Why You Shouldn't Offer Every Podiatry Service

You're listening to Podiatry Marketing, conversations on building a successful podiatry practice with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDannald.

Welcome back to Podiatry Marketing. I'm your host, Jim McDannald. Joined as always with my trusty cohost, Tyson Franklin. Tyson, how's going today?

I'm fantastic. They're big Jim. And I think we should change the podcast title to Podiatry Marketing Outtakes. And we we keep a we keep a copy of all the mistakes we make doing the introductions and and other inappropriate things you say throughout the podcast.

I mean, that'd be a really, really long podcast. I'm not sure all the the listeners want to tune in for that, but I you know, if we need to do that, we need to do that. So I'll I'll let you dive through the archives of all of our missteps and racy conversation topics.

Yeah. I know. No. No. Everything's great over here, and everything's running so smooth that I have no problems whatsoever.

Well, I'm totally lying, but that's that's okay. We won't dig into to your personal life.

Totally lying. And what is it? At least I love Zig Ziglar, and he used to always say when people came out and said, how are you going? He says, if I was any better, I think the deck was stacked. And I went, that is such a positive way of looking at things because there's nothing worse when you say someone, how you going?

They go, not bad. I'm like, so is it good or not? Is not bad not bad does not sound good?

Yeah. Things could be worse maybe.

I know. So I'm gonna dive straight into my topic, which

is What is we're talking about today?

I don't like doing home visits. Okay. It's always like something. I don't like Mondays. But by the BoomTown Rats, great song.

Anyway, and I'm not talking specifically about home visits though. I'm just using it as a bit of an example of a podiatry service that you either enjoy doing or you do not enjoy doing. So I just thought we go with the title, I don't like doing home visits because I think that one, when podiatrists see that, they go, oh, I wanna listen to this episode to find out what it's all about. And I'm gonna touch on it,

but It's a little provocative title to like kind of suck people in a little bit to the the topic.

Oh, I remember I remember a podcast once somebody did, and it said, I'm giving away a million dollars. And I remember talking to the person afterwards and they said, oh, that was one of my most popular podcast episodes. But what they were doing, they said they were giving away a million dollars in ideas. They just didn't they left that part out. So this is along the same lines.

I don't like doing home visits. But if you think about podiatry services, there's gonna be some that you like, and there's gonna be some that you don't like. And always think, regardless of what the service is that you don't like, if you do not like doing it, for example, if it was home visits, then stop doing it because there's no rules that said you must provide all services to all patients all the time. I haven't seen a rule written anywhere about that yet. Neither have I.

So I just think if you don't like doing it, then don't do it. It's it's really that simple. And I have had podiatrists say to me, oh, yeah, but aren't we supposed to do this? Think, if you don't like it, you just don't do it. And I think if you're an employee, I think you have to be really, really honest with your employer when you start there.

Let them know right from the start, whether it's at the the interview. Let them know what you like and let them know what you don't like in podiatry. And I think it's a really, really important conversation to have at that job interview because are you really that desperate to get a job that you're prepared to do stuff that you really don't like and the whole time, you're not gonna be enjoying going to work? The person who's employed is gonna know you're not enjoying yourself. But if you have this conversation upfront, they might be able to to do things about it.

So I don't think you should lie at the interview and then complain about it later that, oh, yeah, where I work sucks. I hate podiatry. I'm getting out. And and I think it's partly where it stems from.

Yeah. It's probably knowing about knowing yourself and like you said, like knowing what your likes and your dislikes are and kinda crafting the career and the the job position that's right for you. If you're trying to be, you know, all things to all people, you're probably gonna either, you're gonna end up disappointed or the employer or the person you're working with, you know, if you sell yourself as something or say you're interested in something but you really aren't, that level of kind of dishonesty will show through at some point in the future. Maybe not next week, maybe not next month, but if you're not enjoying your work, it'll show through.

Yeah. It it will eventually show up just in your performance. And I've done some episodes when, you know, with podiatrists, you know, why they left the profession. And most of them, like, wasn't just because you know, some of them had bosses that they didn't like or felt they were treated poorly, and some of those people just a little bit soft. You know, they could have said something.

