Setting Your Marketing Budget in a Potential Recession

The following transcription was from the Bulletproof Youtube channel. Here is the https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TBig2ar3tM

Peter Boulden
0:00:00
It's a pretty sharp hatchet on there, buddy. Who did your ranch logo? 99 Designs. This podcast brought to you by not 99 Designs. I tell you, it's interesting. I've been looking at this. I'm glad you brought that up.

Craig Spodak
0:00:26
Oh no, Design Pickle, I'm sorry, Design Pickle.

Peter Boulden
0:00:28
Oh, okay. So Design Pickle is the service, actually you and I both use it.

Craig Spodak
0:00:32
Yeah, we use it.

Peter Boulden
0:00:32
I got that from you. We may have a code that we actually use for Bulletproof. We'll have to put that in the show notes later.

Peter Boulden
0:00:37
We do, yes.

Trey Tippit
0:00:38
Yeah, no, we do have a code for.

Peter Boulden
0:00:41
But it's like the unlimited graphics and things like that. So it's fun to be able to use it. Trey, you use it as well?

Craig Spodak
0:00:45
Yeah, we use Design Pickle. I've used 99 Designs, I've always been pretty happy with it.

Peter Boulden
0:00:49
99 Designs is cool. And you know, I've recommended that to some of our masterminds from a marketing standpoint. Actually, I used it here recently for, what were we struggling with? Oh, a billboard option. So I'm doing a billboard above my new option, that's cool, Chris, above my new office. And Trey, I was really having creative block. And so was Lacey, who was helping. And so I was like, look, let's just put it on 99 Designs. And then you get the, you know, you get 30 people kind of creatively ideating about what it should be. You give them a description and then they ideate. That can sometimes form as a primer. Do you say, I like that, but do this. I loop Craig in and all that stuff. Without 99designs, which was pretty cheap, I think for that whole contest, it was $159 or something like that. Something pretty cheap.

Trey Tippit
0:01:33
I like what you chose, though.

Craig Spodak
0:01:34
I really like it.

Peter Boulden
0:01:35
I do, too. No, of course. I think we chose a winner, but Craig, I don't see my point in it.

Craig Spodak
0:01:38
Well, it's cool, Trey, is he had two billboards side by side in Atlanta, and he had both of them came at the same time, and they were right in front of his new location, so he actually created a design that they work together, it reads like one gigantic,

Peter Boulden
0:01:52
like 60 foot wide thing.

Craig Spodak
0:01:53
So it's two big boards together,

Peter Boulden
0:01:54
and then I just made the graphing, so it's two looking side by side.

Craig Spodak
0:01:57
But your eye goes, they should split it.

Peter Boulden
0:01:58
And so I won't keep this, you know, I'm not a big fan of like analog media like billboards and and you know, oh no, but like that's direction

Trey Tippit
0:02:07
That's my first person. I'm a rock media. That's a call to action like we're here straight down straight down

Peter Boulden
0:02:13
Yeah, look down. Here. We are. Yeah, here we are. That's important and I think location strategy It was important So I you know, I pulled trigger on your is actually more more cost-effective than I thought for those two

Trey Tippit
0:02:24
I was expecting super cheap. What do you think would be a

Peter Boulden
0:02:27
double billboard in Atlanta per month? What would you think, Trey? I mean it depends on the location. Let's assume it's a good location there. What, ten grand a month per billboard? That's what I said, yeah. No, no, no. I said five per billboard per month. I thought ten grand per billboard. Yeah, much, much cheaper. I'm getting both of them for, well because I did it on a year. I did it, I think they're around.

Trey Tippit
0:02:49
Maybe you don't want to say it. Maybe you don't want to say it because someone will be like,

Trey Tippit
0:02:52
I'm just trying to protect my boy here. We're jacking up the price on ourselves.

Craig Spodak
0:02:58
Yeah, someone just like, I'll buy his year out. Yeah, he said he'd pay 10 grand a month.

Peter Boulden
0:03:03
Yeah, I'm just going to go right over him. Interesting that you don't.

Trey Tippit
0:03:06
Don't do it, don't do it.

Peter Boulden
0:03:07
Right, well, this actually.

Craig Spodak
0:03:08
It was cheap, it was less.

Peter Boulden
0:03:09
This brings us to a discussion I actually wanted, it was on our agenda that I actually wanted to do I wanted to talk about this is a nice segue about marketing and Were you guys on the mighty network when I posted their question or had Lacey post a question on my behalf basically about? About marketing right and so I had seen both the question Sorry, so it was about it was related to the the this the stand the small business Association recommends that businesses spend X amount on their P&L, okay?

Craig Spodak
0:03:42
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Craig Spodak
0:03:43
I still remember it.

Peter Boulden
0:03:44
Yeah, you present spend. Yeah. Can one of y'all, as I'm, because I got other graphics, can one of y'all go into that question if you can find it in there? Yeah. And so I think the recommended, because I don't want to misquote the quote, I think the recommended was, so I put the quote in there, I said, who here agrees with this or disagrees. And so I think the recommended amount that the SBA recommended was seven to 8% of gross. And I, you know, me personally, I thought that was a little aggressive, a little high. Trey, you for shit sure think it's high. Oh shit, yeah.

Craig Spodak
0:04:17
If you've listened to me talk at all, you know that's ridiculous. So, and so I think that,

Peter Boulden
0:04:23
and I was expecting an overwhelming, okay go Craig.

Craig Spodak
0:04:27
Yeah, the US SBA recommends small businesses, businesses with revenue less than five million

Trey Tippit
0:04:34
allocate between seven to eight percent to marketing, agree?

Peter Boulden
0:04:38
Yeah, and that's why I posted that. And so I was expecting, Trey, an overwhelming proportion of people being like, hell no, that's way too much, and write seven to eight percent line on it. And it ended up being about a 50-50 split. Half people saying, yeah, I agree with that, and half the people saying, no, no, no, too much. And so I was kind of blown away by that. Like I said, I was expecting a disproportionate answer. And so I've dug into this a little bit more just to find out where are people, not so much the spend, but where are people anticipating spending in 2023? And let me share my screen here. Well, while you're sharing your screen, it's a silly question to ask.

Craig Spodak
0:05:12
And it's a silly question, a silly suggestion on behalf of the US SBA. It's conflating so many figures. It's like if you do 5 million or less is what you should do, that's total bullshit, man. So what I was saying is if it's a startup, it could be, you know, double, triple that. And if it's a mature business, it could be 1 or 2%. So truly the reason why you're such a believer in a smaller budget is because you frankly subsidize your marketing with PPO. So you don't you don't spend the money, but it's actually being counted for somewhere. Right. It has a lower use. It has a cost. So, you know, you're not charging. You're charging a participating provider rate for your crown. So if we really, really want to distill that down and be fair, you would actually have to probably back in some of that into a marketing budget and get to a number that's higher than your actual marketing budget really is.

Trey Tippit
0:06:10
Sort of.

Craig Spodak
0:06:11
But it's just dumb to say things like that. Um, you know,

Trey Tippit
0:06:15
well there's too many variables that go in there that's holding virtually

Craig Spodak
0:06:18
nothing constant or holding everything constant. But it also makes people feel like shit because the USSBA says this, I'm way below or way above. It's just like metric dysphoria. Who the hell knows? You have to take in a certain, and I think we're guilty of this in dentistry.

Trey Tippit
0:06:41
This is what your practice should look like.

Peter Boulden
0:06:42
All right, so let's do this then. So let's go there. Trey, what do you think?

Craig Spodak
0:06:45
No, I didn't wanna, I didn't wanna.

Peter Boulden
0:06:46
No, I know, but I like where you're going because I think it's a different based on the context of the practice. So Trey, where do you think the marketing spend of a full PPO practice should be? Just, and don't, under, let's call it under two and a half million dollars. Well, how many years, we have to add another access to it. No, you have to.

Trey Tippit
0:07:06
How long has it been out?

Peter Boulden
0:07:07
I mean, is it a startup? An established practice, not a startup. An established practice, five years, you know.

