E443 | The Importance Of Playing The Long Game

 

A question I get quite a bit is, "how do I develop relationships with other business owners or people that can end up being a referral and/or strategic partners?" My answer to this is always to be extremely patient and do it as slow as possible. I talk about why I think you should follow this method. Enjoy!

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Podcast Transcript

Danny: So there's all kinds of hidden fees within your business that are just part of doing business. One of those is credit. Processing and for us, we didn't even realize how much we were paying in credit card processing with the first management software we were using for our practice. And when we switched over to PT everywhere, we just realized we were saving literally hundreds of dollars a month with credit card processing with their partner with Card point versus who we were using with our prior.

Software. This has made a massive difference. It's more than paid for itself. It allows us to decrease our overhead. It allows us to have more cash flow to reinvest in our people, in our technology, in our facility, in marketing and everything that's gonna drive the business. So don't get abused by credit card processing companies.

Make sure you're paying what you should pay. And if you're looking for a management software, highly recommend PT everywhere directly integrates. Processor makes it very easy and their rates are super, super competitive. So it's saved us a ton of money and it probably will do the same for you if you don't know what you are getting charged.

So head over to PT everywhere. Take a look at what they've got. I think you really like it. So here's the question. How do physical therapists like us who don't wanna see 30 patients a day, who don't wanna work home health and have real student loans create a career and life for ourselves that we've always dreamed about?

This is the question, and this podcast is the answer. My name's Danny Mate, and welcome to the PT Entrepreneur Podcast.

What's going on guys? Doc Danny here with the PT Entrepreneur podcast, and today if I'm breathing a little heavy, it's cuz I literally just got done working out and I got hit with this thing I had to talk to you guys about because I don't know, for me, movement this helps me solidify thoughts in a lot of ways.

But I wanted to do this one before I get into the rest of my day and mainly before my kids wake up because, I'll forget what the hell I was gonna tell you and when that happened. So while I was working out I was thinking about something that just happened to us and something that's super exciting.

And I'm really, proud to to be able to bring these people into the mix a little bit more. And it's that we officially are going to have Kelly Stir and Juliet Tourette as. More involved members in our mastermind, in our pt biz as on our board of advisors. And there'll be a local presence at our in-person events.

And they're gonna be business advisors for us and the things we're doing and as well as helping us get connected with the people that they know, which expands our network dramatically. This is something that And for me, I, you know I wanted them involved in what we were doing from the get-go.

These are people I have a lot of respect for people I have, a long standing relationship with. And I was thinking about this in relation to a question that I got yesterday and frankly, question that I get all the time. With newer businesses, and the question is, how do I develop relationships with other business owners or people that can be key, relationships, referral partners, strategic partners, things like that within business.

And my answer always is as slowly as you can possibly do it. Because it really, it's so counterintuitive. It's so hard to. Be patient with the development of relationships with people that you want to, work with. If you meet somebody locally that's man, this person clicks with me.

They're talking the same language. They seem really genuine. The worst thing to do is try to rush into, Hey, let's, maybe we can collaborate on this, or whatever. It's dude, just be patient with that slow play it, provide value to them. Show them that you're legit. And especially if they're more established than you are.

Give it some time before you go and try to hurry up. Teach a workshop at their facility or hurry up and try to, align with them in some way, in some sort of partnership or co-branded thing, or teach something together or whatever it might be. And, I'd bring this up because I think it's a very difficult thing to do and I just wanted to give you a real life example of something that 100% from the get-go in 2017.

I wanted to get the Tourettes involved in what we were doing, but. I didn't have much validity, much proof of concept for what I was trying to do with PT Biz, and I could have asked them, I could have brought it up and frankly, they might have said yes because we'd already known each other for years and, I'd worked for them as an instructor.

It just wasn't something that I thought was right. So I waited four years and to the point where we had over a hundred businesses in our mastermind and over total 200 businesses we're working with actively before I even brought it up. After having gotten them. To live events that, that we had as guest presenters.

Pay them for their time, show them in our community and what we're about and how much it aligns with what they're doing. And these are friends of mine, mind you, right? So I definitely could have asked them just Hey, w will you present for free? And they probably would've felt obligated to say yes.

And, but I would never do that. Ever, because these are busy people. Valuing other people's time is just so important. Please don't make the mistake of, trying to get, somebody to do something for you because you're friends with them. Make sure you know the value of their time.

Pay them for that. If it's something of significance, like traveling to an event, Get, pay them what they're worth. Like it's worth it to, to maintain a healthy relationship with people that are entrepreneurs so that their time is the most valuable asset that they have. And if you are like wanting to get in with a local practitioner or a coach, hire them, pay for a consult, pay for them to train you for a while, join their gym.

