Episode 78 of the Acupuncture Marketing School Podcast: Starting Over and Building a New Practice from Scratch in Cyprus with Dimitri Boules

This week I’m talking with Dimitri Boules, an acupuncturist who built, scaled, and then sold a super successful clinic with his wife in New York City to relocate his family and their clinic to the island of Cyprus in 2021.

We talk about:

  • What sparked their decision to leave everything behind and move across the world
  • How they’re building their new practice from the ground up with no contacts or family in the country
  • What marketing has been working really well to bring in new patients
  • What’s different building a practicing in Cyprus, which has socialized medicine
  • Dimitri’s specialty and his online class on orthopedic acupuncture, the Oak Point Method
  • Prioritizing family and health over traditional measures of success

I hope you find this episode as fun and fascinating as I did, and feel inspired to pursue your biggest dreams, no matter how impossible they might seem at first.

Show Notes:

🎙️ Listen to Episode #78: Starting a Practice from Scratch in Cyprus with Dimitri Boules

This episode is sponsored by The Business of Practice Conference, hosted this year in Melbourne, Australia.

I know Australia is quite a big trip for those of us in the US but I hope you’ll consider joining us. I’m honored to be the international keynote speaker, and I’m joined by eight other practicing acupuncturists who are experts in business growth, social media, practice management, building a brand, and much more. 

It’s going to be an energizing weekend and the goal is for you to leave feeling inspired and prepared to build a practice that’s aligned with your own definition of success.

The early bird ticket price of $800 Australian ends on June 30th. With the current exchange rate that’s about $530 US. Grab your reduced-price ticket while you can.

Plus I’ll be staying an extra half day the Monday after the conference to teach Acupuncture Marketing School in person. It’s the first time I’m teaching this coursework in person and it’s going to be a small group, so you’ll get plenty of time to ask questions and get feedback. I am really looking forward to it.

Come and join us and your like-minded colleagues for a great weekend of learning, expansion and networking!

Register and learn more here.

Subscribe to the Acupuncture Marketing School podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify

 💖 Love the podcast? Help other acupuncturists find the podcast by leaving a review here.

Transcript:

[MICHELLE GRASEK] (00:00):

Welcome to the Acupuncture Marketing School Podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Grasek, and I’m here to help you get visible in your community, take marketing action with confidence and get more patients in your practice and more money in your pocket every week. We both know you’re a talented, passionate acupuncturist and that acupuncture has the power to change lives. So let’s dive right into this episode and talk about how you can reach more patients.

[MICHELLE] (00:33):

Hello there. Welcome back. This week I’m talking with Dimitri Boule, an Acupuncturist, who built, scaled, and then sold a super successful clinic with his wife in New York City to relocate his family and their practice to the island of Cyprus in 2021. In this episode, we talk about what sparked their decision to leave everything behind and move across the world, how they’re building their new practice from the ground up with no contacts or family in the country, what marketing has been working really well to bring in new patients, what’s different building a practice in Cyprus, which has socialized medicine, what happened to their old clinic when they left, Dimitri’s specialty and his online class on orthopedic acupuncture, the Oak Point Method, prioritizing family and health over traditional measures of success and so much more. I hope you find this episode as fun and fascinating as I did, and feel inspired to pursue your biggest dreams, no matter how impossible they might seem at first.

[SPONSOR] (01:34):

Before we dive in with Dimitri, a note from our sponsor. This episode is sponsored by the Business of Practice Conference hosted this year in Melbourne, Australia. I know Australia is quite a big trip for those of us in the US, but I hope you’ll consider joining us. I’m honored to be the international keynote speaker, and I’m joined by eight other practicing acupuncturists who are experts in business growth, social media, practice management, building a brand, and much more. It’s going to be an energizing weekend, and the goal is for you to leave feeling inspired and prepared to build a practice that’s aligned with your own definition of success. The early bird ticket price of $800 Australian ends on June 30th, and with the current exchange rate, that’s about $530 US. On July 1st, the price goes up to AU$1000 Australian, which is about $667 US. So grab your reduced price ticket while you can.

