Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran
Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran
How to perform dentistry faster, easier, higher in quality and lower in cost. Subscribe to the podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dentistry-uncensored-with-howard-farran/id916907356
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307 Gold Virtual Assistant with Arreanna Cromartie : Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran

307 Gold Virtual Assistant with Arreanna Cromartie : Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran

2/2/2016 7:07:00 AM   |   Comments: 0   |   Views: 546

307 Gold Virtual Assistant with Arreanna Cromartie : Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran



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307 Gold Virtual Assistant with Arreanna Cromartie : Dentistry Uncensored with Howard Farran





Stream Audio here

                                        
            
AUDIO - DUwHF #307 - Arreanna Cromartie
            





Watch Video here

                                        
            
VIDEO - DUwHF #307 - Arreanna Cromartie
            





This episode’s discussion:

- What is a dental virtual assistant?

- How does a dental virtual assistant help the dental office?

- What services does Gold Virtual Assistant focus on?

- How does Gold Virtual Assistant access dental practice information?

- How does Gold Virtual Assistant save dental offices money?


Let me first introduce myself, my name is Arreanna K. Cromartie, and I am the owner of Gold Virtual Assistant, www.goldvirtualassistant.com, the leading dental virtual assistant.  If you are not familiar with the concept of my business I can further explain it to you. Gold Virtual Assistant caters to the modern day dental professional who desires efficiency, rapid results and keen eye for detail on both long and short term basis. My company provides professional administrative support to dental offices across the nation. We provide services to include verifying insurance, claims management, account management and more. We live in 2015, a day of modern technology, and with that being said we at Gold VA's believe that the dental office staff should receive a makeover. I have been in administration for over a decade and throughout my time the one thing that goes unnoticed is there are never enough hands to lend and heads to put together. I remember working in an office 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. leaving for the day thinking I can do more around 7 o’clock at night. I developed this business for that purpose, to achieve my goals of providing a stable but yet productive working environment as well as help achieve the goals of other dental offices.

      

I come to you all today with the goal of spreading the importance a virtual assistant can bring to any dental office. Although we order pizzas by text, submit prescriptions with an electronic click, buy a home from another country, even submit our taxes electronically, we still for some reason are skeptical of a virtual assistant. Why? Virtual assistants are the new dental office and whether you sign up now or later you will eventually have at least one VA on your team years from now. I mean I don't know too many people that would be hesitant to someone putting money in your hands and that's actually what dental offices are doing when they reject the idea.


www.GoldVirtualAssistant.com 


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             
            

Howard:

            
            

It is a huge honor today to be podcast interviewing Arreanna Cromartie, did I say that correct?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

You said it absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Right on, and you started something that caught my attention, the Gold Virtual Assistant. It's goldvirtualassistant.com. Let me read your bio. Let me first introduce Arreanna K Cromartie, the owner of Gold Virtual Assistant, the leading dental virtual assistant.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

If you're not familiar with the concept of her business she can explain it to you. Gold Virtual Assistant caters to the modern day dental professional who desires efficiency, rapid results, and keen eye for detail on both long and short term basis. Her company provides professional administrative support to dental offices across the nation. She provides services to include verifying insurance, claims management, account management, and more.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

We live in 2015, a day of modern technology, and with that being said, we at Gold VA's believe that dental office staff should receive a makeover. I have been an administrative for over a decade and throughout my time the one thing that goes unnoticed is there are never enough hands to lend and heads to put together.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I remember working in an office 8-5 leaving for the day thinking I could do more at around seven o clock at night.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I developed this business with the purpose to achieve my goals for providing a stable but yet productive working environment as well as help achieve the goals of other dental offices.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I come to you all today with the goal of spreading the importance a virtual assistant can bring to any office, although we order pizza's by tax, submit prescriptions with an electronic click, buy a home from another country, even submit our taxes electronically we still for some reason are skeptical of a virtual assistant? Why?