Show them that you value what they do. That goes a long way. And the hardest part is to. Be patient enough to let those relationships develop to where it's like a no-brainer that these people wanna work with you. And from there, like the relationship will be so much better. But also they're so much more likely to wanna expose you to the rest of their community cuz they know that you do things the right way.

And a lot of people don't. In fact, most people don't. And it's hard. It's because it's. Especially when you're just starting and you have no patience, right? You don't have any patience. You're trying to get 'em in as fast you can you get, anxious. You try to hurry it up and the fastest way to get somebody to not like you is to try to get them to like you faster.

That is, that's true. What if, I learned this moving to new schools. I moved a lot. I went to three we moved three times in middle school, three times in high school. Who knows how many elementary schools I went to? I forget a lot. And I could tell you the faster I got people to try to like me, the more I was sitting by myself at a table eating lunch.

And the more I, I didn't really try to get them to like me, I just like basically slow played it. The better it was for me the more likely it was that I was gonna develop friendships and the more likely they were to want to engage with me as well. So it's a difficult lesson in a lot of ways, but it's something that I think is really important for you to keep in mind.

And I know it's. I honestly do. I've been there. I moved to a city where I didn't really know anybody. I didn't have any business connections for sure in that area. And it took me, a long time to develop local relationships. And even having been here in business for seven years I just, I still can't compete with people that grew up around here.

There's no way you can, if you went to middle school, high school, elementary school, all your cousins live here, your uncle is a freaking dentist. There's nothing I can. Nothing that's gonna put me on that level except for like my kids opening a business like generationally, that would change.

I just am not gonna be able to match that, but I can do a pretty damn good job if I do a good job of being patient, developing relationships the right way, proving value to people, showing that I value them and doing things the right way. That's how you develop long term key relationships, and I'm super.

Honestly, like excited for our community for the momentum we have, the people that we're getting involved in what we're doing to help performance clinicians really grow and change the landscape of our profession. That's what it's about. So many people are down on, not just physical therapy, definitely physical therapy, but.

Clinicians in general, they're down on insurance constantly chipping away at you, right? It's death by a thousand paper cuts is what we say. It's every year they just decrease a little bit more, give you a little bit more paperwork to do, make you write a little bit longer note, take a couple minutes of your time, times 20 people a day, and next thing you know, you're spending two hours every Saturday catching up on your documentation.

It's not a way, it's not how you're supposed to use your degree, it's not a life that we want you to live and for us. The clinical side, there's many things. There are many people out there. The, the ready state included, in particular, my friend Toko with inter Institute of Athlete or for athlete Regeneration is great for ConEd.

If you guys are trying to become better on the clinical side, there's so many great resources for you out there, especially when you're looking at the performance side now. But on the business side you don't have that. And we've filled that gap and we're really proud. So I've helped all these businesses be able to, number one, move away from full-time work somewhere else to go full-time on their business to then, scale hire people, build out standalone spaces, hit seven figure businesses like a.

These are things that are happening and it's amazing and it's something that is for us is, it's our a hundred year goal. Like we want this performance clinician to really be at the forefront of health and wellness for musculoskeletal things, right? With primary care, musculoskeletal provider, that's.

Educating people on how to actually use their bodies correctly, having conversations with them about stress and nutrition and sleep and movement and, empowering them to then empower all the people around them. And the more that they can capitalize on efficiencies in the business models, the more people that they can actually get in the doors.

The more people they can hire, the more people they can help. And the net effect of that is massive. We're talking, it's gonna be millions of people that we're gonna have a chance to effect in a positive way. So for us, PT business is a vehicle that we help people get to that it's not about business, it's about helping your business.

Help the people that really need it and putting you in a place where you can really grow, expand, and have a bigger impact. And I'm just so excited to be able to to bring my friends in, in a bigger way and get them more involved in in what we're doing in PT Biz. And I hope that, you learn something from this.

I hope that you're patient and you play the long game. Don't try to rush things. It's probably the biggest mistake I see. People are just starting and just be patient. And I know it's tough. But as always, guys, thank you so much for listening and we'll catch you.

Hey, real quick before you go, I just wanna say thank you so much for listening to this podcast, and I would love it if you got involved in the conversation. So this is a one way channel. I'd love to hear back from you. I'd love to get you into the group that we have formed on Facebook. Our PT Entrepreneurs Facebook group has about 4,000 clinicians in there that are literally changing the face of our.

Profession. I'd love for you to join the conversation, get connected with other clinicians all over the country. I do live trainings in there with Eve Gigi every single week, and we share resources that we don't share anywhere else outside of that group.

So if you're serious about being a PT entrepreneur, a clinical rainmaker, head to that group. Get signed up. Go to facebook.com/groups/ptentrepreneur, or go to Facebook and just search for PT Entrepreneur. And we're gonna be the only group that pops up under that.