Should You Open Your Online Calendar For AI Booking?

You're listening to Podiatry Marketing, conversations on building

a successful podiatry practice with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDannald.

Hi, I'm Tyson Franklin, and welcome back to this week's episode of Podiatry Marketing. With me as he is every week, my good friend, Big Jim Mack, aka Jim McDannald. How are doing today, Jim?

Tyson, I'm doing well. I'm I'm sure that the folks watching the YouTube video can see I'm wearing a purple shirt today. I don't always wear the color purple, it's a bit of a special thing this week. My... One of my college friends, a university friend's daughter was diagnosed with brain cancer a few years ago, and they're in the process of building a kind of a...

Accessible playground in the Milwaukee area. So I'm I'm repping the Stella's playground shirt today for those that can't see the YouTube video.

So is there a purple... There's a reason for purple. It's just the color they've chosen for the promotion.

Yeah. So it's purple because that's her favorite color. And then she's a big she's a big fan of dragons there. So a little dragon here on the on the shirt as well. And actually the few people go to...

You know, you go to stella'splayground..org, you can either donate but you can also look at the plans there's a pretty elaborate kind of rebuild of a playground and includes a like a dragon themed area of the playground so it's pretty cool.

Yeah how's she doing anyway?

She's doing well. Like, I mean, she's had to go through a lot of surgeries. It's been tough rehab and things for her. But over the last two years, she's she's got an ability to walk again, to be back on her feet. She can ride a kind of assisted bicycle.

So... Yeah. She's... And she's going back to school. So those things are great.

But I think this this playground they're building the the... Their mom and... Her mom and dad are spearheading is gonna be a great addition to the Milwaukee community and be a really great thing. So, it's excited to show off the shirt and wear purple tonight for Stella's playground.

Oh, no. I tell you when you hear things about that, yeah, a little bit other people's children or, you know, a child going through what she's going through. Just makes all your problems in life seem so insignificant. I can't imagine what the parents have had to go through. What they went through when they initially found out.

What they've gone through all these years and what they're constantly still going through and the fears that would be happening. Yeah. My life is simple.

Well, they've got a good support system around them. They've got a lot of great family and friends there in the Milwaukee area, but yet hasn't been easy, but they're a great family and doing the best they can.

That's the one thing. Last week's episode, we were talking about creativity. And creativity comes about by putting two dots together. And they've done exactly that with the charity.

Yeah, think they're taking a tough situation and making the best of it and really bringing something to the community that the community didn't have previously. So yeah, it's tough stuff but at the same time they're making the best of it.

Okay, so what are we talking

about today, Jim? On a wider note.

So we're gonna jump from

something else that is not even important now.

So we're gonna jump from cancer and playgrounds to should you open your online calendar for AI booking. That's what we're gonna jump in today. And, you know, what I recommend people do right now is, you know, open up Gemini. That's Google's AI platform. If you have it on your phone, on your desktop, and type book me an appointment with a podiatrist in Chicago next Tuesday.

Since about August, it doesn't hand you a list of names of podiatrists in clinic anymore. It's gonna show open times at practices that take your insurance and you can basically tap... If you're an adult, you can tap and make an appointment there on I think it's Zocdoc right now is the one platform that's attached but it's kind of the way things are going and we'll jump into what that means right now for clinics and what it means for clinics in the future.

Well, I haven't heard of anyone doing that before. Can I just test that out while you're doing it here? I want to try it in Australia is Ask Gemini and do I type it in here? I start chat.

Yeah. Just type it straight in... Yeah. Straight in

the in the chart in Can you book me an appointment with a podiatrist? If I spell podiatrist right, it'd be great. Podiatrist in, I'll put here North Brisbane. I'm gonna stick to a capital city because I don't, you know, if I say Cairns it might be too small. Yeah.

