Solving Veterinary Clinic Chaos: Inside the World of Vet Receptionist Remote Call Services

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Isabelle Blaser  – Vet Receptionists

 

Podcast Overview:

00:00 Supporting Overworked Vet Hospitals
04:20 Staffing Shortages and Owner Misunderstandings
08:15 Vets Avoiding Independent Practice
09:49 Veterinary Staff Experience Insights
13:12 Teamwork in Hospitals Explained
16:57 Veterinary Medicine: Broad, Demanding Expertise
19:31 Healing Through Puppy Care
23:08 “Clinic Growth and Staffing Strain”
28:08 General Practice Veterinary Hospital Size
29:58 Dominance of Market Software Leaders
34:05 “Veterinary Hiring Knowledge Test”

Podcast Transcription:

James Kademan [00:00:00]:
What is Vet Receptionists?

Isabelle Blaser [00:00:01]:
Vet Receptionists is a remote reception service for veterinary hospitals.

James Kademan [00:00:06]:
Nice.

Isabelle Blaser [00:00:07]:
In short, that’s.

James Kademan [00:00:08]:
That’s cool. That’s cool. Why is that important?

Isabelle Blaser [00:00:11]:
It’s important because I’m sure you’ve been to a veterinary hospital sometime recently. The staff is more than you’d like to admit. I think it’s just a nationwide thing that vet hospitals are understaffed and overworked and they always need an extra set of hands. That way they can take care of the patients that are in the hospital.

Isabelle Blaser [00:00:29]:
So that’s where we come in.

James Kademan [00:00:34]:
You have found Authentic Business Adventures, the business program that brings you the struggle stories and triumphant successes of business owners across the land. Downloadable audio episodes can be found in the podcast link found@drawincustomers.com we are locally underwritten by the banks of Sun, Bank of Sun Prairie. Woof. Calls on Call, Extraordinary Answering Service as well as the Bold Business Book. And today we’re welcoming, slash preparing to learn from Isabelle Blaser, at Vet Receptionists. So, Isabelle, how is it going today?

Isabelle Blaser [00:01:04]:
It is going just fabulous. How about yourself?

James Kademan [00:01:07]:
Sweet. It’s going well. I’m excited. We’re talking about veterinary receptionists. Let’s just start there. What is Vet Receptionists?

Isabelle Blaser [00:01:14]:
Vet Receptionists is a remote reception service for veterinary hospitals.

James Kademan [00:01:20]:
Nice. In short, that’s cool. That’s cool. Why is that important?

Isabelle Blaser [00:01:26]:
It’s important because I’m sure you’ve been to a veterinary hospital sometime recently. The staff is more than. More than you’d like to admit. I think it’s just a nationwide thing that vet hospitals are understaffed and overworked and they always need an extra set of hands. That way they can take care of the patients that are in the hospital. So that’s where we come in. It’s really important just to have a backup and just, you know, a fail safe of someone else that can handle the phone calls, the text messages, the emails that come in so that the staff can handle the critical patients that are in front of them.

James Kademan [00:02:03]:
And is this a problem that’s been going on for years, forever, or is this a fairly new issue?

Isabelle Blaser [00:02:09]:
I think it’s been a problem that’s been going on for a while, but it’s becoming more prevalent because more people are having pets. The population is getting a little bit bigger and people are obviously more outspoken about issues that they may have in their workplace and especially in veterinary medicine, you know, that’s, it’s just hard to keep staff. So this is a great way to make sure that everybody’s taken care of.

James Kademan [00:02:34]:
So tell me about keeping staff in the veterinary medicine world. Because I’ve been on the side of the counter where I pay, but not on the side of the counter where I have to take the pets in and deal with the angry customers and all that kind of stuff. I’ve certainly been on this side of the counter dealing with angry customers in other realms. It just, it seems interesting to me because you have someone’s pet who some people like. I think of my dad, to him, a pet is an animal. He grew up on a farm. And an animal can be replaced.

Isabelle Blaser [00:03:05]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:03:05]:
They’re just like, oh, it’s like a hot dog that got moldy. If your animal’s sick, just get rid of it. And I used to be that way until I got my first animal. I got a dog. And now that dog I love more than most other people in my life. So I’m like, that’s a different game. Right. So I guess I say that to say you’re not just ordering popcorn or a beer or something like that.

James Kademan [00:03:24]:
Like you’re actually dealing with this living, breathing member of a family, which means that emotion can get involved. So tell me a little story about what it’s like to work on that side of the counter.

Isabelle Blaser [00:03:34]:
Yeah, I mean, I think you hit a lot of good points. And I think one all encompassing thing is I don’t think people realize that whatever they can do in a human hospital, like imagine that that is also being done for animals. So like the emergency room realm is real. And I think that’s where most of the short staffing and burnout comes from. Because like when you are imagining a pet, you’re probably thinking, okay, yeah, vaccines, well, visit, maybe a spay and neuter. Right. But it really comes down to the emergency side and the critical care side. So like, if your pet is having an active emergency and you come in there, whatever you would imagine that you would get in a human hospital, that’s what’s also being done for the animal side.