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

Virtual assistants are the new dental office and whether you sign up now or later, you will eventually have at least one virtual assistant on your team years from now. I don't know too many people that would be hesitant to someone putting money in your hands, and that's actually what dental offices are doing when they reject the idea.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I just want to say the reason, and by the way it's an honor that you're spend time with me today, I know you're a busy woman, but my good buddy Rick Workman, who started Heartland Dental in little old Effingham Illinois, he basically has something like this for his corporate chain.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I think he owns 1500 dental offices, and he told me the only problem scaling his virtual assistants is he can't hire enough people in little old Effingham which only has 10,000 people, and I don't know if you know where Effingham is, but it's out in the middle of Effing nowhere, and so the big DSSO's who the small general dentist is competing with, they're doing this with spades. They can't grow their call centers fast enough, and you're bringing this home to the small town individual dentist.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes, that is absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

So, what gave you this idea. Tell us your story.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

What really gave me the idea of Gold Virtual Assistant, I was working for a corporate dinner office, and even though I was in corporate dentistry I still had a struggle in the front office. Most of the times the struggle was the insurance verification, so I called a few buddies of mine and I said, "Hey, what are some of the things that you guys are experiencing on your day to day in the office?"

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

The one thing they said was, "Oh, it take the patient some time to come back to the back because the insurances aren't verified correctly."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

A little light bell rung in my head and told me, "Hey, why don't you start a business where you can provide these services to these dental offices?"

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

Here you go, Gold Virtual Assistant.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Are you more of a full-time for a dental office when they sign up for this, or is it more like an overflow? If their phone rings four times it rolls over to you? Tell us exactly how this works. You're talking to several thousand dentists, most of them are driving in their car. Try to paint a picture with details of exactly how it works, how much it costs, go through your whole explanation.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Okay. With Gold Virtual Assistant you will come aboard with us. Some people they do it every day, where we go in, and we just take over their insurance verifications for the entire week, or for the entire month forever. Some people they say, "Hey, can you just verify my new patients whenever they come aboard?"

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

So what I would do is, or what my team would do is, we would remote into their system and we would provide the verifications for them whether it's on our breakdown sheet or on a breakdown sheet they have provided to us. We update it in the system. We do everything as if we were actual employees sitting in the office with you all.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

It's so amazing, because, I don't own a dental office, but I own a media company too, Dentaltown Magazine and Website and on the Dentaltown side so many of our employees, I mean, Howard Goldstein, he's in Bethlehem Pennsylvania, a lot of our sales team, two of them live in New York.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I noticed a lot of people from home, even my president, Lori says she likes to work from home on Friday, the president of our company is Lori Xelowski, says "I like to work from home on Fridays because I'm not interrupted, and I get twice as much done."

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

It is absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

There's this old farmer mentality where everything has to be done on the farm. You've got to make your butter and eggs, and cows, and pigs, everything's got to be done in the office, and you're saying, "You know, it's a lot easier just to buy your eggs at the store instead of having a barnful of chickens and outsource some of the stuff.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

That is absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Would you say more people are totally outsourcing specific staffs, or is it more of an overflow situation?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I would say it's more so specific, say for instance, we get a lot of people that call in and they just say, "Hey, I have someone that's doing the insurances right now, and we want them doing something else."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

We have people that say, "Hey we want them doing something else. Can you take over this task completely?"

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

It's very rare where we get phone calls from people asking for the overflow part of it, but more so just, take over the task specific job duty, you're our actual employee without being an employee.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Would you say to this statement true or false: Half of America lives in 117 metros. You're the Atlanta metro.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You're in Snellville Georgia, I'm in Phoenix, that's where half of America lives, the other half lives in 19,022 small towns and villages, and a lot of the dentists tell me, "Dude, you don't understand, you're in Phoenix, Here's a three and a half million metro. You can hire great people all the time. I'm in this ho dunk town of 2,800 people, and I don't think there's one more person I can hire in this town that can do these tasks,". Do you find more of your customers rural where they have less access to a lot of applicants, or not really?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

We do, but a lot of the times, say right now we have a lot, for some reason a lot of our clients are coming from Missouri. We have a lot of people from the rural areas as well, but I guess it's just dependent.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

It's really hard trying to find really good staff now a days. Especially for the front office because they hire everyone just to do reception work even if they don't even have any dental experience. It just depends.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You know why you're getting a lot of clients from Missouri? I went to dental school University of Missouri Kansas city, graduated in '87 and the Royals just won the world series and the Chiefs are in the playoffs, so no one's working in that state. They're all just watching ESPN.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

On this insurance verification you hear these people say there's these company needs that have automated insurance verification through computers or whatever, but when I try to get my dental office to do that. My office manager in front office just say, "No, It doesn't work."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

It can't be automated. You still have to be a human. Can you go through, and you're talking probably only to dentists. I don't know of any non-dentists that really listen to my show, but can you go through the specifics of why you think insurance verification can't be automated with some of these softwares, and why it still takes a human to do this?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

You need that actual human touch. You need that personal touch whenever you're verifying insurance. Insurance is very important in the dental office. A lot of the times, they'll go through the clearing houses and things like that to try to verify the insurance form. It only gives them a small amount of the information. Sometimes the information isn't accurate even though it's coming straight form Metlife or Delta Dental and things like that.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

You need someone in the office to actually go through your insurances, verify it, there could be things that the automatic systems don't ask. Say for instance, inlays, what if they automated system doesn't know how to generate the information for a inlay?