Brisbane, right, would be even better as well. So here we are, let see what it says. Appointment, I cannot complete a booking on your behalf as online booking says they require personal details such as your full name. However, however, it's then got a list of certain podiatry clinics. So you're saying in Chicago that it links through to another program?

Yeah. So there's an online booking platform called Zocdoc currently and we'll get into the details about that. But you had to basically probably be in The US, and then there might be some geo blocking that you're dealing with there in Australia. Yeah. I don't know how I don't know how widely widely it is rolled out in The US, but it's definitely kind of a sign of the times and Sock Doc and Google Gym and I have kind of combined forces to to make this a possibility.

So today, like for... Like I said, for context, the goal is before you know, you could just... You know, the goal is to be found, right, and be visible.

Mhmm.

Show up in the map pack, have the reviews, get the phone call, showing at the top three on these Google list... Google links. But now we're kinda inching towards the age of AI assistants or AI agents. And what they're trying to do now is kinda skip all the way to the phone call. So, you know, with a voice assistant or even a text...

Typing a text in, you know, if the assistant sees an open slot in a practice that has ZocDoc or maybe in the future an EMR that's connected to these different chat chat and AI platforms, you know, there's gonna be a lot less clicking going on. It's it's gonna be just a direct to making appointment situation in the future potentially.

Makes sense though, because you can picture someone who is looking for a podiatrist. There might be eight podiatrists in the area. They don't know who's who, they're new to the town, they haven't had a recommendation from a friend who's been to a podiatrist, but they just know they need to be seen and in their head all podiatrists recall, yeah, you're not in jail so you must know what you're doing. Going on there and just typing something out, at least it's gonna give them an available appointment.

Yeah, we've known anything about human nature, people like to save time. They don't like to waste time and obviously they want to make sure that they have a reputable podiatrist, but I think sometimes they're leaving the screening or this reputation up to the sometimes into intermediaries. But today we'll be covering, you know, what's changed, you know, this year, know, how the booking is actually, you know, working now and in the future, and why being bookable beats being findable. Yeah. And, like, there's a real there's a real choice people have to make.

A lot of people like to kind of filter their practices and say, oh, I don't wanna see this type of patient on a Tuesday or don't schedule that there. So sometimes people will decide not to use... Utilize online scheduling or online booking on their EMR on their... Or participate in things things like ZocDoc because ZocDoc generally will take a cut of a new patient. So, you know, there's different costs associated with not making your clinic's calendar available online to either book new or returning patients.

So that's something we're going jump in today and to go more detail into.

Yeah, well when I sold my clinic ten years ago, it was probably less than 10% of people even had online bookings. Now nearly every podiatrist that has online bookings. And they're probably like this ZocDoc, there's probably a small percentage of podiatrists using it now. You can see in ten years time how it's going to evolve into that area.:

Now that's where it's going and like talked about, you know, AI is going to at some point it's going to stop recommending doctors and having clinics and these like long list of people have to scroll through. It's gonna start booking them directly. And like I said, in August, Google Gemini rolled out this ability to book doctor's appointments with ZocDoc. Like I said, a patient describes what's going on. Gemini works out kind of what doctor they need to see, shows real open times on practices that take their insurance and the patient picks one.

Since then, you know, there's different other types of health assistance like Amazon has one. Yelp has also plugged into some booking networks as well. The question that patients ask the AI is shifting from who should I see to like get me in to a clinic near me. Right? So if your schedule isn't visible in these tools, that patient may no longer know that you exist or may not be an option...

You you may not be an option for them because they're skipping the the the Google Maps or those things. Like I said, this is very early days, so we're not to

the point where

this is a mature technology and everybody's doing it. But this is more about just kind of informing people about the way things look like they're heading.

Was it two years ago we did the episode on AI just about chat GTP? Two years, just over two years ago. This podcast was one of the first podcasts I'd heard of us even talking about it and that was only two and a bit years ago. Now, you can mention ChatGPT to my mum who's 82 this year, who would know what I'm talking about. So that is gone ahead really quick.

