Alternative Marketing Approaches

Shawn Wilkie: You’re listening to the veterinary Innovation podcast. You’re listening to the veterinary Innovation podcast. My name’s Shawn Wilkie and along with my awesome co-host. We talked to innovators in this space every week Ivan. Why don’t you go ahead and introduce today’s guests.

Meet our guest – Dr. Barry MacEachern

Ivan Zak: Hi, my name is Ivan Zak and we have Dr. Barry MacEachern visiting us today. What we know about very is that he graduated from Atlantic vet College just like I did couple of years before me and he used to be a chief vegetarian with Hope for Wildlife and former president of Nova Scotia Veterinary Medical Association. He’s the owner of the Burnside Animal Hospital. Welcome to our show Barry. How are you?

Dr. Barry MacEachern: Good good. Thank you very much

Shawn Wilkie: Yeah, it’s awesome to have you here Barry. You’re our first Nova scotian on the show and not sure if our listeners know that but I’m I’m in Nova Scotia and Ivan’s one Province over. So you’re the first Atlantic Canadian for us to have on the show.

Dr. Barry MacEachern: Yeah, that’s great. Great. So we had recently a doctor coat on this show here. I don’t know if he was a professor when you were there.

Ivan Zak: What were the highlights of ABC that you remember? I certainly have I don’t know if you’re originally from Cape Breton, but certainly have good memories about Pi that’s why I moved back from Toronto to New Brunswick little closer to Atlantic Canada.

Dr. Barry MacEachern: I’m from Cape Breton, so My memories of ABC will dr. Koh teh was not there at my time. Although I’ve listened to him speak at different conferences when O’Sullivan who is now one of the cardiologists at ABC. She was a classmate of mine. Also Maritime ER, you know, I had a good experience at ABC made a lot of friends who have stayed in contact with my path, you know didn’t necessarily go the way I had planned. I went to a VC think I wanted to be a large animal vet and within my first year being there decided dogs and cats were the way to go and so kind of changed my path a little bit but, you know being a smaller school, you know, there was 50 of us in the class. So we got to know each other quite well, we got to know the professor’s quite well and I thought they gave us a really good education.

Ivan Zak: Yeah, I love that school. We had I think we had 60 people and that time I think that 54 maybe 50 were girls that time. So profession is changing just

Shawn Wilkie: Just before we move off of that. Can you share a quick version of your your arrival to Canada and AVC

Ivan Zak: Are you referring to something specific?

Shawn Wilkie: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely your your trip on the plane. I believe it the nation’s that he had all lined up when you arrived.

Well, I don’t think that show wasn’t easy but it’s an interesting story. So so I was for a year in Canada by that time. We just immigrated, you know, as a family I had my Veterinary degree almost completed in Ukraine. So therefore I work cleaning hospitals in Toronto, that’s all that qualified for and then by a combination of multiple flukes, I was admitted to fit College on pi and on my way there. I was chit-chatting with a lady from PI and she saw me looking for apartments and newspaper and she said why don’t we give you a lift from the airport? Because my husband is meeting which was unusual for me being from Ukraine and Toronto so they picked me up and then she said to her husband Ivan just got into the vet school looking for apartment and needs a lift to University and then her husband casually says, oh we’re seeing in our – why don’t you stay in our house until you find an apartment just handed me the keys and I stayed downtown Charlotte Town for the next two weeks in a completely strangers house and they told me there’s an oil tank in the back put the keys under the oil tank in the magnet. That was my introduction to marry times. Then that’s definitely my experience going forward. That’s why I moved here. So thanks for letting me tell its story Shawn.

Shawn Wilkie: But yeah, the reason I brought it up is because you know, Dr. Barry I’m sure you can relate to that as a maritime or as an it as a Cape Breton or the hospitality that exists in this part of the world since we’re talking about the maritimes. I just couldn’t help myself a bring that up but makes me proud to be an American timer and to be surrounded by people like that, which is pretty cool.