(02:31):

Plus, I’ll be saying an extra half day, the Monday after the conference to teach Acupuncture Marketing School in person. It’s the first time I’m teaching this coursework in person, and it’s going to be a small group, so you’ll get plenty of time to ask questions and get feedback. I am really looking forward to it. Come and join us and your like-minded colleagues for a great weekend of learning, expansion and networking. The link is in the show notes to sign up and to view the lecture topics and everything else that’s included in this fabulous weekend event.

[MICHELLE] (03:00):

All right, let’s get into this episode with Dimitri. Hello, welcome. Thank you so much for being here today.

[DIMITRI BOULES] (03:09):

Thank you for having me. Super excited.

[MICHELLE] (03:12):

Absolutely. So you have a fascinating story and some really cool lessons to share with us. You recently moved to the island of Cyprus and you moved your acupuncture practice, so you started over and your wife also practices acupuncture. And yeah, I would love to hear all about that process, all about the journey of building a practice from scratch in a new country. So if you want to introduce yourself a little bit, tell us a bit about what you do, how you ended up choosing to move.

[DIMITRI] (03:44):

Yeah, so I’m Dimitri Boules. I had a very successful practice in New York in a Story of Queens. It was going really well. I had expanded to the point where I had employees. I was teaching also at a college. I was teaching seminars on marketing, and also, I was teaching mostly like orthopedic electro acupuncture seminars and everything was really good, but we were always talking with my wife, like we were always having conversations about maybe possibly moving to Cyprus, which is the most eastern island in the Mediterranean. We were always talking about that, but there always something would come up. Like we had a really long-term lease. The business was growing, so we had a lot of things that were holding us in New York. Then baby number one came and they we were like, okay, let’s wait a few more years. Baby number two came, well, let’s wait a few more years. Baby number three came. So you can imagine like there was always something coming up. And before, even though it was always a conversation we might want to move to Cyprus, we, before Covid, my second child was going to go to school so we went for a little tour of the school and my son was wearing like these, you know these shoes, like the sneakers that when you walk, they light up?

[MICHELLE] (05:08):

Yes.

[DIMITRI] (05:09):

Yeah, I love those. I used to have at least four pairs back in the day

[MICHELLE] (05:12):

So good.

[DIMITRI] (05:13):

So my son had those and the teacher when she saw him said, oh make sure when you come to actual school, like for your class, if you, don’t wear those shoes and I just, oh, curious, just asked like, why, just out of curiosity, why should he not wear these shoes? I was thinking maybe the kids might be jealous or something like that. Long story short, she said, well, if a shooter comes in, we need to hide the kids and if, —

[MICHELLE] (05:44):

Oh, my goodness.

[DIMITRI] (05:45):

And if there’s lights that are, they can see where the kids are. I was, we went home with my wife and I’m like, “Forget this. I’m not having this.” And then Covid happened and it was like a blessing in disguise. I mean, COVID was not good, obviously but it did give us time to think. Because we weren’t going to work, we were home, we were just, had the time to have these deeper conversations and really think about what we really wanted to do with life and that’s when we decided that we’re going to, we’re just going to go. And then we announced it to our family, and then we started the process. By no means is it easy starting from scratch, especially going from, teaching at a college, teaching courses, having staff and having a big clinic and seeing a hundred plus people a week, to zero essentially. So yeah, it’s definitely a, this is going to be our third year right now and so far, so good.

[MICHELLE] (06:58):

Awesome. Yeah, that is super stressful having a teacher bring up the possibility of an active shooter situation when your kid is what, entering kindergarten. It’s like, wow.

[DIMITRI] (07:09):

Yeah, scary.

[MICHELLE] (07:09):

So what made you choose Cyprus specifically? Because it sounds like it was always going to be Cyprus if you moved abroad.

[DIMITRI] (07:16):

Well, we originally thought, like before we were like, maybe we’ll try another state, maybe it’s not, maybe it shouldn’t be Europe. I’m from Greece, so from mainland Greece, Cyprus is a different country, but they do speak the same language. And one of the things which is really important, and I’m glad actually you brought this up, is that there are certain countries that you have to be a medical doctor in order to pierce the skin. So there are some kind, I think that France is one of them, Italy is another one. Greece is another one that you have to be a medical doctor in order to pierce the skin. Cyprus doesn’t have that law. So that was one of the reasons. But for me, I always, for some reason, I don’t know why, I first visited Cypress in 2004. I felt at home, I felt like this, now this is the place. Even though it wasn’t as developed, it was, I just felt good being here. And plus it was, it’s the safest country in the EU, in the European Union. So bringing up the safety thing with the kids, it just felt like a good place to raise a family.

