The No BS Dental Growth Podcast

The No BS Dental Growth Podcast

By Chris PistoriusBusinessMarketingManagement
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The No BS Dental Growth Podcast episodes

  • The 3-Mile Dental Google Maps Problem

    You can have a great practice, a great team and great reviews, and still barely show up when someone three miles away searches "dentist near me." Chris calls it the 3-mile maps problem, and it's a new-patient growth problem, not just a rankings problem. He covers why searching your own practice from the front desk tells you almost nothing, why local visibility is a field around your office that changes by location and service, the stack Google actually trusts (relevance, prominence, proximity, competition), why "we used to rank" isn't a plan, where Google Ads fit and why maps and organic visibility are the long-term asset, and the practical audit to run this week.

    Homework: pick three nearby neighborhoods, search the way a new patient would, write down who's in the map pack, screenshot it, and decide based on the gap, not assumptions. Clicks are not the outcome. Patients and production are.

    Get My Growth Plan: https://kickstartdental.com | Podcast: https://kickstartdental.com/podcast | Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/nobsdentalgrowth

    22 min
  • Stop Sponsoring Community Events | No BS Dental Growth Podcast

    If your "community marketing" is a logo on a t-shirt and a check you can't track, that's not marketing. That's a donation with better lighting.

    Most dental sponsorships buy the same four things: a logo, a booth, an Instagram photo, and a thank-you email. What they don't buy is booked new patients with a source you can point to. Awareness without a named next step is a weather report. Strategy is a path from stranger to scheduled patient.

    Before you write another check, run the four-part patient-path test:

    1) A named offer (not "call us")

    2) Tracking (URL, QR, code, or dedicated line)

    3) A follow-up owner within 24 hours

    4) A 30-day scoreboard

    Fail two of four and you're funding a charity line — which is fine, if you budget it that way. Don't call it patient acquisition.

    This episode covers what most sponsorships actually buy, when community marketing is worth it (referral-channel behavior + a measurable next step), how to redesign a 5K or walk away clean, the objections you'll hear ("but it's a good cause," "they'll be mad," "exposure"), a no-jerk "no" script, and homework: cancel one logo-only sponsorship this month and give one real partner a four-line referral script.

    No path, no check.

    CHAPTERS

    0:00 Cold open — logo + untracked check ≠ marketing

    0:37 Intro

    1:25 Awareness is a weather report

    2:13 What most sponsorships actually buy

    3:21 Four-part patient-path test

    4:45 Story: amnesia with a logo

    5:41 When community marketing is worth it

    7:30 Money math: spend ÷ credited new patients

    9:03 Redesign the 5K — or move on

    9:22 Homework + four-line referral script

    10:48 Objections + how to say no

    12:25 Recap

    12:50 Outro

    LINKS

    Get My Growth Plan: https://kickstartdental.com

    Podcast: https://kickstartdental.com/podcast

    Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/nobsdentalgrowth

    15 min
  • Patients Already Asked ChatGPT. Now What? | Dental Practice Growth

    Your patient may arrive with an answer from ChatGPT before you have asked your first question.

    How should your dental team respond?

    In this episode of the No BS Dental Growth Podcast, Chris Pistorius explores how to handle consultations when patients have already researched symptoms or treatments using AI, Google, or social media.

    The conversation covers:

    • Asking what the patient has already researched

    • Understanding the goal behind their questions

    • Guiding the conversation into the clinical exam

    • Keeping the front desk, clinical team, and treatment coordinator consistent

    • Practicing a clearer opening at your next team huddle

    For dental practice owners and leaders, the takeaway is practical: understand where the patient is starting, then help them understand the next step.

    What opening question works best when a patient says, “I already asked ChatGPT”? Share your approach in the comments—without patient details.

    Learn more about KickStart Dental Marketing:

    https://kickstartdental.com

    Subscribe for more No BS Dental Growth Podcast episodes and Dental Growth Hacks.