Craig Spodak
0:07:14
Okay, but let's add another layer. No, no, shut up. Four weeks, four months? A guy who wants to grow his belly and add another doctor? No, because we're doing a disservice by saying this is what you should, because we're experts and we're saying this is what it should be. But are you adding a doctor? No, we're not. We're saying, what is your opinion? Yeah, we're going to take an opinion down and we're going to talk about it in a vacuum and then we'll have to just understand that, yes. Okay, let's have a conversation for shits and giggles. We're going to do it. Well, that's all we do anyway. Thank you for shits and giggles. No, I know, but let's say you're baking a dessert.

Craig Spodak
0:07:50
How many people?

Trey Tippit
0:07:51
That doesn't matter.

Craig Spodak
0:07:51
So I'll say this.

Craig Spodak
0:07:52
I'll say this. And in my head, I would say that a mature practice in a pretty good location in a, let's say, a metropolitan area that is under two and a half million, let's say, and let's say over a million. You have momentum. You're going to spend anywhere between one and five percent depending on what you like. So obviously, we all have very specific ways we market, and probably the polar opposites are going to be Pete and me. So I have a very specific way of what I do it and he has a very specific way of what we do it and we have some crossover in between. But I'm gonna spend money on certain things that, and frankly, mine is probably more than that in the sense that I pay for a big sign. You know, that's marketing but it's a one-time deal. So figure that out. Figure that out, yeah. But you look at things like that and realize that, where do you want to go with it? How much content creation do you want to put in? That can be super expensive.

Trey Tippit
0:08:54
So, this is the difference here.

Peter Boulden
0:08:56
We won't go into that, Craig, because I don't want you to pull all these.

Craig Spodak
0:08:59
Well, I just want to say one thing and then I'll let you go. It's, you and I know Trey's model really well. So, we have a lot of context to what he does, Trey. Just as a reminder for those that don't remember this, Trey has a quadrant dentistry model. It's taking the an average or above average doctor and plugging him in. He doesn't have to have these advanced super GPs doing all on X and all that. It is a different model.

Peter Boulden
0:09:26
Trey wants to- Let me, let me, okay, let's just, let's just stop this for a second because that's really not, I don't really care. What I really want to get to is this. If we are in a recessionary time, if everyone is expecting potentially a dip coming, do you titrate your marketing expense very true to I'm at 5%, I stay at 5% in a bear market per se. So do you titrate that accordingly based on your new budget of it being a 5% of the previous month? Or do you allow to say, hey, we're going into more of a, you know, a recessionary time, and allow it to escalate plus or minus up to 7%, right? Because if it's relative to your revenues, then of course that percentage on your P&L is going to go more if you keep all marketing the same. So I guess that's where I'm going is, do you guys personally go dynamic, or are you hard and fast with the percentage on which you allocate?

Trey Tippit
0:10:31
Craig?

Craig Spodak
0:10:33
So, for me and my ecosystem, I have a very interesting, a different way when the blood is running in the streets, I ramp up. But I do, it's a game of chicken. In the face of declining revenue, do I have the intestinal fortitude to keep ramping up? No, I don't think I could. But for the foreseeable future, I wouldn't adjust downward. So if I had three or four months of declining revenue and the news is all about recession and blah, blah, blah, I would possibly increase my marketing, knowing me. I would increase my marketing there. If it went on for 12 and 18 months,

Trey Tippit
0:11:19
I don't think I have the balls or the cash flow to do that.

Peter Boulden
0:11:22
But that's how I feel.

Craig Spodak
0:11:23
Trey, what would you say? I do nothing different. If I was to do anything different, I would be, it would be dynamic only in the sense that I am reallocating things from one thing to the next, but I don't do enough of it to, I mean, it's not, that I do anyway. So I don't, and I will say this from the standpoint of a model, I don't look at this as declining revenue. We will increase. In a recessionary time, you will increase.

Peter Boulden
0:11:48
Correct.

Craig Spodak
0:11:49
Well, to what point, though? I mean, like 12 months of declining, 18 months of declining, I mean. Forever. Okay, well, you can't forever. But I like your, well, yeah. So I can if I continue to have the Titanic approach.

Trey Tippit
0:12:05
You're like basically playing the violin and the Titanic's

Trey Tippit
0:12:08
going down.

Trey Tippit
0:12:09
Like, no need to pat any mimosas out.

Craig Spodak
0:12:12
But you're happy all the way down. So when you're dealing with, and you know, Craig, you like the term quadrant dentistry. I don't. I like the term bread and butter dentistry. We're doing a neat, we have a neat space.

Peter Boulden
0:12:24
I hate that term.

Craig Spodak
0:12:25
I know, but I hate quadrant dentistry. We actually don't do quadrant dentistry very much. We do single tooth dentistry. Wow. Okay, can we just agree to call it something other than bread and butter? Make up a name and come to me.

Peter Boulden
0:12:38
One tooth dentistry? One tooth dentistry.

Craig Spodak
0:12:40
Yeah, we do a slice of bread.

Craig Spodak
0:12:41
It's just a slice. You do FMRs, it just takes you 28 years to do it. Yeah, that's easy. Listen, John, you need to get an FMR. We'll start now and we'll end in 2050. So when you have that type of model, all the stuff that we do that you make a full practice and model out of, that may disappear, but that's just icing on the top. So we, year over year, we continue to rise in revenue because the needs do not change in a down market.

Trey Tippit
0:13:15
Yeah, it's a brilliant model.

Craig Spodak
0:13:16
So from a marketing perspective, no, it's all the same. You keep doing the same thing you do. It's a brilliant model is what I'm saying. Like if any of us just like, Peter, you're gonna jump all over this right now, but if we were intellectually honest, we would all say that the easiest thing to scale and grow is what Trey has done.

Trey Tippit
0:13:35
It's easiest to recruit talent,

Craig Spodak
0:13:37
it's easiest to recruit dentistry, it's most recession-proof, it's the reason why there's not too many DSOs that are made of high, multi, super-GP models.

Trey Tippit
0:13:50
You don't see many DSOs that are made up of like what Peter and I have built at ADS and

Trey Tippit
0:13:55
SDG.

Craig Spodak
0:13:56
So, Craig, I'm going to throw something out to you just because it's been mentioned to me a number of times. This is where I don't stay quiet. But, and not to steer us too far off topic, getting into models, but the argument I would make with you is if you threw one of the docks out of my model into yours, they would boom. And if you threw one of yours into ours, they would drown. Because the level at which you have to perform in speed is not something a super GP is comfortable with. Interesting. Go look at the level of, and I'll use our mastermind as an example, at one point Pete asked, posed the question to everybody, how many hygienists can you do? And it was a unanimous across the board too, with me being the only person that says three. And I would argue that three is the average. You're gonna have guys that go beyond it, but in order to do that you have to be phenomenal as a clinician to run through that process. So if I come in and tell you, here's your schedule, good luck. You mean a three to one ratio is what you're saying? A three to one ratio of hygienist to doc. And that's just a single piece of it. But the idea becomes, in order to perform at that level, your clinical skills have to be on point and you have to be a superstar. So I have to keep docs on the bench in training to get them to the level that allows me to plug them in to that point to be able to basically to perform at that level. So the differentiator and why the only thing I think this model does become different with, if you wanna uphold the quality and the level of care that you are giving is the training aspect. That's the game changer.

Trey Tippit
0:15:34
So you're saying one of your docs in Craig's environment would flourish, one of his docs in your environment would…

Craig Spodak
0:15:37
So yeah, I disagree. So what I see… You have so many more at-bats, here's what I would say. You have so many more at-bats for your doc that they can hit a single every time, right? And they wouldn't have the same amount of at-bats in Craig's practice because it's not based on just the crown of the month, right? And so you have to do more of the at-bat. Craig's docs would have hit triples and so your docs would not be used to hitting a base hit. You know guys, I want to just jump in because it's not entirely correct. So we have a lot of doctors that are just like Trey's doctors. They're seeing three columns of hygiene. They don't do FMR. They do, as you would call single-tooth dentistry or bread-and-butter dentistry. They don't do any They're insurance providers on three or four networks, they're hustling and they're doing 1.5, 1.6 million. They do a little bit of in this line because they're in my ecosystem and we do a lot of that but they're not doing it all on X, they're not doing FMR, they're not doing veneers, they don't do any of that. What winds up happening is we take those docs on that are like quadrant dentistry and single tooth dentistry and they start looking around like, oh wow, look what that person's doing, look what that person's doing. And they start educating themselves and they start doing more advanced dentistry. But I don't, sometimes I seek out just base hitter dentists. It's just in our ecosystem, they start evolving. So it's a hybridized model in every manner. There's guys that are fee for service that like, no, we need a cone beam to do an FMR.