[MICHELLE] (08:35):

Got you. I had no idea it was considered the safest country in the European Union. I love it. And because it’s in the Mediterranean, so is it a tropical feel? Forgive me for dumb questions, by the way.

[DIMITRI] (08:49):

No, this, all good questions. So it is warm, like right now, we were at the beach the other day. It’s warm here. There’s 350 days of sun, sunshine.

[MICHELLE] (09:03):

Wow, compared to New York?

[DIMITRI] (09:04):

Yeah, I think winter’s like two months and winter it’s like a sweater, maybe a light jacket, but it’s —

[MICHELLE] (09:14):

Oh, that really is the dream.

[DIMITRI] (09:16):

Yes, that’s another reason. In New York, I was always cold from like November, so even like, you know in April. So I like going to the beach. I like doing things like standup paddle and all these other things on the water.

[MICHELLE] (09:35):

So how did you figure out, because you must have determined before you left all the regulations for being able to practice in another country? And did you decide on a space to rent, or did you just make the move and then find a location? Like how, logistically, how did you start a new practice in another country? It sounds like in 2021 so like kind of still in the pandemic.

[DIMITRI] (10:01):

Yes, it was. When we moved here, COVID, because everything was moving a little slower in Cyprus, they had a lockdown right after we moved, which means like send a text message to exit the house, only to go to like the supermarket and come back. It was only for a certain amount of time and it was only, I think twice a day, if I remember correctly. You had to present like your vaccination card or paper that, you had the virus and you, for another three months, you don’t need to get the vaccine. It was very complicated, but, so yeah, it was very, even more difficult with that, but before even moving here, I contacted a lawyer and I explained my situation. I told him that I want to move. I told him my education background, my profession, et cetera, and I asked them to do research and to look at the laws if I can practice. That’s number one. That’s what the lawyer did. They were really good on doing the research. They know what to do. I don’t know where to look for these things. So the lawyer knows exactly what to ask, where to go look for all this information. So that’s number one.

(11:19):

Number two is I looked for an acupuncture association in Cyprus. So I wanted to see if there is an association, who’s part of it, and then I asked them questions as well. I just wanted to confirm that what I got from the lawyer and what I got from the association was similar or the same. And that’s that part. So I wanted to make sure if I could practice. When we moved here, I needed to understand, because there’s a social insurance here, so everybody has insurance, I needed to understand what the “the market” is. Like what do people need, what are they open to? And what I realized is that, first of all, a lot of people don’t know what acupuncture and Chinese medicine is and there’s a lot of people that take a weekend course in something like dry needling, for example. They call it acupuncture. And there’s a lot of physio, or physiotherapists that provide dry needling and they’re just calling it acupuncture.

[MICHELLE] (12:27):

Got you.

[DIMITRI] (12:28):

So I needed now, with that information, I needed to use my marketing, my online presence, my everything that I could to educate people on what we do and how we’re different. So that was like the starting point. So there was a lot of research. I was asking people, I was, when you first move to an area, you start making friends, and so I was asking people just to see what they would tell me. That’s come out the beginnings of it before we even found a place.

[MICHELLE] (13:04):

Got you. Because, so you moved and you didn’t have a place set up already for your clinic, and then when you arrived it was basically lockdown.

[DIMITRI] (13:14):

Yes.

[MICHELLE] (13:15):

So I suppose you had some time to maybe research potential places, like look at real estate because there may be nothing else to do.