Isabelle Blaser [00:04:20]:
And I think there’s just like a lack of knowledge on the owner’s side, firstly, that maybe they don’t understand everything that’s going on. So when they get upset and you have an angry owner and you’re getting yelled at, you just want to like, say, like, I wish you could understand what I’m doing. And just that, you know, after a long period of time leads to people saying, okay, well I’m not doing this anymore. Maybe I don’t get paid enough money, I don’t have a good work life balance Whatever, it just accumulates over time and that ultimately leads to the staffing shortages. Another thing is, you know, just the whole money side of it, which I hate to get into. But people, yeah, it’s important. Owners, obviously, they love their pets. Some things are expensive.

Isabelle Blaser [00:05:15]:
If you take your pet to an emergency hospital, they got hit by a car and they need to be in the ICU for a week, they might tell you it’s going to be eight to ten grand just to keep them alive. And people, owners sometimes can come across saying, like, you just care about the money. Right. We don’t, we don’t care about the money. We’re not. I’m not getting that 8 to 10 grand, like I promise you.

James Kademan [00:05:37]:
Yeah, Just.

Isabelle Blaser [00:05:38]:
Yeah. Directly in my bank account. No, I might see it a very small fraction of that. So I think it’s just that there’s a side of veterinary professionals and there’s a side of owners and we don’t always mesh a hundred percent because they don’t see our side. And maybe we don’t understand their side completely either. And there’s just, you know, hostility and things like that sometimes. And I just think that accumulates over time and leads to people wanting to leave the veterinary field because they don’t get the same respect as a human doctor would.

James Kademan [00:06:15]:
Oh, interesting that. You know, it’s funny, I have noticed that as well with the veterinary side. Talking to my vet, who he’s a male and I didn’t know that. I’m learning the veterinary field is female.

Isabelle Blaser [00:06:29]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:06:30]:
I had no idea because my one vet, the guy that I see is a dude. So my, the awareness that I had was this one guy. So therefore a lot of vets are guys. I don’t know. I’m wrong.

Isabelle Blaser [00:06:43]:
You’re very wrong. Yeah, very wrong.

James Kademan [00:06:45]:
Oh my gosh. But it’s interesting because talking to him, he was talking about expanding his practice and the cost of build out. He’s in an older building. It looks beat up. It’s prison beige inside. It’s the brick that looks like it was put up probably 50, 60 years ago.

Isabelle Blaser [00:07:02]:
Sad beige.

James Kademan [00:07:04]:
Right. And he’s like, I’m 50 some years old. Am I gonna go into, you know, a million and a half in debt right now so that I can expand and add more veterinarians and add more services and stuff like that, or am I just going to ride the tide for the next 10 years until I retire? And it was interesting talking to him about that because his perception was like, I’m just a veterinarian, you know, there’s only so many animals. And I’m like, come on, you got a wait list. You could bring on more business. But from a financial point of view, he was looking at it like, how long will it take for me to get that return to actually justify sticking my neck out? Seven figures. It’s a big deal.

Isabelle Blaser [00:07:44]:
Yeah. I mean, the. They’re not rolling in money, right? Like, if. If you take your pet in for an exam and vaccines, they’re not making very much on that because they’re not, you know, doubling, tripling the prices. They’re making what. Or they’re charging, rather, what they can to keep the place open and to pay their staff and to make a teeny tiny bit to stay alive. But they’re not like upcharging. So it’s not like a human hospital where, you know, you get a cut and you have to have stitches and of course there’s insurance involved.

Isabelle Blaser [00:08:15]:
But there’s a drastic difference on paying things for almost the same services. But that’s also to your point, James, like, why some vets straight out of school don’t want to open their own practice anymore because they. They don’t know. Like, even if. If they’re like, yep, I want to do it, they’re taking all of these things into consideration. Right. Like, how much is this gonna cost for me to do it? How am I gonna find all these staffing, like, staff people to do it, support staff? How am I gonna keep the doors open for X amount of years to make this return and keep growing and prospering? That’s why all these people are just like, I’ll just go corporate and I’ll just work and I’ll go wherever they tell me, and I know I’ll have a job.

James Kademan [00:08:59]:
Yeah. Interesting. There’s something we said for punching a clock and walking away.

Isabelle Blaser [00:09:03]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:09:03]:
I was just joking with a buddy of mine who sold his business. Now he’s got this little side job. I don’t know what he’s doing. Delivering parts for an auto parts store or something like that. And he’s like, james, it’s amazing. I just punch out and that’s it. I don’t care until I punch in again. I was like, oh, what’s that?

Isabelle Blaser [00:09:19]:
Like, we don’t know.

James Kademan [00:09:22]:
Yeah, no idea. Tell me from the vet receptionist side, you guys are doing answering phones essentially, for veterinary clinics. Is the. We talked a little bit about the veterinarians, the doctors, ones that went to school for a billion years or whatever.

Isabelle Blaser [00:09:38]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:09:39]:
What kind of experience or knowledge do the the vet receptionists need or typically.