Trey Tippit
0:17:10
And there's a lot of people like, what's an FMR?

Trey Tippit
0:17:12
Right.

Craig Spodak
0:17:13
But I think you're not going to… And I think that's brilliant. I think the thing that I would love to have… The hybridized practice is what you're… The hybridized practice that I think is so awesome at that point is that you take that doc and you have exposure literally down the hall to something beyond that they come in and go, oh, that's cool, I want to see that. And then they start practicing at that level. My normal conversation I'm having the practice more frequently than any other conversation is, hey doc don't you don't have to worry about that FMR just because he or she's doing it I don't want to do it you know I don't want to do that type of dentistry send it out and then to the FMR doc by the way don't mess around with those three crowns in a row if you're gonna be doing an FMR send it over there. It's a cross referral is what's best for the patient

Trey Tippit
0:18:06
It's fine.

Craig Spodak
0:18:07
I tell people all the time, I stopped doing FMR early on in my career. It was not worth it for me. I would use different verbiage on that. Not that you might feel like that. I don't feel like that. Yeah, the highly talented is all the way across the board.

Craig Spodak
0:18:20
No, I know.

Craig Spodak
0:18:21
That's just preference. Yeah, I was dumbing it down for the sake of what I say to you, but I tell people like admittedly it's not worth your

Peter Boulden
0:18:29
time. Let me go back to where my point of this stuff. Of marketing. Go ahead. Well, yes, because it kind of started that way and I think I gave it a little bit. Yeah, we take a little of you, sir. The Mighty Network and then yeah, we got into like, right, it's different and we brought in insurance and marketing spend and things like that. So I follow this guy who's got a pretty big marketing company, pretty big column. I think he's got one of the biggest marketing companies. His name's Neil Patel. And so he sends emails and I think he aggregates a lot of data. I thought this would be interesting. And I was like, this would be applicable for the pod.

Trey Tippit
0:18:59
This is not the dentist Neil Patel, by the way.

Trey Tippit
0:19:02
We have one of those.

Peter Boulden
0:19:03
No, no, no. But basically he has access and surveyed tons of companies and says, what is your SEO budget doing? And this is all in the context of if we are in a down year, what is your budget? Are you going to increase, maintain or decrease? And so overwhelmingly the response was we're going to increase the SEO budget. Okay. So SEO is one, is one aspect. What are you going to do with your organic social media budget in 2023? And it was pretty much split down there. It's just going to, going to increase, maintain or decrease. And they're all kind of tied. So I would say that that one's just a push no one's really gonna change much of anything but the the majority of people were doing a decrease in organic social media for their budget. Can you explain for me and the listener that doesn't understand the differences between those two? What? SEO? So like SEO is going to decrease the increase. So SEO Greg is how what is your domain authority? How are you ranking in organic? Someone types in Delray Implant Dentist. How do you show up in the one through 10? That's organic. And that is built up by you building links and getting authoritative inbound links from people and having your site set up correctly from an SEO standpoint, meaning on-page SEO, having your pages structured right, having enough content, all these things, right? So that's called organic SEO. And it is something that's probably not paid attention to enough, myself included, and I'll get there in a second. Organic social media, right, is now how well are you, how much are you playing into the TikToks and the Instagrams and the postings and the reading? Oh, okay, I'm sorry, I missed, I wasn't listening to the difference.

Craig Spodak
0:20:51
Okay, got it.

Peter Boulden
0:20:52
Organic SEO, organic search.

Peter Boulden
0:20:52
So now organic social media. And so most people, 42% said, I'm gonna decrease probably my attention to that in 2023. What are you doing with your content creation budget in 2023? So content creation is the thing that I alluded to in the first thing. So content creation is how many, your article writing, your links, getting guest posting, things like that, making videos, articles, right, expanding your website, things like that, that's content creation. That goes up, I can't read the red,

Craig Spodak
0:21:22
it's increasing it, that's the most-

Peter Boulden
0:21:24
83% say they're gonna increase that in this. So that was the most drastic move

Craig Spodak
0:21:29
of everything you've showed so far.

Trey Tippit
0:21:30
Correct, correct.

Peter Boulden
0:21:32
And then, do you plan to invest in AI tools in 2023? And then 98% said yes. And so we taught we had that pod. You know, the last part we Craig, you and I talked about it and kind of anyway, that's a that's a very fascinating percentage. 98% 98 of that level. Yeah. Yeah, it's really the title of that pod was it changes everything. And I truly as I've even gone geekier since then and talk to more people who are in the know and this is their life and you know it changes it really does change everything. Absolutely. I think for the better but it really just it flips a lot of industries on their head. And then let's see that's really the only thing that's oh and then what are you doing with your podcast budget in 2023? So 92% are increasing it. So that's really it. I'll take this screen off of it but I guess it goes back to my question is, is do you remain, do you remain consistent with your marketing or do you remain dynamic in which capacity? Meaning if your revenues go down, do you follow it with a, let's say you set it up as a 5% of your P&L, do you follow it down as your revenue goes down potentially? And do you do the converse? Do you follow it up on the way up as well? Or do you just say, we're burning the ships, like Craig gave the answer to, right? I'm going to push in a little bit harder and allow my 5% of my revenues, from a P&L perspective, to go to seven or eight in this time because everybody else is going to be putting their foot off the gas, right? That's what you were saying, Craig, right?

Trey Tippit
0:23:10
Yeah, yeah, it's been a certain amount.

Peter Boulden
0:23:12
Well, I just like to eat, pick up things, because even if the blood is yours, so to speak

Trey Tippit
0:23:16
Well, it's just that when when you when times are good You have to spend a certain amount just to rise above the other voices when the voices go down Because people are pulling back budget year year you can you're you can give marketing dollars go further So that's all saying is just right now We're just having, I mean, pay-per-click and all this stuff is higher because we're trying to outspend the people who are competing with us.

Peter Boulden
0:23:42
Right, and that's my, I think that's really where I was going, I think I had this conversation with either one of you or on this pod, but I'm digging into, I think I became a little bit lazy in that I threw a lot of money at paid ads, guys. A lot of money, because it was the easy button for new patients.

Trey Tippit
0:24:02
Specifically what though?

Craig Spodak
0:24:04
Paid, YouTube, paid.

Peter Boulden
0:24:06
Yep, keep going, ask me a question.

Craig Spodak
0:24:09
Google, SEO?

Trey Tippit
0:24:10
Yep, no.

Craig Spodak
0:24:11
PPC? PPC. So Google, PPC, YouTube.

Peter Boulden
0:24:15
Paid ads is not SEO, Craig.

Craig Spodak
0:24:17
No, I'm sorry, I didn't mean SEO, I meant PPC, I'm sorry.

Trey Tippit
0:24:20
I'm outclassed this far.

Peter Boulden
0:24:21
PPC, all it stands for is pay per click.

Trey Tippit
0:24:23
So yeah.

Craig Spodak
0:24:24
Did you go anywhere other than Google or YouTube? Google pay per click is what I meant specifically, sorry.

Peter Boulden
0:24:28
Google Ads, yes.

Trey Tippit
0:24:30
Google Ads, were you doing that?

Peter Boulden
0:24:32
Inside Google Ads, Craig, there are two things. There are the text ads, there's Google Map Ads, and there's YouTube ads. They're all on the same platform.

Craig Spodak
0:24:38
Right, I understand. YouTube, I know you did that. But well, I mean, I understand enough for the sake of the conversation. I'm not pretending to be the marketing guru here. I know you paid for video promotion. Did you occupy in the maps? Number one, Atlanta, down, let's click here.

Trey Tippit
0:24:55
You know, on the maps here.

Peter Boulden
0:24:56
Did I advertise in local? Yes.