    16 min
  • Your Google Profile Is the Waiting Room. Treat It Like One | No BS Dental Growth Podcast

    A patient already decided they need a dentist. They are not reading your implant blog. Most of them open Google Maps, land on your profile, and ask the same five questions your front desk hears every day: cost, wait, anxiety, parking, and insurance.

    Chris Pistorius walks through why your Google Business Profile is the waiting room (website = consult room, ads = highway sign), how AI overviews lean on public Maps facts, why keyword stuffing looks like an ad patients and models skip, how to use GBP Q&A, and the homework: categories, photos, matching hours, front-desk language, and a legal business name only.

    Furnish the waiting room. That is the job this week — not another blog package.

    LINKS Free Strategy Session: https://kickstartdental.com

    Podcast: https://kickstartdental.com/podcast

    Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/nobsdentalgrowth

    11 min
  • Your Dental Practice Is Busy — So Why Aren't You Making More Money?

    Your dental practice can be booked solid, producing more than last year, and still leave you wondering where the money went.

    In Episode 11, Chris Pistorius breaks down the “full schedule trap”: why activity is not the same as profit, the numbers every practice owner needs to know, how an inefficient schedule quietly destroys margin, and why more leads will not fix a broken operating system.

    You will learn how to look beyond a full calendar and diagnose the five levers that actually determine whether your practice is becoming healthier: clinical productivity, collections, conversion, overhead, and profit.

    LINKS

    Free Strategy Session: https://kickstartdental.com

    Podcast: https://kickstartdental.com/podcast

    20 min
  • Most Dentists Are Bad at the Actual Job, Which Is Sales
    Most dentists are excellent clinicians and untrained salespeople. That gap — not your marketing budget — is where most production quietly disappears.
    In this episode Chris Pistorius breaks down why the word "sales" makes dentists flinch, how the industry invented a whole vocabulary to avoid it (case presentation, patient education, treatment acceptance), the seven places consults reliably break, and what good actually looks like in the operatory. Plus the math on why lifting case acceptance 10 points is almost always cheaper than buying more leads.
    Free strategy session: https://kickstartdental.com
    Read the full breakdown: https://kickstartdental.com/blog/dentists-bad-at-sales-case-acceptance
    24 min
  • Your Patients Aren't Looking for a Dentist
    Nobody opens Google and types "please help me find a decent priced dentist with great reviews and modern technology close to me." They type "why does my tooth hurt on the lower right?"
    Patients aren't searching for a dentist. They're searching for a solution to a problem — and that one shift changes how you should market your practice, especially now that AI-powered search answers questions conversationally.
    In this episode, Chris Pistorius breaks down:
    - How patients actually search (and why "dentist near me" thinking is outdated)
    - Why nearly every dental website reads identically — and what causes it
    - Why patients don't buy implants, veneers or Invisalign (they buy a better life)
    - The four silent questions every patient asks on your homepage
    - How to coach patients into reviews that actually sell
    - Building content around the old trio: time, fear, money
    - Why specific always beats general — and how to become known for one thing
    - Campaign + landing page structure that converts
    - Your homework: the two-column exercise
    📖 Full written breakdown: https://kickstartdental.com/blog/patients-search-for-solutions-not-dentists
    🚀 Free 15-minute strategy session: https://kickstartdental.com