Isabelle Blaser [00:09:44]:
Have the ones that are on rsf.

James Kademan [00:09:47]:
Let’s talk about universities or just in general. The ones that are on your staff.

Isabelle Blaser [00:09:49]:
Yeah, so the, the ones that are on our staff, I guess I’ll start there. Have some sort of clinical veterinary experience, whether that’s working the front desk, whether that is working as a technician or assistant in the back, it’s just kind of all encompassing. They have experience in a veterinary hospital. Obviously, when you’re in a hospital and not working remotely for a veterinary hospital, there’s a little bit of a different skill set that the actual receptionists have to have because they’re dealing with people right in front of them. They’re also dealing with making sure everything’s presentable and tip top shape and things like that. So I think it does vary a little bit of if they’re in the hospital or working remotely. I think that most of the people on our team right now all. I don’t think any of us were just straight up receptionists, which is a good edge for us.

Isabelle Blaser [00:10:37]:
So we were all, you know, in the back with the doctors helping them with treatments or surgeries, procedures, whatever. So we know a little more of the, the actual medical side, which, which allows us to help our clients and their callers a little bit more.

James Kademan [00:10:54]:
So in my experience, my limited experience with the veterinarian that I have, the front desk people that I would deal with for quite a while, there was never the same person. Yeah, it was always just a rotating door. And up until recently there were a lot of vet techs that like, you could see them all scrubbed in, but they got to answer the phone or I don’t know, they’re working on their computer, they even have a fax machine. So it’s a little archaic. I don’t know what they do with that, but whatever. So it seemed to be like that was. There’s turnover there. That was especially during pandemic time, which I imagine that happened with a lot of places universal.

James Kademan [00:11:32]:
But are you seeing that or have you seen that on the receptionist side.

Isabelle Blaser [00:11:37]:
Turnover or more of the technique?

James Kademan [00:11:40]:
Talk about turnover first. Yeah, yeah. Do you see that a lot?

Isabelle Blaser [00:11:44]:
I think the turnover has definitely gotten better post Covid and I think that either people, like when I got out of clinical veterinary medicine, A, it was because I moved to the middle of nowhere, so I didn’t really have a choice. But B, I was almost to the point where I was like, I can’t, you know, it’s been almost 10 years of me doing this Like I think that’s kind of people’s like Max. So when you get this younger generation in, they, they all come at once and you have the same people for like, you know, a good chunk of time. So I think that right now, at least everywhere that I’ve taken my pets semi recently, it’s been the same staff like for the last five, six years.

James Kademan [00:12:27]:
Okay. All right.

Isabelle Blaser [00:12:28]:
Post pandemic a little bit before that. And I think that especially on our side, like the vet receptionist company side, our turnover has been great. I mean not great. It’s been, it’s been down. Low turnover. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:12:43]:
Low is good, right?

Isabelle Blaser [00:12:44]:
Low is good. What was the other side of the question? Sorry?

James Kademan [00:12:47]:
The other side is how often do you see vet techs or someone that’s not necessarily didn’t apply for the, to be the desk person person doing the admin stuff behind the computer. They actually thought they were getting a job giving the vaccines and doing whatever it is techs do. I’m not going to pretend to know what techs do.

Isabelle Blaser [00:13:04]:
And then they end up answering the.

James Kademan [00:13:05]:
Phone stuff hands on with the animal and they get stuck behind the desk. How often do you see that?

Isabelle Blaser [00:13:10]:
All the time.

James Kademan [00:13:11]:
All the time.

Isabelle Blaser [00:13:12]:
All the time. Yeah. And I think it’s just, it’s kind of twofold. Like one the sometimes short staffed ness and everyone just kind of needing to jump in. But also I feel like most hospitals have kind of like, you know, a really good team dynamic where they’re like, okay, I need to jump in here, let me do that for them. I’ve had many times where I was, you know, dealing with a critical patient here in front of me on the table and the phone is ringing and nobody’s answering it and I have to answer it. So I have a phone here, I’m dealing with a pet here that’s like needs my full attention. But I still pick up that phone because I don’t want that person on the phone to potentially have an emergency that’s not getting answered.

Isabelle Blaser [00:13:51]:
And I think that’s not uncommon. Like, I think that’s something, something that happens everywhere. And I. That’s the whole premise behind what we’re talking about. Right? Like the person that’s taking care of that critical patient should not have to pick up that phone. They should know that someone else can take care of that call so they can put their focus where it needs to be.

James Kademan [00:14:11]:
This reminds me of a restaurant that I went to, I don’t know, this summer. So we have my kids in soccer. So I say let’s go out to lunch or whatever like that, right? The whole team’s going to. The whole team ends up at this little cafe. Because I try to talk people out of going to fast food. Let’s say we’re in a different town, let’s try different food. So go to this cafe. And the guy has this little cafe and it’s like 1:30 in the afternoon, maybe 2:00′, clock, something like that.