Peter Boulden
0:24:58
Yes.

Craig Spodak
0:24:59
I didn't think you were,

Trey Tippit
0:25:00
because for a minute, like a while, you know, two, three years ago,

Craig Spodak
0:25:03
you were all about not doing that.

Trey Tippit
0:25:05
Right.

Craig Spodak
0:25:06
What changed?

Trey Tippit
0:25:07
Because I haven't talked to you about this since then.

Peter Boulden
0:25:09
Yeah, I think it's important. I think people are using more geospecific results, right?

Trey Tippit
0:25:14
I think…

Peter Boulden
0:25:15
Well, was I right that you stopped this altogether? No, it wasn't that I stopped, it's that…

Craig Spodak
0:25:20
Or you just didn't want to compete in that ad space. I remember a conversation around, why compete where everybody else can compete when I can just make video and compete in this guy?

Peter Boulden
0:25:28
So you're talking about, I wasn't competing with Google Ads, just the ads, right? So you're confusing our audience here.

Craig Spodak
0:25:36
And then you ask I'm confused you know measure what the audience is feeling so Pete

Peter Boulden
0:25:41
You're talking about Google YouTube. What do you do anything other than Google or YouTube Facebook Instagram?

Craig Spodak
0:25:46
Okay, so you do social media paid ads as well

Peter Boulden
0:25:48
So my and you were careless with it. I wasn't careless I was just lazy because we have so much content so much video so much things It was as easy to step and deploy the problem with paid ads is that you're competing and paying for momentary attention. And that is fine when you when when things are great, right? When you just want to get a lick, get a patient, get the phone to ring. Paid ads are good. I'm not saying there's not a place for it. I'm saying it became almost, I forgot all the fundamentals of the marketing, the branding. Well, not branding, but I left SEO absent a little bit.

28
0:26:29
Okay.

Peter Boulden
0:26:30
So organic SEO is, is almost like an investment trade. You mentioned your sign, right? Building up your domain authority is really no different than your sign. You put in effort, you put in, you put your bricks on one by one to build your sign. You do the same thing for your domain authority, which then creates a powerhouse, right? Google says, hey, this domain is so much more powerful than the one across the street. So it's collateral, it's equity of your business, no different than your sinus. And I got a little bit lazy with that whole thing, Craig, is where I was going.

Craig Spodak
0:27:06
That brings up a really good point. What made you say that? Sorry, Dwight, what was the result you got? Just quirk that for one second, Dwight. I mean, I try, sorry. What had you, not only until I cut you off, I misname you, you in the red hat. Why did you say that though Peter? What realization have you had that got you to the place where you're like, okay, this mea culpa, what is

Craig Spodak
0:27:32
it?

Peter Boulden
0:27:33
It was just, it needs to be, what I was reminded of Craig is that the easy button never yields longstanding results.

Trey Tippit
0:27:42
So what are you seeing?

Craig Spodak
0:27:43
You're seeing money being spent and not the same amount

Trey Tippit
0:27:47
of motivation?

Peter Boulden
0:27:48
Yes, I'm saying that the spend is going up, and right now, currently, new patients are trending in a different direction. Not drastically, but they're not trending the way they were 12 months ago.

Craig Spodak
0:27:59
The ROI is changing.

Craig Spodak
0:28:00
The ROI is changing.

Peter Boulden
0:28:01
Got it. Okay. Okay. So, in hard times when winter is coming, it's nice to rely back on free content creation, right? Looking at stuff like where's traffic coming from? Because all the end of the day, it's just traffic and eyeballs. And either you pay for it or you put in the hard work to get it free.

Craig Spodak
0:28:20
So this is where I was going with that because that kind of furthers the whole point that I was about to make is your digital footprint should match your actual physical footprint. Your user experience online should match the user experience when they walk in your door. And we all get, the easy button happens to all of us. We all start to coast and we start to not pay attention to where the money is spent. The hard part is to create your patient experience in your retail space. They walk in the door, how do they experience it? the whole experience from start to finish, including phone calls, marketing, all that, but there's digital real estate as well. So your Google ad, if nothing else, even if it's never clicked, you own a piece of that real estate on the digital page. So you want to own the digital stuff. You want to have a good-

Peter Boulden
0:29:05
Necessarily, you don't own it. It's just, it's very, you own it temporarily.

Craig Spodak
0:29:08
He's saying you have that real estate. It goes back to what you said, eyeballs. You're looking at eyeballs, which you're creating name recognition, because although they may not click on it, they saw it. And it is a temporary, that specific case is a temporary one. It goes back to even your website.

Peter Boulden
0:29:23
So when you're looking at, everyone here who's listening, and you're looking at your analytics and your ad platforms, and you see the word impression, that's what Trey's referring to. Someone sees your ad, they may not have clicked on it, but it's still this psychological branding. So impressions are good, right? Because they cost $0 in a paid scenario. They cost you $0, you don't get charged until you click on it, and it's still some kind of braining. So, Trey, I agree. I agree with that. I agree. That's a nice halo effect, as Craig would say. Yeah, they mimic each other, and you should work on both, but to work on both is difficult,

Craig Spodak
0:29:56
and therefore you start to coast.

Peter Boulden
0:29:57
Oh my God, dude, I'm telling you. So that's what I'm saying, is that months ago, just about six months ago, I was beating my chest being like I'm at 1.5% P&L from marketing percent and we're getting over 350 new patients a month kind of thing. And it's like, look at me, I'm the marketing genius. And then shit changes a little bit. It's like, okay, wait a second. And so I can't stay with the same tactic because that might be trending in the wrong direction. So sometimes when shit gets hard and you revert back to 2008 and micro recessions we've had, you have to change your strategy because doing the same thing and expecting the same result might be insanity in this case. So that's all I'm saying, is that it's time for me, I've just dug in and been like, okay, where's the guerrilla warfare for me as the CMO, CEO, CFO of the practice, right? Where can I do things that retain money and amplify attention? Okay, just, I wanna, sorry to be capital and obvious here,

Craig Spodak
0:31:02
but have you also made sure that the variable is solely related to the marketing? So, for those people out there that don't have any understanding they've just persisted through the first 30 minutes of this podcast and they're like I don't even understand marketing I don't care about marketing I don't have a website blah blah blah but they're kicking ass because their patient experience and they have such a good organization culturally and everything what I'm trying to say here is but you're so special you don't even need anything like that restaurant in downtown Manhattan that has a black door and you have to work to find it. So what you mean is marketing in the traditional sense? Right because everything is really marketing. So what I'm just trying to drill down with you Peter is that are you certain that nothing else has changed? Because good times make it easy to become lazy or not paying attention. So not only were you thinking on like the fricking Steven Jobs of marketing, but were your doctors also feeling like, holy shit, 300 patients, 500 patients a month? Come on, man. You don't have to like either do the FMR or don't. Call me whenever. And now that it starts, people kind of like you know who moved my cheese here

Peter Boulden
0:32:28
Are they is the whole organization feeling we are such badasses that we don't have to you know 300? Yes, it's just a point it so yeah, I don't know if it's so much the experience. I think the experience stays consistent

Craig Spodak
0:32:41
I think what happens though great like to think so as business owners, but it does it changed you How could it not change them? to them. So if you're thinking I'm the master of 350 new patients, don't you think Dr. Jones and the practice is like, oh man, come on. You're both right. Craig, you're speaking of the norm. Most people, it doesn't, they think it stays consistent and doesn't. Pete, you audit it. So yours stays consistent because you have an accountability process put in. That's what I was trying to say. But the majority of people, I think, is who Craig is talking about and that is correct. They don't audit it. That goes on autopilot too and starts to go as well.

Peter Boulden
0:33:16
I guess too, the other point I was trying to make is the thing that we forget to do when times are great, right, when we're in a bull market. Everyone knows what I'm saying when I say bull market, right, it's just like, wow, we're doing so well. Look at us, look at the economy, everything's doing well. You forget to do the small things. Call the patient in the evening, ask for referrals, ask for reviews. And so that is the drum I've been beating recently. Not the injections, because gosh, we do that and we audit that. But like the simple low-hanging fruit, we sometimes forget because all of our needs are being met by quote-unquote the marketing machine. And so you forget the things that got you there. And so, you know, I don't know. I don't have a point to make.