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I'm not big on the automatic system. I feel like someone should personally be calling and verifying those insurances, and they want you to get the facts back if there's an extra question you need someone to actually call the insurance company and ask them,. "Hey, why isn't this covered?" Or make sure that it's not covered. That's important information.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah, we always call it keeping it real. We won't recommend or do anything until we're doing it in our place and we have not been able to automate that.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I've got a lady named [inaudible 00:10:22] and it's a Hawaiian name, and that's basically all she does.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

She just sits there as a human being verifying insurance all day long, and I've had her sit through several demos of these programs, and I ask her what she thinks. They just laugh. They go, "We go down this road you're going to be regretting it."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

What do you mean verify new patients. What does that mean? Verifying a new patient?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

A lot of people call in, they'll say, "Hey," they want us to do all patients, new patients, recall, but say when a new patient comes in they want that full break down verified. They want to know all the frequencies.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

They want to know, did that patient go somewhere last month and get any treatment done? If so, we need to know about that. They want to make sure that if this patient comes in, we're able to go ahead and take certain precautions and follow up on possible same day treatment.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

If everything is verified with the insurance correctly whenever that new patient comes in you can go ahead and present to that patient and let them know, "Hey, your insurance said that they'll cover fifty percent towards this crown. Do you want to go ahead and possibly schedule it?"

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You actually when you do this, you dial into their system?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How does that actually work? First of all, the first question is the major systems are Dentrix, Eaglesoft, SoftDent, PracticeWorks, Open Dental, do you work with all those?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

We work with all of those.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How long have you been working with these?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I would say now for about four or five years.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

If a young kid was in dental school, was coming out of dental school, and you got someone like you who, you go talk to your dentist and they're using SoftDent, and they say, "Hey what do you think about SoftDent?" And you say, "It's great," and of course I'm thinking, yeah, that's the only one you know, how would you know it's great? Great compared to what?

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

You work with several different ones. If some kid was in dental school what ones do you like the most?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I would say, Open Dental is probably, it's a little more easier to maneuver for me. I probably would go for the open dental.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah, and that's what everyone says. I've been on SoftDent since '87 and I'm this close to pulling the trigger and switching, because it's going to be a huge pain in the ass to deal.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

What makes it harder about Dentrix, Eaglesoft, SoftDent, all the others?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I just like the way that it's easier to access, get into open dental and actually update the information in Open Dental. With Eaglesoft, Eaglesoft is... I pretty much like Open Dental when it comes to things like that. It's easier for me whenever I'm verifying the insurance to put the information in there code by code, with SofDent I really only had about one client that ever used soften and with them they even merged over to Open Dental.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Was he a really old fat senile bald guy?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

He was older.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That's me. I'm on SoftDent. It was another old bald guy.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

He wasn't bald.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

He wasn't bald? He was wearing a wig then. He was wearing a rug. If you go into Dentaltown there's a little search bar and to have that function, that cost me like fifty grand to buy that Google search box to put it on my website back in my office. If you do a search for any of those [inaudible 00:14:13] softwares, Dentures, Eaglesoft, SoftDent, Prize work, you read those threads it's always a bitching, whining, moaning thread. You go to open dental, it's always raving fans, it's just people who can't help themselves but to log on and say how much they loved it, so there's [inaudible 00:14:29]

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

It's okay. This is dentistry uncensored so let me ask the crude, rude, vulgar question that you know they're all thinking, what does this cost me? Wouldn't it be cheaper to hire someone to do this in house? Does it cost more money to outsource, or do I save money because it's not an employee? Talk about cost?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

With cost wise, that's one of the biggest things there. You do save a lot of money whenever you outsource to Gold Virtual Assistant. Say if you hire someone you have to worry about holiday, you have to worry about sick time, vacation, all of that extra stuff that's involved. When you go Virtual Assistant you're just paying a flat rate. I don't charge by the insurance, or we don't charge by the hour or anything like that. We just charge a flat monthly rate.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

