In this Veterinary Social Media Podcast episode, host Cheyenne Flerx interviews Michael Shirley, Chief Empowerment Officer and co-owner of Family Pet Health, about his unique journey into veterinary medicine. Michael discusses his transition from an agriculture teacher to running a veterinary practice alongside his wife, Dr. Amy Shirley. They delve into the practice's vision, community engagement through events like the 'Walk My Dog Challenge' and trivia nights, and the importance of fostering a positive work environment. Michael also shares insights on the role of social media and the benefits of having a podcast in connecting with clients and the community.
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⏰ TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Introduction to the Veterinary Social Media Podcast
00:12 Meet Michael Shirley: Chief Empowerment Officer
00:54 The Journey to Family Pet Health
04:06 Building a Visionary Veterinary Practice
04:48 Creating a Positive Work Environment
07:34 The Importance of Social Media Presence
13:36 Handling Negative Reviews with Grace
20:38 Setting and Achieving Goals with Traction
28:59 Social Media's Role in Rural Areas
29:29 Managing Events: Walk My Dog Challenge
32:03 Community Partnerships and Sponsorships
36:04 Trivia Nights: A New Initiative
43:47 Podcasting for Pet Health Education
49:42 Leveraging Long-Form Content for Marketing
52:44 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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PRODUCTS AND RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS VIDEO:
⭐The Energy Bus for Schools: 7 Ways to Improve your School Culture, Remove Negativity, Energize Your Teachers, and Empower Your Students by Jon Gordon (Author), Jim Van Allan (Author): https://amzn.to/3yxxQ9Z
⭐ Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business Paperback by Gino Wickman (Author): https://amzn.to/4cepKRl
⭐VLBC (Veterinary Leadership Book Club): https://www.facebook.com/groups/3142499042461591
⭐ Connect with Michael and check out his practice, Family Pet Health here: http://www.familypethealth.com/
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Want to learn more? Try these episodes:
- How Do I Get Clients to Follow My Hospital on Social Media: https://www.heycheyanne.com/post/how-do-i-get-clients-to-follow-my-hospital-on-social-media
- Why Won't Pet Owners Engage With My Social Media Posts? https://www.heycheyanne.com/post/why-won-t-pet-owners-engage-with-my-social-media-posts
- How to Get Your Team Excited About Social Media https://www.heycheyanne.com/post/how-to-get-your-team-excited-about-social-media
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🎁 RESOURCES I CREATED FOR YOU!
🤳 Quick Start Guide to Get Started with Social Media FAST: https://www.heycheyanne.com/start
🤳 FREE Content Calendar to Help You Plan Your Posts: https://heycheyanne.ck.page/3118bb6b86
🤳 See all my free goodies here: https://www.heycheyanne.com/freestuff
🤳Learn how to be a professional social media manager for your veterinary clinic ➡️https://www.heycheyanne.com/foundations
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💕 CONNECT WITH CHEYANNE
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the Veterinary SocialMedia Podcast, where you learn
how to navigate social media andapply it to the world of
veterinary medicine.
I'm your host, Cheyenne Flerx,and let's get down to business.
Cheyanne Flerx (00:10):
Welcome to the episode today.
And I'm so excited because wehave our official first guest on
the show.
And his name is Michael Shirley.
He is the Chief EmpowermentOfficer for Family Pet Health.
And if I'm understandingcorrectly, you are also the
owner of your practice.
Is that correct?
Correct.
Michael Shirley (00:27):
I am a co owner with my lovely wife, Dr.
Amy Shirley.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (00:30):
I wanted to have Michael on the
show today for a few reasons.
One, he's a former client ofmine, so I have a little bit of
a different perspective of howhis practice operates.
But from a distance, I am a hugefan girl of everything that
they're doing at the practice.
And so I want to dive in, justget to know your practice a
little bit more, talk about someof the unique events that you've
been doing and talk about justreally your overall vision for
(00:52):
your practice today, Michael.
So.
With that, I would love to firstoff, just kind of start with
your backstory and get to knowhow family pet health came to be
and really your journey to vetmed.
Because, um, if I'munderstanding correctly, you
aren't a doctor, you didn'tstart out in vet med, but you
have a little bit of a differentjourney
Michael Shirley (01:12):
very long story short is that I am a, an
educator by training.
Uh, my career was in agricultureeducation as 4 H agent and as an
agriculture teacher at the highschool.
One day I was sitting on thecouch and my wife came home
after about 10 years of, uh,being an associate veterinarian
at one practice.
She came home one day and said,And, um, well, she, she decided
(01:35):
to leave that practice and wasdoing relief work about a year
and a half into that process.
She came home one day and said,I want to open my own practice.
And after the initial shock woreoff, I had given her a high five
and told her I would help herhowever I could.
And, um, that led her saying, Ito help me with the business
(01:55):
side of things and the peopleside of things, and I'll be the
doctor.
And so that's been, our dynamicis my wife started out.
We, we, we purchased an existingpractice in the spring of 2018.
It was my wife.
We had three team members and Iwas teaching full time and was
helping after school.
Um, and I would, uh, all nightlong usually until two or three
(02:17):
o'clock in the morning.
It was a, whoo, it was a tiringtime then cause we did a bunch
of remodeling and rebranding.
but now we just celebrated oneyear in a new hospital, a brand
new building.
Um, have five doctors now and20, uh, three team members, I
think, I lose track.
(02:38):
Um, but we have a big team.
Yeah, we're growing.
And, um, so yeah, so my, my, mybackground was education.
Um, my wife and I, the veryfirst time I ever met my wife or
saw her, I was working in aveterinary hospital and, uh, I
remember very vividly was andwhere she walked around the
corner and I was like, Whoa, youknow?
um, uh, but We attended the sameundergraduate university and
(03:01):
then she went on to vet schooland we got married two weeks
after she graduated.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (03:06):
Oh.
That's awesome.
I love that.
I always like to ask peopleabout their story and how they
got to vet med, because I feellike not everyone was like,
they, a lot of people are like,Oh, I want to be a vet when we
grow up or when I grew up, butit's not always that same, like,
okay, I'm going to be vet and itall ran smoothly from there.
And so I just love to hear thosestories.
So thank you for sharing that.
(03:27):
That's really cool.
michael-shirley---f (03:28):
absolutely.
It's a, it's a cool journey.
It's really unique.
You know, I think like many ofyour listeners, I wanted to be a
veterinarian, but I didn't wantto study.
So those don't go well together.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (03:38):
Same, same.
I always wanted to, when Ientered, I'm also a huge fan of
4 H.
My love for dogs started with 4H in middle school and into high
school, um, but I fell in lovewith the whole, like, animal
behavior and animal science ofit all.
So I was like, okay, I'll be avet.
Well, I joined my hospital.
I was like, nope.
I don't want to be a doctor.
I, I'd rather do marketing.
(04:00):
Um, yeah, but with that said,you've celebrated one year of
being in your new location.
I would love to dive in a littlebit more of like your whole
journey of coming to create thatvision for your new practice.
Like I know a lot of hospitalswill just move locations, but I
feel like it had a deepermission and meaning for you.
michael-shirley---family-pe (04:19):
Oh, for sure.
You know, when I asked my wifewhy she wanted to own her own
practice, because she had nevertalked about that ever in our,
in our dating, in marriage, thattopic of ownership had never
come up from her.
And so when I asked her why, shesaid, I want, I want to create
the type of work environmentwhere I want to go to work every
(04:39):
day.
And I want to surround myselfwith people with whom I want to
work every day.
And I said, now that I can helpyou with, cause it's, that's
people.
And that's what I do.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (04:47):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet (04:48):
so the, uh, the title that I gave
myself as chief empowermentofficer, uh, my job, my role is
to hire, find great people, hirethem, equip them with the tools
that they need to, to.
to do their job and then workalongside them to accomplish the
vision of our practice.
Everyone that applies to familypet health, before they can come
(05:11):
in for an in person interview,that's where it starts.
Like getting buy in startsthere.
Before they can come in for anin person interview, we require
them to read a book.
Uh, the book is called theenergy bus and it's a 10 rules
for fueling your life withpositivity, your life, work,
family with positive, positiveenergy.
Um, that's not to say that it'slike sunshine and rainbows and
(05:32):
puppies and kittens all the timeat our office.
It's
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (05:34):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-p (05:34):
that way.
Right?
Um, but We talk about our visionall the time and it all goes
back to Dr.
Shirley's desire to, uh, build,work in a nice facility where
they enjoy going to work andthen having a really great high
functioning team.
Everything else.
that we've done that's beensuccessful is because we've
(05:55):
stayed true to those first twothings.
Um, the new building that you'retalking about when, when we, we
started out in a 1960s ranchstyle house.
It was almost the identicalfloor plan to our first house.
It was not meant to be aveterinary hospital.
and So when we, when we decidedthat we were going to build a
(06:16):
new building, we had a visionboard in our office.
And, um, it was right when youcame out of the only bathroom we
had in the hallway.
And we would, and I would post,I would write questions on the
board for my team to answer.
While we were going through thedesign process things like what
is your ideal vacation and theywould put things on there What
is your favorite restaurant?
(06:37):
They would put things on thereWhat's the one thing in this
building that you love thatyou're gonna miss?
What's something that you can'twait to get rid of?
What's a design feature that wemust include in our hospital?
And so our team at the time had,had a, they helped us design
what we have now.
And it does go back to thatvision.
(06:59):
You know, we spend more time, atleast I know my wife and I do,
spend more of our waking hoursat the office than we do at our
house.
So it is important that we had aplace that brought us joy when
we were walking in or leaving atthe, in the evening.
Um, so we incorporated a lot ofnatural lighting.
We, um, you know, our Casco wellkennels that we have, everything
(07:21):
is, everything in our hospitalwas laid out and picked with a
purpose.
And that purpose goes back toour, our core values and our
purpose statement.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (07:32):
I love that so much.
Something that you said reallystuck out to me that I feel like
Is a huge missing piece to a lotof teams when they come to do
social media in particular isyou had buy in from the get go
that was something you were veryintentional about and you laid
the foundation for the culturefrom the from the get go and I
will talk about this here in afew minutes because I want to
(07:54):
dive into that more but I feellike That intentionality from
leadership trickles down down tothe support team and how they
feel about coming to work andhow they feel about promoting
your clinic, right?
Like I, I don't know about foryou, but when I was working at
the clinic at my clinic, I was ahuge ambassador for the place
that I worked because I loved itso much and I wasn't afraid to
(08:17):
tell people, yeah, I work at Xand X clinic.
Right.
And, um, it was something that Iwasn't ashamed about.
And I'm not saying like, youknow, people feel ashamed about
what their work, but I, I knowsome people that aren't excited
about work and don't want totell people about it.
So, um, yeah, I, I love that.
For you, is that the case withyour team?
Are they excited to tell people,Hey, I work here.
(08:38):
Um, and really just promote theclinic for you with word of
mouth
michael-shirley---family-p (08:42):
not, not only are, as it sounds so,
is it braggadocious, I guess, soplease don't take it as that,
but not only do the people thatcurrently work at our office,
uh, feel that way, but our many,many of our, not all of our, but
many of our former employeesalso feel that way and still
recommend us, even those thatwere let go by me.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (09:04):
Wow.
michael-shirley---family-pet (09:05):
it has taken, not everybody, but
many of them have come back andsaid, man, that was the best
thing that ever happened to me,you know, and they still talk
about the work environment thatwe had.
And, and so, so, so yeah, Ibelieve it because that's how we
are very clear of who we are andwe're, we're very clear through
(09:28):
who we are through our hiringprocess.
Through our onboarding process,through our client education and
communications, our socialmedia, everything explains who
we are and it's real, so wedon't, we're not faking it
because we're online.
Um, and so when people do joinour team or clients do come into
our hospital, they're like, Ohyeah, uh, this is exactly what I
(09:49):
thought it was going to be like,because I've been following your
journey since you were in thatold house.
And I'm like, Oh yeah, they'relike, demoing stuff at two
o'clock in the morning.
And then.
before the next day before yourteam opened up.
And so it's real.