Craig Spodak
0:34:00
Yes, I kind of look at it like soft times make soft people. So everything's been easy, everybody gets a little used to it. Your doctor's going to look at you like, hey, marketing guy, do your thingy, whatever your thingy that you have to be holistic in your ownership of all areas of the practice But what I would say is before Flicking the switches of marketing on always when when when the when tough times hit get back to basics Get make sure that each person is leaving like holy shit. Was that just a debt like that was crazy I felt like it was a family if you don't have that walking out every single day, you're going to be spending shit tons of money disappointing more people. Like pay attention to Google reviews. Some of them are douche bags.

Trey Tippit
0:34:58
Some of them might actually be bringing up a good process. When people give you feedback, thank them. Ask your friends that patronize your practice and say, hey, is there anything that you could suggest that we could do better?

Craig Spodak
0:35:11
And say thank you and learn.

Trey Tippit
0:35:13
Just because, you know, things are changing.

Peter Boulden
0:35:14
I mean, honestly, Craig, it's really, what it has forced me to do, too, is not just to market anything, and it's forced me, like, we had our book club inside the Bulletproof Mastermind, right, recently. Right, we went over a book, and book club probably, like, sounds a little nerdy, but we all chose to, like, pick a book.

Craig Spodak
0:35:32
It was right after the Tupperware party.

Peter Boulden
0:35:34
It was really fun, actually.

Craig Spodak
0:35:35
So fun.

Peter Boulden
0:35:36
So fun.

Craig Spodak
0:35:37
The Tupperware party.

Craig Spodak
0:35:38
Yeah. By the way, Trey, the fruitcake recipe you shared was to die for.

Craig Spodak
0:35:40
Phenomenal.

Peter Boulden
0:35:41
Phenomenal. For bringing the white Diffendale tray.

Trey Tippit
0:35:43
I know. The Bartlett and James, I loved it.

Craig Spodak
0:35:47
Beautiful.

Peter Boulden
0:35:48
Beautiful. All right. So we had, you know, we picked a book called Traction by-

Trey Tippit
0:35:54
By we, Peter.

Craig Spodak
0:35:55
What?

Craig Spodak
0:35:56
I said by we.

Peter Boulden
0:35:57
I did not. Here's the book we- No, you didn't write the edit. Come on This is what we're doing, but I politely say we Go ahead, I don't want to steal your thunder heaven forbid. I actually do something and lean in to the ecosystem Yeah, you just sit for heaven forbid Caring I mean Greg my coattails are getting so heavy. Can you can you jump off? All right, listen, don't make me drop another PBD DM on you All right, so listen so what it's forced me to do to it So looking at that retrospect you know being being retrospective where your position saying gosh been a little lazy looking all these things and then Going through the traction inside the traction by Gino. What's it? What is his last name Gina? Wickman, thank you You know because I discovered this at one of the YPO seminars. Everyone was like, it's the greatest book ever. So I brought it to our mastermind. We kind of discussed it. And, and obviously we all read it and then came to a zoom room one night and started just chatting. And what was funny is we all came to the same conclusion and we were like, dude, this is really just the bulletproof pathway, but just condensed a lot more. And so what it reminded me of is like, sometimes we just forget the small basic stuff, right? The steps that you go, you forget the little things that are accretive to the master new patients, if you want, or the master revenues. You forget all the things in the bull market. So I went back and revisited it, and I was like, how the pathway is so much better than even what Traction is recommending for the entrepreneurial operating system. And so it was just, it was a nice, it was a nice confirmation for the curriculum which we go through, but also just like that we're beating the right drum. If the best-selling books, if people who are in the YPO world are saying this is the greatest book ever, then isn't that cool that we're kind of tracking the same way in a dental standpoint? I guess it was my thing. But it reminded me to kind of look at it and be like, oh yeah, kind of not so good in that referral department. Probably not asking for as much as we should and you know and where's our where's our retention activating system how are we activating how are we I'm sorry inactive how we activating new how we activating inactive patients thank you react to things like that react well I was going on a little monologue and you guys are flustering me because I feel like you're both against me right now.

Craig Spodak
0:38:28
It's not true, we love you.

Trey Tippit
0:38:30
We love you. No, it is true, it is a good confirmation of, and what I like about, I read it a long time ago, but it does point to the idea of, at least what I gleaned from it, was having accountable people to cover your weaknesses as well. You know, like having people that can back someone to your organization. You mean, you're saying,

Peter Boulden
0:38:49
and that actually, you're right Craig, that was pretty much the thesis of the book, was having the right person on the right seat of your bus. Right, and that was like 50%, that's 50% of the book, and then holding them accountable to what they can do, so to speak. Right, but you are right, that was a big portion. I said, man, like, you know, when we talk about culture index, that really has helped confirm by data, is the right person here, right? So.

Craig Spodak
0:39:18
I think that book is great because it brings up the fact that it's a system. You need a system. All it does is define the system. And there are a million books that define systems. What's that other Four Pillars book? That's another one that's similar. Yep, there's a million of them. They're operating systems. And the better companies that continue to grow have an operating system. They have an outline, they have a bulletproof pathway that they stick to and follow. And when you have that system, whatever it may be, it's like a diet, what diet works? The one you use, all of them get you there. So don't worry about which one's better, just pick one and go with it, and you'll improve and you'll do great. And I think that's a huge positive that people get lost on. And to apply that to the marketing aspect, we spend so much time talking about what marketing is and how Pete does it or how Craig does it or how I do it, how Dwight does it. And they're all different but they all work. And I think one of the big things that you have to focus on especially as you have what seems to be coming down the pipe from an economy standpoint, is you need to set metrics that you're trying to achieve. So we talk about, oh, we wanna have a good content creation, pay-per-click ads, this is what we're doing, but what's your goal? I mean, if your goal is, and I'll use ours as an example, I want 40 new patients per doc, and if I'm hitting it, then if I stop hitting it or I see a decline, I'm pulling the easy levers first. Are we calling the patients?

Peter Boulden
0:40:44
Are we, you know, well, I'm gonna audit the actual- Yeah, if you stop hitting that, you're saying you go back and audit.

Craig Spodak
0:40:48
Yeah, so you are always dynamic in that sense, and the point I'm trying to make there is you need to have a metric you're shooting for. Because if you're just randomly doing it, and Greg, you mentioned the Titanic, just keep going up forever. That's a good way to be problematic, is set a goal and try to achieve it. And don't just go, we need more. More for the sake of more is not good. And marketing has an end game to it. And you need to define the end game, and then you need to go get it. And then pull the easy button, or pull the easy levers you can pull first, up to whatever else those could be hard. If you don't know how to use pay-per-click, don't do it first. Do something you know how to control first.

Peter Boulden
0:41:26
Well said, Trey.

Craig Spodak
0:41:27
Very well said.

Peter Boulden
0:41:28
All those things are really valid,

Trey Tippit
0:41:30
and every single time I've met an amazing, iconic company, there's always an iconic founder somewhere. When I talk to that person or get to interact with that person, there's so many things that that person possesses, care, vision, clarity, focus, good attitude, good communicator, that like marketing is like the unintended side effect of having a great leader. And I think that there's a lot of, in the consulting world, there's a lot of people that will give you and sell you the five easy steps to marketing. And you have to do it all. And the hardest thing is to be that leader, first and foremost. So for those, because I get a lot, maybe it's just the way my brain works. But when I talk to somebody, and they're talking about a very tactical question about marketing. When I start drilling it down, because I'm asking them some active questions, I'm like, oh shit, they actually don't need as much marketing as they do clarity. And they're disguising it as a marketing question. You know, what were you trying to go? Are you trying to hire someone? I don't really know. I'm not sure. Maybe I think that, yeah, I could want to do that. Like, oh, shit. So the three of us are in our own echo chamber with laser-focused vision of where we want to go. I know exactly what would make Peter happy, what would make Trey, what would make Dwight. We know exactly where we're going. But when we talk to the average dentist out there, they don't have that. We see that with our mastermind. We really do. And we're doing, you know, so I think that's, you know, not to say that the marketing is not important, it's paramount, it's paramount, but directionally where you're going is the most important thing. And I think that we don't think of that. We don't even think of us as business owners

Craig Spodak
0:43:25
by and large, the average dentist.