But a lot of them just didn't like the work that they were doing, and they and I don't think they ever really sat down with their employer and discussed it with them and just said, you know, I'm like, I don't like doing this. If I had started a job somewhere and, for example, had to do ulcers, I would have said told them after the first one, I'm sorry, but I can't I don't like doing ulcers. If you put them in front of me, I'm leaving. Now it'd be better to say that to them and they go, oh, okay. Didn't really feel that strongly about it.

We'll do the ulcer patients. If you do these other ones, yeah, I'm fine with it. But if I said nothing and I kept getting an ulcer patient and kept getting another one, I'm getting home and I can't scrub the smell off myself and it was bugging me that much, how long would you think I'd stay in podiatry? I'd just get out. So I I think it's important to actually have that conversation.

Yeah. You're gonna be straightforward. If there's something you don't like doing then there's no there's no use in just gonna try to hide it or sucking up and doing it if you know that it's gonna lead to kinda long term dissatisfaction with with your work.

So the next thing, I think, if you are an employer is don't ask an employee to do something you hate doing yourself. I think that is just totally unfair. I think it's it's extremely unfair, and I have seen it multiple times. I've seen it happen all throughout the profession where the employer just employees will do all the crap they absolutely despise, and then they wonder why they're constantly having to replace team members all the time. And, I did have employees do more of the work I enjoyed least, but I never asked them to do something that I actually hated.

I didn't think that would be fair.

No. It makes a lot of sense. If you're as as much as you wanna have kind of wide coverage of different activities, but if there's not something that you're willing to do yourself, it doesn't make sense to have someone in your practice do that as well.

Yeah. And and I think there's a huge difference between things you like least and things you hate doing. So like I mentioned, I hated ulcers. Hated ulcers. Now if I had someone in my clinic who said, oh, but I love all ulcers.

You know, I can't get enough of them. I'd be like, oh, fine. If you wanna do them, then you can do them. But rarely did our clinic ever get an ulcer patient in the clinic. You get the occasional one.

I also didn't like penny pinching patients. I didn't like tight asses. So we did not treat them in our clinic. We had someone come in who was just whinging about money. We didn't treat them because I did not like those type of patients.

I didn't like actually doing home visits, but I did do it initially. I did it for a number of years. We did home visits till I worked out. I didn't like doing home visits. So if I didn't like doing them, why should I ask anybody else in my team to do it?

And I remember the the last time visit I overdid, and I was the last one to do it. I didn't have my team doing it. And have I told you a story about the plumber? No? I don't think so.

Okay. So patient rang up said oh, it wasn't patient's son or daughter rang up. Can you see this patient? They were in Maribah. I happened to be going to Maribah to do some work.

Not a problem. I went, oh, I sort of stopped doing them because I don't like doing them, but, okay, I'll do this one. And I said, you've gotta pay in advance, though. So they paid in advance, which is fine. I said, also, somebody needs to be there from the family to let them know who I am when I come walking in.

Because they said they were pretty old, a little bit demented, deaf. I said, I don't wanna confuse this person. Same way, I rock up, knock on the door. This old guy sitting at the kitchen table, hi. And I'm going, oh my god.

Here we go. And I said, I'm the podiatrist. He goes, oh, the plumber? It's about bloody time you got here. And I said, no.

I'm the podiatrist. I heard you, the plumber. I've had a problem with the sink leaking for ages now. I went, I'm not here about the sink. I'm here about your feet.

He goes, the sink is over there. And I went, oh, god. Oh, you know what? I'm gonna go and look at his sink. Still went over and looked at his sink.

I looked and said, no. I think I can fix this. I bent in there, fixed up a few things, tightened up, and said, turn to another. How's that? He goes, that is fantastic.

Said, not a problem. See you later. And I left. And that was the last time visit I ever did. And from that point onwards, I just went, I'm never doing another home visit.