Using mass media as a marketing tool

Dr. Barry MacEachern: Cool. Yeah, I know that was a pretty amazing story – and queens exciting but it was kind of similar when when I get into vet school friend of mine who went to the agricultural college and Furrow her and I decided to get an apartment together and when we went over apartment hunting it was old home week which we didn’t figure on and so when we got to Charlottetown all the hotels were were full and we were having a really hard time finding a place to stay just for the night. We called a bed and breakfast which happened to be a dairy farm. They were full but they did have spare rooms for that their kids normally stated and so they welcome to the in like once they found out we were over apartment hunting because we had gotten into vet school. We ended up staying on a dairy farm which was a bed and breakfast for the night to find our first apartment. Well, yeah, they certainly are friendly.

Shawn Wilkie: So I think we should probably reach out to the vet college and start selling advertising on the podcast.

Ivan Zak: So TV show how does one become a vent and then ends up with the TV show can tell us about it. Oh that was kind of a little bit of a surreal story. I had never thought I’d it was never part of my plan. I used to be a rather private person. Although that’s going to done by the wayside now because I get recognized places, but it just it just kind of happened. I was doing Hope for Wildlife. I was the vet going out to the rehab treating the animals and just one day. I went out to check on the deer and there happened to be some cameras there and I kind of asked what they were for and they told me it was just a documentary. I believe them and I think in the beginning Hope for Wildlife was just going to be a documentary. It wasn’t going to be a TV show like it turned out to be, you know, each time. I went out clay used to go out once a week. I had Wednesday’s off the time and I spend my Wednesdays at the rehab they were always there but they’re kind of like flies on the wall. You didn’t really know the camera was in front of you. It’s a great film crew and they know what they’re doing so it went on a few you weeks and it wasn’t until maybe a couple months went by when finally they said, you know, we’ve got some really good footage here. We’re going to make this into a miniseries. It’s not going to be a documentary and I was like, okay well, okay, whatever and that was until a year went by actually that I actually saw the first show and kind of realize the gravity of it the the first show, you know with the opening sequence then you know going through everything all the footage they had of us and what they have like 13 episodes per season and it truly was until the first year that I that I knew it was a TV show know at that point. We had no idea who was going to watch it. We didn’t know if it was going to be a hit. What’s until it kind of Hit the airwaves and we realize hey people enjoy. This people are watching it. The I guess I realized I was too far into really back out is kind of how it happened. It.

Shawn Wilkie: Sounds like they did Hell of a sales job on you.

Dr. Barry MacEachern: There was no sales job. Like I don’t even remember first even signing anything saying hey, you can use my footage. I probably did sign something. So the first year, I don’t really remember any of that. It wasn’t and the way TV works is you know, they put all the footage together, but then it can be months before anything’s actually put together and edit it and then it can be even months longer before broadcasters show anything. So, you know, the first time I was taped it was probably almost two years before anything went to Air and there’s a lot of downtime in between when you have the film crews are still there because they’re getting footage and case they use it in the future but there’s really no talk of the the TV show. In fact when we were filming that was never on our minds. It was never oh, make sure you get this this will be good for TV. It was we went away about our daily business because I only went out once a week. There was a lot of the most to see and we didn’t have time to be filming things over again. And so it was made very clear from the get-go that I’m just going to come out. I’m going to do what I need to get done. And if you guys want to get images you have to get them as we go it was until the series kind of went on maybe, you know season three or four that then they started sitting us down after the fact talk about the previous episode. So they already had their idea together of what the show was going to be about and that set us down and we talked about what we were doing so you can really see how the show evolved over time

Shawn Wilkie: seems like it started off as a passion something you enjoy doing and then all of a sudden you were the star of a TV show