So I'm expecting this if it works and it works well with not being too many hurdles, I can see it. This is where it's gonna be headed.

No, for sure. Like I said, it's kind of slowly rolling out. So if you type, you know, if if if the listeners or the the viewers of this video do it themselves and it's not available in the area, that's that's not too surprising. But right now, Gemini, know, books, like I said, through ZocDoc for US adults currently. Any provider already on ZocDoc with open slots is kind of automatically added so they don't have to...

If they're a ZocDoc customer, they don't have to do that. But like I said, I think where this is gonna go is not gonna just stop at ZocDoc. I think there's gonna be direct integrations into at least the scheduling portion of electronic medical record. So like I said, there's this constant conflict. I think a lot of the clinics I talk to is they want to have control their schedule and have the, you know, the right fit patients come to the practice.

But at the same time the availability of getting someone on the books after hours, after the clinic is closed and there's only kind of emergency backup. Sometimes these AI schedulers that can schedule appointments, People have not implemented those or they don't... They really wanna make sure they sift through the the forms and who's requested an appointment. But, you know, as we get closer to this, you know, the patients are already on these platforms. Right?

About half of people these days have used AI to research a doctor. And AI, you know, edges out, you know, in the future, you know, AI, we talked in the in the past is like... Sometimes, like, it's like 20 to 30 Google searches in one in a way. Right? So you're gonna get better information, better feedback from these these AI platforms.

And like I said, they're moving not only just to show you who the best doctor is near you or the one that you want, but it's gonna go take that next step and bypass the search results and go in straight into booking.

This be applied more to a new patient who hasn't seen a podiatry check because your existing patients if they're already seeing you would know to go to your website to book an online appointment.

Yeah, think that majority would be new patients, but at the same time, if you're booking out six weeks and your staff, I mean, it's also communication potential. If your clinic doesn't communicate well with returning patients, this might be an outlet for them. If they have something emergent and you're telling your patient, oh, it's going be a week or it's going to be two weeks, and they feel like it's something more urgent, maybe they'd be willing to use one of these AI platforms to book an appointment. But yeah, I'd say it's primarily focused on new patient activation and appointments, but at the same time the convenience factor can't be overlooked about how easy it is to talk to these things and get on the schedule instead of having to fill out a form, wait for a callback, have a phone call and talk to that person, then to confirm the booking. That's only a lot of time...

I mean, it's five-ten minutes total, but these days people expect things like with Netflix and Amazon Prime, people expect minimal interaction with kind of the same type of customer service. So it's one of these things where it's becoming not necessarily that you're wasting their time, it's their expectations about the way that they would like to receive care.

Where should everybody start? They're hearing you talk about this and they're going, okay, Jim, that sounds great. What should I do? Where do I Yes. Begin with all

So first I just kind of like explain a little bit more detail, you know, how the booking actually works. Like I said, right now most people's EMRs aren't connected directly to these platforms. So what happens is when an AI assistant books a podiatry appointment, it isn't logging, like I said, into your EHR. There's hundreds of these kind of practice management systems out there and no AI company is going to wire into each of them. So what sits right now at least is that in the middle of these kind of these booking networks, the most common one that a lot of people know about is Zocdoc.

And this network connects your calendar and your EMR to these different AI networks. So for Gemini, the network is ZocDoc. So opening your calendar to AI comes down to one question today. Is your schedule sitting somewhere that AI can reach it? Like I said, I think there'll be more of these.

I don't think Zocdoc is going to have the monopoly, but right now they're the kind of biggest provider of this right now. Maybe there's going to be ways that AI and these platforms can connect directly to hundreds of EMRs, but that's always been a problem especially in The US when it comes to healthcare is that there are so many different EMRs trying to get integrations and connections to all of them can be very very difficult. It can be something where you know, I'm sure competitors will crop up, but it takes time to integrate into all these different software systems.