I don't like doing them. But I worked out. I could be a part time plumber if I wanted to, but you need to have a license to be a plumber in Australia. So I didn't have that.

So that's what I was thinking. You were being a plumber without a license. I was gonna ask about that.

Yeah. I know. It was I was an unlicensed plumber, but all was just had to tighten up something underneath the sink. I didn't really do any plumbing work in case there's any plumbers listening. But I just worked out there and then.

I'm never doing another home visit. And if I'm never gonna do another home visit, I'm never gonna ask somebody that works for me to do a home visit. Just not gonna work that way. It was the same as I did not like doing nursing homes. Exactly the same reason.

But if we were asked to do one, I would go and check it out, and I would be prepared to put my hands up. I will do it first to see what the place is like, and if this is something that we're gonna keep doing, and I'd be prepared to do it if somebody went on holidays, then it's something that we can actually do as a team. I remember my last nursing home too, and it's a sad story. It'll almost make you cry. And it was just it was terrible.

I got in there, walked in, went to the medical room thing, set myself up, and the lady came and said, oh, no, can't work from here. This is where the doctor works from. I went, well, where do you want me to work from? So we got this room set up here, went down to this room, and it was a toilet. It was like a handicapped toilet.

And I said, no, seriously, stop joking around, I'm going back up the other room. No, no, this is where the podiatrist previously used to work from. I said, did they have no respect for themselves? They wanted the patient to sit on the toilet, which is a comfortable seat, I may add, but it's not where I wanna be treating patients. And I just looked at her and said, tell her where she could stick her job, the stick, this, that, and I walked out of there and said, that's it.

We are never doing home visits again, and we never did one from that point onwards. I just think, as an employer, never ask an employer, a team member to do a task or do any form of work that you would not do yourself if they went away on holidays, or if they left your business that you would wouldn't that you'd be happy to just continue doing yourself.

Yeah. I think that's a good policy. You wanna make sure that you feel comfortable and your staff would feel comfortable in whatever environment or whatever type of care they're asked to provide.

Yeah. It's I don't know. I I find it I just find it rude for an employee to ask someone to do something they wouldn't do. And and it's even in the you know, just throughout the clinic itself when you're just running your business. If I walk past a a piece of paper in the hallway, I would pick it up.

And because I would do that, I expected every team member to do exactly the same thing. If their room is looking at, I'd bloody tidy the thing up. You know, this is off track from home visits, but it's just never ask them to do something you're not prepared to do yourself. And I'll admit that I liked routine foot care less than I liked MSK patients. So I did more MSK biomechanical type patients.

And now if I was opening up a clinic tomorrow, if I was a solo practitioner, I would do zero routine foot care because I prefer to do biomechanical MSK. So you do have the choice to actually do that.

Yeah. You have the choice to do it and also kind of like how you develop your online presence and how you market yourself. There's different ways to go after those patients. So, you know, if you were to start again, there's definitely ways to get more visibility for those types of services.

Yeah. Well, when I was in Liverpool, and I did a story about niching. I did a story. When I was in Liverpool and I did my talk on stage about niching or podiatry business, And when we so initially, I was in Cairns, then I set up in Mackay. In Mackay, we decided we were just gonna do biomechanical patients and orthotics.

No routine for care. Had no watercloth, had no instruments. Just that's all we were gonna do. What took me eight years to build in Cairns, I did in twelve months in Mackay, just money turnover. Because we were niched in one particular area, and we that's all we pushed.

The marketing message was really easy. Which leads on to the fourth thing I wanted to mention was if you're an employer or a business owner, do not market any podiatry services you do not like. It's just it's just crazy. Don't write about them. Don't blog about them.

Just because you can write about cons doesn't mean you need to. Doesn't need to be on your website. A lot of patients already know you do it. It's a

perfect point. If if it's not something you want to see patients for, then don't have it visible on your website. You wanna make sure that that website appease appeals to your ideal patients and the type of procedures and treatments you wanna provide.