James Kademan [00:14:38]:
And it was slow before the soccer team came in. So he sent all of his worker bees home. So he’s. And he was super cool. He’s like, oh, what do we got here? I was like, 11 kids and 20 parents feed us. And my thought was, dude, we just made your week. And his thought was, it is just me. So the first thing he did, you could just tell he was going on damage control in his head, just prioritizing.

James Kademan [00:15:04]:
He’s like, okay, here’s the situation. I’m gonna take care of half of you. The other half, if you don’t mind, there’s another restaurant around the corner. I’m gonna walk you there. And he walks half the crew to this other cafe. And that cafe was better staffed, but still understaffed for this.

Isabelle Blaser [00:15:20]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:15:21]:
Crowd. It was just smaller cafes, right? So this guy, he was cook, he was waiter, he was busting tables. And in my head, he was kicking ass. Right to the point that there was a sibling of one of the soccer players. He put that kid to work and he paid him. This kid was like 16, 17 years old. He was a brother, one of the kids. And he’s like, hey, can you bring out the food? And it’s like, okay.

James Kademan [00:15:46]:
And I don’t know if he gave him 50 bucks or something. You made some healthy money for just bringing out food for an hour. Anyways, I say that to say that was an anomaly. That was a one time thing for this guy, right? He figured it out, but it wasn’t like, oh, what do I do? Right?

Isabelle Blaser [00:16:00]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:16:00]:
But oftentimes when I go into the veterinary clinic, that’s every day for them where they’re just like, oh, I got to cook, I got to bus tables, I got to do all this stuff. I’m like, there’s no way that someone’s going to be like, yeah, I should do that every day for the rest of my life. That sounds amazing. That is crazy. So I guess to put that into a question, how do we get to the point where veterinary clinics are just like, that’s acceptable.

Isabelle Blaser [00:16:28]:
I think that’s a tricky answer. Because the reason that Most people get into this field. Right. Is that they love animals and they want to take care of them. And then when they get into it, and it’s such a convoluted job description, like, okay, you’re going to do all of these things. You’re going to take X rays, you’re going to help in surgery, you’re going to do dentals, you’re going to run blood work, you’re going to do all these things. I think it just becomes the norm of like, okay, this is, this is what the job entails. Because like, and to compare it a little bit.

Isabelle Blaser [00:16:57]:
So in human nursing, right there you have specialties of what you do. You have a nurse that just works in the er, you have one that just runs the CT machine, you have one that just does this. There’s not that in most places, like everyone does everything. You’re expected to know everything. Of course, in the very high end places there might be like a specific technician that does a specific job, but for the most part everyone does everything. And that’s a really great thing about veterinary medicine because people are phenomenal and are so smart. But that’s also can be a downfall and push people out of the field because they have all of this stuff in their brain, you know, and they’re running around a million miles an hour and then they just can’t anymore. That’s why you don’t really.

Isabelle Blaser [00:17:49]:
I mean, at least when I was in clinical practice, I feel like I never worked with anybody that was over like 40 years old because they were just like, I’m done. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:17:58]:
Oh really? Like they just get out of the field entirely.

Isabelle Blaser [00:18:02]:
Yeah. Just do something else. They’re like, I’m too old for this.

James Kademan [00:18:05]:
Wow. Okay. So a lot of times I hear that it’s like I’m sick of lifting 80 pound dogs and stuff like that. But it sounds like it goes beyond.

Isabelle Blaser [00:18:14]:
Just, it goes beyond that. Yeah, I think it’s just like a. You’re just exhausted physically and emotionally and mentally. Because on top of all of this, you’re dealing with the actual very sick slash dying pets. You know, unless you’re just giving vaccines all day, which nobody’s doing. Like, we’re not just playing with puppies and kittens. Like, everyone thinks it’s, it’s serious. So yeah, it, I mean, if you have a day where you’re helping euthanize all these sick pets, like, what.

Isabelle Blaser [00:18:47]:
Why do you want to go do that the next day?

James Kademan [00:18:49]:
You know, I can imagine if someone’s job is euthanizing And. And they’re doing. I don’t. More than one a week. I feel like that’s got to be a little bit heartbreaking each time. It’s got to build on.

Isabelle Blaser [00:19:03]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:19:03]:
Them to a. To a negative point or they just become immune to it.

Isabelle Blaser [00:19:09]:
No, that’s a thing.

James Kademan [00:19:10]:
Kind of thing.

Isabelle Blaser [00:19:11]:
Yeah. When I finished my. So I worked in general practice, then I went to ER icu, and then I went back to general practice when I was in my ER ICU phase. Like, near the tail end of that, I could feel myself. Like, I care a lot, but I. I’m just not emotional about it anymore. Like, yep, that needs to. Like, they’re better off because we’re gonna euthanize them.

Isabelle Blaser [00:19:31]:
Whatever. Then when I got back to general practice, I felt like I had to, like, melt my frozen heart. Like, it took. We had. I think it was like, my first week back, we had this puppy that came in for its first puppy visit, and I saw it for every single one of its puppy visits. She came in and got spayed and then, like, saw her so many times after. And, like, through that process, I, like, it was the opposite. Right? It’s the opposite of euthanizing a dog.