Is there any privacy concerns with any of this?

Well, yeah. I mean, there's always concerns, you know, when it comes to patient, you know, HIPAA and kind of patient information. Obviously, a lot of these kind of middlemen sitting between AI and and the EMR is is is... Should be HIPAA compliant. Right?

So you shouldn't just sign up for any kind of these middleman services like ZocDoc. But, generally, they will have a a BAA, which you need to... Which says they're gonna, you know, treat the data securely and all these types of things. But, yeah, there there are always those concerns. Right?

It's like you know, people these days, you know, you talked about before the shows that, you know, AI kind of hacked into like the Australian health care system or something. There needs to be sometimes a buffer or an in between service that if something gets hacked into or there's something that patient information is kept safe but that's always... Security is always a concern with these types of things.

And you're talking about Gemini doing this. Are the other... The other AI programs using it as well? Not

currently then, the research I've done, like I said it's very early here. Right now like I said at least from what I've seen online it's the connection between Gemini and ZocDoc that makes this possible currently. If you're looking for podiatrists on ChatGPT or Claw they're gonna kind of give you the standard almost like a Google type list of the nearby podiatrists or kind of ranking them by different types of signals or different types of online resources. But, yeah, like I said, there's... It kinda comes down...

This system comes down to three pieces. Like I said, the AI that patient's talking to, that can be Claude or ChatGPT or Gemini. That booking network in the middle, like ZocDoc or some others, and your practice management calendar. So the patient only sees the first one, you know, in this scenario, like I said, they're not gonna see... When this comes to maturity or fruition, they're not gonna see that that that kind of middleware at all.

They're just gonna see that they're on your schedule. So like I said, the the biggest booking network right now connects more than a 150 scheduling systems. And it's just... Like I said, it just... Zocdoc just opened their AI platforms via Google Gemini.

Okay. So then what's next? So they've... They now understand what it is.

Yeah.

What what what can a podiatrist do or what should they be doing to get more involved?

No. I think that's... It's it's a bit of a mindset shift. Right? Like we talked about...

And I still talk about a lot. It's still important is that, people need to be findable. But really, bookable beats being findable in the future. So I think using your marketing dollars to make sure your clinic is visible online through Google Business Profile and your website and newsletter, that visibility is still super important. But, you know, there is this kind of gradual shift that people need to be aware of.

So, like I said, when an AI assistant books for a patient, its job is to finish the task. If it can see an opening at 09:40 on a Thursday at one practice and only a phone number on yours, it isn't going to wait until Monday to call you. It books the one it can see. So being findable used to be enough, right? Like because the patient would give you a call.

Now the practice that's bookable at 10:00 on a Sunday night is going to see the patient and they're going to get that appointment. So the one that answers the phone on Monday, they never knew they lost one. So having... It's this kind of thing like if you currently have your online scheduling offer in EMR, realize that at some point in time that that could be a disadvantage for you and for your practice. So it's a matter of workflow and preference currently, but in the future, as these AI agents and these AI platforms are able to see into your calendar and make appointments on the weekends or making it much easier for patients to interact and not even have to go to your website anymore, It's a real dilemma that I think a lot of clinics are going to have to confront.

Yeah, but I can see what I've mentioned before. If you don't have online bookings, if there's two websites and someone's looking at both websites, the information is equal. But one of them has an online booking where they can make a booking straight away and the other one doesn't, people are probably gonna make the online booking. As it progresses, you know that if they're then asking the questions and then Gemini for example is looking and going straight away. Well this one, you can book an appointment.

So they'll start booking it straight away. You're not even getting a look in if you don't have this set up.

No. Absolutely. And I I like I said, this is a more topic just to help educate our peers. I don't think this is gonna happen tomorrow or next week where you have to, like, make these really hard decisions. I think one of the benefits of being a podiatrist that podiatry tends to kind of skew older when it comes to a lot of the clinics who they treat and who's trying to make these appointments.