Starting a practice from the bottom

Dr. Barry MacEachern: that’s exactly right. I mean, I really enjoy doing Wildlife it was something I hadn’t really planned on doing going through that school. I I wasn’t part of the Wildlife Club, you know, I was focused on doing dogs and cats. I got out, you know, I practiced for a while in Ontario then moved home practiced emergency for a while and it was until I started at the particular Clinic where hope worked that I started doing wildlife. And and then I just kind of took it over. I started being the only that doing Wildlife at the clinic and then because I had winds days off I started going into the rehab because I enjoy doing the wildlife side of it, you know, if we go back 15 years ago there weren’t that many people doing Wildlife. I mean there are more now doing it. But at that point very few people number one felt that they had the knowledge to do Wildlife number to have the interest in doing wildlife and number three have the time to do Wildlife. I just happened to be in a unique situation where I worked three 12-hour days a week. And so I had the time to do it I had the Interest in doing it. I won’t say I had the knowledge to do it. I truly learned as I went

Ivan Zak: And that’s the true specialty that is pretty hard because there’s not many specialization the school that you do for that, especially in handling and you know, the differences between the species and because you can get anything that’s you know, sort of like an emergency medicine. So at that time did you own the practice or it was after that that you you started your practice, you know, I was an associate.

Dr. Barry MacEachern: I worked somewhere else. I open my own practice just five years ago. We five years this month since I know I know

Ivan Zak: graduations. So did that have any impact the show on your practice? Do you recycle the material? Do you have a big sign as seen on TV or how did that impact your professional career?

Dr. Barry MacEachern:I knew I always wanted to open my own practice. That was never a question in my mind. I you know from the time before I went to vet school. I said I wanted to own my own practice and in some ways Is maybe doing Hope for a wildlife slow down the process of opening my own practice because I truly enjoy doing the wildlife and the job as an associate allowed me to do Wildlife. We traveled a lot with the show, you know, we went to Costa Rica. We went all over the us across Canada Europe and if I own my own practice, I wouldn’t have been able to do that. So in some ways it’s slow down the process of opening my own practice, but then when the time came to open my practice, I think it gave me a huge boost by then, you know the show had been airing for a few years. My name was out there people knew who Barry was and so from the from the time I opened right up until now we’ve been busy. There’s never been a downtime the show did definitely give the clinic of boost and starting. So although it may have delayed my timing in opening. I don’t think it’s slow down the progress any Any

Ivan Zak: Hmm, excellent and then so so from the show, were you able to through this fund your your hospital when you started it was this a successful sort of exit out of the show. How did that look like financially wise for me there was not a lot of money from doing the TV show which surprises a lot of people the first few years of Hope for Wildlife. I didn’t get paid anything because I was doing the work anyway, and I had said, you know what any funds that would have went my way donate back into Hope for Wildlife. So there was no money for me because I honestly truly enjoy doing it and the experiences I got to have and travel, you know around the world doing wildlife. There’s not many people that can say they had those experiences and the fun we had doing it. They wasn’t all maybe season 5 6 7 that I did start getting an honorarium. It’s still lost in a lot of money. It certainly didn’t fund my new that clinic in any way. And in fact when I open my new Clinic I still was doing Hope for Wildlife and Our Hope was that I would continue to do Hope for Wildlife just sings changed I opened and we became extremely busy with dogs and cats and you know pets and so there was a transition year of me trying to do both I couldn’t do a good job of both. I couldn’t keep up with running a practice seeing patients and seeing Wildlife patients. So after the first year of trying to do that is when I stepped back from Hopeful wildlife and Hope for Wildlife hired a full-time that yeah, it’s really interesting.

Shawn Wilkie: We talk a lot about Innovation on this show and sometimes being Innovative is just a matter of you know, looking at time management and making hard decisions. It must have been a pretty hard decision. Especially it sounds like it was such a labor of love. , you can use my footage. I probably did sign something. So the first year, I don’t really remember any of that.

