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What sets this podcast apart? We believe in the power of meaningful marketing—a holistic approach that prioritises authenticity, connection, and purpose, whilst still turning a profit.
Chantal Gerardy is an International Award Winning Marketing Strategist who empowers purpose-led businesses to revolutionise their online marketing approach and create a brand that resonates deeply with their online audience. If you're tired of cookie-cutter marketing advice, and seek strategies that truly make a difference, this podcast is for you.
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Hey, this is Chantal Gerardy and welcome back to another episode of the Meaningful Marketing Podcast. Today, I have a guest with me who specializes in, four different pillars of growing businesses in the veterinary clinic. Industry, and I'm so excited to welcome you to Sam today.
Hey, thanks for having us.
It's great to be here.
Absolute pleasure. So tell us a little bit about yourself. Let's go straight into it. Cause I know you're not a vet anymore, but tell us a little bit about your story and how you fell into what it is that you do.
You know, I was a vet and I was, running a vet practice and I thought, I really want to get ahead, financially and, uh, which is a little, most, most vets are about technically being great vets and, then when you become a business owner, you know, I was after sort of creating a bit of freedom in my own life of time.
And, you know, have enough money to do what you want, when you want, with who you want. So I actually went and bought a sheet metal factory while I was running a very new vet practice thinking, oh, this is under management, this will go great. And sure enough, I got a nice little universal tap and, that didn't work out particularly well.
So if you're listening, don't go buy sheet metal factories if you know nothing about them. And, anyway, about 12, uh, it started going south the minute I bought the thing. And anyway, about, 12, 18 months later, I was at a point of, I now realize I was sort of in depression, I didn't want to go anywhere, I didn't want to talk to anyone, I felt nauseous all the time because it was losing money, hand over fist, week in, week out, and I just didn't know what to do about it.
And so I had this, what's called sort of a snap point, I remember it was 2. 05 on a Monday morning, and I'm in bed, I'm insomnic. Feel nauseous about the week to come and I had this snap point. I just went, I simply refuse to let my life continue on like this. I just, it just wasn't what I thought I had signed up for.
So I just basically had that thing where you know, your ego just completely drops. It's gone. And I just went, I'll do whatever it takes. And, and I remember I got this, you know, They talk about synchronicity, which I now know is not a sort of a lucky thing. It's how it works. And, I got this email, something amazing has happened.
Dot, dot, dot was the subject line. And it was about this guy, nothing to do with the vet space, but it could teach you how to make plenty of, you know, money out of practice. And I signed up to this event and went along, had to use frequent flyer points to get there cause I hadn't got enough money, frequent flyer points to stay for the hotel, which is down in Sydney.
I didn't have enough money to pay for it. And went to this three day event, and I walked out and an event was actually called how to make stacks of cash, which was pretty relevant to me then. And I walked out and I said to my wife, I said, it's going to be okay. Someone showed me different way of business and I've sort of been on that journey ever since.
And as a result, it's sort of, you know, within Within probably about four years of that first event, and I just piled on into, you know, the world of educating myself around, you know, business and marketing and leadership and psychology and finances and, uh, and we're financially free within about four years of doing that, going from a place.
That I was, I, I just thought it was impossible for anyone to crawl out of, let alone in four years.
Oh, look, there's so many great points that you mentioned over there and, it's kind of like the universal slap in the face, and it's important to listen to those universal slaps in the face. So
If you don't, they just get bigger.
They do get bigger. I always say
you go around in circles until the slap's hard enough for you to do something. And then the other thing is courage. You know, you, you can either always say fear, you can either face everything and run, Or you can, you know, face everything and rise. So at the end of the day, you, you didn't have money.
You still had the courage to go and do something. And then you gave it a good go, which I absolutely love, and credit to you for doing that. So tell us a little bit about the business now that you have.
Sure. And just one segue to that. Sure. When I was down and out and I first got my first business coach and he said, this is the best thing that ever happen to you.
And I looked and I went, that's not very nice. Like, I want some sympathy. I mean pain in, and he said, no, no. He said Every single successful person, bar none. And this was really important to me. This is quite a pivotal point for me. Every successful person, bar none that he's ever seen has been through what you've been through.