So, you know, like, it's not something that, you know, unless you live in a very young upcoming area, maybe that's... Obviously, younger people like phone calls even less than than my generation does. Like I said, right now in podiatry maybe one out of five people prefer to book online. It's even fewer, maybe one out of 10 over the age of 65. So people are still going to call the clinic, but giving that opportunity to get on your schedule right away, I think is a huge advantage.

These people are going to show up. And I think it's a really, really important component to consider. So like I said, it's not gonna happen tomorrow or next week, but just knowing that this, you know, opening the calendar for people that want it could be a potential advantage for you to do that, but also could be a disadvantage of the future of these AI agents are are looking at... Looking for a calendar on your website and one does not exist.

It's also as people, as this rolls out, people use it, they'll talk to other people. Other people will then start using it. It was only a couple of years ago, I would still would ring a clinic to make an appointment. And then I think it was like on a Sunday night, I had to make a physio appointment, a dental appointment and a doctor's appointment. And I'd said something to my wife, said, Why you just get online and do it now?

I went, I'm so used to just ringing because it's just what I've done. Within six minutes I'd booked all three appointments and from that point onwards I never ever have picked up the phone to make an appointment because it was so simple. Moving ahead, as soon as somebody is able to do this, this will be how they always do it. They will just, even if they're going to their, even if they've already seen an existing podiatrist and they may not have been for six months or twelve months, I would need an appointment just to get X treated. They're gonna go online, especially if they have no loyalty to any podiatrist.

No, absolutely. I think it's a convenience factor for people. I think, like, for example, with me, it's a little bit on a different topic, but, know, during the pandemic, I started ordering my Costco groceries to be delivered. And I looked I looked back at all the time and effort that I saved from getting in a car, driving a half an hour to go to Costco, be tempted by all the big screen televisions, computers, hard drives, and then there's groceries there as well. You Spending 30 to 45 minutes shopping and then hauling it all into my car, driving back home.

We're talking like two hours, right? Or I can just get online, order my groceries on Costco and have it delivered to my door. Obviously, it's probably a little bit more expensive. I'd try to tip well for the the people to deliver it. But at the same time, like, once you go to...

Once you do certain things, I just like... I'm never... I'll get I'll get some fresh vegetables and some meat and some other stuff and some nice Italian food in my in my neighborhood as a walk away, but I'm never gonna go get the the staples and like... And waste two or three hours of my day anymore. I get that time back.

So the same thing there. And I think one other quick point I wanted to make out is, you know, make up here for for the folks is that this is an opportunity to make sure that your your website, all your online profiles, that you have the same, you know, links to your website, the phone number, the address because this is what Google, Gemini, and all these different platforms are pulling from. So you wanna make sure if they do turn... If you do turn it on, you wanna make sure that you're getting the phone calls to the right number or the the online form is connecting to your EMR EMR in the right way and the... They have the right website there.

So making sure you're feeding good information to these different AI agents and AI platforms.

Okay, so if somebody is not already using online bookings but they've got it available, should they start getting... Should they just make sure we need to be doing online bookings and we need to get that done right.

I would say so yes. I would have... I'd recommend that people turn on online scheduling that they already have with their EMR. Most practices already have this online scheduling with their EMR. It's sitting there.

It's switched off. The usual reasons that the doctor office manager wants to screen every new patient by phone first. And I understand that. But every patient who has to call to get screened could book somewhere else and they don't have to wait or make that phone call. And an AI assistant is not going to be required any kind of waiting whatsoever if they use it.

So you don't have to open up everything. Use one as a test. Maybe you're comfortable with having like one day a week be open to new patients scheduling through online booking. And then maybe even then as you're as you're doing it, you wanna at least kinda like baby step it a little bit, maybe you have the the office manager or someone to screen those calls on the back end. But I think there is a huge benefit of having it on because if you're...