Dr. Barry MacEachern: It wasn’t and the way TV works is you know, they put all the footage together, but then it can be months before anything’s actually put together and edit it and then it can be even months longer before broadcasters show anything. So, you know, the first time I was taped it was probably almost two years before anything went to Air and there’s a lot of downtime in between when you have the film crews are still there because they’re getting footage and case they use it in the future but there’s really no talk of the the TV show. In fact when we were filming that was never on our minds. It was never oh, make sure you get this this will be good for TV. It was we went away about our daily business because I only went out once a week there was a lot of animals to see and we didn’t have time to be filming things over again. And so it was made very clear from the get-go. Go that I’m just going to come out I’m going to do what I need to get done. And if you guys want to get images, you have to get them as we go it was until the series kind of went on maybe, you know season three or four that then they started sitting us down after the fact talk about the previous episodes. They already had their idea together of what the show was going to be about and that set us down and we talked about what we were doing so you can really see how the show evolved over time seems like it started off as a passion something you enjoy doing and then all of a sudden you were the star of a TV show that’s exactly right. I mean, I really enjoy doing Wildlife it was something I hadn’t really planned on doing going through school. I wasn’t part of the Wildlife Club, you know, I was focused on doing dogs and cats I could help, you know, I practiced for a while in Ontario then moved home practiced emergency for a while and it was until I started at the particular Clinic where hope worked that I started doing wildlife. And and then I just kind of took it over. I started being the only that doing Wildlife at the clinic and then because I had winds days off I started going into the rehab because I enjoy doing the wildlife side of it, you know, if we go back 15 years ago there weren’t that many people doing Wildlife. I mean there are more now doing it. But at that point very few people number one felt that they had the knowledge to do Wildlife number to have the interest in doing wildlife and number three had the time to do Wildlife. I just happened to be in a unique situation where I worked three 12-hour days a week. And so I had the time to do it at the interest in doing it. I won’t say I had the knowledge to do it. I truly I learned as I went and that’s a true specialty that is pretty hard because there’s not many specialization the school that you do for that, especially in handling and you know, the differences between the species and because you can get anything that’s you know, sort of like an emergency medicine. So at that time did you own the practice or it was after that that you you started your practice, you know, I was an associate. I worked somewhere else. I open my own practice just five years ago. We five years this month since I held my own congratulations. So did that have any impact the show on your practice? Do you recycle the material? Do you have a big sign as seen on TV or how did that impact your professional career? I knew I always wanted to open my own practice. That was never a question in my mind. I you know from the time before I went to vet school. I said I wanted to own my own practice and in some ways may be doing Hope for Wildlife slow down the process of opening my own practice because because I truly enjoy doing the wildlife and the job as an associate allowed me to do Wildlife. We traveled a lot with the show, you know, we went to Costa Rica. We went all over the us across candidates Europe and if I own my own practice, I wouldn’t have been able to do that. So in some ways it slow down the process of opening my own practice, but then when the time came to open my practice, I think it gave me a huge boost by then, you know the show had been airing for a few years. My name was out there people knew who Dr. Barry was and so from the from the time I opened right up until now we’ve been busy. There’s never been a downtime the show did definitely give the clinic a boost and starting. So although it may have delayed my timing in opening. I don’t think it’s slow down the progress any Hmm, excellent and then so so from the show, were you able to through this fund your your hospital when you started it was this a successful sort of exit out