And it's not that there's anything wrong. He said, that's just part of the process. And he said, you're just learning. And so as long as you, A, learn, why did that happen? And B, go again, you'll be okay. So if anyone's listening and you're having a down and out, I can tell you that was just so true for me.
And it gave me the courage to get up. I wouldn't say I was particularly courage, but someone else had courage for me and that allowed me to sort of jump up. So essentially where the business is at now, we went through this whole period of over a number of years, I was just all in on. You know, learning and applying stuff.
And what I wanted to do was take what I was learning outside the industry to help me. We turned our practice into one of the fastest growing practices for five years straight in the veterinary space. And I wanted to turn that, make that available to other practices because there's so many in our industry who, who are struggling because technically they're great vets, but they're running businesses like, you know, most industries.
People are great technically, but then business is a completely different beast. I wanted to bring up a process in that was, simple, was handheld, that was highly predictable outcome. So really what we did is develop that my, you know, I spent, I stopped counting at 350, 000 that I've spent on myself personally in coaches and mentors and that.
And we develop that into a two year process. And we work in four pillars of business, which is your psychology, your mindset, why you do what you do. You'll find understanding financial mastery, which is understanding your relationship with money and understanding the finances within your business. And of course, marketing, which is, which is what this is all about is what's the 20 percent of marketing in your business that will give you 80 percent of your ideal client.
And lastly is how to use leadership. How do you find a line and grow your ideal team? And so that's the process. It's a two year process that we take people through and, We're currently working with around about 80 vet practices around Australia and New Zealand overseas, on that journey of helping them create, you know, their ideal, their abundant practice.
Yeah. Look, I absolutely love that because, for my listeners, many of them know my story where I literally fell into what it is that I do, in both my businesses. First it was in my health, wellness and fitness business, and then it was in my marketing business. And then it was like, Oh my gosh, I need to like show everybody else how to do this because I don't want them to have the same.
the same problems. But I think the difference is the pivotal point there is that when you have no money and you are struggling and then people say, Oh, but then you want me to invest in my marketing or invest in a coach or invest in it. They go, no, I don't have any money. So I can't do that. It's the biggest, biggest, hardest thing.
It's a tough, it's a tough pill to swallow. It's a tough pill to swallow, but here's the thing, right? You take that risk and you do it. And because of the financial pressure that you're under that time, what will you do, you'll actually apply yourself. You'll actually do what they say because you've spent all that money, so there's skin in the game.
And you'll actually make a difference in your life. And every time I've used a coach, cause I'm a big fan of coaches, I myself have used so many coaches. I've got coaches for everything and I love it. And the investment in yourself is absolutely so important because the level of thinking that got you to where you are right now is not going to get you to the next stage.
So if you want to get off the hamster wheel, something has to change. So I love so much of what you've said there. So let's just dive deep into, because you said you've got the four pillars, right? So let's just talk about marketing and talk about, marketing in the veterinary space. We spoke about, earlier off camera, we spoke about USP and trying to work out what that USP is and you said, you know, you found something that was really interesting inside the veterinary space.
And I'm going to say that's a meaningful marketing strategy for veterinary practices. So probably worth sharing to everyone. Because also you'll understand that Everyone is different, everyone's marketing is different and it's not cookie cutter or fluffy. Okay. It's going to be, different and you have to differentiate yourself in the marketplace.
So tell us a little bit about what you found in the marketing space for veterinary clinics.
Well, when you talk to most business owners about marketing, they get this kind of sort of this sort of, it's like a storm trooper mask comes over their face. They're like, Oh gosh, this is my idea of pain.
And I was asking, so who's great at marketing and no one will put their hand up and I go, well, you're all pretty good at marketing because. You've probably got a partner in life and so somehow or other you've acted in a certain way or created an environment that's attracted someone to you and, and we, we just had to simplify the marketing into, because it's such a, it can be so complicated because so many things you can do and it's like, well, help me understand what I should do first, just what's my, what we call the next obvious step.
So we just break it into three stages. Like there's three types of marketing, find, serve and sell. Keep. So what's your find strategy and you know, how do you find a new client? And if you think about it, it's like going out on a date, right? How do I find someone? I mean, I know that they use different strategies.