And that, that's what I wouldtell people that are watching
this is as you work on yoursocial media marketing, uh, just
(10:11):
be yourself and People willappreciate it.
It doesn't have to be polished.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
People are so curious about whatwe do in our vet hospital.
You can just show something thatyou think is totally boring and
run of the mill and people arefascinated by that.
And so and if you're just ifyou're just true to who you are,
then I trust Any of my team topost on our social media
(10:35):
accounts.
Um, I love it when I see themtalk about, uh, in our
community, Facebook groups, uh,when they're like, oh, when
people are looking forveterinarians, they say, come
check us out.
You know, I love working here orin the technician job posting
Facebook group.
Um, when someone asks aboutworking in Tennessee and my team
(10:58):
with, you know, we're in that,they, I think they know we're in
that group now together, butwhen my team gets to there and
responds first, that's awesome.
It makes me feel good to seethat they really enjoy working
with us.
And we have, we have long termemployees.
So that's also, we've been openfor, uh, We're now six and a
half years in and most, many ofour people have been there.
(11:19):
This is their first job in VetMed and they're still with us,
whether that be six years, fiveyears, three years, um, or even
just a couple of months now.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (11:32):
Yeah, I love that And I also love to
hear that there's a low turnoverrate.
Like, of course, that's alwaysgoing to happen in business and
with practices, but I love justthat there's that passion and
that your team is willing tostick up for you, even if
they're not working with youanymore, that, that speaks
volumes.
And honestly, like we, I feelany way that we could spend a
(11:52):
lot of money on advertising andspending so much time on social
media, but really it's down tothe word of mouth and how the
community.
Views you as a practice.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (12:02):
I feel that that's true now more
than ever.
You know, when, when you and Ifirst started working together,
uh, I think that we could stillcontrol the narrative a lot more
than we can now.
Like make, you know,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_ (12:14):
Mm hmm.
michael-shirley---family-pe (12:15):
uh, and through our market, through
our posting and our marketing.
And what I've found now is thatit's really hard to track
whether things are working ornot.
Engagement's hard to really comeby.
Um, and yet we're still churningout content.
And I think that the reallyimportant thing about social
media is to have a consistentpresence and don't worry about
(12:37):
whether you're, um, It.
I don't think it's, I don'tthink you can track ROI on it
anymore.
It's, it's really, really hardto track ROI on social on the
time that you spend on socialmedia and, but I don't think
that that should be a reasonthat people should stop doing
it.
I want, again, I want to usesocial media to help tell our
(12:58):
story so that we.
Um, the people that aren't agood fit for family pet health
go look somewhere else and thepeople that are a right fit for
family pet health become morecurious and want to reach out or
they start looking for morecontent and it's easily found.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (13:16):
Um, you said something there that
was so powerful and I want todive in deep because I feel like
a lot of practices want toattract everybody in their
community or work with anybody,but I am firm believer of
repelling people.
Um, if.
If you don't want to work withthem.
ha
michael-shirley---family-pe (13:36):
go, go Google, go Google family pet
health, Murfreesboro, Tennessee,and read our latest one star
review.
And that is an example of wherewe didn't communicate with the
wrong person the right way.
What does that mean?
When somebody calls and says,how much is it to get my cat
spayed?
The question that our CSRs aresupposed to ask is, Oh, thanks
(13:58):
for calling.
Uh, is is price you're going tobe your main determining factor
in who you decide to and if thatperson says, if that person
says, yes, then we say, well,we're not the lowest price in
town, so, but let me save you alot of time and I will give you
the three cheapest veterinariansin Rutherford County we know
(14:21):
them.
Yeah,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (14:23):
Oh.
Yes, I love this so much.
I love that so much.
I want to pause there realquick, Michael, because that
right there, like I know there'sa lot of practices looking for
clients, but if you don't wantto work with somebody, if you
just get the sense that they'renot going to be a good fit for
your practice, just because ofthat question alone, I love that
(14:43):
you said, okay, we're not going,basically you're not going to be
the best fit for us, but hereare other places that can serve
you well.
You are serving that client.
Just with that answer and youare Attracting the kind of
clients you want to work withbecause people are going to say
oh, okay Well, they're not goingto be the cheapest But they took
the time to even direct me to adifferent direction for saying
(15:05):
we're not for you or we'rebooked for eight weeks Sorry,
bye Um, like I know I might bestepping some on some toes there
But I I love what you said therebecause as a former veterinary
assistant I didn't want to workwith certain clients because
they made me feel uncomfortableor You They just weren't very
pleasant people, and I hate tosay that, but they just weren't
(15:25):
happy people, and they took um,want me, cause me to come to
work because of that, so, Ithere, so, please continue.
michael-shirley---family-pet (15:33):
So instead of giving that line and
finding out we told her ourprice and she laughed on the
phone and hung up The whole callfrom the from the time that the
first ring until she hung up was54 seconds And so she left that
phone call and went straight toGoogle and left a one star
review and I'm like man Don'tyou have anything better to do
(15:54):
with your life?
But, but no, she didn't.
So she left us and told us thatwe were price gouging.
And so my first response, I wasin a bad mood that day.
And, and, um, so my firstresponse, I typed it out and I
hit post and I was, I looked atmy brother and said, Hey, will
you read that review?
I just, the response I justleft.
And he read the first sentenceand he go, and he leaned back in
(16:16):
his chair and looked at me andhe goes, Rewrite it.
I was like, man, he goes,that's, that's not your voice.
And I'm like, all right, allright.
And so I did, but the responsethat I gave her first sentence,
I don't remember what her namewas, Amanda.
I think I was like, Amanda, wewish you the best of luck in
finding a good veterinarypartner.
Next paragraph.
That's it.
That's it for her.
(16:37):
I didn't address any of theother junk that she said.
So my next paragraph was.
Um, for those of you reading onestar Google reviews, let me, let
me take this opportunity to tellyou about the family pet health
difference.
And then I listed what makes usdifferent.
The fact that we have sixlicensed technicians, that
(16:57):
they're the ones that are doingthe monitoring, that we do pre
and post op pain control and,and all these different things.
And it's in that one star Googlereview, which you know, that's
where people go to look.
They don't look at the fivestars they because I do it they
sort by lowest and read thoseAnd and go with it because even
(17:18):
though I disagreed with hercoming and leaving a one star
review.
She didn't lie I mean she shesaid that we're price gouging
but we're not but she but whatshe said She gave the right
estimate, which is of how muchit cost to get a cat spade.
Um, and, and so there was truthin her, there was some truth in
(17:38):
her post, but it gave me anopportunity.
I kind of flipped that.
It gives me an opportunity.
I'm not talking to her.
She's never coming to Family PetHealth, but there are people
that are going to be on Googlereading those reviews, and how I
respond to someone like that isgoing to tell them more about me
(17:59):
than just about anything elsethat I could do.
And we have had people that whenwe ask every single incoming
client, how did you hear aboutfamily pet health?
And more than, more than 10 thatI can think of have said your
response to one star Googlereviews.
That's how they found, or that'swhat made them come to Family
(18:21):
Pet Health.
And so, I, I think that everyoneout there should respond to
every single review, even ifit's just with a thank you.
And, and, you'll get, you'lllearn how to deal with Google
reviews.
Um, but use those to youradvantage, even the one star
ones.
Mm
cheyanne-flerx_2_08 (18:40):
Absolutely.
I love that a lot because I feellike people take on those
negative responses or negativereviews from people and take it
as a personal attack.
And the thing is, it's not aboutyou.
It's about that person and howthey're feeling and what's going
on in their world.
You just entered it, whetherthey contacted you, you
(19:02):
interrupted their feed,whatever.
And they're coming from a placethat is not their world.
Very happy there's somethinggoing on with them.
So if we can reply to them withnot addressing anything
Emotionally just comingneutrally sticking to the facts
But really just focusing on thepeople who will see that review
and are wanting to come Partnerup with you in your practice And
(19:26):
that is going to be just abetter outcome and like you
said, so thank you for bringingthat up because I feel like that
is a, a huge hurdle for a lot ofpeople to overcome.
This is wonderful.
michael-shirley---family- (19:37):
Well, this is another one of those
reasons that being a high schoolteacher uniquely qualified me
for running a veterinaryhospital because I've had, I've
had more than one student standup in the middle of the class,
throw me the bird and tell me toF off.
And then, and all the otherstudents are looking and pulling
out their cell phones to record.
(19:59):
so there is nothing that someonline keyboard warrior is going
to do that's going to hurt myfeelings.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (20:06):
Exactly.
Exactly.
We have a choice of how we aregoing to react to whatever
people say to us or do to us.
michael-shirley---family-pe (20:12):
the rule number one in the energy
bus is you are the driver ofyour own bus.
You can't control what happensto you, but you can control how
you respond to it.
And so, uh, it is sometimes ahard pill to swallow, but, uh,
um, just assume the best inpeople, respond appropriately
and move on.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (20:34):
I love that.
I'm writing down that bookrecommendation cause I would
love to read that myself.
Now, with that said, I want totalk about traction.
I started reading it, and I needto finish it, but I know that
the book Traction, um, by, oh,what's his name?
Can you remember the author'sname?
Can you tell me?
Gino Yes, okay, I'll put it intothe show notes for everybody,
(20:54):
but, um, I love how you tookthe, the premise and the concept
from Traction and made it intoyour, uh, social media manager's
goals for her.
I would, so go ahead and dive indeep on that because this is
really, really awesome to me.
michael-shirley---family-pet (21:09):
So the book Traction is written by
Gino Wickman.
It's about EOS, which stands forthe Entrepreneurial Operating
System.
It's a book that's designed forcompanies that have between 10
and I think 250 employees.
But really, if anybody out thereis thinking of owning your own
business, no matter what it is,uh, I am sold out to the
(21:31):
Traction Colt.
So you should read, you shouldread the book, read the book,
um, in the book, it talks about,uh, company goals, five, three,
one year goals, and, and thenfor each person on your team,
each quarter, they're working onthings called rocks.
So these are big, big, Big, bigthings that need to get
(21:51):
accomplished that take more thanone week in order to help
achieve a company goal.
So this year for 2024, ourcompany goals, we had, we had
two in particular.
One was to increase dentalcompliance by 10 percent and one
was to increase heartwormcompliance.
Uh, there, we had a revenue goalin there and some, some other,
(22:14):
uh, fear free goals and, and,uh, hiring a doctor goal.
So we had some other things inthere too, but those were our
compliance, uh, goals.
do you do that?
Well, you start, you have tobreak it down into quarters.
So, so our social media manager,Haley, Haley Cameron does a
phenomenal job of, uh, stayingup on our, especially, um,
(22:37):
Instagram, cause I don't doanything on Instagram.
So she does that and, and.
What she does is amazing.
So she has a goal.
She has her own goals of postingso many, uh, social media posts
per week and, and she tracksthem and keeps up with them.
We do sometimes sneak offercodes in there so we can see if
(22:58):
any of them are moving theneedle on anything.
Um, And so, so traction, so, soHaley's not the only one working
on a, on a goal.
Every single person on our teamhas individual goals and rocks.
And so some of her goals, uh,like are to produce a video
about our weight loss program.
And so she's working withanother team member who that's
(23:19):
their big rock.
And they work together to, to,to, um, to, let people know
about those things.
So, um, Haley, I, uh, sent Haleythrough your course.
And, uh, the Instagram coursespecifically, because I knew
nothing about Instagram.
And so she, she, uh, she hasjust rocked and rolled with that
(23:40):
and has done a really great jobwith, with all of our social
media, making the graphics and,uh, infographics and things that
are real easily shared.
And we're, we're seeing goodresults from that.
And again, it's providing anonline presence so that when
curious pet parents out therefinally go to Google your.
practices name, they can findrelevant and timely content.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (24:07):
love that so much.
And I bet your team feels a lotmore bought in from another
perspective into your practicesvision, because you have goals
and a purpose for them versusjust, okay, we've got to pump
clients through.
We got to get all this done andthis done.
And, um, So I love that.