Like I said, you're putting yourself at... In the future I think you're putting yourself at a disadvantage by not having that option. You still have the phone number there, you can still have a form fill if you'd like to have that on the website but making that calendar open to book an appointment I think is going to be the most common way of doing it in the future and the kind of filtering on the front end is going to go by the wayside because these clinics that do that are going to be missing out on these new patients that are coming into the practice.

Like I said, there'd be a lot of people if they're searching between two people and one's got a simple system to get online and book and the other one I'll have to ring to make the appointment. And especially if like I know people when they're making their appointments, there's certain questions that you're answering. That information's all going through the clinic. So the clinic can then ring the patient if they need to clarify anything or if they need to allow more time because it might be a more complex problem. I think if you've got it available you should be using it.

But I know there's some podiatry clinics, I don't know in The States but they still have a paper diary.

Well, like I said, not everybody's ready for the real time booking. Right? So there's some systems that see CMR... EMRs that offer, you know, a request an appointment mode that the staff has to confirm those appointments. So it's a But like I said, a request is not a real booking.

Right? So the patient's still waiting and the AI assistant, I don't know if they're gonna be able to suss that out, at least for right now, probably not because it's still early days. It's something get

annoyed when that happens. I get annoyed when I go on there and say, hey, make your appointment. You book it. You put all your information. You do it all.

It's just we will get back to you to let you know whether you have that appointment. And I've gone, why don't you just tell me that from the start? Then more than likely you might get the appointment, but there's a chance you may not. That's frustrating.

Yeah, it can be frustrating. So you have to kind of tread lightly when you're kind of rolling out that way. And then, like I said, most of these are built into EHRs or your EMR. And, you know, I would ask that you should be asking your... The company you use about kind of what's the best practices or how are people turning on.

What are my option when it comes to online booking? And it does... Yeah. These AHRs that they have, you know, will they... Are they gonna partner with one of these kind of middle scheduling companies?

Are they going to try to partner directly with Google Gemini and ChatGPT and those places in the future? Like what is their forward thinking way of getting patients through these different AI agents? Because like I said, this is going to be a thing moving forward for sure.

Okay. So what's next?

The last is kinda like, obviously, when we talk about these types of things, people think about the pocketbook, they think about the bottom line and wanna know, you know, what does it cost to be bookable? And then, you know, and then who owns the patient? Because that's always a tricky thing. ZocDoc is not a free service. Like I said, they take a cut Yeah.

Of every new patient that comes in. So, like like, even me right now, when I work with clinics that are on ZocDoc, it's like, how can we potentially like wean ourselves off that? I think this AI connectivity makes it a little trickier. You know, like I said, getting booked through AI isn't free. Right now, the main road, like I said, you run into, you know, somewhere between, you know, depending on the specialty, it can be between 30 to a $140 for...

To to spend on per patient with Zocdoc. That can be a Depending great deal of on the specialty. Like in podiatry, probably not quite that much, but it it can be a significant amount. So, if you're already using Google Ads or doing other types of marketing it's something to consider. So you really want to know your cost per patient with any channel that you're using.

So if people are coming through ZocDoc, did you do? Did you make orthotics for them? Were they a surgical candidate? Just knowing kind of what you're paying per new patient coming into practice, super, super important. Because like I said, you want to ask before you sign up to any of these intermediaries.

Are they going to charge for all the traffic they send? Are they only gonna charge for new patients? How do they know that somebody's a returning patient that they're sending you? So these are the types of things you have to be really, really aware of when you're looking at Zocdoc and its intermediaries. That could be actually...

Zocdoc could probably be another podcast in of itself but you know, right now these are the only conduit to things like Gemini and these AI agent platforms.

Yeah, I was just surprised it costs that much for that process to happen. So somebody can make an appointment you get charged $30 but if they don't turn up you've still been charged $30 Yeah,

I don't have a lot of experience as far as what the refunds are. If you can ask if the patient was a no show like how you do that but that's definitely, like I said right now they kind of own that relationship between the EMRs and these AI platforms. So something to be aware of.