    16 min
  • The Case for Raising Your Prices Tomorrow | Why Most Dentists Are Underpriced
    Everyone who touches your practice got a raise except you. Your supply company, your lab, your landlord, your hygienist — all repriced. If your fees haven't moved in three to five years, you didn't hold prices steady. You cut them by about 20% in real terms, and it never showed up on a single report.
    In this episode, Chris Pistorius makes the case for raising your fees tomorrow — not next quarter — and runs the actual math on the thing every owner is afraid of.
    You'll learn:
    - Why revenue growth hides a shrinking margin (and how owners end up producing more while earning less)
    - The real math: how a 10% fee increase on a $1M practice turns ~$350K profit into ~$450K
    - Why a fee increase is 100% margin — it has no cost attached to it
    - What actually happens when practices raise fees 8–12% (spoiler: almost nothing)
    - Why the patients you lose were never loyal — and why losing them frees the chair time growth requires
    - How your fee schedule works as a positioning signal, whether you mean it to or not
    - The 4-step rollout: benchmark, size the move, don't apologize, put it on the calendar forever
    - A one-hour action item that quantifies exactly what your fear cost you last year
    🦷 Ready to build a practice that attracts patients who choose your value instead of your price? We work with independent dentists and orthodontists — one practice per market.
    👉 Free strategy session: https://kickstartdental.com
    📖 Read the full write-up: https://kickstartdental.com/blog/raising-dental-fees-underpriced-practice
    #dentalmarketing #dentalpractice #practicemanagement #dentistry
    15 min
  • Your Market Isn't Saturated. You're Just the Same. | No BS Dental Growth Podcast
    Every week dentists tell me "my market is just too saturated." But after 17 years of helping independent practices grow, I can tell you — that's almost never the real problem.
    In this episode, I break down:
    → Why the math proves your market isn't actually saturated
    → The 3 things that DO get saturated (and what to do about each)
    → 3 specific levers to differentiate your practice immediately
    → The "Mirror Test" — a brutally honest self-assessment you can do today
    → One sentence that will change your entire marketing strategy
    If you've ever said "it's just too competitive here," this episode will challenge everything you believe about your market — and put the power back in your hands.
    🦷 RESOURCES:
    📖 Blog post: https://kickstartdental.com/blog/your-market-isnt-saturated-youre-just-the-same
    🌐 Website: https://kickstartdental.com
    📅 Free strategy session: https://kickstartdental.com
    💡 THIS WEEK'S ACTION ITEM:
    Sit down with your team and finish this sentence:
    "We are the only practice in our market that ___."
    Rules: It can't be "cares about patients" or a piece of equipment. It has to be something a patient would repeat to a friend.
    🎧 The No BS Dental Growth Podcast
    Hosted by Chris Pistorius, founder & CEO of KickStart Dental Marketing, 17 years helping independent dentists grow — no fluff, no vanity metrics, just truth.
    Subscribe for weekly episodes every Thursday!
    #DentalMarketing #DentalPracticeGrowth #DentistMarketing #PracticeManagement #DentalBusiness #NoBSDentalGrowth
    16 min
  • Pricing & People: The 2 Decisions That Keep Your Dental Practice Small
    There are really only two decisions that move the needle in a dental practice: what you charge and who you hire. Everything else is downstream.
    In this episode, Chris Pistorius breaks down why pricing and people are the two highest-leverage decisions a dental practice owner can make — and why most owners resist both out of fear.
    🔑 What You'll Learn:
    - Why a 10% fee increase can add $150K to your revenue without a single new patient
    - The "insurance trap" that keeps PPO-heavy practices stuck
    - How great teams create exponential value (and bad teams make YOU the ceiling)
    - The virtuous cycle: higher fees → better margins → better people → better patient experience
    - Practice A vs. Practice B: same city, drastically different outcomes
    - The real reason owners push back on both decisions
    🦷 Ready for a custom growth plan? Book your FREE 90-day roadmap.
    📖 Read the full blog post
    https://kickstartdental.com/blog/pricing-and-people-the-2-decisions-that-keep-you-small
    🎧 Subscribe on your favorite platform:
    Apple Podcasts
    Spotify

    14 min

About The No BS Dental Growth Podcast

From the publisher's feed

Welcome to The NO BS Dental Growth Podcast – the ultimate resource for dental professionals who want straight talk about growing and managing a thriving dental practice. If you’re tired of fluffy advice and industry buzzwords, this podcast delivers actionable insights, proven strategies, and candid discussions to help you navigate the business side of dentistry.