It involves swiping. I've never tried that. I don't need to, thankfully. , but, it used to be, I'll meet someone at a barbie or at the pub or go out or whatever. So how do you find someone? And then the middle bit, serve is, of course, that client experience. How do you do that? And that is sort of so massive because that's what's in, you know, obviously in a vet industry, it is so much trust and word of mouth is incredibly strong, but it's the same for any business.
And then keep what you keep strategy because if you go out, if you attract someone to see him at the pub, they're great. You go out on your first date, you're doing everything right. You brushed your hair and you've put on your extra special cologne and you know, you've got some funny gags. And if you do that, but you don't send a text afterwards, or you don't ring them up later, and you're not sort of reminding them how you still are there, that's a keep strategy.
Well, you're probably going to be good at find serve, but you won't have a long term keeper, which of course, that's the goal in most businesses, and I'm sure you agree is keep. So one of the things that we found is in find strategy, Often it's a new client coming to you and it's like, well, how do I know which vet to go to?
Like you all kind of like animals, I hope, and he will stick needles in them and you know, give them vaccinations and et cetera. How do I know the difference between one and the other? And what we found is that it really comes down to, a lot of the time the technical skills are similar. It's the experience that someone has that can be vastly different between two practices.
And the best way to pull that out of someone. When we say, well, what's unique about you? And they go, nothing, I'm just a vet. I did the same thing. It's like, no, there is something unique about you. And it comes out of that Simon, the way I got this process, I was watching that Simon, Simon Sinek, that golden circle thing.
And he talks about, it's what you believe. It's what you believe. And it's like, okay, what do you believe about a pet coming to your practice? And they go, I don't know. Well, I believe that the pet should not be nervous. And you go, great. What is it you do? And this is sort of the next part of the golden circle.
What is it that you do that allows them to experience that belief? And they go, well, we give every pet a treat. And so we go, okay, so this is where you tie it together. And if you're doing like a video on their website, we've found that if you do this well, and you do like a two minute video, people will get you and they'll go, Oh, I resonate with that person and when we measure the conversion of site visit to a booked appointment, it went up, it goes up, we're getting a 30 percent conversion doing websites from a site visit to a booked appointment, which is very high, and it would sound like this, well, we believe that going to a vet Your animal should feel as relaxed as possible, which is why, which is the linking piece, which is why every pet gives, gives a treat.
So we give them a little liver treats and we get down in one knee and make them feel comfortable so they're not feeling threatened. There's this thing in the vet space called fear free handling, and it's the whole way of doing it. And it's super important because of animal going, the vets, you know, scared out of their eyeballs, you know, all these weird smells and, you know, other animals like, Oh gosh, I've been in the car, probably car sick.
So he was pulling it out. What is it that you believe about your space or, what someone will experience when they go there or what the outcome should be, that's unique to every single business. And when you hear these videos, you listen, you go, They're actually really different, but they're all offering the same service.
But it's allowing those people who resonate with you, that allows that marketing, it comes through in your marketing. And then, of course, you take that cross contextually to all your different areas, your different channels that you use.
Yeah, 100%. So, I always say, marketing is not about what you do that's the same as everyone, it's what you do that's different.
So, So if you're talking about veterinary clinics and everyone knows that I love my dogs, I now have two dogs.
What breed are your dogs?
I've got a nine year old, cross Labrador, both of them are rescues. And I have a six month old cross Jack Russell and I'm called what I'm called a foster fail because I fostered him.
to foster him to, give him back, but he's been through about four or five different people in his short little life. And I looked at this hyperactive wild dog and went, Oh my gosh, I think you're me.
I couldn't give him back. I was like, no one else is going to be able to put up with this. like, wildness. I just went, I'll keep him. So I've ended up with a six month puppy, which is the last thing I wanted. But with my two dogs, they're at two different vets. So I've got it on my fridge because I obviously have to get pet sitters in.
And I've got two different vets because I've got the nine year old who has arthritis, he's got a kidney disease, he's got a whole bunch of stuff going on. And he likes things done a certain way. So he goes to a certain vet and then I've got the puppy and the puppy is another way. And he's got his anxiety and his allergies and, his absolute ADHD.