Trey Tippit
0:43:27
Do you ever make those people who like,

Peter Boulden
0:43:29
you ask them a question and they say, well, everything is, it depends. Depends, depends on what? I don't know. No, I have those conversations.

Craig Spodak
0:43:42
I think there's one on this call.

Peter Boulden
0:43:44
I think there's one on this call.

Trey Tippit
0:43:46
Well, because it's not…

Peter Boulden
0:43:49
It depends. Like you didn't look at the human, you didn't look at their vision, you didn't look at their marketing, you didn't look at that, you didn't ask them if their pet shit on the carpet today. Everything depends.

Craig Spodak
0:43:59
Well, it does. That's correct.

Peter Boulden
0:44:02
Doesn't it?

Craig Spodak
0:44:03
In the end.

Trey Tippit
0:44:04
Absolutely.

Peter Boulden
0:44:05
It depends. For the sake of conversation, when you're sitting here trying to give tangible takeaways

Craig Spodak
0:44:09
from a podcast, this is a tangible takeaway. It's saying to those people that, you know, like I remember a conversation that we had right before stage in Nashville at Summit. We had that really renowned dental speaker who will remain nameless, don't fill in his or her name please. And he says to me, you know, it's interesting you talk about business being stressful. My business never stressed me out before, but a day in my life, I was like, bro, let me guess, I've just never done a sex now. I was like, you don't have business, you're a dentist, that's what you do. Why would it stress you out? You worry that you're not gonna be able to do the crown right after 23 years, have 20 people doing crowns that you don't even get to talk to. That's a different level. It's a different magnitude. So it's like even the business consultant doesn't own a business. I'm not throwing shade. I'm just saying don't speak to that. It's like saying the NBA doesn't stress me out. You've never played an NBA game. That would stress the hell out of us right now. So it's I think that we're just we're you know we're not being real And I think it's important to just figure out what do you want to do? What are you doing and then mark it to what you want not to say well trade does that so I should do that, too Because you know what to that. It's not that effect Yes, you read biographies And you take things from people you've met you see people you admire whether they be you know you read a book on Thomas Jefferson, and you see these pieces of his life in that biography, you model yourself after. And to some extent, when you're sitting here with a microphone and you're answering a question, you do have to answer it exactly how you do it, because what you're doing is telling them, this is what I do and it works for me, but then giving

Peter Boulden
0:46:17
them the ability to say, I like that,

Craig Spodak
0:46:04
I'm gonna take this from Pete, I'm gonna take this from Craig, and I'm gonna

Peter Boulden
0:46:12
take this from Trey. So you're kind of giving a little bit of a footprint of these are possible, now you choose. Now to choose your own adventure, which were great books. Yeah, I remember them well. That's a good point, Trey. I think we read and we educate ourselves so we can compare That's the stories that we listen to or the movies or even the education, right? You compare and contrast with what's deficient in my life, where do I need to augment, where do I need to adjust, where I know, you know? And, you know, that's why like reading is such a, like I was actually looking at Patrick Badavitz. He just posted a new video on like the five books he's going to be reading this year, right, in 2023. And I was kind of shocked by them, actually, because some were stories. Like one was on Onassis, right? The story of Jackie Onassis and the Kennedy's and all that stuff. And I was like, oh, this is business. And then, but he kind of explained how it was. So, you know, YouTube is more like my, you know, I'm not a big novel reader. I think I am more of a consumer of how-to's on YouTube if you couldn't tell. Right, I educate myself just by watching videos. But it's really just to kind of just to kind of apply to life. No different than reading. No different than reading. Right. Anyway, I must think like

Trey Tippit
0:47:23
each book changes you a little bit, you know, like you're you're different after each book, like after each compelling book, like, you know, listening to the

Craig Spodak
0:47:32
autobiography or the biography of Thomas Jefferson or whatever. You take one pearl from anything you do and you apply it to the rest of your life? Yeah. I mean, what a compounding effect of knowledge.

Peter Boulden
0:47:48
Well, think about the compounding thing. Did you see what I posted yesterday on the Money Networks about something I stole from Jesse Itzler, which I thought was really cool. I never really repurpose stuff. But it was called, he put out a post the other day, and it was the 100-hour rule, right? So, Trey, back to your point of compounding, basically the 100 hour rule states that doing something for 100 hours in a given year, whatever it is, right? If I want to learn how to scuba dive or play the violin or sing or do dentistry or play some plans, whatever it is, okay, 100 hours. Let's just put a pin in that. Which would break down to 18 minutes a day. If you, at the end of the year, have put in 100 hours worth of work towards that craft, you are now gonna be better than 95% of the world's population at doing X task. X skill, I shouldn't say task, X skill. And I was like, yeah, 100 hours seems like, damn, that's a lot of time. 18 minutes a day? Man, that's pretty easy, you know? And so back to your point of compounding, I thought that was a very interesting way of just breaking, eating the elephant in micro-bites and at the end of the year, looking back and saying, damn, I am now, so if you're a shitty marketer and you're like, I know nothing about Google Ads, what you were saying, guess what? In 18 minutes a day, you'd be a better marketer than 95% of people if you just watch YouTube, start digging in, doing that, right? If you're a shitty business leader, if you're a shitty leader, right? Fix the things that you know you're bad at is where I'm going and you can do that in 18 minutes a day and now become superior. Not inferior, but superior to 95% of the population.

Craig Spodak
0:49:29
And it also makes you happy too,

Trey Tippit
0:49:30
because of progress.

Peter Boulden
0:49:31
Yeah, because you're solving problems, Greg. Like you said, isn't happiness, you know, you push on this. Happiness is so much on solving problems, things, and better quality problems. Yes, that's the quest, is having better quality problems to solve. Humans are most happiest when they are solving things. And that is hard, honestly. I get so much great, great happiness in being the answer guy, as you all know, trying to be that, or at least fronting as that. And I have a hard time just shutting my mouth and letting the answers come out in the room. That's probably one of my deficits in leadership is that I give the answer. What I think the answer is versus letting the collective come up with the answer because I want to speed, speed, speed through, let me just give you the answer because I know the answer and move on. And that is a detriment.

Craig Spodak
0:50:20
Yeah, that's a detriment. It's funny, those CEOs that are iconic like that, like the Lee Iacocca's or whatever, whatever the amazing CEOs, they're the ones that solve everybody else's problems. But statistically speaking, when they exit the organization, they leave everybody less than they found them. They leave a vacuum. And Steve Jobs was even so much of a subtractor that upon his death, he released the next I heard, and this may not be true, this might be a wives tale, but I heard he's like, okay guys, here's like the next three updates that you'll release after I die. Basically, you guys are so fricking stupid,

Trey Tippit
0:51:02
like I'm gonna have to manage you from death.

Peter Boulden
0:51:04
Well, it's funny you say that. Remember how I was just mentioning,

Craig Spodak
0:51:07
Did you guys hear that?

22
0:51:08
Or did I make you laugh?

Craig Spodak
0:51:08
No, you were right.

Peter Boulden
0:51:09
I love his deal of how do you know they want that? He said, they don't know what they want because I haven't told them what they want.

Craig Spodak
0:51:18
Well, I mean, Henry Ford would say that. Yeah, you're talking about ego more than anything.

Peter Boulden
0:51:23
No, no, that's what he means.

Craig Spodak
0:51:24
But it also drives success. It drives success.

Trey Tippit
0:51:27
Henry Ford said, if I would have listened to the population, I would have built a faster horse. And to some extent, they are right. People don't know what they want until you give it to them. You see the need. No one knew that they needed a drive-thru spicy chicken sandwich place, but you know, the guy's chicken was like, this is what we need.

Peter Boulden
0:51:44
Craig, so you said, like, you gave this Steve Jobs example, and I'm throwing this back up on the screen, because that was actually one of Patrick B. David's recommendations, was called After Steve. Apple became a trillion dollar company and lost its soul after Jobs, right? So it, you know, so that was one of the books, I don't know.