Isabelle Blaser [00:19:56]:
It’s seeing it grow up and, like, do all its things. And I remember, like, this sounds so mushy, gushy. I remember crying at one point, and I was like. I think I forgot that I had emotions because they were just gone.

James Kademan [00:20:10]:
Wow. Holy cow.

Isabelle Blaser [00:20:13]:
And that’s not. That’s not an anomaly.

James Kademan [00:20:15]:
Help me with the crying thing.

Isabelle Blaser [00:20:16]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:20:17]:
So the dog came in just to get a check.

Isabelle Blaser [00:20:19]:
Oh, yeah. She was just there for, like, her. I think that’s when she got her last puppy shots and her rabies. And then I wasn’t going to see her again for, like, a few months until she got spayed or something. So I was like.

James Kademan [00:20:29]:
Came in, got hit by cars.

Isabelle Blaser [00:20:30]:
No, no, no, no, no. It was good crying. Yeah. I was just like, I. My heart is full because I got to see this dog from 8 weeks of age to 16 weeks of age. Everything’s good. She. She’s fine.

Isabelle Blaser [00:20:44]:
She’s taken care of. And now I get to see her for wellness visits. Moving forward. Like, I wasn’t thinking, like, oh, the next time I’m going to see a pet walk in the door, they’re going to be dying. Like, I get to see her for happy things.

James Kademan [00:20:56]:
Okay. We’re on the emergency side. It’s never like, hey, just check them out. Let me know if they’re good.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:00]:
Oh, never. No, no, no.

James Kademan [00:21:02]:
Okay.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:02]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:21:03]:
Interesting. I still have to wrap my head around the good cry thing, because I don’t even know.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:07]:
You don’t do that. Yeah, that’s okay.

James Kademan [00:21:10]:
No, I don’t have a good motorcycle ride, I guess. I don’t know. Is that close? I don’t. I. I have heard it from other people.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:18]:
A good cry, a good motorcycle ride.

James Kademan [00:21:21]:
I don’t know what that means. What is a good cry? I just can’t wrap my head around that.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:25]:
Just so emotion. Like, you didn’t cry on your wedding day. Maybe it’s not good. You’re so emotional that it just.

James Kademan [00:21:31]:
Like, my wife cried on the wedding day because it was raining and we were.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:36]:
Because she was upset.

James Kademan [00:21:37]:
Jamaica or whatever. And I’m like, it’s one day, right? And then I heard later, if it rains on your wedding day, that’s lucky.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:44]:
Good luck.

James Kademan [00:21:45]:
Yeah, yeah.

Isabelle Blaser [00:21:46]:
Just whatever.

James Kademan [00:21:48]:
I was like, it’s a day. We’re not gonna understand the guy anyways, so what does it matter? But, yeah, it was fine. It was fine. Yeah. She a good cry. I have heard employees say that. I’ve heard friends say that. All female.

James Kademan [00:22:03]:
I’ve never heard. I don’t. Maybe there’s a male friend that I have that has had a good cry. No male friend has said, hey, James, I had a good cry.

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:11]:
It’s not even. Like, you don’t have to ball just like one or two teardrops of just. You’re overcome with happiness.

James Kademan [00:22:17]:
Huh?

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:17]:
My husband cried on our wedding day.

James Kademan [00:22:19]:
All right.

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:20]:
He did that.

James Kademan [00:22:21]:
Okay.

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:23]:
Just a little, Yeah.

James Kademan [00:22:24]:
I mean, like, he bald or like.

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:26]:
No, just a few. A few tears.

James Kademan [00:22:27]:
Okay. All right. There’s so many jokes, but I don’t want to make them.

Isabelle Blaser [00:22:32]:
So all good.

James Kademan [00:22:34]:
Tell me the veterinary side. Digging in, more of the shifting that. How’s this for a segue? Non existent. So veterinary clinics are, generally speaking, understaffed, it sounds like. Is that safe to say? All right, so is that, in your perception, partially a financial decision, just because the money coming in doesn’t equal enough to pay for what would be considered a reasonably logical full staff?

Isabelle Blaser [00:23:08]:
I think it’s probably somewhat of that. I think also, and I’ve seen this happen first from firsthand, when a clinic is growing. They say, okay, well, I’ve survived with this amount, and let’s see how far I can stretch it. Which, as a business owner, like, seems fair, right? Like, how much work can I get out of this existing staff that I already have? And they just push and push and push and stretch, and sometimes they don’t hire more people. Like, they may hire two new doctors and they have all these new clients, but they won’t hire more receptionists or more technicians.

James Kademan [00:23:46]:
So it’s interesting you say that. Here’s a perfect segue. My doctor, my veterinary doctor that I see the veterinarian. I see him after going through front desk person. Then I get shoveled to a room. I’ll probably see a tech.

Isabelle Blaser [00:23:59]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:23:59]:
Maybe two will come in. Because my dog Kirby, they love Kirby. So they probably have a good cry or whatever.