And I love that you'veestablished a certain amount of
posts that you and Haley agreethat she's going to meet and
(24:31):
that she's working with otherteam members and that you're
encouraging her to, to do that.
I know that a lot of ourlisteners are frustrated because
they don't have a lot of teambuy in.
And that's why I want to ask youmore questions about this,
because I think there's a lot ofwork that practices could do,
but there's a lot that as, asthe support team members could
(24:52):
do to ask and prompt ourleadership to say, okay, what
expectations do you require ofme for this?
Or what do you envision of myrole as the social media manager
doing?
Because if I recall correctly,Haley is also in charge of the,
Doing the events, which I wantto dive into.
Um, and she's also areceptionist, right?
So she's got a lot of otherresponsibilities, but that
(25:14):
doesn't mean that she's feelingso overwhelmed or so
bottlenecked about everythingthat she can't feel excited
about work.
Um, so feel free to, to talkabout that more if you'd like.
michael-shirley---family-pe (25:26):
One of the neat things about
traction is that, um, when, whenanyone on our team encounters
problems or issues, we put it onthe issues list.
And so let's say that we had seta goal for Haley to do 25 social
media posts per week.
And she's, that's a number thatis re it's a smart goal, right?
(25:47):
It's, it's, it's, it hits allit's specific, measurable,
attainable, and, uh, relevantand time bound.
And The, not only, we don't stopwith SMART goals.
We do SMARTER goals.
So we evaluate and respond, uh,as the ER on that.
But if she's encountering aproblem that she can't meet her
goal, she's gonna put that onthe issues list.
(26:08):
And the issues list, it mightjust say, having trouble
reaching 25 posts a week.
That's, that's the issue.
She doesn't have to comeinterrupt her day, interrupt my
day, or anything like that.
We deal with issues at aregularly scheduled weekly
meeting, and, and when we comeup with that issue, we, we
start, we identify it.
(26:29):
We identify the issue is, she'snot posting 25 posts a week.
Then we, so we have identifiedit.
Then we discuss it.
Why?
What are some challenges?
What are some things that arepreventing you from doing that?
Is it another person isn't doingwhat they're supposed to do,
which is holding you back fromdoing what you're supposed to
do?
Or is it purely that you don'thave time?
(26:49):
Um, so we identify, we discussit, and then we solve it.
So together, we may re evaluateand say, Hey, 25 was just too
many.
So we're going to move it to 14.
And we so that's we've we'vesolved it.
We just we lowered it to 14 orit might be all I really need to
(27:11):
is 35 minutes On a tuesday toblock myself off and I can knock
out a whole week's worth of postas long as I have that blocked
Well, we can discuss is thatpossible?
Yes, it's possible We're goingto adjust the schedule so that
hayley can step away from thethree other things that she does
You And she's just going to puton her social media posting hat
(27:34):
and get it done and then go backto Her regularly scheduled
programming, right?
So so we identify it We discussit and we solve it and we do it
in specific scheduled meetingsso that it's not Blowing up our
work day Because ultimatelywe're a veterinary hospital.
We're supposed to be gettingclients in the door and to a
room so our medical team cantake care of them and then we
(27:56):
check them out and get them outthe door.
That's our goal.
That's what pays the bills.
Our social media is not payingthe bills.
But social media might be what'shelping us keep our books full.
So it, it, that's where it'slike, is this important or not?
Well, I couldn't, it'simportant.
I know it's important, but Ican't tell you exactly what the
ROI is on.
And I just know that we're goingto keep doing it.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (28:18):
exactly.
Yeah.
And it's just taking that timeto assess.
Okay.
It, how effective is this goingto be right now?
And are we using our energy andtime wisely on social media or
is there somewhere else we canfocus or, you know, just taking
that time to reassess.
And I feel like there, that's anessential step to marketing as a
whole.
Like, I know a lot of practicesfeel like they should do social
(28:40):
media just because that's whatthey've been told or that
they've heard like, Oh,everyone's on social media,
that's where all the money'scoming from, but they don't
really stop doing that.
and pause and say, okay, is thisan effective tool for my
practice?
Because I can tell you there'seight hospitals just in my town
alone, so it's kind of saturatedin that regard.
But, so, social media might bean important role for us, but
(29:02):
for someone who's out in a ruralarea that has, like, they're the
only competition, right?
They're, it's just them.
You know, social media might notbe such an important tool for
them.
So just taking that time to see,okay, how is this going to apply
to my situation?
How can I make it possible?
And how can I still beconsistent with it without
burning out and making it, youknow, the bane of my existence,
(29:24):
right?
So I love that.
So with that, I do want to pivota bit.
But, um, as I mentioned, Haley'salso in charge of managing
events.
So I know that you guysrecently, a few months ago at
the time of this recording, justfinished with, you know, walk my
dog tap challenge.
Um, and now you're doing trivianights.
And so I would love to hear fromyou on how both of those events,
(29:47):
um, have been going for yourpractice and what kind of return
on investment have you beengetting from those?
michael-shirley---family-pet (29:54):
So the walk my dog challenge for us
started in 2020.
It was, uh, we, we totally, um,saw it in, on, in a, in a chat.
Somebody mentioned it offhand ina Facebook.
And I was like, wait, can you,what was that you said?
Walk my dog.
What's, what's that about?
And, um, so they they werefriendly enough to just share
(30:18):
with us their framework.
It's, it is a, it's a communityevent.
It's open to anybody in thewhole world.
You walk your dog, you log yourmiles.
you win free prizes.
It's that simple.
So we created a landing page onour website.
We use whisker cloud.
We talked to them.
They just created a Google entryform.
So people, we would just sayfamily, pet health.
(30:40):
com slash walk my dog.
And it takes you to the entryform and they put in their,
their contact information, name,email, and phone number, their
dogs.
name, breed, size, uh, they putin their age group as well, and
that gets them entered.
Then we, we have this wholeemail, uh, system.
Now we're five years, this isour fifth time to do this, so
(31:04):
it's all pretty automated atthis point, but, uh, we, for
eight, Yeah, we do it for eightweeks, and at the end of the
eight weeks, we have a big dogparty, we pass out t shirts to
everyone that walked 50 miles,everyone that walks 5 miles gets
like poop bags, 10 miles is um,a squeaky ball, and if you walk
(31:26):
70, 50 miles is a t shirt, and75 miles is a free exam.
So, that's a big deal.
And they're even allowed todonate their gift certificate
for an exam to someone else.
So, you know, maybe they lovetheir vet on the other side of
town, but they have a friendthat's on our side of town.
(31:46):
Like, hey, I won this fromFamily Pet Health.
I'm not going to drive overthere, so you take it.
So, it's, you know, a littlemarketing thing there.
But, uh, we walked to the moonand back last year, and this
year we walked around the world.
And, I don't know, 55 times.
100 miles.
Um, so it's, it's pretty cool.
Uh, but the cool.
thing about it, and I think whatyou are wanting me to maybe talk
(32:07):
about probably is that it's notjust family pet health, but each
week we identified localbusiness, partners in our
community.
They had to be small business,independent, small businesses,
um, mom and pops, if you will.
And we went to them, told themwhat we were doing and asked
them if they would like tosponsor a One of the weeks of
the walk my dog challenge.
(32:28):
So each week has a, has a smallbusiness sponsor.
They give out a picture prompt.
And so you on your walk withyour dog, you take a picture and
you post it, you tag us, andthen.
We do drawing some, sometimesit's five drawings in one week.
Sometimes it's one drawing atthe end of the week for everyone
that posted a picture.
(32:48):
Uh, for example, Simply PureSweets, my favorite place to eat
breakfast in Murfreesboro.
They, uh, have these giantcinnamon rolls, which are really
bad for my diabetes, but, um,they, they, uh, give away five
of them.
So it's a picture of your dogstopping along the walk to enjoy
a snack.
Uh, Evans Plant Farm.
(33:09):
Take a picture of your dogstopping to smell the flowers
and they give them a big, like areally nice gift basket.
They're always our first weeksponsor cause it's still not
just summer heat.
So plants are still a big thingat that time.
Gets people excited.
Um, a local, uh, animalphotographer donates a session.
(33:29):
So there's all sorts of realestate agent gives a hundred
dollar gift card to a homeimprovement store.
We had, um, uh, um, a yogastudio or actually a bar like
studio.
Um, they gave a whole month, uh,free membership, uh, doggie
daycare did a, you know, free,free grooming or something.
So it was, it was great.
(33:50):
And so what we're doing isleveraging.
their social media to putpeople, redirect people back to
family pet health.
So we may not have reached theirclients on our own to get them
to register.
But when they say, Hey, it's ourweek to sponsor the walk my dog
challenge.
Uh, go to FamilyPetHealth.
com to sign up and they sendthat out to all of their email
(34:13):
lists or social media contactswhich is redirecting them back
to our website.
So, we partner, we've done thisfive years, we partner with our
favorite local fear free dogtrainer in town and uh, it's a
joint venture and it has been areal success.
Now the ROI on it.
Can't really tell you.
Um, I will tell you that ithasn't garnered as many new
(34:37):
clients as I thought it would.
Like, we have a lot of peoplethat get that 75 free or 85 free
exam and a small, only a smallpercentage of them have ever
been redeemed.
And I don't really know thereason why.
I might look into that more if Ihave time, but Honestly, people
are pretty bonded to their vetsand we're not doing this to try
(34:58):
to steal people away.
We're just doing it to help thecommunity.
Obviously it started in 2020.
We didn't know it at the time,but when we were planning this,
it turned out to be a hugething.
The local newspaper wrote astory about it and everything
because it was right in themiddle of COVID.
And, but we didn't know that atthe time when we were planning
it, that it was going to be socool.
And now we've just been.
(35:19):
Doing it.
Like I said, it really doesn'ttake a lot of time.
Um, cost me less than a thousanddollars in prizes, maybe, maybe
2, 000 in prizes to do it, but.
It's good content and, and, uh,and people really enjoy it.
We've had people that do itevery year, so we're going to
continue it.
I do know that Haley wants tohave an evaluation meeting, uh,
(35:40):
this, this go around, because Ithink we're going to require
some of our community partnersto be more specific in how they
share it.
Or they can't be our partnersanymore because we do all the
work.
We just need them to share it.
So, so that's that, that walkedmy dog challenge.
Yeah, The walk my dogchallenges.
It's been a lot of fun and we'llcontinue to do it.
I just, we're going to make somechanges to it this year.
(36:02):
Now that.
The Trivia Night is um, an ideathat I had, I don't even know
what I was doing when I had theidea, but we sponsor trivia, so
it's dinner and trivia at ouroffice, we have a, in the new
building, and people should gocheck it out, go to
FamilyPetHealth.
com.
building project and take a lookat the, take a look at the floor
(36:25):
plan.
It's all posted there.
You can look at it, but we builta garage on the end of our
building and it's about 1200square feet.
So it's bigger than the actualbuilding that we were in over
before we moved.
And, um, so, It's it's kind offlex space.
It is literally a drive throughvet service garage, but it holds
(36:45):
About a hundred people withtables and chairs And so we we
offered Four local non profitsthat are animal related for the,
well, one was trade schoolrelated, but, um, for local
nonprofits, we said, Hey, we'llprovide, we will provide the
space and I will pay for thisguy that runs trivia.
(37:06):
I'll, that will be my donationto your organization as I'll pay
for the trivia guy.
So all you have to do is selltickets and And we're, we're
going to make this a lot of fun.
So far we've had, we've, we'vesuccessfully held two of these
events.
Our third one is Monday andwe've already raised about 5,
000 for just the first, uh,first sessions that we've done.
(37:28):
And that money goes straight tothose animal, uh, groups.
And, uh, we're really proud ofthat.
It's been a lot of fun.
And that has.
That event has.
resulted in at least three newclients in two events So I
consider that a huge roi becauseit cost me about 200 bucks for
the trivia 200 I got Thoseclients to come so the lifetime
(37:53):
value of our client of ours isway more than 200.
So um that that's been reallygreat and the best part is is
that We're, we're serving ourcommunity, which is a big part.
That's one of one part of ourmission, uh, is that we want to
be active in our local communityand be a place that people come
for more than just vet care.