Trey Tippit
0:52:03
Right, but it is one of the things that was the hardest lesson for me to learn and the thing that I'm most grateful for learning it is to allow people the space to grow into. And if you're the smartest person and you get all the answers, you will actually make everyone around you really dumb. And you can carve years off of your trajectory if you allow people to to To reach their own potential, you know, it's like that space between reaction stimulus is space for growth same thing in a business Hey, I know, you know, they ask you something It's so freaking easy to be like it's a plus B and equals C But if you say what do you think or what? What would you do? Okay, that's okay And then boom then you can grow a business that you're free of. I mean, if we all, and again, it depends, if you all want a business that you actually don't have to show up to.

Peter Boulden
0:52:55
You just say it depends.

Craig Spodak
0:52:57
And I'm saying that because it's tongue in cheek, but it's true. If your goal is to have a business that runs without you, do that.

Trey Tippit
0:53:07
If you have a need, either in your ego or something else, to never be replaced, and you tell people, I don't wanna be there, but it's true that you really do want to be there, then answer everybody's questions for them. Just figure out what you really, really want. I had a very interesting conversation with an old friend from dental school, and she was telling me how she had this associate, and she just completely, she told me what happened. This guy's running late. She basically walked in the operatory and was like, hey, do you need, I mean, it's probably nicer than this, but like, do you need me to like finish up your patients for you? Because you're like running really late, like basically like you're an F-guard. And like the guy like, he's like, we should talk at the end of the day. I'm like, I know how this is going to go. He quit, right?

Trey Tippit
0:53:51
She's like, yeah, how'd you know?

Trey Tippit
0:53:52
I'm like, because you completely emasculated this guy in front of patients. You made him feel like an idiot. And now how do I know?

Craig Spodak
0:53:58
Because I used to do that. And she has to really, I'm like, what do you want? You really really want a practice that runs without you because if that's the case you can't treat people this way You know and there's all these rules about like how people should work and he's a sissy and he should man up I'm like, oh damn. That's how you really feel. You're gonna have a lot of heartache in front of you. I Don't know are you guys paying attention to me you guys cheating out right now. Did he wear jogger scrubs?

Peter Boulden
0:54:28
It depends.

Craig Spodak
0:54:29
He, I don't know. I don't know, I never asked. I never asked, but I just think it's important to, we all value a business that runs without us. And if you're gonna want that,

Trey Tippit
0:54:42
you have to adapt how you lead people.

Craig Spodak
0:54:44
That's true. That's true.

Trey Tippit
0:54:46
That's the biggest ask.

Peter Boulden
0:54:47
How busy are you between now and the end of the year?

Craig Spodak
0:54:52
I mean, is he like normal? This is probably the answer.

Peter Boulden
0:54:55
So no, like it's not hair on fire. We don't squeeze. We don't squeeze it in. I'm terrible at that. You could do that. And we just don't. When you say busy, like you mean his practice or him personally? His practice. OK, his practice. Is that is that what you thought he meant Yes, that's what I thought he thought he meant. That's what I thought. He might they just have a weird brain people They hear different things. We love you for that weird brain. It depends weird what so what other books were on that list? Oh, yeah, you want to dig into my con? Oh, you know PBD can I have a moment of shameless promotion? Gave me a shout a shout out thing to do is be shameless. Well. I mean dude. It was a real shout out. He's like this pod. Did he did you root canal? Yeah, you are right. Keep going. He did he Post that clip on because it was good, even though he mispronounced your name, which I hope you doesn't matter. I don't That's karma

Craig Spodak
0:55:51
I'll pronounce I'll pronounce his wrong next time I see him It was cool he did tie actually two times Craig I believe you guys two times wasn't it? Well, what I was saying is I love, he's got a guy in the show, and I'm like, I love when you argue with the guys because it's real, and I talked about it in our podcast how we go back and forth and we disagree. He's like, that's the way it's supposed to be. That's journalism. That's what people want to see.

Craig Spodak
0:56:16
Mm-hmm.

Peter Boulden
0:56:17
So he said, were you being honest with that, you like him arguing with that guy named? Yeah, because I don't know the guy's name, but he's like,

Trey Tippit
0:56:26
this guy, what's his name?

Craig Spodak
0:56:28
He's like the little bit of social left-leaning guy. He said, he asked a question to PVD, and PVD's like, well, answer your question.

Trey Tippit
0:56:36
He's like, well, I don't, he's like, how can you ask a question that you're not willing to answer yourself? You have to be able to answer the question. And they're going back and forth,

Craig Spodak
0:56:43
it's like, you're not answering the question.

Trey Tippit
0:56:44
I just loved it.

Craig Spodak
0:56:45
I love holding people's feet to the fire.

Trey Tippit
0:56:47
Yeah.

Craig Spodak
0:56:48
Because you say words, you're a stickler on words. Well, I just you know, I just think that there's that's where the That's where the real content is happening Like, you know, we are about to get there with your boy Chris Ramsey And we're gonna get there and you like dude. No, no, no, no, we can't go here He's never remember that with the rim. I don't know what it was about. I Don't know what it was about. Of course. I remember. Yeah, when I told him I could double his practice. Yeah, I was being kind. I was too, because if you double my business… It's like my three-year-old, kind is cool. You got to remember, Craig, kind is cool.

Trey Tippit
0:57:23
Well, were you being kind when you told me to buy Bitcoin at $2,500 or cool? Or taunting me and sending me texts like, you go, come on, man up. I think it was pretty kind, because you made me do it.

Peter Boulden
0:57:36
In hindsight, it was very kind it was buried in that way You could have been you could have been blaming me if it had gone the other way right it depends All right, so Trey you asked the question. What were the five books here? They are how the mighty fall And that is by Jim Collins, and it says how the mighty fall and why some companies never give in by Jim Collins, okay? so so his books were in the context of is winter is coming kind of thing, if it's a hard year, how do you prepare? So that's number one, How the Mighty Fall. Number two was the one I just told you guys about is After Steve, how Apple dealt with the death of Steve Jobs

Trey Tippit
0:58:20
and lost its soul in the process,

Peter Boulden
0:58:22
but became super profitable. But then how Tim Cook kind of took over and changed the direction. Number three was How to Invest by David Rubenstein. I think he interviews a bunch of investment firms and just kind of some of the biggest names in finance. And so that was one. And then, sorry, I'm losing my screen here. It's tough to do all this and be moderate. The next one was Atlas Shrugged, the classic Atlas Shrugged, which is a 62 hour audible book, by the way. Wow, you gotta read that.

Craig Spodak
0:59:02
I have never, everyone has said that and I just.

Peter Boulden
0:59:05
I never read it. You haven't either? You haven't? Oh man, I've read that three or four times. No way. But you can't do that in audiobook. That's too much. Okay. All right, but that's a that's a phenomenal book I've heard well, isn't it easier and audible? No, he's funny. He'll lose track of it Is that the Galt Jim Galt or whatever his name is? Um, who is John Galt John Galt? Yeah Who is John Galt for 400? I caught that little jeopardy What what well give me the cliff notes? What's it about and then home it let me finish then you go back to this and then the last one was on asses like I told you and that's that's the story of it's called on asses an extravagant life by Frank Brady and Those are the books he's reading. All right, so go. Yeah go to Atlas shrug, what is that? What was that tray

Craig Spodak
0:59:56
So it's Ayn Rand, which, the two books you've got to read by Atlas Shrugged are Ayn Rand and Fountainhead. You need to read Atlas Shrugged first, and it is, there's just a lot of good lessons that will reside in it, even from, I mean, to some extent from a business aspect of it too. But go and, it's too, it's very, and it's too long. It's way too long to go… And, you know, I mean, if you're an audible person, go for it. But it's a… It is definitely a book that has a lot of ins and outs to it, a lot of… There's a lot of good character development. There's a lot of great story to it, and there's a lot of good lessons. Read the book. I think you will get more out of it. Fountainhead's cool. It's a little bit… It's different. It has a little bit… Craig, you would actually like that, there's a lot of architecture stuff in there. But those two, I would say, are just great books to read, just from the standpoint of, even if just a good story, if you just ignore all the rest of it.