[DIMITRI] (13:25):

I want to emphasize here, I had no family here. I had no friends here. I knew nothing about the area. Like I don’t, I didn’t know the neighborhoods. So I didn’t know like directions. Like people would tell me, oh, come to this place, it’s, you’re given directions, I was like, I have no idea what you’re telling me. So I had to figure that all out and what I did with my wife, we were just driving around trying to figure things out. It did take a little bit of time. Real estate agents were not taking me seriously because they would ask me, where are you looking for like a clinic and I’m like, I don’t know, can you like, recommend something? And they were like, yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ll give you a call back. They would never call me back. It was like never called me back. And, I’m all, I’m really, I mention this a lot. I really think our thoughts are magnets. We think of something, it just, it goes out to the universe and then the stars align. And what ended up happening, we found, we saw this huge sign that said for rent, like, and we’re like, what is for rent? So we called, we found this location. As soon as we saw it, we’re like, this is it. Let’s do it. Let’s pull the trigger. We left, as we’re about to go into the car, I turn around to my wife, I’m like, let’s just go back and just shake hands and let’s sign this thing. And that’s what happened.

[MICHELLE] (14:57):

Amazing.

[DIMITRI] (14:58):

But even then, we were just still trying to understand what people are going to, what should, should I do my orthopedic stuff, should I maybe do, because you got to understand nobody else is doing fertility acupuncture. Like, should I do the fertility acupuncture and just like focus on that. So I was a little bit on the fence, should Anna keep doing, my wife, should she keep doing her cosmetic acupuncture? Should she do something else? So we’re just trying to figure things out. But yeah, it does take a little bit of time. It’s not easy. But if your why, as you mentioned, you’re on your podcast, if your why is strong enough, like anything, any obstacles, you’ll be able to deal with it and figure solutions out.

[MICHELLE] (15:49):

I love that. And so how long do you think it took before you really felt like your practice was rolling, like things were working, you had your name out in the community?

[DIMITRI] (16:01):

It’s always going to be a process. It’s never, it’s a never-ending thing. But I think I want to say about, this is my, going to be my third year, next month, so I would say about a year ago I started being like, oh, okay, this is going to really work out. This is going well. It’s not where I wanted to be. It’s not where, it’s not New York status yet, for sure, but I don’t think I’m ever going to even want to get to that point. I want to go a little bit more like a smaller practice compared to what I had in New York, but about a year ago is when I’m like, oh man, I’m seeing like, almost 20 patients a day. That’s what I almost was doing in New York, a little, I was doing a little bit more in New York. I’m like, this is good. And people were, the phone was ringing and that’s a good sign. When the phone is ringing, it’s a really good sign.

[MICHELLE] (16:57):

And I think that’s helpful for people to hear whether they are new, they like, they just graduated or they’re starting over somewhere, that even when you’re giving it your all and you know what you’re doing, it still takes time to build, to have a reputation in the community, to have people know why they should come see you. So I hope that reminds people just don’t give up, keep going. It’s just, it’s only going to get better. And I’m really curious about your practice style, because you said 20 patients a day. What’s a lot?

[DIMITRI] (17:30):

Oh, in New York it was like 26, 27 patients, easy.

[MICHELLE] (17:32):

Wow.

[DIMITRI] (17:34):

I had like four rooms. I also had staff, which means, like I had a front desk that was able to take care of the bookings, the payments, et cetera and it was like a dance. Like I would have students from the college or acupuncture students follow me because they were like, they couldn’t leave it almost, it was like, so I’m like, yeah, come to the clinic whenever you want. So they would come and it was literally like a, I had this flow go in. Back then I would start with what we call a secondary mod, so I would do like either a twen or cupping or something, guaca first and then I would do the acupuncture. And it’s almost always electro acupuncture. So I would set those in, go to the next patient, and I had a flow, like I had, the schedule was set in a way where as soon as I was done with that first patient, the second patient was already in the second room. But those numbers for me required me to have that front desk staff

[MICHELLE] (18:39):

Yeah.

[DIMITRI] (18:40):

But it was, I like it when it’s a little, I like the high energy. I like that. I like it when it’s a little crazy. That’s my style. But I just want to add nothing felt rushed to the patients. Like the patients didn’t feel like it was a mill. The patients didn’t feel that they were getting awesome treatments, fantastic treatments. And New York, there’s an acupuncturist, a block down, a block up, like they’re everywhere. So I just had that flow and everybody got an amazing treatment and nobody felt rushed. They were able to relax. It was awesome.