Isabelle Blaser [00:24:04]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:24:05]:
And then you hang out for another 10 minutes. Right. Because they’re called patients. And then my vet comes in, and I’m sure that he’s just moving room to room to room. Yeah. So he doesn’t see what had to happen for Kirby, my dog, to get into that room. So from him’s point of view, like, hey, every time I open this door, there’s a dog or cat or whatever for me to look at. And that has never been a problem.

James Kademan [00:24:31]:
So therefore there is no problem.

Isabelle Blaser [00:24:32]:
Exactly.

James Kademan [00:24:34]:
And I remember telling him, man, your front desk staff, what’s going on there? And he’s like, what do you mean? And me, the business guy, is looking around going, dude, what is going on here? You gotta tweak your systems here.

Isabelle Blaser [00:24:47]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:24:48]:
And it was interesting having a conversation with him because he’s like, we’re good. We’re fine. Everything’s great. Everything’s wonderful.

Isabelle Blaser [00:24:54]:
Well, that’s a good point because, yeah. If he doesn’t. How do I say this nicely? He’s not maybe directly affected by it. Right. So if the techs are working double what they used to for the same amount of pay, and they’re just sucking it up because they like where they work and they want to continue doing that, then that’s not going to necessarily affect the doctor. What they’re going to see is, oh, we’re seeing twice as many pets, and I’m making more money with the same staff. So let’s keep going as is.

James Kademan [00:25:20]:
Yeah, more like that. More like that. It’s interesting because the veterinarians typically are the clinic owners. So I understand they’re looking at bottom line and top line being like, oh, well, we brought in more clients. I didn’t have to pay more employees. So, yeah, let’s keep doing that. So we’re good until an employee leaves or five employees leave or whatever. And they’re.

James Kademan [00:25:40]:
Or clients just don’t come back because they’re so annoyed.

Isabelle Blaser [00:25:44]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:25:45]:
I know. I suppose there’s a lot of avenues there. It’s interesting in my business journey, how you used to be like, hey, let’s cut expenses everywhere we possibly can and that. And you assume, like, hey, make. Bring in more cash, reduce expenses. That’s how you make more money. But short game. Sure.

James Kademan [00:26:04]:
Long game is not necessarily the case.

Isabelle Blaser [00:26:06]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:26:08]:
So depending upon where you’re cutting and all that jazz. So it’s interesting, I guess. Do you feel like veterinarians. I’m going to ask you to generalize here. So apologies to veterinarians here. Do you feel like veterinarians that you have worked with or that you are aware of that own these clinics, do you feel like they would consider themselves if they were asked directly? Do you consider yourself business savvy? Do you think they would answer that? They are business savvy? No.

Isabelle Blaser [00:26:35]:
No, no.

James Kademan [00:26:36]:
All right. Is that from lack of desire, lack of awareness, lack of even knowing that business savvy is a thing?

Isabelle Blaser [00:26:45]:
I don’t think. It’s not that they probably want to, because if they’re the ones owning it, they probably want to be savvy about it. I think that at the end of the day, they just have other priorities. Like, they’re not business people, they’re animal people. So I think that unless. And they don’t teach business courses in vet school. Like, unless. I mean, I’m sure you can.

Isabelle Blaser [00:27:07]:
Don’t come for me. Anybody watching this, but they don’t. There’s not a, to my knowledge, a course of how to open a practice, like, how to do this, how. Here’s your business plan type situation.

James Kademan [00:27:20]:
There’s not.

Isabelle Blaser [00:27:21]:
So they probably don’t know.

James Kademan [00:27:23]:
Oh, interesting.

Isabelle Blaser [00:27:24]:
Again, not that I know of the vets that I personally know.

James Kademan [00:27:28]:
Well, I never worked at a veterinary clinic, so I don’t know either.

Isabelle Blaser [00:27:30]:
But I’m sure there are resources they can find. But I think it’s just like a, you know, here, let’s do this. Because I want to be my own boss, like we were talking about. They don’t want to deal with other people, so let’s do this. But then they kind of have to, like, backtrack of. Oh, okay, now I need to hire outside business people to tell me how to do it, because that’s not their expertise.

James Kademan [00:27:52]:
All right, tell me a story about the veterinary clinics that you see. As far as size goes, are they typically one or two or three doctor practices, or are there some. I don’t know, do they have 50 doctor practices? They do, yeah. Holy cow.

Isabelle Blaser [00:28:08]:
And I mean, the larger ones are usually emergency and specialty hospitals. So they have, you know, an oncologist and a cardiologist and a. And a bunch of surgeons. So there’s various types of doctors that we’re talking about. But if we’re just talking about like the average size for a normal general practice that just does vaccines, spays and neuters and some other stuff, I mean, it just depends on. On everything really. There’s some small one to two doctor, and then there are some that are four to five doctors. But I would say if we’re just talking about regular general practice, like, five and under is probably a good average.

James Kademan [00:28:46]:
All right, talk to me about veterinary clinic software, because I feel like every industry has their proprietary software that does basically the same things that every other software does. So talk to me about your experience with that and your, I guess, good and bad.