And what is this monthly rate?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

It's dependent on the size of the office, say for instance if you're a one doctor two hygienist office, then typically your fee's going to be less than what you would pay probably a part time employee, so you're looking at probably in the seven hundred, eight hundred dollar range per month.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah, and nobody has an employee for seven hundred dollars a month.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah. Especially not an employee with ten years experience.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

The only person that works that cheap would be your mom or your sister.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Or your wife.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Or your wife. For one doctor, two hygienists, seven hundred dollars is the most, if someone didn't know if this was a fit or not, can they talk to you?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How would they get a hold of you?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

They can either call me, what I recommend is, I have my own little Gold Virtual Assistant's phone, call me on my mobile phone any time. You can also go -

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

What's that number?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

910-587-4243

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That's 910-587-4243 and that's your Gold Virtual Assistant mobile phone to talk to new clients?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

What about email?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

You can email right now just email goldvirtualassistant@outlook.com.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

What is that. I've been seeing that, usually everyone has AOL or Gmail. What is @outlook.com?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

It's through Hotmail and MSN. I just like that a little bit better. It deals with a lot of Microsoft.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

It's through Hotmail, does Microsoft own Hotmail now?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I think so.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

It's a Hotmail. It's a Microsoft. Yeah. I've been seeing that more and more.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

What percent of your business is doctors calling you up and saying, "I use one outsource intern verification," or are there other services that you do? Could you go through all the services and tell us what percent of your business is those? Is that the main thing or is there-

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes, the insurance verification is the main thing, eventually, because we want to keep it personal, we want to make sure that we have someone to handle each and every office, and be more on a personal level. We do do the claims management, the account management and things like that but for right now we're just focusing on the insurance verifications. I want to master this part first, and then move on upward to the next space.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

And the next phase will be what?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

The claims management.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

What does that mean?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Basically, we'll be managing the claims, if you need-

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You mean account receivables from insurance? Thirty, sixty, ninety, one hundred and twenty?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yep. That is absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Right now you're doing insurance verification.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

For new patients and existing patients?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes, we can do the entire schedule if you like. That's really what we want to do is the entire schedule, but whether you do it for the entire schedule, or if you're just doing it for the new patients that are calling in or your emergency patients, it's still going to be the same price.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You're out there in Georgia which is east of the Mississippi river, which in America, 75% of Americans live East of the Mississippi river, but the other 25% live west of the Mississippi river, so what do you do for different time zones, say California? Because when those guys are closing you're probably going to bed, that's two hours later.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yep.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Do you cover California?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

We have a team for that.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Oh, you have-

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes. We have a team for that time zone. That client will be designated to that team.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Oh, that's interesting because when we get up and go to work at 7 o clock the New York dentists have already been in their office for two hours.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

It's a big country. Do you cover Hawaii?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Right now we don't, but eventually we will.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

There's not enough pineapple out there to change your mind?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

When you do insurance verifications are some insurance companies easy to work with, and do some just far more difficult? Do you have your favorites that you work with?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

No, they're all kind of difficult honestly.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

They're all equally difficult?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

The maximum insurance that they spend all their time collecting the premiums and no time paying the claims. Is that about what you experience?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes. That is exactly what I experience.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Do you think they do that on purpose to control their costs and their overhead by making it very more difficult to submit and receive payment.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I do at times. It seems likes sometimes, I don't know if it's true or not, but sometimes the insurance rep will almost give you false information and it's like this little thing int he back of your head and you say, "Hey, let me call them back just to make sure that the next representative says the exact same thing."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I don't know exactly, but I feel like it's something going on with the insurance company when it comes to things like that.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah. I agree. The other thing that's weird about the insurance companies is they don't run with their dentist homies. You go to convention and not see one dental insurance person, booth, frenemy. Give me the dentist that retired at 75 years old and say name one person who works for a dental insurance company. They don't. It's almost like two separate societies, without any overlap. Do you agree? Disagree?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah. That's absolutely correct.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How did you get into dentistry? What's your story? How did you get into dentistry?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I started off in dentistry after I finished school I was working actually at a private practice. I started working as a treatment coordinator there. I moved up from being just a treatment coordinator int he private practice and move up into being an office manager.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I relocated to the Atlanta area because I'm originally from North Carolina. I relocated to the Atlanta area and I came aboard in a corporate dental office and I moved up to being the practice administrator.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I've been int he dental field now for about eight years.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You thought it was a switch for being a panther to a falcon?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

