The and I think she ended it with the Hippocratic oath means nothing to this man.

60:12I mean, you avoid him at all costs. It was a bad review. And I'll that's one that sticks with me, you know, all the time. So Oh, god. Yeah. Okay. Okay. One piece of tech you rely on daily, ChatGPT. Okay. Yep. Yankees or rangers, if you could only keep one. Yankees. K. If you weren't in dentistry or tech, what job would you pick? And would it be it could be ridiculous or realistic. If I wasn't in tech or dentistry, what would I be in? Probably entrepreneur some type of entrepreneurship. Probably well, I I actually have another business. I own a I I co own a sports card business. So maybe Oh, you do? I didn't know it was a business. Oh, that's cool. I own I own a sports card store in South Florida.

60:58I gotta go I I've got thousands thousands in my parents' basement that I've been meaning to get out someday and actually look through. They're probably not in good enough condition, but I probably have some some gems in there. Yeah. So that's I would say probably something related to that. Okay. So your go to comfort food after a long day? Macaroni and cheese. Oh, man. I'm right there with you, buddy. Right there with you. Excellent. So as a photographer, what do you enjoy photographing most? My my son or my family. My dog now. I take pictures all day long of my dog. I mean Alright. One thing you always overpack for your speaking trips. Or you could probably carry on every time, don't you? You don't overpack Yeah.

61:37I don't overpack every time. I am so I literally if I ever have to go on a long trip, I regret it because Yeah. I dread it, I should say, because I had to put something under the plane. I never Right. Put something under the plane. So I don't really overpack anything. I I take the bare minimum with me because I don't wanna have to worry about I flew to, like, Iceland for five days with just a carry on. I mean Yeah. That's impressive, man. Like, I need to take lessons because I've always overpacked, personally. Definitely don't overpack. So So okay. Most overrated social media platform for Dennis today? TikTok. I don't get I don't get it. I just joined two months ago, and, honestly, I get more engagement on TikTok than any other any other platform.

62:17It's not like bringing in business necessarily, but it's Yeah. It's interesting to watch. I never I never understand. Never I still don't understand TikTok. So I haven't done any dancing or singing on it either. So I have one dance on there. If you look me up, just type in doctor Len Tao. Seriously. Those listening type in doctor Len Tao into TikTok. There's one video I I did many, many years ago, and it's on there and people comment on it. So I think you might have shared it from the stage at a supercharge, actually. Yeah. It's me dancing on you. Yes. Yes. Yep. Yep. So what matters more now? Clinical skill or digital trust? Well, I think clinical skill is really important. You can I mean, if you don't have good clinical skills, you it affects really everything?

62:53But if you don't have the trust of, you know, whether it's Google or the patient, it's not gonna affect you either or it's not gonna help you either. I think it's a combination of both of those things. Agreed. What's harder on a dentist? A no show or a one star review? Probably a one star review. Yep. I'd agree. Because a one star review literally can have a lasting effect of a problematic for for doctors. You know, a no show sucks, and it may cause you to be stressed for that, you know, hour is there. They're definitely one star review. Well, and that's why people need to sign up with BirdEye. You know? Get get get more five star reviews, and it just floods it right out.

63:26So Exactly right. A dental trend that's over hyped, already asked you that. So I'm not gonna ask you that again. The biggest lie dentists tell themselves about growth. Like, what do what do dentists always think? This is gonna be the silver bullet. This is gonna be the thing that takes me to the next level, but it's not going to. Hiring a consultant isn't always gonna help you grow the practice. You have to and you have to be willing and able to accept change or being malleable to do something different in very few practices or or doctors can do that. Oh, man. I I agree a 100% with that. One metric that instantly tells you if a practice is healthy. Everybody's worried about their front door, how many patients they attract and get new patients, but very few people know how many people leave the practice and activate themselves.

64:06And you can be getting 50 new patients a month, but you've got 75 leaving the back door and your practice is going downhill, not uphill. Yeah. And, boy, a lot of times, dentists don't even don't even look at that. So well, that's great, Len. I tell you what. I really enjoyed the conversation. You're just a a great guy and a a plethora of great information and experience. So appreciate you being so kinda transparent and just I mean, really dropping a lot of pearls that I think Dennis can can go out there and and run with next week. Well, I appreciate you having me on, and I'm happy to engage or or, you know, talk to everyone so I can drop my content information. I know you I don't I know you're gonna ask, but I appreciate having me on.

64:44So Yeah. No. Absolutely. So how how can people reach you if they wanna learn more? So very easily gotten a hold of. I am on every social channel, so it's doctor Len Tao. My email address is len@doctorlentau.com. My cell phone number, because it's all over the Internet, is is (215) 292-2100. You can go to my supercharge website, superchargeyourdentalpractice.com. You can go to my raving patients podcast. You can go to my Facebook group called raving patients. There is if you need to get ahold of me, you will find a way. It's very easy to do. You are definitely the most accessible guy in dentistry, and I and I love that. What about your next event? Tell us about the next the next thing you have coming up on the calendar.

65:25I mean, I'll be selfish here, Maya. I mean, I I have a lot of travel coming up in 2026, a lot of smaller events, so I'm really avoiding the big events. They're not just not the same thing anymore. But my event is super Supercharger Dental Practice. It's 2026. It's at Pier 66. Mhmm. On September. Okay. So twenty fifth to twenty seventh, 2026 at Pier 66. Fourteen, fifteen amazing speakers. We extended it to a third day this year because the one thing that people were a little bit disappointed in is they had this great resort that they really couldn't experience. So it's a full day Friday. It's like a shorter day on Saturday and then a a really shorter day on Sunday, but it's spread over three days versus two very long days.

66:08I think people will really enjoy the experience then. Well, awesome. I I can highly recommend it because I really enjoyed Bermuda. I really enjoyed Supercharge this fall, and I think that everybody I talked to did as well. So that's awesome. So last last thing, was there anything I didn't ask you that you'd you'd like to leave the listeners with? No. I mean, look. If you have interest in BirdEye, you can reach out to BirdEye. You'll get me anyway, or you can reach out to me directly and say you have interest to learn more about BirdEye. It's the same thing either here or there. But, honestly, I I have to be honest with That that was the most thorough interview I've ever gotten. I mean, that was that was a lot of lot of questions.

66:42We went through a lot of different things. So that was really well done. You're you're for somebody who hasn't had a podcast in a you know, for a long time or phone or only had a podcast for a very short time, you you did a very good job interviewing me. So that's that's well done on your end. Thank you. I I really appreciate that. I, you know, I did some research and it just I I love I love researching guests because you learn so much. And there's just a a lot of depth and a lot of things, and I wanted to to really honor that. So so thanks so much again for taking the time. I really appreciate it, buddy. Thank you for having me.

67:14I really appreciate it as well. Alright. Well, thank you so much for watching our podcast today, and we'll drop all of Len's contact information in the in the show notes, and he is very accessible. Feel free to reach out. And if you enjoyed this podcast, please like, comment, and subscribe. Have a great day, everybody. Thanks very much, Jim, for having me.