Isabelle Blaser [00:29:02]:
Good and bad between different software.

James Kademan [00:29:04]:
Yeah, what they have and what you see. And like, I’m assuming veterinary clinics aren’t just using Google Calendar in a spreadsheet. I hope they’re not.

Isabelle Blaser [00:29:13]:
They are not.

James Kademan [00:29:14]:
What do you typically see there?

Isabelle Blaser [00:29:16]:
I mean, everyone is pretty much using. There are so many different softwares now. So many different ones.

James Kademan [00:29:22]:
Are we talking hundreds or dozens or.

Isabelle Blaser [00:29:25]:
I mean, I don’t know an exact number off the top of my head. Maybe like 25, 30, maybe. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:29:36]:
Okay. It’s always interesting to talk software because I think of something like QuickBooks. QuickBooks. Almost every small business uses QuickBooks because all the accountants are like, we totally do QuickBooks. And so small business owners are like, well, I guess we’re using QuickBooks even though it’s. It’s kind of crappy software. It’s not that great, but it’s accounting. There’s no magic to it.

James Kademan [00:29:58]:
And it’s interesting because QuickBooks has such a huge percentage of the market. And I keep wondering, like, in an accounting software, like, no one else has come up with enough of a competitive chunk of software to compete with QuickBooks. So it’s interesting, I guess, when you get into like Arborist or something like that, they’re like, these are the four or five that. I’m sure there’s other ones out there, but typically you run into that same with massage, your spas and stuff like that. They got the same whatever. There’s five or six there that are major players, a bunch of smaller players, but there’s bigger ones that I suppose, 80, 20 rule, right? Yeah, 20 of the programs make up 80 of the population there. So in the case of veterinary software, are there a few big players and.

Isabelle Blaser [00:30:46]:
The rest are like, yeah, there’s Definitely. And I kind, I. I guess I kind of rounded up for once because I’m sure I don’t know about every single one of them. They’re tiny ones, but yeah, there are probably, I don’t know, five to ten big name ones. Okay. I honestly feel like once we kind of got into the cloud based ones, they’re all more or less kind of the same like as all patient softwares as you can imagine. There’s a patient tab, there’s a client tab, there’s the calendar to do stuff. So I think nowadays they’re all pretty user friendly.

Isabelle Blaser [00:31:18]:
But yeah, I mean, do you want me to help? How in depth do you want me to go here?

James Kademan [00:31:22]:
No, I guess the question I’m alluding to is the crew at Vet Receptionist, then they have to know all these software chunks, right?

Isabelle Blaser [00:31:29]:
Yeah, yep, we know all of them. So whatever our client uses for their software, we can access that and we just learn the ways of all of them. Obviously some of them we have used in a prior life, as when we’re working in clinic, and then some of them we just kind of have to learn. So if there’s a new one on the market that someone’s trying out or they just started and we haven’t used it before, then we kind of have to adapt and go through the training modules of that new software to try to adapt. All right, yeah.

James Kademan [00:32:02]:
Has there ever been a time where someone on your crew is just like, I don’t know how to use the software or anything like that?

Isabelle Blaser [00:32:09]:
Oh, for sure, yeah.

James Kademan [00:32:10]:
Okay.

Isabelle Blaser [00:32:11]:
Like when new employees come on and they’re like, I haven’t used three of the seven that you guys are using right now. And you’re like, okay, well buckle up, buddy.

James Kademan [00:32:21]:
So how do you get over that?

Isabelle Blaser [00:32:22]:
Just learn. You just have to like, go. The best way to learn all these software is to get into them and to click around and figure out all of the different places that things go in there. And like I said, most of them nowadays are more or less kind of the same. They just might be laid out a little bit visually different. So that’s how you learn. Just go in there and okay, this is the calendar. This is where I do the things.

Isabelle Blaser [00:32:45]:
And most of them, I will say this one thing about all software, they usually have pretty good training modules or help things. So like always, when you have it open, there will be somewhere on that screen that says help press here. And there will always be like a bunch of videos or articles that you can read just to better learn what you’re doing so.

James Kademan [00:33:06]:
Gotcha. Because I imagine the people that are actually working in the clinic, they’re not necessarily the most tech savvy either. So they don’t know when they got that software. They had to learn it as well.

Isabelle Blaser [00:33:15]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:33:16]:
No one is born with the knowledge about how to use whatever proprietor.

Isabelle Blaser [00:33:20]:
Unfortunately not out of the womb.

James Kademan [00:33:24]:
Tell me a story about employees and what you look for in a great agent to answer the phones for a veterinary clinic.

Isabelle Blaser [00:33:32]:
Oh, James. It’s not tough. It’s just. It’s hard looking for employees. It is universally. Absolutely universally. But, yeah, with veterinary receptionists, specifically, that we’re looking for, obviously, we’re just making sure that they’re a knowledgeable human that’s nice and compassionate and can answer the phone and has a nice voice. That’s one thing that we have to look for.

Isabelle Blaser [00:34:01]:
One thing.

James Kademan [00:34:03]:
Right.