At the time.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

You told this to Cam Newton and he agreed that it was a good idea to move out of North Carolina and go all the way to Georgia? Are you regretting your decision now?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

I'm just so damn proud of you that you started your own business. How many people go from treatment coordinator to front office manager to open up her own damn business. I just think that's cooler than hell, so damn proud of you.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Thank you. Thank you very much.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That's why I wanted to podcast you to expose you and turn you on to more- how is your business doing? How many years? You said 4 to 5 years old now?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yes.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How's it going? Are you glad you're doing it? Or do you wish that you would have stayed at the safety of a treatment coordinator, an office manager, a stable employee job versus the high risk I start up my own business sink or swim. What do you think of that decision you made?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I love it. It's probably one of the best decisions I've made thus far. I love it. I absolutely love it. I love interacting with the new people, getting to know the new clients. I just love it.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That is awesome. So what is the downside of it?> Do you seem more stressed? Because you own your own business?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Definitely more stress involved with it. This is my baby, so of course it's going to be a little more stress involved with it.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

How do you think I can help you? My job is, I want to help my homies. They come out of dental school and they're trained in algebra, physics, and chemistry, and then they graduate, one hour later they own a business and have to make payroll, and somewhere in eight years of college they never thought it was wise idea to sit down and teach you how to do payroll on Quicken.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I didn't learn how to file one insurance claim after eight years of college and 87,000 dollars in student loans back then in the day.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

My job is to try to help these dentists lower their stress, faster, easier, higher quality, give them your pitch. You're talking to several thousand dentists right now. Tell them how you're going to make their life easier, less stressful, and put more money in their back pocket if they give Arreanna Cromartie a call at 910-587-4243.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Your life would be a lot easier. Going into the dental office, not having to worry about, for one it's going to eliminate a lot of your payroll expenses, you don't have to hire someone to come in board and provide the services I'm providing it to you. You don't have to worry about me calling out sick. You don't have to worry about a vacation time. You don't have to worry about anything, but you're still going to be receiving insurance verifications. You're still going to be receiving accurate insurance verifications.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I don't see why people wouldn't want to sign up with it. There's no long term contracts. I don't make you sign long term contracts. Everything is done month to month, and on top of that the rate is a lot cheaper than a full time employee.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Then I'm going to ask you a crazy question, what percent of dental offices do you think don't even verify their insurance claims and just do the work and then submit it and don't even, just blindly, don't even know what they're doing?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

It's greater than what I thought it was. Honestly I didn't know that offices really didn't do that.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Oh God. I'm 53. I've been in this deal a long time. What percent do you think it is?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I would say probably about 40 percent.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah. I was thinking half. I got a way I know I can help you plug your new start up that I'm so proud of you that you did. You should write an article for Dentaltown Magazine. That goes to 125,000[inaudible 00:25:51] a month and electronically it goes all over, about the importance, that most offices are, half of them aren't verifying, the half that do they just have one person. The dentist doing the root canal, I guarantee you she's never done it one time in her life, and then here you are, that's all you do, and you got a company and you're doing 10, 20, 30 times what any dental office would do.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

You should write an article on the business of verifying insurance, giving away your secrets, this is how you do it, this is how we recommend doing it, and then at the end of the article say, "Oh, and by the way, if you don't want do this and you've got better things to do. I'll do it for you."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

What do you think of that idea?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

That is awesome. That is-

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

And, I also think if you made an online CE course, I don't know if the doc would watch them or not, but I bet a lot of them would make their front desk people watch it, and then at the front desk they might say, Okay so half the dentists watching that thing don't even do it, the other half doing it, at the end of the show they might go, man she's at a different level than we are, and I think with dentists you always know when a dentist walks across the room, because he's so tight his butt squeaks when he walks.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

I think the selling point with the dentist, if you can show them that you can do it lower cost than having Adrienne up front do it in his office, instead Arreanna over in Georgia, that'll perk their ears up every time. Dentist's are, I wouldn't call them cheap, because I take cheap derogatory that you're just cheap for no reason, I think dentist's like engineers, like mathematicians- Do you know Vegas, they rank all the industries for who they want to attract for gambling, and the number one is rodeo people and number two are bowlers, and the only person lower than a dentist is an engineer.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Oh wow.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