So having these trivia nightshas been a lot of fun.
(38:14):
Um, it's a blast.
You should go to our Tik TOK andyou can see some of the
highlights, uh, from thosetrivia nights so far, and
they've been really great.
And we've been able to raisesome, um, large sums of money
for, for, by their standards,uh, for some really great local
nonprofits.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (38:31):
Awesome.
I love this so much because,Even though your practice to
anyone listening may not havethe space like Michael does to
host events, there are ways foryou to continue hosting events
in your local area that iscommunity based, um, and still
getting your name out there.
And I really like how you'reusing the walk my dog challenge
(38:53):
to get, uh, To use otherpeople's audiences in your local
community to really push outyour own name, um, and to really
get your name out there.
And that is a really cool hack,to get more followers to your
account.
If that is the goal of yours,um, I will be doing an episode
(39:13):
on that a little bit morebecause I definitely have some
opinions about that.
But, um, overall, it reallyHelps you to get more reach to
people in your local community,because Michael, I'm sure you
can attest to this reallyfocusing on your local
community, whether it's just onsocial media or doing just
events is going to be a betterreturn on investment for
(39:34):
whatever you're putting intosocial media, because if you're
focusing on the people in yourarea, You'll get more clients
that way versus just everybodyin the world, because everybody
in the world's not going to beable to do business with you.
As you can tell with just yourwalk, your dog challenge, you
know, people aren't comingacross town for some, what,
whatever reason that may be todo business with you, but people
(39:54):
know what you're about.
You're building that brandawareness through that.
And I think that's really thebest thing that you can do for
your brand overall, because ifyou're not getting clients, but
people are telling, um, theirfriends and family about you,
it's a much easier buy in forpeople to come to you versus
just cold search off theinternet.
michael-shirley---family- (40:15):
Yeah, and, and so,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_ (40:16):
I, I love that.
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (40:20):
a meeting space to hold 75 people,
then clearly you're not going tohave a trivia night in your exam
space, right?
But just like our, our, ourvendors have CE at restaurants,
you can find a restaurant thatwill provide you space.
Um, find a school gymnasium,find, you know, find, uh, just
(40:41):
find a space to do it.
And, and it doesn't have to be arestaurant.
It can be just a warehousespace.
As long as it's climatecontrolled, you're good, right?
And, and bring in food trucksand do this.
It's, it's easier than you maythink that it is, uh, and like
Cheyenne said, it's, it's justleveraging other people's, uh,
Social media and contact emaillist to at least plant a seed
(41:05):
with your, with your company'sname in it.
They may not, uh, the BeasleyAnimal Foundation is a low cost
spay, neuter and vaccine clinic.
That's just down the street fromme.
I used to consider themcompetition and now I consider
them friends.
Like one of our doctors is ontheir board of directors.
They are literally like theclosest.
(41:25):
Other they're the closest othervet clinic to our office.
So but rather than see them ascompetition We looked for ways
to partner with them.
They have an oliver It's calledthe oliver trust and it is an
account.
It's just a spay neuter andvaccine clinic.
So when they diagnose, um, acracked canine tooth or tumors
or something else they say hey,you need to find a full service
(41:48):
vet and When people say well, Idon't have any money the oliver
fund You Uh, the Beasley cliniccan call me and say, we're
sending Cheyenne down to see youand she's approved for up to 800
in care.
Our team knows that if thatperson's coming, we, we don't do
many discounts, but we workreally hard to keep that low.
(42:10):
And then we just send that billto Beasley.
So and they have several othervets in town that, that are,
that, that work with them aswell.
So they're able to do that.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (42:19):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet (42:20):
My point is, like, just think
outside of the box, look at,look at community partners that
are doing good work, people thatyou want to be associated with,
and just go up to them and say,Hey, I heard this crazy idea
about a food truck trivia night.
Would you like to, like we'llhelp, we'll help put it
together.
Yeah, we'll help put ittogether, but the money stays
with you.
(42:42):
Why wouldn't they do that?
That's like what, you know, so,um, yeah.
And if they're a non profit,they can, they can, uh, like all
of ours are, are 501c3s.
They set up, they do all thecollecting of money, the ticket
sales and all that.
All we help do is produce it.
It's a, it's a really cool, it'sa really cool, uh, creative way
to have fun and raise money fornon profits and do some
(43:05):
marketing on the side there too.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (43:08):
Yeah, oh, such a great idea with the
food trucks, because I know alot of practices have parking
lots, right, so if you justclose early one day or decide to
open up, like, on a Saturday, ifyou're not open on Saturdays,
normally just host an eventduring the summer, if it's not
too hot in your area, um, andjust have a food truck come up
and do trivia night or whateverthat may be for you.
(43:31):
You know, that's a greatopportunity right there to
support your community and bringpeople to your practice.
They get an idea of what's goingon at your practice and they get
to know you and your team.
So that's wonderful.
All right, Michael, I have onemore question for you and, um,
we'll land the plane here as thecool kids say.
But, um, I would love to talkabout your podcast if you're
open to that, because I feellike that's a lot of, uh, that,
(43:54):
that podcast that the concept ofthe podcast is that.
Area where I feel like a lot ofpractices could really lean
into.
Um, so I would love to know howthat's going for you and how
that's opened the door for your,your clients as, or at least in
the way that's been a good ROIis what I'm trying to get at.
michael-shirley---family- (44:12):
Yeah.
So our podcast is called theFamily Pet Podcast.
It's a podcast for curious petparents where we believe the
more you know about pet healthcare, the better pet parent you
can be.
You can tell I've said that afew times, right?
Um, it, our episodes are about25 minutes long, which is the
average length that it takessomeone to walk one mile with
their dog.
(44:32):
Walk your dog.
Walk my dog.
So, uh, yeah, so the podcast,honestly, I'll be completely
honest with you.
The podcast started because Imiss teaching.
I miss talking.
I miss, like, Educating peopleand I miss my classroom.
So the podcast was a way to keepme from going back to teaching.
(44:54):
But, uh, um, so it was, it wassomething that I had thought
about starting a podcast with mykids where we, we were going to
call it tales of tales, tales ofTennessee, T A I L.
Of Tennessee and we were justgoing to tell fun stories about
animal related stories aboutTennessee animals, but um,
(45:16):
anyway What we realized was thatwe needed it for our office So
the first I don't know 15episodes were the 15 They were
the answers to the 15 most askedquestions in the exam room.
And the, the thought process waswe would make an episode about
all of the things that weconstantly are talking about in
(45:38):
our exam room.
Then the next time someone askedabout it, we would say, Oh,
well, here's a little handout.
Scan this QR code.
It'll take you to our podcast.
And you need to listen toepisode three, which is all
about heartworms.
Or you need to listen to episodeone, which was about the rabbit
hemorrhagic disease.
And, um, it had made it, thatwas a big deal.
It made its way into Tennesseefor the first time.
(46:01):
So the podcast has continued to,to be strictly for.
Pet parents as an educationalopportunity to teach them about
pet health care So they couldtake better pet better care of
their pets and be their petshero and it has been so much fun
I have met so many cool peoplein vet med when I told them I
(46:23):
have a podcast and I want totalk about That one weird thing
that they're the expert in.
They're like, yes, I would loveto talk about Ehrlichia.
And like, nobody ever wants meto talk about Ehrlichia.
I'm like, well, I want you to doa whole podcast about Ehrlichia.
And they're like, this isamazing.
So, um, yeah, so, so it's been alot of fun and it's certainly
built my network up ofveterinary professionals, people
(46:45):
that I can call when I needadvice or, or some con
consulting on a case orsomething, uh, it's been really
cool to have that.
It is hard.
It, it takes a lot of time.
So, Even like right now, ifsomebody went to our podcast,
you would see that I haven'tposted in about, it's probably
getting close to five weeksbecause I have been going
(47:07):
nonstop.
But once school starts back andwe get our family back into a
more normal routine, we'll getback on, On track posting them,
but it is it's the our latestpodcasts are better audio
quality better flow than ourfirst ones But again, it doesn't
have to be perfect.
You just need to have goodaudio.
That's the main thing Yourcontent doesn't have to be great
(47:29):
But your audio needs to becrisp.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (47:34):
Yes, 100%.
And nowadays, it doesn't have tobe polished.
People don't want polishedcontent.
They just want to see thatyou're present or entertaining
them or giving them some quickwins or something that's adding
to their life.
And they're, they're golden.
I think that's the huge shift insocial media in particular.
(47:54):
Um, And I think podcasts are aperfect place to have on social
media, or use social media topromote to your podcasts, um,
just because people want thatraw, um, authentic conversations
like this, um, so I, I thinkthat the podcast is going to be
a huge opportunity for you.
And I wanted to ask, are you,um, transcribing those podcasts
(48:16):
into your blog and making those,um, rankable search engine
content?
michael-shirley---family-p (48:21):
Just recently switched to Riverside
as our recording platform.
And it does, it does make atranscript.
So we do auto generate thetranscript.
It's got some errors in it andstuff, but we do use that to
upload to Spotify and YouTube.
It's a, it's on, we just put itup straight up on YouTube now
too.
So, Again, it doesn't have to beperfect.
(48:43):
People understand.
I know, you know, when we readsubtitles, when we're watching
TikTok on silent, during ameeting, uh, they don't always
get it right.
But you are intelligent enoughto fill in the blanks the way
they need to be.
Resort words, right?
So, just do it.
But, but, So, Yes.
we do use the transcription, um,we have it on, uh, anywhere you
(49:06):
can download a podcast, we'rethere.
And then we do have it onYouTube.
as well.
So again, when people finallydecide that they're ready to
search and learn more about thiscrazy vet clinic that has the
outdoor patio seating for theirexam rooms and a garage, like
who has a garage?
And so they're finally ready todo that search when they type in
(49:28):
family pet health Murfreesboro,Tennessee, everything that
populates is going to be,they're going to have a wealth
of of options.
to choose from of how they wantto learn more about us.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (49:41):
I love that.
I think that the podcast, um,whether you guys, whoever's
listening, does a podcast, doesa YouTube channel, does blog, I
think it's really importantnowadays.
And I know it takes a lot ofextra time and you already
pressed for time with socialmedia, but I would love for you
just to open your mind to doingsome form of long form content,
like a podcast, YouTube, blog,like I said, and really
(50:03):
leveraging that to get some uh,good organic reach through that
on the internet, um, but you canuse that for your social media,
so that can be a fuel, that canbe your topic for a social media
post, you can repurpose thatcontent so it's not such a heavy
load like, okay, I have tocreate a podcast, I have to
create something new, no, you'rejust repurposing something This
(50:27):
huge cake and then you're justcutting it up so that it's easy
to distribute.
So weird analogy but Michael,thank you so much for coming
onto the show today.
I really appreciate you justsharing everything that you've
been doing at Family Pet Health.
And, um, I know you've mentionedit a few times, but if people
want to follow you and connectwith you in particular, where is
(50:48):
the best place they can connect?
michael-shirley---family-pe (50:50):
The best place is just go to
familypethealth.
com And you can find all of oursocial media channels.
You can email the the websitejust email us there.
They'll get it to me And I dowant to I would be remiss if I
didn't make a one final plug orone plug here before we go That
everyone out there that'swatching.
This is obviously interested inveterinary medicine Join us on
(51:14):
Facebook at the VeterinaryLeadership Book Club.
So you just do a Google searchfor, yeah, uh, do a, do a, do a
Facebook search for VLBC, whichstands for Veterinary Leadership
Book Club, and we read a book.
Uh, and we talk about ittogether.
We, we, we reframe all of ourquestions related to vet meds.
(51:37):
So we read traction.
That's before I implemented itat my office, we read through it
in the book club, um, we've readeverything from traction to
green lights by MatthewMcConaughey and yes, we were
able to successfully.
Relate Matthew McConaughey'sgreen lights to vet med.
It was fun Um, we're currentlyreading qbq which is the
(51:58):
question before the question andit's been a lot of fun So, um, I
would encourage everybody tojoin us there on the book club
as well, but you can reach me atfamily pet health.
com
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (52:10):
Yes.