Isabelle Blaser [00:34:05]:
We have a test that we give the prospective employees to test their veterinary knowledge and that I think since we implemented that, that’s been a good, like, weeding tool of, oh, okay, this person’s going through. Indeed. And just hitting apply on all of these things. Or this is someone that’s actually knowledgeable in this field and would be a good addition to the team. But as you know, hiring just kind of depends on the person. So you really have to meet with them and see kind of what they’re about.

James Kademan [00:34:33]:
It totally does. I. I guess in my world, I’d like to hire for personality because you can train almost everything else. Not necessarily everything else, but. Yeah, I can’t train personality.

Isabelle Blaser [00:34:46]:
You can’t. And you can’t teach people to have. I mean, you can to an extent, people to have pride in their work or to be, you know, a superstar. But, yeah, I feel you. Those are.

James Kademan [00:34:59]:
Yeah, there’s a work ethic part of that, I guess the work ethic thing. You don’t know until after you hire them, you learn like, ew.

Isabelle Blaser [00:35:06]:
And you’re like, oopsies, you’re not that.

James Kademan [00:35:08]:
Great, or, holy cow, we need to stamp up more of you. You’re in unicorn. All right, cool. Isabel, we don’t have a lot of time left here, but just so that the people with pets that take them to veterinary clinics know what are, let’s say, some top three things that you would like them to know just off the bat, so that the next time they go to the vet, they can be like, oh, yeah, I’m smart now. I won’t be a pain in the butt.

Isabelle Blaser [00:35:33]:
Be nice. You would never. You never know what is going on in the treatment area of the hospital. Like when you come in with fluffy, if you have to wait five minutes, there could be somebody like performing CPR on a dog back there. That’s getting into too many details. But just, you just never know what’s going on back there. And, and clinic staff is literally trained to not portray that to you. So just be patient.

Isabelle Blaser [00:35:58]:
That’s the general rule that I have to give out. You asked for three.

James Kademan [00:36:07]:
We touched on the financial one. Right. Knowing that when the veterinarian or veterinary clinic is giving you a quote or charging you for something, it is that they can gold plate their yacht.

Isabelle Blaser [00:36:20]:
Yeah, we’re not making money off of it. This is just what we have to charge to keep the doors open. And if you have a puppy, get pet insurance and that can help with the cost so you don’t have to cough up all that money from a. For a bill all at once. Right on number three, don’t feed your pet a raw diet, please, for the love of God. We might have to do that in another episode.

James Kademan [00:36:50]:
Okay. Wow. Oh my gosh. You just opened up a can of worms.

Isabelle Blaser [00:36:53]:
No, raw, fresh is okay. If you want to home cook your meal and you want to talk to a veterinary nutritionist that can help that be a well balanced meal for your pet. Fine. Just the raw stuff. No, just don’t do that.

James Kademan [00:37:04]:
Raw. You’re talking like raw meat.

Isabelle Blaser [00:37:06]:
Raw meat. Yeah. Well, some. There are companies that sell that now. Like freeze dried raw stuff, huh? Yeah.

James Kademan [00:37:13]:
All right.

Isabelle Blaser [00:37:13]:
Just imagine the bacteria in there and how big of a problem that could be. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:37:19]:
All right, well, now we know.

Isabelle Blaser [00:37:22]:
Now you know.

James Kademan [00:37:23]:
Now we gotta do another episode on Raw Diet because I, yeah, that’s, that’s the thing I had heard of, but I never went down that road. But it’s certainly a curiosity thing for me and I imagine it’s a curiosity thing for other people as well.

Isabelle Blaser [00:37:39]:
Yeah, surely. Next time.

James Kademan [00:37:41]:
Next time. You got it. This has been Authentic Business Adventures, the business program that brings you the struggle stories and triumphant successes of business owners across the land. My name is James Kademan and Authentic Business Adventures is brought to you by Calls On Call, offering call answering and receptionist services for service businesses across the country on the web https://callsoncall.com as well as the Bold business Book, a book for the entrepreneur in all of us, available wherever fine books are sold. If you’re listening or watching this on the web, if you could do us a huge favor, give the big old thumbs up. Subscribe and of course share with your entrepreneurial friends and those friends that you know that have some pets, they need some veterinary help. And most of all we should say I guess safely, right? Send it to the veterinary clinics that you know that don’t answer their phone that well, tell that their people are running around frantic. It’s probably just about every veterinarian we can help, right? We’d like to thank your wonderful listeners as well as our guest Isabel Blaser, at Vet Receptionists.

James Kademan [00:38:38]:
Isabelle, where can people find you?

Isabelle Blaser [00:38:41]:
Where can people find me? VetReceptionists.com awesome.

James Kademan [00:38:45]:
That’s https://VetReceptionists.com all one word.

Isabelle Blaser [00:38:48]:
Yes, you got it. All one word.

James Kademan [00:38:50]:
Well, that makes it easy. Past episodes can be found morning, noon and night at the podcast link found at drawincustomers.com thank you for joining us. We will see you next week. Want you to stay awesome. And if you do nothing else, enjoy your business.