That's harsh. Just, it is. It's something that you really, when you, if you look at your other marketing, like I said, I can see this is going to be the future of appointment bookings but I can see the price needs to come down before it would become mainstream.

No, for sure, for sure. But that's like kind of, you know, to wrap up things today, I'd just kind of go over the main points of what we talked about today. And, you know, one being that AI went from recommending doctors to booking them this year, starting with Gemini. So be aware of that. Two, for now the booking runs through a network connected to your calendar, not directly to your EHR.

So that's like Zocdoc on these platforms. So I'm sure there's gonna be more popping up in the future, but just know that for now. Three, bookable beats findable, but your older patients still need someone to answer the phone. So this is early days. This is more kind of an educational podcast tonight just so you're aware of what's coming down the pipe.

Super important.

That still applies to now though, even without what's happening in the future, even just with online bookings right now, Bookable is better than Findable. So they find two places, one they can book an online appointment and one they can't. You're do the online appointment.

Yeah, the online scheduling for HR is already there, right? So I'd recommend that people turn it on so you can get those patients that are calling or looking for care on a Sunday night or after hours when you don't have someone taking those phone calls and making those appointments in person. And the last point I would say is that know what each booking that comes through these different platforms cost you whenever possible because, like I said, you know, if if... Hopefully the prices come down on things like Zocdoc and those things in the future, but, you know, if they own that relationship between AI and your EMR, they're they're gonna be more than happy to charge you through the nose for that. So hopefully some of these platforms will...

Some of these AI agents and platforms will connect directly in a safe way, in a secure way to EMR so you don't have to kind of go through that middleman anymore but that's just something really really important to consider.

I know you like your action steps. So what is the action step for everybody this week?

Yeah, so I'd say this week if you don't know already find out whether you have online scheduling turned on in your EMR. If it isn't, write down maybe two or three visit types or maybe a certain day or a couple of days that you're willing to turn it on so people have that open availability to make an appointment. Then maybe like, you know, if you if you are a Zocdoc user, maybe open up Gemini and see if you can make an appointment in your town somewhere during... With with Gemini. Like I said, it's probably...

It's kinda rolling out slowly across America, so maybe not every location has it. But that's something to be aware of. And if you want to see how your practice looks, like I said previously, if you want to see how you're currently showing up, where you're visible, if you have questions, more questions about this online bookability and ways to open up your EMR to online scheduling, you can always reach out to myself or Tyson or you can reach us at podiatry. Marketing or via our email. But I think it's really, really important component that's only going to grow in the future is this online booking tied in with these AI agents.

So don't get caught behind. Think you said, like I said, you still have time to get things going, but definitely look into your online scheduling, what your EMR offers, talk to your EMR company to make sure that they have something that's going to work for you and for your practice.

Fantastic information. Jim, you're always looking into the future. Yeah, like in two years, I mentioned the chat we spoke about two, two and a half years ago and now we're talking about this now. In two years time we go, oh Jim, remember when we first spoke about this on episode two fifty two and you go, oh, that's right, we did once again ahead of our time.

Yeah, I'm always talking to my computer via like different ways of doing it or my phones and I can only imagine that it's going to start talking back and provide more options, better options in the future. So yeah, it'll be interesting to see where this goes the next two years.

Will be. And anything else you wanna promote before we wrap up?

No. I think I'm good there.

Okay. So if anyone wants to get ahold of me for any particular reason, you can go to my website, timsonfranklin.com. And I'm also... I've got... Know I when this episode comes to you.

I'm doing a few events online in 2027. If you go to my website, details are on there. I look forward to seeing some of you online.

Yeah. Definitely people should check that out.

Okay. Big Jim, I look forward to talking to you next week.

Sounds great, Tyson.

Okay. See you.

Bye now.

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