Thank you for mentioning that.
I wanted you to bring that upand I will add a link to it into
the show notes for everybody.
But yeah, thank you so much,Michael.
And I hope to talk with you moreand maybe have you back on the
show later.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (52:23):
I will do anything you need.
I'm here to help you.
I appreciate our friendship andand you've definitely helped
family pet health Like I wantyou when you.
look at our building and andhear our stories, you know
Definitely know that you.
helped us to achieve that.
So I appreciate that
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (52:42):
Thank you, Michael.
Appreciate you.
Thanks for tuning in everybody.
Bye.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX ( (52:47):
Thanks so much for tuning in.
I hope you found value from thisepisode.
today.
And if you did, would youconsider sharing subscribing and
even reviewing the podcast?
I want to be sure that you don'tmiss the next piece of marketing
content that I have to sharewith you because I've got a lot
planned and I would love to beable to support you on your
marketing journey.
So if you wouldn't mind sharingthis and following and doing all
(53:08):
the things possible.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX (Elg (53:09):
And sharing the podcast with others.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX (El (53:11):
That would be wonderful because I
want to help as many veterinaryprofessionals as possible.
So I can't do that without yourhelp.
So.
if you'd be willing to do that,that would be amazing.
But in the meantime, I willcatch you on the next episode,
and I wish you the best weekpossible.
Bye.
Welcome to the Veterinary SocialMedia Podcast, where you learn
how to navigate social media andapply it to the world of
veterinary medicine.
I'm your host, Cheyenne Flerx,and let's get down to business.
Cheyanne Flerx (00:10):
Welcome to the episode today.
And I'm so excited because wehave our official first guest on
the show.
And his name is Michael Shirley.
He is the Chief EmpowermentOfficer for Family Pet Health.
And if I'm understandingcorrectly, you are also the
owner of your practice.
Is that correct?
Correct.
Michael Shirley (00:27):
I am a co owner with my lovely wife, Dr.
Amy Shirley.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (00:30):
I wanted to have Michael on the
show today for a few reasons.
One, he's a former client ofmine, so I have a little bit of
a different perspective of howhis practice operates.
But from a distance, I am a hugefan girl of everything that
they're doing at the practice.
And so I want to dive in, justget to know your practice a
little bit more, talk about someof the unique events that you've
been doing and talk about justreally your overall vision for
(00:52):
your practice today, Michael.
So.
With that, I would love to firstoff, just kind of start with
your backstory and get to knowhow family pet health came to be
and really your journey to vetmed.
Because, um, if I'munderstanding correctly, you
aren't a doctor, you didn'tstart out in vet med, but you
have a little bit of a differentjourney
Michael Shirley (01:12):
very long story short is that I am a, an
educator by training.
Uh, my career was in agricultureeducation as 4 H agent and as an
agriculture teacher at the highschool.
One day I was sitting on thecouch and my wife came home
after about 10 years of, uh,being an associate veterinarian
at one practice.
She came home one day and said,And, um, well, she, she decided
(01:35):
to leave that practice and wasdoing relief work about a year
and a half into that process.
She came home one day and said,I want to open my own practice.
And after the initial shock woreoff, I had given her a high five
and told her I would help herhowever I could.
And, um, that led her saying, Ito help me with the business
(01:55):
side of things and the peopleside of things, and I'll be the
doctor.
And so that's been, our dynamicis my wife started out.
We, we, we purchased an existingpractice in the spring of 2018.
It was my wife.
We had three team members and Iwas teaching full time and was
helping after school.
Um, and I would, uh, all nightlong usually until two or three
(02:17):
o'clock in the morning.
It was a, whoo, it was a tiringtime then cause we did a bunch
of remodeling and rebranding.
but now we just celebrated oneyear in a new hospital, a brand
new building.
Um, have five doctors now and20, uh, three team members, I
think, I lose track.
(02:38):
Um, but we have a big team.
Yeah, we're growing.
And, um, so yeah, so my, my, mybackground was education.
Um, my wife and I, the veryfirst time I ever met my wife or
saw her, I was working in aveterinary hospital and, uh, I
remember very vividly was andwhere she walked around the
corner and I was like, Whoa, youknow?
um, uh, but We attended the sameundergraduate university and
(03:01):
then she went on to vet schooland we got married two weeks
after she graduated.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (03:06):
Oh.
That's awesome.
I love that.
I always like to ask peopleabout their story and how they
got to vet med, because I feellike not everyone was like,
they, a lot of people are like,Oh, I want to be a vet when we
grow up or when I grew up, butit's not always that same, like,
okay, I'm going to be vet and itall ran smoothly from there.
And so I just love to hear thosestories.
So thank you for sharing that.
(03:27):
That's really cool.
michael-shirley---f (03:28):
absolutely.
It's a, it's a cool journey.
It's really unique.
You know, I think like many ofyour listeners, I wanted to be a
veterinarian, but I didn't wantto study.
So those don't go well together.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (03:38):
Same, same.
I always wanted to, when Ientered, I'm also a huge fan of
4 H.
My love for dogs started with 4H in middle school and into high
school, um, but I fell in lovewith the whole, like, animal
behavior and animal science ofit all.
So I was like, okay, I'll be avet.
Well, I joined my hospital.
I was like, nope.
I don't want to be a doctor.
I, I'd rather do marketing.
(04:00):
Um, yeah, but with that said,you've celebrated one year of
being in your new location.
I would love to dive in a littlebit more of like your whole
journey of coming to create thatvision for your new practice.
Like I know a lot of hospitalswill just move locations, but I
feel like it had a deepermission and meaning for you.
michael-shirley---family-pe (04:19):
Oh, for sure.
You know, when I asked my wifewhy she wanted to own her own
practice, because she had nevertalked about that ever in our,
in our dating, in marriage, thattopic of ownership had never
come up from her.
And so when I asked her why, shesaid, I want, I want to create
the type of work environmentwhere I want to go to work every
(04:39):
day.
And I want to surround myselfwith people with whom I want to
work every day.
And I said, now that I can helpyou with, cause it's, that's
people.
And that's what I do.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (04:47):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet (04:48):
so the, uh, the title that I gave
myself as chief empowermentofficer, uh, my job, my role is
to hire, find great people, hirethem, equip them with the tools
that they need to, to.
to do their job and then workalongside them to accomplish the
vision of our practice.
Everyone that applies to familypet health, before they can come
(05:11):
in for an in person interview,that's where it starts.
Like getting buy in startsthere.
Before they can come in for anin person interview, we require
them to read a book.
Uh, the book is called theenergy bus and it's a 10 rules
for fueling your life withpositivity, your life, work,
family with positive, positiveenergy.
Um, that's not to say that it'slike sunshine and rainbows and
(05:32):
puppies and kittens all the timeat our office.
It's
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (05:34):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-p (05:34):
that way.
Right?
Um, but We talk about our visionall the time and it all goes
back to Dr.
Shirley's desire to, uh, build,work in a nice facility where
they enjoy going to work andthen having a really great high
functioning team.
Everything else.
that we've done that's beensuccessful is because we've
(05:55):
stayed true to those first twothings.
Um, the new building that you'retalking about when, when we, we
started out in a 1960s ranchstyle house.
It was almost the identicalfloor plan to our first house.
It was not meant to be aveterinary hospital.
and So when we, when we decidedthat we were going to build a
(06:16):
new building, we had a visionboard in our office.
And, um, it was right when youcame out of the only bathroom we
had in the hallway.
And we would, and I would post,I would write questions on the
board for my team to answer.
While we were going through thedesign process things like what
is your ideal vacation and theywould put things on there What
is your favorite restaurant?
(06:37):
They would put things on thereWhat's the one thing in this
building that you love thatyou're gonna miss?
What's something that you can'twait to get rid of?
What's a design feature that wemust include in our hospital?
And so our team at the time had,had a, they helped us design
what we have now.
And it does go back to thatvision.
(06:59):
You know, we spend more time, atleast I know my wife and I do,
spend more of our waking hoursat the office than we do at our
house.
So it is important that we had aplace that brought us joy when
we were walking in or leaving atthe, in the evening.
Um, so we incorporated a lot ofnatural lighting.
We, um, you know, our Casco wellkennels that we have, everything
(07:21):
is, everything in our hospitalwas laid out and picked with a
purpose.
And that purpose goes back toour, our core values and our
purpose statement.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (07:32):
I love that so much.
Something that you said reallystuck out to me that I feel like
Is a huge missing piece to a lotof teams when they come to do
social media in particular isyou had buy in from the get go
that was something you were veryintentional about and you laid
the foundation for the culturefrom the from the get go and I
will talk about this here in afew minutes because I want to
(07:54):
dive into that more but I feellike That intentionality from
leadership trickles down down tothe support team and how they
feel about coming to work andhow they feel about promoting
your clinic, right?
Like I, I don't know about foryou, but when I was working at
the clinic at my clinic, I was ahuge ambassador for the place
that I worked because I loved itso much and I wasn't afraid to
(08:17):
tell people, yeah, I work at Xand X clinic.
Right.
And, um, it was something that Iwasn't ashamed about.
And I'm not saying like, youknow, people feel ashamed about
what their work, but I, I knowsome people that aren't excited
about work and don't want totell people about it.
So, um, yeah, I, I love that.
For you, is that the case withyour team?
Are they excited to tell people,Hey, I work here.
(08:38):
Um, and really just promote theclinic for you with word of
mouth
michael-shirley---family-p (08:42):
not, not only are, as it sounds so,
is it braggadocious, I guess, soplease don't take it as that,
but not only do the people thatcurrently work at our office,
uh, feel that way, but our many,many of our, not all of our, but
many of our former employeesalso feel that way and still
recommend us, even those thatwere let go by me.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (09:04):
Wow.
michael-shirley---family-pet (09:05):
it has taken, not everybody, but
many of them have come back andsaid, man, that was the best
thing that ever happened to me,you know, and they still talk
about the work environment thatwe had.
And, and so, so, so yeah, Ibelieve it because that's how we
are very clear of who we are andwe're, we're very clear through
(09:28):
who we are through our hiringprocess.
Through our onboarding process,through our client education and
communications, our socialmedia, everything explains who
we are and it's real, so wedon't, we're not faking it
because we're online.
Um, and so when people do joinour team or clients do come into
our hospital, they're like, Ohyeah, uh, this is exactly what I
(09:49):
thought it was going to be like,because I've been following your
journey since you were in thatold house.
And I'm like, Oh yeah, they'relike, demoing stuff at two
o'clock in the morning.
And then.
before the next day before yourteam opened up.
And so it's real.
And that, that's what I wouldtell people that are watching
this is as you work on yoursocial media marketing, uh, just
(10:11):
be yourself and People willappreciate it.
It doesn't have to be polished.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
People are so curious about whatwe do in our vet hospital.
You can just show something thatyou think is totally boring and
run of the mill and people arefascinated by that.
And so and if you're just ifyou're just true to who you are,
then I trust Any of my team topost on our social media
(10:35):
accounts.
Um, I love it when I see themtalk about, uh, in our
community, Facebook groups, uh,when they're like, oh, when
people are looking forveterinarians, they say, come
check us out.
You know, I love working here orin the technician job posting
Facebook group.
Um, when someone asks aboutworking in Tennessee and my team
(10:58):
with, you know, we're in that,they, I think they know we're in
that group now together, butwhen my team gets to there and
responds first, that's awesome.
It makes me feel good to seethat they really enjoy working
with us.
And we have, we have long termemployees.
So that's also, we've been openfor, uh, We're now six and a
half years in and most, many ofour people have been there.
(11:19):
This is their first job in VetMed and they're still with us,
whether that be six years, fiveyears, three years, um, or even
just a couple of months now.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (11:32):
Yeah, I love that And I also love to
hear that there's a low turnoverrate.
Like, of course, that's alwaysgoing to happen in business and
with practices, but I love justthat there's that passion and
that your team is willing tostick up for you, even if
they're not working with youanymore, that, that speaks
volumes.
And honestly, like we, I feelany way that we could spend a
(11:52):
lot of money on advertising andspending so much time on social
media, but really it's down tothe word of mouth and how the
community.