I'm a dentist. I don't want go sit on a black jack table, throw away several hundred dollars. I'd rather go buy some tangible, or glittery show, or dinner, or whatever, so dentist's are wickedly smart people. They got A's in calculus, physics, geometry, they don't waste money.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

If you can convince them that you'll do it faster, easier, higher quality, and lower in cost, you'll explode your business.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

When you email me I'm howard@dentaltown. The guy doing the online zine is Hogo, Howard Goldstein, so he's Hogo@dentaltown because there's two Howard's. I'm howard@dentaltown.com, he's hogo@dentaltown.come, you should do an online c course with him and then do an article for Dentaltown Magazine that's Tom, tom@dentaltown.com, and then with this podcast, and the other selling feature I did-

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

The bad guy in dentistry right now is corporate America. They're all afraid of the harlins and the Aspins and the Pacific Dental. If you could sit there and get any specifics on, they're doing this, they're building call centers.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

My friend Rick Workman says, the only thing holding back the growth of their outsourcing from all their offices to a central location is they can't hire employee fast enough. You're the prefect answer to that.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah. That's absolutely right.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Yeah. Anything else you wanted to say?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I just-

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Anything else you want to talk about?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

I would love for people to contact me inf they have any questions. If they have any possible concerns, let me address it to them, as far as the insurance verifications, I really feel like Gold Virtual Assistant is going to help the office tremendously. I have not had one complaint from any of the clients saying, "Hey, you guys are doing a terrible job, or hey, you guys were a waste of money."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

If anything I'm getting the referrals and things like that. I would just recommend anyone to call and ask me the questions that they might have. 910-587-4243 just give me a call, and let me answer them for them.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Why did you name it Gold Virtual Assistant instead of frankincense or Myrrh virtual assistant. That's what I was wondering.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Because we're just as good as gold. You knew the answer to that.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

I love that joke. These three wise men show up at the manger and one brings gold, one brings frankincense, but wait, there's myrrh.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

All of my jokes are pretty stupid, but I seriously think you've covered it all. Anything else you want to say?

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

No. I think that might be it.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Alright, well hey, young lady, another thing you might want to do is every year we hold the towny meeting in Las Vegas, and so in Dentaltown there's like 205,000 dentists, but 1,500 of them post all day long, and all that stuff, you might want to go to Vegas because if you spend two or three days talking to those and you got what I think is the best marketing thing in the world, this is the secret marketing weapon, no so much an ad in Dentaltown or [inaudible 00:31:17] get some of the people who have 5, 10, 20, 30,000 posts, get one or two of those as one of your clients, and then they're on the message board.

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

If I go to a party and say, "Hey I'm great," everybody's like, oh you're an egomaniac, but if someone else walks in and says, "Hey, see that fat bald guy over there, he's great,"

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

So if you get someone else talking about you, I would go on Dentaltown and say, "Who are these people that are posting every day."

            


            

            
            


            

            
            

Try to get some of them as a client, and one good way to get some of them as a client is go to the Towny meeting and stay up and get drunk with them at the bars until 3 in the morning and if you can win some of those people over that are going to shout out the whole world, they'll be your biggest marketing and it won't cost you a dime.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Yeah. That is true, That's really true.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Unless you have a severe gambling and drinking problem. Then maybe this isn't good.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

No, I don't think that'll be issue.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That won't be an issue, Okay. I love going to Vegas just because it'll be our fifteenth meeting and the city of Las Vegas still doesn't have a restraining order against me. I don't know what is-

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Not yet.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

Not yet. That's my goal.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Maybe this is the lucky year.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

That's my goal. Darling again, thank you so much for doing this and again I, as someone with an MBA and a self made millionaire I just say, you're like my daughter now, in the fact that I'm just so proud of you that you busted out from the safety of the security of a guaranteed paycheck to start your own company, and I just love entrepreneurs. I love them all, and you're an entrepreneur and that's why I called you, you did not call me, I called you, and I checked out on you. and I looked into you and all that stuff. I didn't hear anything but amazing great things about you.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Thank you.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

So your reputation is already gold and I wish you the best of luck.

            


            

            
            

Arreanna:

            
            

Thank you so much.

            


            

            
            

Howard:

            
            

All right. Maybe I'll see you in Vegas someday.

            


            

            
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