of the show. How did that look like financially wise for me there was not a lot of money from doing the TV show which surprises a lot of people the first few years of Hope for Wildlife. I didn’t get paid anything because I was doing the work anyway, and I had said, you know what any funds that would have went my way donate back into Hope for Wildlife. So there was no money for me because I honestly truly enjoy doing it and the experiences I got to have and travel, you know around the world doing wildlife. There’s not many people that can say they had those experiences and the fun we had doing it. It wasn’t all maybe season 5 6 7 that I did start getting an honorarium. It’s still lost in a lot of money. It certainly didn’t fund my new vet clinic in any way. And in fact when I open my new Clinic I still was doing Hope for Wildlife and Our Hope was that I would continue to do Hope for Wildlife just things changed I opened and we became extremely busy with dogs and cats and you know pets and so there was a transition year of me trying to do both I couldn’t do a good job of both. I couldn’t keep up with running a practice seeing patients and seeing Wildlife patients. So after the first year of trying to do that is when I stepped back from Hopeful wildlife and Hope for Wildlife hired a full-time that yeah, it’s really interesting. We talk a lot about Innovation on this show and sometimes being Innovative is just a matter of you know, looking at time management and making hard decisions. It must have been a pretty hard decision. Especially it sounds like it was such a labor of love. Of but then you had this business that you had to run at the same time. And I’m sure that decision wasn’t necessarily one of the easiest ones know it was a tough decision, but I just kind of had to sit down and say my dream and my dream was to have you know my own Clinic treating dogs and cats and seeing patients and getting to know owners because I enjoy seeing people I might be one of the one of the very few veterans that actually enjoys people but I do like the pets and the people that care for them and so in the end it came down to what was my dream and Wildlife was a great 10 years, but it wasn’t part of my dreams. So that’s where ultimately like decision came from. I think the reason that we wanted you on the podcast is really understand these different types of media, you know television being one of them. Everyone has some sort of a camera right now, but a lot of veterinary clinics aren’t really taken advantage of video and video content marketing if veterinarian team out there that’s listening to us wants to start filming and producing content. What have you learned as a TV show that’s on air. Are about being around a camera crew. Can you talk to us about that a little bit? Yeah, and you know, I don’t think I’ve taken full advantage of the TV show and my name being out there on the TV and I do realize that I should be taking more advantage of the publicity that I’m getting in order to build the practice and that’s a downfall it’s a time management thing, you know, trying to figure out how to monopolize or how to capitalize on the TV shows. Now, you know, if you’re thinking of doing digital media or videos for the show things that I’ve learned number one is you need to truly trust the people that are filming you you have to get to know the people that are filming you and they need to be able to read your next move. Sometimes trust goes a long way because we all know in that clinics things don’t always go to the way that we hoped or planned for and and so you got to be careful. Sometimes the things don’t show up on TV that you didn’t intend and so having trust in the film crew making sure that you have final say for my own TV show the Barry show that was written rate in the contract that I have final say of anything that goes on air and I get to watch the shows before they go on air so I can veto or XA anything that I see that I don’t like because you always want to portray yourself in the best light obviously also having a story. You know, what are you actually trying to portray here? So there needs to be a story and then always being aware of what’s going on in the background because that’s the biggest thing when I watch the rough cuts is seeing what people are doing in the background on the video. They may be filming me and the animal I’m with but what’s the rest of the staff doing in the background how do things look around the clinic or things neat and tidy because that’s what viewers are there’s a lot of viewers out there that are watching those things as well