Views you as a practice.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (12:02):
I feel that that's true now more
than ever.
You know, when, when you and Ifirst started working together,
uh, I think that we could stillcontrol the narrative a lot more
than we can now.
Like make, you know,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_ (12:14):
Mm hmm.
michael-shirley---family-pe (12:15):
uh, and through our market, through
our posting and our marketing.
And what I've found now is thatit's really hard to track
whether things are working ornot.
Engagement's hard to really comeby.
Um, and yet we're still churningout content.
And I think that the reallyimportant thing about social
media is to have a consistentpresence and don't worry about
(12:37):
whether you're, um, It.
I don't think it's, I don'tthink you can track ROI on it
anymore.
It's, it's really, really hardto track ROI on social on the
time that you spend on socialmedia and, but I don't think
that that should be a reasonthat people should stop doing
it.
I want, again, I want to usesocial media to help tell our
(12:58):
story so that we.
Um, the people that aren't agood fit for family pet health
go look somewhere else and thepeople that are a right fit for
family pet health become morecurious and want to reach out or
they start looking for morecontent and it's easily found.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (13:16):
Um, you said something there that
was so powerful and I want todive in deep because I feel like
a lot of practices want toattract everybody in their
community or work with anybody,but I am firm believer of
repelling people.
Um, if.
If you don't want to work withthem.
ha
michael-shirley---family-pe (13:36):
go, go Google, go Google family pet
health, Murfreesboro, Tennessee,and read our latest one star
review.
And that is an example of wherewe didn't communicate with the
wrong person the right way.
What does that mean?
When somebody calls and says,how much is it to get my cat
spayed?
The question that our CSRs aresupposed to ask is, Oh, thanks
(13:58):
for calling.
Uh, is is price you're going tobe your main determining factor
in who you decide to and if thatperson says, if that person
says, yes, then we say, well,we're not the lowest price in
town, so, but let me save you alot of time and I will give you
the three cheapest veterinariansin Rutherford County we know
(14:21):
them.
Yeah,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024 (14:23):
Oh.
Yes, I love this so much.
I love that so much.
I want to pause there realquick, Michael, because that
right there, like I know there'sa lot of practices looking for
clients, but if you don't wantto work with somebody, if you
just get the sense that they'renot going to be a good fit for
your practice, just because ofthat question alone, I love that
(14:43):
you said, okay, we're not going,basically you're not going to be
the best fit for us, but hereare other places that can serve
you well.
You are serving that client.
Just with that answer and youare Attracting the kind of
clients you want to work withbecause people are going to say
oh, okay Well, they're not goingto be the cheapest But they took
the time to even direct me to adifferent direction for saying
(15:05):
we're not for you or we'rebooked for eight weeks Sorry,
bye Um, like I know I might bestepping some on some toes there
But I I love what you said therebecause as a former veterinary
assistant I didn't want to workwith certain clients because
they made me feel uncomfortableor You They just weren't very
pleasant people, and I hate tosay that, but they just weren't
(15:25):
happy people, and they took um,want me, cause me to come to
work because of that, so, Ithere, so, please continue.
michael-shirley---family-pet (15:33):
So instead of giving that line and
finding out we told her ourprice and she laughed on the
phone and hung up The whole callfrom the from the time that the
first ring until she hung up was54 seconds And so she left that
phone call and went straight toGoogle and left a one star
review and I'm like man Don'tyou have anything better to do
(15:54):
with your life?
But, but no, she didn't.
So she left us and told us thatwe were price gouging.
And so my first response, I wasin a bad mood that day.
And, and, um, so my firstresponse, I typed it out and I
hit post and I was, I looked atmy brother and said, Hey, will
you read that review?
I just, the response I justleft.
And he read the first sentenceand he go, and he leaned back in
(16:16):
his chair and looked at me andhe goes, Rewrite it.
I was like, man, he goes,that's, that's not your voice.
And I'm like, all right, allright.
And so I did, but the responsethat I gave her first sentence,
I don't remember what her namewas, Amanda.
I think I was like, Amanda, wewish you the best of luck in
finding a good veterinarypartner.
Next paragraph.
That's it.
That's it for her.
(16:37):
I didn't address any of theother junk that she said.
So my next paragraph was.
Um, for those of you reading onestar Google reviews, let me, let
me take this opportunity to tellyou about the family pet health
difference.
And then I listed what makes usdifferent.
The fact that we have sixlicensed technicians, that
(16:57):
they're the ones that are doingthe monitoring, that we do pre
and post op pain control and,and all these different things.
And it's in that one star Googlereview, which you know, that's
where people go to look.
They don't look at the fivestars they because I do it they
sort by lowest and read thoseAnd and go with it because even
(17:18):
though I disagreed with hercoming and leaving a one star
review.
She didn't lie I mean she shesaid that we're price gouging
but we're not but she but whatshe said She gave the right
estimate, which is of how muchit cost to get a cat spade.
Um, and, and so there was truthin her, there was some truth in
(17:38):
her post, but it gave me anopportunity.
I kind of flipped that.
It gives me an opportunity.
I'm not talking to her.
She's never coming to Family PetHealth, but there are people
that are going to be on Googlereading those reviews, and how I
respond to someone like that isgoing to tell them more about me
(17:59):
than just about anything elsethat I could do.
And we have had people that whenwe ask every single incoming
client, how did you hear aboutfamily pet health?
And more than, more than 10 thatI can think of have said your
response to one star Googlereviews.
That's how they found, or that'swhat made them come to Family
(18:21):
Pet Health.
And so, I, I think that everyoneout there should respond to
every single review, even ifit's just with a thank you.
And, and, you'll get, you'lllearn how to deal with Google
reviews.
Um, but use those to youradvantage, even the one star
ones.
Mm
cheyanne-flerx_2_08 (18:40):
Absolutely.
I love that a lot because I feellike people take on those
negative responses or negativereviews from people and take it
as a personal attack.
And the thing is, it's not aboutyou.
It's about that person and howthey're feeling and what's going
on in their world.
You just entered it, whetherthey contacted you, you
(19:02):
interrupted their feed,whatever.
And they're coming from a placethat is not their world.
Very happy there's somethinggoing on with them.
So if we can reply to them withnot addressing anything
Emotionally just comingneutrally sticking to the facts
But really just focusing on thepeople who will see that review
and are wanting to come Partnerup with you in your practice And
(19:26):
that is going to be just abetter outcome and like you
said, so thank you for bringingthat up because I feel like that
is a, a huge hurdle for a lot ofpeople to overcome.
This is wonderful.
michael-shirley---family- (19:37):
Well, this is another one of those
reasons that being a high schoolteacher uniquely qualified me
for running a veterinaryhospital because I've had, I've
had more than one student standup in the middle of the class,
throw me the bird and tell me toF off.
And then, and all the otherstudents are looking and pulling
out their cell phones to record.
(19:59):
so there is nothing that someonline keyboard warrior is going
to do that's going to hurt myfeelings.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (20:06):
Exactly.
Exactly.
We have a choice of how we aregoing to react to whatever
people say to us or do to us.
michael-shirley---family-pe (20:12):
the rule number one in the energy
bus is you are the driver ofyour own bus.
You can't control what happensto you, but you can control how
you respond to it.
And so, uh, it is sometimes ahard pill to swallow, but, uh,
um, just assume the best inpeople, respond appropriately
and move on.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (20:34):
I love that.
I'm writing down that bookrecommendation cause I would
love to read that myself.
Now, with that said, I want totalk about traction.
I started reading it, and I needto finish it, but I know that
the book Traction, um, by, oh,what's his name?
Can you remember the author'sname?
Can you tell me?
Gino Yes, okay, I'll put it intothe show notes for everybody,
(20:54):
but, um, I love how you tookthe, the premise and the concept
from Traction and made it intoyour, uh, social media manager's
goals for her.
I would, so go ahead and dive indeep on that because this is
really, really awesome to me.
michael-shirley---family-pet (21:09):
So the book Traction is written by
Gino Wickman.
It's about EOS, which stands forthe Entrepreneurial Operating
System.
It's a book that's designed forcompanies that have between 10
and I think 250 employees.
But really, if anybody out thereis thinking of owning your own
business, no matter what it is,uh, I am sold out to the
(21:31):
Traction Colt.
So you should read, you shouldread the book, read the book,
um, in the book, it talks about,uh, company goals, five, three,
one year goals, and, and thenfor each person on your team,
each quarter, they're working onthings called rocks.
So these are big, big, Big, bigthings that need to get
(21:51):
accomplished that take more thanone week in order to help
achieve a company goal.
So this year for 2024, ourcompany goals, we had, we had
two in particular.
One was to increase dentalcompliance by 10 percent and one
was to increase heartwormcompliance.
Uh, there, we had a revenue goalin there and some, some other,
(22:14):
uh, fear free goals and, and,uh, hiring a doctor goal.
So we had some other things inthere too, but those were our
compliance, uh, goals.
do you do that?
Well, you start, you have tobreak it down into quarters.
So, so our social media manager,Haley, Haley Cameron does a
phenomenal job of, uh, stayingup on our, especially, um,
(22:37):
Instagram, cause I don't doanything on Instagram.
So she does that and, and.
What she does is amazing.
So she has a goal.
She has her own goals of postingso many, uh, social media posts
per week and, and she tracksthem and keeps up with them.
We do sometimes sneak offercodes in there so we can see if
(22:58):
any of them are moving theneedle on anything.
Um, And so, so traction, so, soHaley's not the only one working
on a, on a goal.
Every single person on our teamhas individual goals and rocks.
And so some of her goals, uh,like are to produce a video
about our weight loss program.
And so she's working withanother team member who that's
(23:19):
their big rock.
And they work together to, to,to, um, to, let people know
about those things.
So, um, Haley, I, uh, sent Haleythrough your course.
And, uh, the Instagram coursespecifically, because I knew
nothing about Instagram.
And so she, she, uh, she hasjust rocked and rolled with that
(23:40):
and has done a really great jobwith, with all of our social
media, making the graphics and,uh, infographics and things that
are real easily shared.
And we're, we're seeing goodresults from that.
And again, it's providing anonline presence so that when
curious pet parents out therefinally go to Google your.
practices name, they can findrelevant and timely content.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (24:07):
love that so much.
And I bet your team feels a lotmore bought in from another
perspective into your practicesvision, because you have goals
and a purpose for them versusjust, okay, we've got to pump
clients through.
We got to get all this done andthis done.
And, um, So I love that.
And I love that you'veestablished a certain amount of
posts that you and Haley agreethat she's going to meet and
(24:31):
that she's working with otherteam members and that you're
encouraging her to, to do that.
I know that a lot of ourlisteners are frustrated because
they don't have a lot of teambuy in.
And that's why I want to ask youmore questions about this,
because I think there's a lot ofwork that practices could do,
but there's a lot that as, asthe support team members could
(24:52):
do to ask and prompt ourleadership to say, okay, what
expectations do you require ofme for this?
Or what do you envision of myrole as the social media manager
doing?
Because if I recall correctly,Haley is also in charge of the,
Doing the events, which I wantto dive into.
Um, and she's also areceptionist, right?
So she's got a lot of otherresponsibilities, but that
(25:14):
doesn't mean that she's feelingso overwhelmed or so
bottlenecked about everythingthat she can't feel excited
about work.
Um, so feel free to, to talkabout that more if you'd like.
michael-shirley---family-pe (25:26):
One of the neat things about
traction is that, um, when, whenanyone on our team encounters
problems or issues, we put it onthe issues list.
And so let's say that we had seta goal for Haley to do 25 social
media posts per week.
And she's, that's a number thatis re it's a smart goal, right?
(25:47):
It's, it's, it's, it hits allit's specific, measurable,
attainable, and, uh, relevantand time bound.
And The, not only, we don't stopwith SMART goals.
We do SMARTER goals.
So we evaluate and respond, uh,as the ER on that.
But if she's encountering aproblem that she can't meet her
goal, she's gonna put that onthe issues list.
(26:08):
And the issues list, it mightjust say, having trouble
reaching 25 posts a week.