Peter Boulden
1:01:03
That's good. Alright guys, we're right at an hour. I think I've reached my cap with you guys today.

Trey Tippit
1:01:11
That's enough.

Trey Tippit
1:01:14
Another one hour whether you need it or not.

Craig Spodak
1:01:15
Trey, what do you got going on for holidays, buddy?

Peter Boulden
1:01:16
I want to ask you real quick.

Trey Tippit
1:01:17
You're sending me some…

Peter Boulden
1:01:18
I'm having a little girl.

Trey Tippit
1:01:19
Yeah.

Trey Tippit
1:01:20
Well, that's right.

Trey Tippit
1:01:21
When's the due date? The 28th.

Craig Spodak
1:01:23
Wow.

Peter Boulden
1:01:24
That's awesome.

Craig Spodak
1:01:25
I got quite the Christmas present coming. Wow.

Trey Tippit
1:01:27
Yeah, you do.

Trey Tippit
1:01:28
So if you were asking personally, are you busier, my answer is not yet, but I'm about

Peter Boulden
1:01:29
to.

Craig Spodak
1:01:30
Yeah, you're going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier.

Peter Boulden
1:01:34
I'm going to be a little bit busier.

Peter Boulden
1:01:35
I'm going to be a little bit busier.

Craig Spodak
1:01:36
I'm going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier. I'm going to be a little bit busier. My answer is not yet, but I'm about to be.

Craig Spodak
1:01:42
Yeah, you will be.

Peter Boulden
1:01:42
Yeah, you will be.

Trey Tippit
1:01:44
Peter, you traveling at all for the holidays?

Peter Boulden
1:01:46
Just to Mississippi. Yeah, Philadelphia, Mississippi. I actually made the mistake. I actually booked travel for next Christmas and next Thanksgiving because I regretted. You know, travel you almost have to look at kind of a year in advance I think when you're doing things. And so I was like you know this would have been a great time to take a nice little vacation with my family. Sometimes we you know when they get out of school I start looking around like and you become you know in my house I be I am the playmate for some reason like and so they look at me like dad what are we doing today? I'm like, one, two, can we go to this? And so, anyway, I think holidays and summers get stressful for me because my kids look at me as the playmate.

Craig Spodak
1:02:34
So funny enough, I actually, every, in the beginning of the school year, I block off my work calendar for every day

Trey Tippit
1:02:41
that my kids are off from school.

Craig Spodak
1:02:43
You do?

Craig Spodak
1:02:44
So no school, no work.

Peter Boulden
1:02:45
Very cool.

Peter Boulden
1:02:46
That's good.

Peter Boulden
1:02:47
That's a good place to be, Craig.

Craig Spodak
1:02:48
Good for you. And then do you plan something at that day? Yeah, I mean, more or less. You know, today was, you know, I woke up, I was at the ranch today and I came down for this and I'm working tomorrow. But by and large, like when there's a teacher planning day or MLK or a little odds and ends, I block off.

Trey Tippit
1:03:07
You're hanging out with them. I'm hanging.

Craig Spodak
1:03:09
Or we're going away or doing something fun.

Peter Boulden
1:03:10
Very cool. That's awesome.

Craig Spodak
1:03:12
That's a good place to be, man.

Peter Boulden
1:03:13
Good for you.

Trey Tippit
1:03:14
Yeah, I mean, it's, as a buddy of mine said I will Emily Bowden or Emily

Trey Tippit
1:03:17
Let's talk to her speaking of Philadelphia, Mississippi

Trey Tippit
1:03:19
I do have a little thing to end this with it's my buddy John will always say to me and I love this quote he says he says I'll stand on what I've done over the last 25 Years, but not necessarily in what I've done today. And it's like, the three of us have worked our tails off, you know, literally tails off to build things into the position that we are today. So it's not like we woke up and I was doing this,

Craig Spodak
1:03:51
I'm 51 years old, I'm doing this like the last three years.

Peter Boulden
1:03:53
You got lucky.

Trey Tippit
1:03:54
I did as well, I did get lucky. You know, but fortune favors the bold. And if you go out and take risks, you tend to get luckier.

Craig Spodak
1:04:03
And you learn a lot, you tend to get luckier.

Trey Tippit
1:04:05
And with that, we should end.

Craig Spodak
1:04:08
I think that's a good wrap.

Peter Boulden
1:04:09
What are you guys doing, I think just a quick thing, what are you doing in preparation for, I think, you know, I look at the end of a year and the beginning of a new as like, new goals, new thing. Are you doing anything different? Is there anything kind of like, I'm not saying what are your goals, I'm saying are you a…

Craig Spodak
1:04:29
Do you use the end of the year as some sort of way point for you guys?

Peter Boulden
1:04:33
I do, I personally do, yes. I use it as a, I reflect back, Craig I spend a lot of time making goals in the beginning of the year, and then I use the end of the year to reflect back on like my success ratio, like what, how did I do?

Craig Spodak
1:04:45
Yep, I do the same thing. I write a, I'd call it a vision, but it's almost like white paper of the year. But it's where I have, what I have accomplished this year, and then where I will go next year. And I write it in November of every year. That's cool.

Peter Boulden
1:05:01
Yeah, so it's almost like, is it like a letter to yourself? Yes.

Craig Spodak
1:05:05
And funny enough, many times I don't refer to it until the summer of the next year. Yeah, I used to send it to myself, and my wife on God No, no, I'm telling a story So I wrote a letter We could do this every year and I'd send it on December 30th, and I was out of town I was like dear Craig, you know blah blah blah and she freaked out You know I mean she thought it was like a suicide. No, you blow it up your phone. Yeah, it's just blowing me up I'm like yeah, it's kind of crazy It was like it was written the first person like I'm really proud that you did this, and you did that, we did this, and she started getting in, and it was just like, holy shit, she called me immediately.

Trey Tippit
1:05:47
Like, she was like,

Peter Boulden
1:05:48
Craig, what is this nonsense you've written?

Craig Spodak
1:05:50
So she opened your mail, read your letter. Well, it was addressed to me from me. So it was Craig, from Craig to Craig. It was like, you know, we just did that for the entire office. Like, what would be cool if I'm just, like, so it was in the first of the year, what did you accomplish over this last year? And writing it why you were proud and

Trey Tippit
1:06:09
what you were able to do. But she freaked out.

Craig Spodak
1:06:12
A little drama. December 31st drama.

Trey Tippit
1:06:16
Yeah, exactly. I mean, it is unfortunate the holidays are a time when people do take those types of, they start going in those directions. I had a personal thing, like a person that just attempted suicide and one of my good friends' niece just did it. It's like crazy right now. What is it about this time of year that causes that?

Craig Spodak
1:06:40
But it does feel like that's when this seems to happen.

Craig Spodak
1:06:44
Holidays?

Peter Boulden
1:06:45
Yeah.

Peter Boulden
1:06:46
What is that about? It's a celebration of friends and family and you feel a little top days for a heart attack are on New Year's Day Christmas Day and I think the day before New Year's or to maybe it's Wow yeah and and and science has tried to blame it on well it's cold weather and there's constriction and you know vessels that causes tension and you know but it's it's not it's this time it's your spouse it's the spouse is all the other days.

Trey Tippit
1:07:14
Those three things are different.

Trey Tippit
1:07:15
Yeah, exactly.

Craig Spodak
1:07:15
Right, right, right. What did they say?

Trey Tippit
1:07:19
Happiness is a warm, caring, close-knit family that lives in another city. So when they all come to your house, it can get a little stressful, but on a serious note, you're not alone. This is all, we all deal with stuff like this. Reach out to your friends and family. Always reach out. Always reach out. There's someone that cares to talk about stuff like this. If anybody, I do.

Craig Spodak
1:07:39
So reach out to me. I'm a voice for that. Or I'm an ear for that.

Peter Boulden
1:07:44
There you go, Craig. So you took your morbid thought and we turned it into a, we shined that penny.

Peter Boulden
1:07:49
Turn that frown upside down. Turn that frown upside down.

Craig Spodak
1:07:51
Bye guys.

Transcribed with Cockatoo