Yeah. Treat treat the parts of podiatry you don't really enjoy, don't have them on your website and I say treat them like Voldemort. Do you know who Voldemort is from Harry Potter?

Of course. I I I read all the Harry Potter books.

Yeah. So treat them like Voldemort. We do not mention it. The name is not to be mentioned. So if there's certain things about podiatry you like least or you don't like doing, you should don't write about them.

Don't have them on your website. It should never be brought up in conversation in your clinic. It's just you just don't talk about it. If it happens to be put in front of you, like I said, I don't you know, I hate adults. But occasionally, the old patient would sneak through with one, and they'd rip that dressing off and I got don't go get somebody else in the clinic who didn't mind it as much as me.

Sure. I had a weak stomach. Really, really weak stomach. So if I just get back to the home business part, if I if you want to look at that as a service that I didn't particularly like doing, and I'll go home visits slash nursing homes, hostels, that type of work, unless there's a professional setup, not a toilet seat or but do you call it toilet seat in America?

Yeah. It's a toilet seat.

But you don't go to toilet though, do you? You go to the bathroom.

Yeah. But then I'll I'll I don't live in The US though. Right? So I I think about toilets. I think about or the yeah.

That's really funny. I just realized that. To go back to the home visits slash nursing homes, I found them, they were time consuming. But they always were to leave your clinic and go do something and come back again very time consuming. They were backbreaking.

I used to find out I used to get a lot of sore sore shoulders, my back, my neck, and and I don't think a lot of podiatrists charge accordingly for how much time and effort they put into it and the discomfort they put themselves through sometimes. I don't think podiatrists charge enough to do them. And but I do believe they are a valuable service for the right podiatrist if you're if you're set up a certain way. But if it's not for you, that's okay. You don't you don't have to do home visits.

Like I said, right from my side, you don't have to do anything in podiatry. You do not enjoy doing. So that's what I want to talk about on this particular subject. Sort of marketing related.

No. I think it makes a lot of sense. Right? It kind of comes back to what your goals are as a podiatrist, right? If there's a certain type of patients you enjoy seeing, whether it's different types of procedures or a certain demographic, one of the first things you should do when you're in practice is to really hone in on what direction you wanna go and who you wanna treat.

You know, obviously, like you said, doesn't mean you're not you know, you're occasionally gonna get someone that's not kind of in that cohort of people that are kind of your ideal patients. But if you're being more deliberate about what you see and what you don't see and what direction you go to, you know, you have a lot better chance to have a more successful and a more kind of a happier practice and more of a practice that you enjoy going to every day.

Yeah. And I know some people who got very successful podiatry clinics that are very that are heavily home visit based. And they do really well from it, and the people that work for them love it. So it's it's suited to certain people. And the people who are and the podiatrists that are taking that job know exactly what they're in for.

And they actually enjoy moving around from house to house, and and they love that type of work. So I don't think it's a service that you you should look down on. It's just it's gotta be for the right podiatrist under the right circumstances, but that comes to any area of podiatry. And I mentioned when I set up Mackay, and we didn't do any routine foot care. If you really believe what you're gonna do, stand behind that.

And even though you you sometimes might doubt that you're doing the right thing. And I know when we had bills to pay and people ring up saying, oh, can we be seen for an ingrown toenail? Oh, my grandmother needs a toenails cut. I'm going and my receptionist is saying to me, sure you don't wanna start seeing these patients? And we're just letting money go.

I'm going, I know we're doing the right thing here. And we let them go. And what was good is we let them go to the other podiatrist in town. We kept him really busy with all the routine foot care, which he was great at. And that freed up airtime just to do biomechanical MSK stuff.

And in the end, it all paid off. So I think stick stick to what you stick to what you think is gonna work, and don't give up too early.

Sounds like sage advice.

Mhmm. Okay. Jim, that's enough for me this week. I will talk to you again next week.

Sounds good, Tyson. Okay. Bye. Bye now.

Thanks for listening to Podiatry Marketing with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDonnell. Subscribe and learn more at PodiatryMarketing. That's the website address, podiatry.marketing.