That's, that's the issue.
She doesn't have to comeinterrupt her day, interrupt my
day, or anything like that.
We deal with issues at aregularly scheduled weekly
meeting, and, and when we comeup with that issue, we, we
start, we identify it.
(26:29):
We identify the issue is, she'snot posting 25 posts a week.
Then we, so we have identifiedit.
Then we discuss it.
Why?
What are some challenges?
What are some things that arepreventing you from doing that?
Is it another person isn't doingwhat they're supposed to do,
which is holding you back fromdoing what you're supposed to
do?
Or is it purely that you don'thave time?
(26:49):
Um, so we identify, we discussit, and then we solve it.
So together, we may re evaluateand say, Hey, 25 was just too
many.
So we're going to move it to 14.
And we so that's we've we'vesolved it.
We just we lowered it to 14 orit might be all I really need to
(27:11):
is 35 minutes On a tuesday toblock myself off and I can knock
out a whole week's worth of postas long as I have that blocked
Well, we can discuss is thatpossible?
Yes, it's possible We're goingto adjust the schedule so that
hayley can step away from thethree other things that she does
You And she's just going to puton her social media posting hat
(27:34):
and get it done and then go backto Her regularly scheduled
programming, right?
So so we identify it We discussit and we solve it and we do it
in specific scheduled meetingsso that it's not Blowing up our
work day Because ultimatelywe're a veterinary hospital.
We're supposed to be gettingclients in the door and to a
room so our medical team cantake care of them and then we
(27:56):
check them out and get them outthe door.
That's our goal.
That's what pays the bills.
Our social media is not payingthe bills.
But social media might be what'shelping us keep our books full.
So it, it, that's where it'slike, is this important or not?
Well, I couldn't, it'simportant.
I know it's important, but Ican't tell you exactly what the
ROI is on.
And I just know that we're goingto keep doing it.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (28:18):
exactly.
Yeah.
And it's just taking that timeto assess.
Okay.
It, how effective is this goingto be right now?
And are we using our energy andtime wisely on social media or
is there somewhere else we canfocus or, you know, just taking
that time to reassess.
And I feel like there, that's anessential step to marketing as a
whole.
Like, I know a lot of practicesfeel like they should do social
(28:40):
media just because that's whatthey've been told or that
they've heard like, Oh,everyone's on social media,
that's where all the money'scoming from, but they don't
really stop doing that.
and pause and say, okay, is thisan effective tool for my
practice?
Because I can tell you there'seight hospitals just in my town
alone, so it's kind of saturatedin that regard.
But, so, social media might bean important role for us, but
(29:02):
for someone who's out in a ruralarea that has, like, they're the
only competition, right?
They're, it's just them.
You know, social media might notbe such an important tool for
them.
So just taking that time to see,okay, how is this going to apply
to my situation?
How can I make it possible?
And how can I still beconsistent with it without
burning out and making it, youknow, the bane of my existence,
(29:24):
right?
So I love that.
So with that, I do want to pivota bit.
But, um, as I mentioned, Haley'salso in charge of managing
events.
So I know that you guysrecently, a few months ago at
the time of this recording, justfinished with, you know, walk my
dog tap challenge.
Um, and now you're doing trivianights.
And so I would love to hear fromyou on how both of those events,
(29:47):
um, have been going for yourpractice and what kind of return
on investment have you beengetting from those?
michael-shirley---family-pet (29:54):
So the walk my dog challenge for us
started in 2020.
It was, uh, we, we totally, um,saw it in, on, in a, in a chat.
Somebody mentioned it offhand ina Facebook.
And I was like, wait, can you,what was that you said?
Walk my dog.
What's, what's that about?
And, um, so they they werefriendly enough to just share
(30:18):
with us their framework.
It's, it is a, it's a communityevent.
It's open to anybody in thewhole world.
You walk your dog, you log yourmiles.
you win free prizes.
It's that simple.
So we created a landing page onour website.
We use whisker cloud.
We talked to them.
They just created a Google entryform.
So people, we would just sayfamily, pet health.
(30:40):
com slash walk my dog.
And it takes you to the entryform and they put in their,
their contact information, name,email, and phone number, their
dogs.
name, breed, size, uh, they putin their age group as well, and
that gets them entered.
Then we, we have this wholeemail, uh, system.
Now we're five years, this isour fifth time to do this, so
(31:04):
it's all pretty automated atthis point, but, uh, we, for
eight, Yeah, we do it for eightweeks, and at the end of the
eight weeks, we have a big dogparty, we pass out t shirts to
everyone that walked 50 miles,everyone that walks 5 miles gets
like poop bags, 10 miles is um,a squeaky ball, and if you walk
(31:26):
70, 50 miles is a t shirt, and75 miles is a free exam.
So, that's a big deal.
And they're even allowed todonate their gift certificate
for an exam to someone else.
So, you know, maybe they lovetheir vet on the other side of
town, but they have a friendthat's on our side of town.
(31:46):
Like, hey, I won this fromFamily Pet Health.
I'm not going to drive overthere, so you take it.
So, it's, you know, a littlemarketing thing there.
But, uh, we walked to the moonand back last year, and this
year we walked around the world.
And, I don't know, 55 times.
100 miles.
Um, so it's, it's pretty cool.
Uh, but the cool.
thing about it, and I think whatyou are wanting me to maybe talk
(32:07):
about probably is that it's notjust family pet health, but each
week we identified localbusiness, partners in our
community.
They had to be small business,independent, small businesses,
um, mom and pops, if you will.
And we went to them, told themwhat we were doing and asked
them if they would like tosponsor a One of the weeks of
the walk my dog challenge.
(32:28):
So each week has a, has a smallbusiness sponsor.
They give out a picture prompt.
And so you on your walk withyour dog, you take a picture and
you post it, you tag us, andthen.
We do drawing some, sometimesit's five drawings in one week.
Sometimes it's one drawing atthe end of the week for everyone
that posted a picture.
(32:48):
Uh, for example, Simply PureSweets, my favorite place to eat
breakfast in Murfreesboro.
They, uh, have these giantcinnamon rolls, which are really
bad for my diabetes, but, um,they, they, uh, give away five
of them.
So it's a picture of your dogstopping along the walk to enjoy
a snack.
Uh, Evans Plant Farm.
(33:09):
Take a picture of your dogstopping to smell the flowers
and they give them a big, like areally nice gift basket.
They're always our first weeksponsor cause it's still not
just summer heat.
So plants are still a big thingat that time.
Gets people excited.
Um, a local, uh, animalphotographer donates a session.
(33:29):
So there's all sorts of realestate agent gives a hundred
dollar gift card to a homeimprovement store.
We had, um, uh, um, a yogastudio or actually a bar like
studio.
Um, they gave a whole month, uh,free membership, uh, doggie
daycare did a, you know, free,free grooming or something.
So it was, it was great.
(33:50):
And so what we're doing isleveraging.
their social media to putpeople, redirect people back to
family pet health.
So we may not have reached theirclients on our own to get them
to register.
But when they say, Hey, it's ourweek to sponsor the walk my dog
challenge.
Uh, go to FamilyPetHealth.
com to sign up and they sendthat out to all of their email
(34:13):
lists or social media contactswhich is redirecting them back
to our website.
So, we partner, we've done thisfive years, we partner with our
favorite local fear free dogtrainer in town and uh, it's a
joint venture and it has been areal success.
Now the ROI on it.
Can't really tell you.
Um, I will tell you that ithasn't garnered as many new
(34:37):
clients as I thought it would.
Like, we have a lot of peoplethat get that 75 free or 85 free
exam and a small, only a smallpercentage of them have ever
been redeemed.
And I don't really know thereason why.
I might look into that more if Ihave time, but Honestly, people
are pretty bonded to their vetsand we're not doing this to try
(34:58):
to steal people away.
We're just doing it to help thecommunity.
Obviously it started in 2020.
We didn't know it at the time,but when we were planning this,
it turned out to be a hugething.
The local newspaper wrote astory about it and everything
because it was right in themiddle of COVID.
And, but we didn't know that atthe time when we were planning
it, that it was going to be socool.
And now we've just been.
(35:19):
Doing it.
Like I said, it really doesn'ttake a lot of time.
Um, cost me less than a thousanddollars in prizes, maybe, maybe
2, 000 in prizes to do it, but.
It's good content and, and, uh,and people really enjoy it.
We've had people that do itevery year, so we're going to
continue it.
I do know that Haley wants tohave an evaluation meeting, uh,
(35:40):
this, this go around, because Ithink we're going to require
some of our community partnersto be more specific in how they
share it.
Or they can't be our partnersanymore because we do all the
work.
We just need them to share it.
So, so that's that, that walkedmy dog challenge.
Yeah, The walk my dogchallenges.
It's been a lot of fun and we'llcontinue to do it.
I just, we're going to make somechanges to it this year.
(36:02):
Now that.
The Trivia Night is um, an ideathat I had, I don't even know
what I was doing when I had theidea, but we sponsor trivia, so
it's dinner and trivia at ouroffice, we have a, in the new
building, and people should gocheck it out, go to
FamilyPetHealth.
com.
building project and take a lookat the, take a look at the floor
(36:25):
plan.
It's all posted there.
You can look at it, but we builta garage on the end of our
building and it's about 1200square feet.
So it's bigger than the actualbuilding that we were in over
before we moved.
And, um, so, It's it's kind offlex space.
It is literally a drive throughvet service garage, but it holds
(36:45):
About a hundred people withtables and chairs And so we we
offered Four local non profitsthat are animal related for the,
well, one was trade schoolrelated, but, um, for local
nonprofits, we said, Hey, we'llprovide, we will provide the
space and I will pay for thisguy that runs trivia.
(37:06):
I'll, that will be my donationto your organization as I'll pay
for the trivia guy.
So all you have to do is selltickets and And we're, we're
going to make this a lot of fun.
So far we've had, we've, we'vesuccessfully held two of these
events.
Our third one is Monday andwe've already raised about 5,
000 for just the first, uh,first sessions that we've done.
(37:28):
And that money goes straight tothose animal, uh, groups.
And, uh, we're really proud ofthat.
It's been a lot of fun.
And that has.
That event has.
resulted in at least three newclients in two events So I
consider that a huge roi becauseit cost me about 200 bucks for
the trivia 200 I got Thoseclients to come so the lifetime
(37:53):
value of our client of ours isway more than 200.
So um that that's been reallygreat and the best part is is
that We're, we're serving ourcommunity, which is a big part.
That's one of one part of ourmission, uh, is that we want to
be active in our local communityand be a place that people come
for more than just vet care.
So having these trivia nightshas been a lot of fun.
(38:14):
Um, it's a blast.
You should go to our Tik TOK andyou can see some of the
highlights, uh, from thosetrivia nights so far, and
they've been really great.
And we've been able to raisesome, um, large sums of money
for, for, by their standards,uh, for some really great local
nonprofits.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01 (38:31):
Awesome.
I love this so much because,Even though your practice to
anyone listening may not havethe space like Michael does to
host events, there are ways foryou to continue hosting events
in your local area that iscommunity based, um, and still
getting your name out there.
And I really like how you'reusing the walk my dog challenge
(38:53):
to get, uh, To use otherpeople's audiences in your local
community to really push outyour own name, um, and to really
get your name out there.
And that is a really cool hack,to get more followers to your
account.
If that is the goal of yours,um, I will be doing an episode
(39:13):
on that a little bit morebecause I definitely have some
opinions about that.
But, um, overall, it reallyHelps you to get more reach to
people in your local community,because Michael, I'm sure you
can attest to this reallyfocusing on your local
community, whether it's just onsocial media or doing just
events is going to be a betterreturn on investment for
(39:34):
whatever you're putting intosocial media, because if you're
focusing on the people in yourarea, You'll get more clients
that way versus just everybodyin the world, because everybody
in the world's not going to beable to do business with you.
As you can tell with just yourwalk, your dog challenge, you
know, people aren't comingacross town for some, what,
whatever reason that may be todo business with you, but people
(39:54):
know what you're about.