Ivan Zak: Interesting, So transitioning from the TV show into the clinic. You’ve built it from the ground up was it the new build was a de novo or did you acquire it from a previous owner?

Dr. Barry MacEachern: You know, I don’t get true the ground up boy at least a space and I renovated the space and said it for a vet clinic. So it was a fresh start zero clients opening really just kind of did it on a shoestring it was myself and my husband and a veterinary technician the kind of plan the floor plan it all the ordering got everything together for it.

Ivan Zak: So, how was that experience from what were the challenges because right now that you know, the industry is consolidating their so many of these big consolidator. So every time you make a decision of building a clinic that’s you know, it’s quite a challenging and and And how we can compete against these Giants. What was the most challenging part in designing and building it out with a small crew that you just mentioned?

Dr. Barry MacEachern: Oh, you know, I guess I had it really easy. There were no major challenges for me. And I think that was one place that the TV show opened the door for me. I knew when I opened I was going to have clientele because I had people contacting me on Facebook I of course started a Facebook page early on you know, I attended the Hope for Wildlife open house and I had a booth thing. I would be openings in the next few months. If you want to become a client leave your name and your number and we had pages and pages of people that wanted to be clients. And so by the time we opened my appointment book was full and I was working 12-hour days five days a week plus a couple hours on Saturday, you know within six months. I was up to another an at full time within a year I was up to there was three of us three that’s working full-time. And so it grew really fast. I found I got respect from all the distributor’s or you know, the different reps because they knew me through Hope for Wildlife because of course when I did hope for a while, I found was always contacting, you know, the different drug companies looking for donations of drugs to treat Wildlife. So they all knew who I was and so when I open my own Clinic they kind of knew. Okay? Well, it’s Berry calling us. Okay. What can we do for my had a good working relationship with them? It was more of a timing thing when I opened because I did do it really fast. So waiting for the cages to arrive. We actually the first day we opened the cages weren’t installed yet because things just didn’t get delivered on time. That was really I think the biggest stress that we had when we opened was that and of course learning a new new computer software but everything kind of fell into place. I picked a team when I opened that had a lot of experience which comes with its pros and it’s cons the receptionist. I hire had many years experience. I hired three seasoned veterinary technicians and then it was myself and of course my husband who was in the office and so when we opened we all knew we had a job to do and we knew what that job was and we didn’t take on any new staff the downfall of doing that was my payroll was high when I opened because I had hired season technicians, but it sounds like we’re the pre-sale that you made through your Facebook Channel you filled up the schedule really well, so that’s that sounds amazing because that’s how you know in any sort of product Builder or business. That’s the essential part to have the clients come when you were there. So the yes, yeah, it’s good. I think one of the downfalls that I have encountered but it’s been more overtime is because of the TV show. It is hard to build the practice at this point because people want to see me they’re calling to book an appointment with Dr. Barry and you know, I have two Associates and sometimes you can’t get them to book with the associates. They stay at the clinic. They’re at because they only want to see Barry because he was the one on TV and that’s been the challenge that we’ve been trying to get over. Of course. Some of them do booking with the associates and that’s great. But I can only see so many people in the round of the day. And so that that is the hurdle we’re trying to get over right now. We’re hoping that because of the Dr. Barry show every episode one of my associates also has a story on the episode. So we’re hoping people are seeing Seeing them and we’ll start calling to book with them as well.

Shawn Wilkie: It’s really interesting. You’re digging it all of these Innovative things Facebook introducing your other associates on the TV show. These are some pretty pretty interesting marketing tactics. I was a berry that I think will probably pay dividends for you guys as you go forward because it’s all about the team isn’t it? You start it with, you know a team that was seized and it sounds like you’ve built to practice with some great Associates one man. Never built a village by himself. I don’t think know

Making mistakes

Dr. Barry MacEachern: And and that is the hurdle we’re trying to get over now because it did become I did make mistakes along the way. I mean when I opened although the Clinic’s called burnside’s Veterinary Hospital all my paperwork my Sciences, dr. Berries Burnside veterinary hospital because I wanted people to know that that’s where Dr. Barry is at and that’s certainly did help it first because I’m on a main drag Craig in the industrial park and people would say we saw the sign. Dr. Barry is that the guy from TV and they come in and they book the problem. We’re having now though is it says dr. Berry on the sign and I kind of looking back wonder if that was a wise move or not. If it should have just been Burnside Veterinary Hospital help me grow fast, but that may be one of the challenges with getting people to book with the associate.

Shawn Wilkie: You know, you’re the classic entrepreneur. Barry, you know, just making mistakes along the way and still there. You know, I think that’s always the big Testament an entrepreneur a classic business person is yeah. We make a ton of mistakes my God we could do a show of me and Ivan just of mistakes that we’ve made and probably be not a 20-hour episode but my section would be a couple of hours long

Dr. Barry MacEachern: I think it’s okay to make mistakes as long as you recognize them and figure out how to alter the course and that’s kind of where we’re at. Now, you know the past five years have been been extremely busy and a little bit crazy because I am trying to manage the practice still seeing, you know, 40 hours a week of appointments on top of that and and then also trying to figure out how do we Market this differently? What do we do differently? And so the mistakes that were made are fine now it’s to sit down and figure out how do we alter it? So the mistake actually turns into a positive thing and and that that will work out for us, you know, we’re still looking at that and like I said on the TV show my associates are front and center of my technicians all have a part in it, you know, they try and make sure in every episode that all the staff is seen and spoken to you.

Shawn Wilkie: Thanks so much for listening to the veterinary Innovation podcast. We’re pretty social people. So you’ll find us on every social media channel. Also, you can check out our website at the veterinary Innovation podcast.com. Thanks so much for listening.