And he goes to a different vet. So I've got two different vets. So it comes down to connection, right? It's comes down to, for me, I want to connect with that person and I want to trust that person. Because they are my dogs. And as my children would say, I love my dogs more than I love them. So I absolutely love that you're using a video, in your marketing to be able to bridge that gap in that connection.
And of course, I'd imagine that people go on obviously, and they look at testimonials as well. So making sure that you're continually going out and getting testimonials, that, that really do communicate your point of difference. Your values.
Yeah, I think. Values is a fascinating one because I hear sort of people talk about, oh here's our values and it's honesty, it's integrity, and it's like, so what?
Like, shouldn't humans just have that? Tell me what you do that demonstrates your value. So it's a little bit like, we care, you know, we're vets, we care. Well, so what? And I find whenever you ask that question, so what, it makes you go deeper and deeper and deeper till you finally get the point, what is it you do?
That tells you the care. Well, every pet gets a treat. We make sure that we have a lot of fun at work because we know that'll transfer to the animals. Every, you know, when we're greeting an animal, we always get it on a knee because that actually getting down to their same height, so it makes them safer.
So I think it's, I think, Marketing is such a challenge that people think it's this big sort of agency thing and it's really not. Marketing really starts with you being clear about what you believe and then what, what can you do to, and tell people what you do that, that shows that, you know, I think it should be a safe experience or that you should, you know, if it's value for money or whatever.
And the other thing with is that trust thing is just having, having that consistency of video like in the vet space or, you know, in, in professional space. Professionals don't do videos. Like it's hilarious. You say you're going to make a video and they're just about vomit. Like, that's going to vomit on you.
It's like, just the fact, if you're prepared to have that courage that you talked about to just do a video, just. Just get a iPhone and just shoot something and yeah, it's gonna be horrible. That's okay. It'll get better You can shoot the same thing 20 times But if you'll just do that I reckon you're just leagues ahead of anyone because people can get to feel you and in today's age Do I trust this person?
Are they real? A video, it's it's better than written content It's better than photos because you can actually get a sense of the person.
I love that I always say when I'm working with my clients, I say to them If you were to die, sounds very grim, but if you were to die and there was a whole bunch of people at your funeral, everything from the coffee lady that you see every Friday, to your children, your parents, the people that you've loved, your, even your exes, and everybody was lined up over there, what would they say about you?
What would they say? Say that she could never or she or he could never shut up about or would never stop talking about or whatever You know, and what are those words and how do they describe you because sometimes talking about yourself is really difficult But when you when you visualize and you look at it like that, it's like okay now I'm self aware Those are the things that people see me.
That's my juice. That's my glitter And that's what I want to use to be able to attract more of those types of people. Earlier I was saying to you that, I love natural therapies. I'll never compromise the health of my, my, my animals or my children or myself based on that. I'll always do my research, but I do love some natural therapy.
So I drive a fairly long way to go and see a particular vet. on a Saturday. I'll try and wait until Saturday because I know that vet won't just say to me, Oh, it's a virus. Your dog's got a virus. Here's antibiotics. They'll actually weigh up the pros and cons and go at what stage are we going to intervene?
We'll try natural therapies and until what stage can we do that? And I will drive all that way. It doesn't matter how much. It costs, doesn't matter how much, how inconvenient it is, it's because I trust that person and I have that connection with that person.
That this, the connection thing, I know we were talking about this early before, before this session.
I, people are just dying for that. Like, you know, little things we'll do, like I'll see someone's results. And, you know, in our coaching program, and I'm, you know, I don't sort of do the coaching, we have coaches that do it, I sort of, we sort of lead, I lead the front end of it. But I'll just shoot him a little email, say, hey, I was just checking around, hope you don't mind, I had a little sneaky peeky at your results, hey, well done, you're nailing it.
Like, just a little personal thing like that, that's it, not after anything. And the impact of that is unbelievable, people are just like, oh, you noticed me. But that's that level of connection and this is where I think great marketing is, is within the context of your business. What is it that you do that makes every person feel a little bit significant?