You're building that brandawareness through that.
And I think that's really thebest thing that you can do for
your brand overall, because ifyou're not getting clients, but
people are telling, um, theirfriends and family about you,
it's a much easier buy in forpeople to come to you versus
just cold search off theinternet.
michael-shirley---family- (40:15):
Yeah, and, and so,
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_ (40:16):
I, I love that.
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (40:20):
a meeting space to hold 75 people,
then clearly you're not going tohave a trivia night in your exam
space, right?
But just like our, our, ourvendors have CE at restaurants,
you can find a restaurant thatwill provide you space.
Um, find a school gymnasium,find, you know, find, uh, just
(40:41):
find a space to do it.
And, and it doesn't have to be arestaurant.
It can be just a warehousespace.
As long as it's climatecontrolled, you're good, right?
And, and bring in food trucksand do this.
It's, it's easier than you maythink that it is, uh, and like
Cheyenne said, it's, it's justleveraging other people's, uh,
Social media and contact emaillist to at least plant a seed
(41:05):
with your, with your company'sname in it.
They may not, uh, the BeasleyAnimal Foundation is a low cost
spay, neuter and vaccine clinic.
That's just down the street fromme.
I used to consider themcompetition and now I consider
them friends.
Like one of our doctors is ontheir board of directors.
They are literally like theclosest.
(41:25):
Other they're the closest othervet clinic to our office.
So but rather than see them ascompetition We looked for ways
to partner with them.
They have an oliver It's calledthe oliver trust and it is an
account.
It's just a spay neuter andvaccine clinic.
So when they diagnose, um, acracked canine tooth or tumors
or something else they say hey,you need to find a full service
(41:48):
vet and When people say well, Idon't have any money the oliver
fund You Uh, the Beasley cliniccan call me and say, we're
sending Cheyenne down to see youand she's approved for up to 800
in care.
Our team knows that if thatperson's coming, we, we don't do
many discounts, but we workreally hard to keep that low.
(42:10):
And then we just send that billto Beasley.
So and they have several othervets in town that, that are,
that, that work with them aswell.
So they're able to do that.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (42:19):
Yeah.
michael-shirley---family-pet (42:20):
My point is, like, just think
outside of the box, look at,look at community partners that
are doing good work, people thatyou want to be associated with,
and just go up to them and say,Hey, I heard this crazy idea
about a food truck trivia night.
Would you like to, like we'llhelp, we'll help put it
together.
Yeah, we'll help put ittogether, but the money stays
with you.
(42:42):
Why wouldn't they do that?
That's like what, you know, so,um, yeah.
And if they're a non profit,they can, they can, uh, like all
of ours are, are 501c3s.
They set up, they do all thecollecting of money, the ticket
sales and all that.
All we help do is produce it.
It's a, it's a really cool, it'sa really cool, uh, creative way
to have fun and raise money fornon profits and do some
(43:05):
marketing on the side there too.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (43:08):
Yeah, oh, such a great idea with the
food trucks, because I know alot of practices have parking
lots, right, so if you justclose early one day or decide to
open up, like, on a Saturday, ifyou're not open on Saturdays,
normally just host an eventduring the summer, if it's not
too hot in your area, um, andjust have a food truck come up
and do trivia night or whateverthat may be for you.
(43:31):
You know, that's a greatopportunity right there to
support your community and bringpeople to your practice.
They get an idea of what's goingon at your practice and they get
to know you and your team.
So that's wonderful.
All right, Michael, I have onemore question for you and, um,
we'll land the plane here as thecool kids say.
But, um, I would love to talkabout your podcast if you're
open to that, because I feellike that's a lot of, uh, that,
(43:54):
that podcast that the concept ofthe podcast is that.
Area where I feel like a lot ofpractices could really lean
into.
Um, so I would love to know howthat's going for you and how
that's opened the door for your,your clients as, or at least in
the way that's been a good ROIis what I'm trying to get at.
michael-shirley---family- (44:12):
Yeah.
So our podcast is called theFamily Pet Podcast.
It's a podcast for curious petparents where we believe the
more you know about pet healthcare, the better pet parent you
can be.
You can tell I've said that afew times, right?
Um, it, our episodes are about25 minutes long, which is the
average length that it takessomeone to walk one mile with
their dog.
(44:32):
Walk your dog.
Walk my dog.
So, uh, yeah, so the podcast,honestly, I'll be completely
honest with you.
The podcast started because Imiss teaching.
I miss talking.
I miss, like, Educating peopleand I miss my classroom.
So the podcast was a way to keepme from going back to teaching.
(44:54):
But, uh, um, so it was, it wassomething that I had thought
about starting a podcast with mykids where we, we were going to
call it tales of tales, tales ofTennessee, T A I L.
Of Tennessee and we were justgoing to tell fun stories about
animal related stories aboutTennessee animals, but um,
(45:16):
anyway What we realized was thatwe needed it for our office So
the first I don't know 15episodes were the 15 They were
the answers to the 15 most askedquestions in the exam room.
And the, the thought process waswe would make an episode about
all of the things that weconstantly are talking about in
(45:38):
our exam room.
Then the next time someone askedabout it, we would say, Oh,
well, here's a little handout.
Scan this QR code.
It'll take you to our podcast.
And you need to listen toepisode three, which is all
about heartworms.
Or you need to listen to episodeone, which was about the rabbit
hemorrhagic disease.
And, um, it had made it, thatwas a big deal.
It made its way into Tennesseefor the first time.
(46:01):
So the podcast has continued to,to be strictly for.
Pet parents as an educationalopportunity to teach them about
pet health care So they couldtake better pet better care of
their pets and be their petshero and it has been so much fun
I have met so many cool peoplein vet med when I told them I
(46:23):
have a podcast and I want totalk about That one weird thing
that they're the expert in.
They're like, yes, I would loveto talk about Ehrlichia.
And like, nobody ever wants meto talk about Ehrlichia.
I'm like, well, I want you to doa whole podcast about Ehrlichia.
And they're like, this isamazing.
So, um, yeah, so, so it's been alot of fun and it's certainly
built my network up ofveterinary professionals, people
(46:45):
that I can call when I needadvice or, or some con
consulting on a case orsomething, uh, it's been really
cool to have that.
It is hard.
It, it takes a lot of time.
So, Even like right now, ifsomebody went to our podcast,
you would see that I haven'tposted in about, it's probably
getting close to five weeksbecause I have been going
(47:07):
nonstop.
But once school starts back andwe get our family back into a
more normal routine, we'll getback on, On track posting them,
but it is it's the our latestpodcasts are better audio
quality better flow than ourfirst ones But again, it doesn't
have to be perfect.
You just need to have goodaudio.
That's the main thing Yourcontent doesn't have to be great
(47:29):
But your audio needs to becrisp.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (47:34):
Yes, 100%.
And nowadays, it doesn't have tobe polished.
People don't want polishedcontent.
They just want to see thatyou're present or entertaining
them or giving them some quickwins or something that's adding
to their life.
And they're, they're golden.
I think that's the huge shift insocial media in particular.
(47:54):
Um, And I think podcasts are aperfect place to have on social
media, or use social media topromote to your podcasts, um,
just because people want thatraw, um, authentic conversations
like this, um, so I, I thinkthat the podcast is going to be
a huge opportunity for you.
And I wanted to ask, are you,um, transcribing those podcasts
(48:16):
into your blog and making those,um, rankable search engine
content?
michael-shirley---family-p (48:21):
Just recently switched to Riverside
as our recording platform.
And it does, it does make atranscript.
So we do auto generate thetranscript.
It's got some errors in it andstuff, but we do use that to
upload to Spotify and YouTube.
It's a, it's on, we just put itup straight up on YouTube now
too.
So, Again, it doesn't have to beperfect.
(48:43):
People understand.
I know, you know, when we readsubtitles, when we're watching
TikTok on silent, during ameeting, uh, they don't always
get it right.
But you are intelligent enoughto fill in the blanks the way
they need to be.
Resort words, right?
So, just do it.
But, but, So, Yes.
we do use the transcription, um,we have it on, uh, anywhere you
(49:06):
can download a podcast, we'rethere.
And then we do have it onYouTube.
as well.
So again, when people finallydecide that they're ready to
search and learn more about thiscrazy vet clinic that has the
outdoor patio seating for theirexam rooms and a garage, like
who has a garage?
And so they're finally ready todo that search when they type in
(49:28):
family pet health Murfreesboro,Tennessee, everything that
populates is going to be,they're going to have a wealth
of of options.
to choose from of how they wantto learn more about us.
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-2024_1 (49:41):
I love that.
I think that the podcast, um,whether you guys, whoever's
listening, does a podcast, doesa YouTube channel, does blog, I
think it's really importantnowadays.
And I know it takes a lot ofextra time and you already
pressed for time with socialmedia, but I would love for you
just to open your mind to doingsome form of long form content,
like a podcast, YouTube, blog,like I said, and really
(50:03):
leveraging that to get some uh,good organic reach through that
on the internet, um, but you canuse that for your social media,
so that can be a fuel, that canbe your topic for a social media
post, you can repurpose thatcontent so it's not such a heavy
load like, okay, I have tocreate a podcast, I have to
create something new, no, you'rejust repurposing something This
(50:27):
huge cake and then you're justcutting it up so that it's easy
to distribute.
So weird analogy but Michael,thank you so much for coming
onto the show today.
I really appreciate you justsharing everything that you've
been doing at Family Pet Health.
And, um, I know you've mentionedit a few times, but if people
want to follow you and connectwith you in particular, where is
(50:48):
the best place they can connect?
michael-shirley---family-pe (50:50):
The best place is just go to
familypethealth.
com And you can find all of oursocial media channels.
You can email the the websitejust email us there.
They'll get it to me And I dowant to I would be remiss if I
didn't make a one final plug orone plug here before we go That
everyone out there that'swatching.
This is obviously interested inveterinary medicine Join us on
(51:14):
Facebook at the VeterinaryLeadership Book Club.
So you just do a Google searchfor, yeah, uh, do a, do a, do a
Facebook search for VLBC, whichstands for Veterinary Leadership
Book Club, and we read a book.
Uh, and we talk about ittogether.
We, we, we reframe all of ourquestions related to vet meds.
(51:37):
So we read traction.
That's before I implemented itat my office, we read through it
in the book club, um, we've readeverything from traction to
green lights by MatthewMcConaughey and yes, we were
able to successfully.
Relate Matthew McConaughey'sgreen lights to vet med.
It was fun Um, we're currentlyreading qbq which is the
(51:58):
question before the question andit's been a lot of fun So, um, I
would encourage everybody tojoin us there on the book club
as well, but you can reach me atfamily pet health.
com
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-202 (52:10):
Yes.
Thank you for mentioning that.
I wanted you to bring that upand I will add a link to it into
the show notes for everybody.
But yeah, thank you so much,Michael.
And I hope to talk with you moreand maybe have you back on the
show later.
michael-shirley---family-pet- (52:23):
I will do anything you need.
I'm here to help you.
I appreciate our friendship andand you've definitely helped
family pet health Like I wantyou when you.
look at our building and andhear our stories, you know
Definitely know that you.
helped us to achieve that.
So I appreciate that
cheyanne-flerx_2_08-01-20 (52:42):
Thank you, Michael.
Appreciate you.
Thanks for tuning in everybody.
Bye.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX ( (52:47):
Thanks so much for tuning in.
I hope you found value from thisepisode.
today.
And if you did, would youconsider sharing subscribing and
even reviewing the podcast?
I want to be sure that you don'tmiss the next piece of marketing
content that I have to sharewith you because I've got a lot
planned and I would love to beable to support you on your
marketing journey.
So if you wouldn't mind sharingthis and following and doing all
(53:08):
the things possible.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX (Elg (53:09):
And sharing the podcast with others.
Wave Link MicrophoneFX (El (53:11):
That would be wonderful because I
want to help as many veterinaryprofessionals as possible.
So I can't do that without yourhelp.
So.
if you'd be willing to do that,that would be amazing.
But in the meantime, I willcatch you on the next episode,
and I wish you the best weekpossible.
Bye.
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