So we had a golden rule in our practice that you had to find one thing about that animal, even if it was this nasty little snail that you had no, you know, pussy teeth was trying to bite you, you know, looked horrible, had Cushing's disease and everything wrong. You had to find one thing to compliment that owner on that was amazing about their pet.
And it might be something like, Wow, look at the bond between you two, because this thing's trying to kill you, right? And so, but why? Because it made them feel significant. Or if you said something like, oh wow, that is the, you know, the cutest dog. I love, love Labradors. Like classic line. Oh, I love that.
They're my favorites. Well, straight away, you've, you've got a common alley. You've got a bond there. That's just next level. And I don't think it's manipulative if you're, if you're doing it with integrity. , because most people actually care about what they do. They're actually comfortable having that discussion, but.
I think that's the best marketing you can do. It is the tiny little things you do day in, day out, that you're actually going, what's that one little thing I can do just to make their day a little bit brighter, happier, that may not even be anything to do with what we do. It's just a little comment or a helper, helping the car or whatever.
And that's the value of working with a coach, right? Because we get so stuck in the day to day of delivering our service. So when you step out of that and you actually allocate time in your life to work with coaches, they'll remind you of these things. They'll just remind you of the important things, because we don't intentionally do it, but we can get caught up in the rut of things, so I absolutely love that.
And I'm now thinking that you probably train one of the vets that one of my dogs go to, because every time I go in, they go, uh, Ziggy's so stoic, he's so stoic, and I'm like. Anyway, it's been an absolute delight having you on here today. So if anyone is, running a practice and if they're looking to step off the hamster wheel, and you know, work with a coach and get into a program that's going to give them that time and give them that freedom and help them, you know, create a financially viable business, where can they connect with you?
Probably the easiest way is just through our place, through our website, which is the acceleratepracticeacademy. com.
Awesome. And we will put that in the show notes as well. So so much. Hey, can I share one last
little thing around marketing, because I know this is marketing. I think marketing should be really fun, because I think a lot of time people go, Oh, marketing.
So we went, okay, client experience. So we had a, A month in our business where we said we're going to have ridiculous customer service. And so we had a competition running who could provide the most outlandish over the top ridiculous customer service. So it wasn't even being nice. It was being so obtusely over the top.
It was. And anyway, it was hilarious, like people were running around like there's coffee going around and the next one sort of running and going, I'll go and get a coffee for you across the road, you know, for a client or then, you know, like someone to go out was, you know, I'll wash your car while you're here having a pet scene and, uh, and someone, you know, Oh, well, I was carrying the bag of dog food out and I said, well, and in the end I actually won.
, as nepetition, but I carried the client to the car. So, but I tried this at home, but my point is it's something as simple as that. And out of that, we sat and looked at all the stupid things we'd done and out of that there was about three or four rippers that we went, Hey, let's just do this more continuously.
And so I just want to finish with that. I think that if you actually look at marketing it, it's really fun. It's a game because it's so gray, you don't know what's going to work. It's such test and measure and 90 percent of what we try doesn't work. But we do those to find the 10 percent that does work.
And when you do, you really develop a formula. I think you should have fun on the way through in marketing.
Oh, I absolutely love that. In my personal training days, I used to say to people, you know, you had all these trainers and they'd always make people do burpees at every single session. Didn't matter how old, unfit, sore backs that they had, it was like do a thousand burpees.
And I was like, there's so many other things that you can get them to do that they'd actually like. doing and then look forward to coming to your sessions and stay with you for longer, right? So marketing should be fun and it should be in alignment with your values and then you'll get up every day excited to do it because it's not about selling.
It's about serving.
So true. If you wake up and go, Oh, I just can't wait. Who am I going to help today? Yeah. That's marketing. It's the essence.
So good. Oh, it's been an absolute blast. Thank you so much again for coming today. This is the Meaningful Marketing Podcast. I'm your host Chantal Gerardy. If you haven't already, please make sure that you click and you give our show a rating.
And if you're on YouTube or one of the other channels, please leave a comment below. Thanks so much for coming. Thanks for listening in. Meaningful Marketing is all about you making your marketing meaningful. If you've enjoyed today's episode, please hit that subscribe button. For subscribing means that you won't miss out on future episodes all about marketing and motivation.
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