[MICHELLE] (19:22):

And so now it sounds like you don’t have a receptionist, so you’re doing that entire flow by yourself.

[DIMITRI] (19:29):

Yes, and I’m still seeing like 18, 20 patients. It’s like, again, that flow. People come in, now, I actually do the acupuncture first, and I’ll do my secondary, I almost, not almost, I always do my secondary modality second, so after I take out the needles, and that’s because the tissues are just much more looser and the patient has got into that parasympathetic state, and then I can treat the neuromuscular, the muscles and the fascia are much better. I’m able to check them out. I have plans, like a wellness plan or a package, whatever you want to call it. And then people usually come in at around the same time on the same day usually. Not always, but that makes things a little bit easier. Also, I have, I mean, you mentioned the EHR, I think Jane is the one that you mentioned.

[MICHELLE] (20:27):

Oh, yep.

[DIMITRI] (20:28):

Yep. So that’s, it’s easy for them to change their schedule, the appointment if they need to. They can book online by themselves. So I’ve tried to automate that as much as possible and make it their, the patient’s responsibility to book. So that helps a lot.

[MICHELLE] (20:45):

Got you. And so you practice neuro-puncture, which I am not super familiar with, but I remember that you used to, and you still do teach orthopedic style acupuncture, right? So what is the difference?

[DIMITRI] (21:00):

So orthopedic, the stuff that I teach is just straight up orthopedic sports acupuncture. This is for your neck pain, back pain, knee pain, various knee conditions, everything from the head to toe. What 90% of patients seek out acupuncture for is covered in that course. Neuro-puncture, which is a fantastic system, is neuroscience-based acupuncture. So for me, when I was in school, I had an issue with the, nobody can explain to me in western terms how acupuncture works. I am a very science-oriented person, like, I really want to understand neurologically what’s going on with the needles getting inserted into the body. I don’t want to go to a medical doctor or to a western patient and tell them about, there’s chi flow and like, oh, you have this zen chi and this gucci. I didn’t want to get into that. I like having that conversation with you and other people that are in the field that they know what I’m talking about. But I wanted to be able to also understand what happens neurologically when we do acupuncture and that’s where I continue my education into neuro-puncture.

[MICHELLE] (22:15):

So your wife does cosmetic acupuncture? And I love, your website is so streamlined.

[MICHELLE] (22:23):

What’s that?

[DIMITRI] (22:25):

I was about to, I’m really 65 years old, but she does a good job and she keeps me.

[MICHELLE] (22:29):

That’s so funny because I always tell people I’m 82. Like it’s the cosmetic acupuncture. Your website is super, it’s very streamlined. I like that it only really gives people two options. They can choose the neuro-puncture, and you’re very clear about this is what neuro-puncture treats, or they can choose cosmetic acupuncture and the adjunct modalities that go along with that. Do you feel like the cosmetic acupuncture is doing well in Cypress?

[DIMITRI] (22:58):

It’s, it is. And see, the thing is here in Cyprus, it’s in now to get Botox everywhere. It’s in to get —

[MICHELLE] (23:06):

Here too.

[DIMITRI] (23:07):

Yeah, but here, it’s like everybody’s doing it

[MICHELLE] (23:11):

Oh, interesting.

[DIMITRI] (23:12):

Everybody is doing every kind of cosmetic thing you can imagine. And so there is, though, there are people that understand that, you can start preventatively doing things to extend that so you don’t have to start when you’re 30, for example. There’s nothing wrong if they want to do Botox, there’s nothing wrong if they want to do that. I’m not judging them. They can do whatever they want. It’s just that there are other options before that. And also my wife, I’m not an expert on this, but my wife says that those who do get work done, when they combine it with the cosmetic acupuncture, things last a lot longer. So they noticed, she noticed that as well. So I’m not an expert on the cosmetic acupuncture, I have, no, I just like getting it done. But that’s what we’ve noticed. And that’s another thing. It’s just like really understanding what the people, what the communities, what everybody’s doing here that’s different. In New York, Ana had, a six-month waiting list.

[MICHELLE] (24:16):

Wow. Amazing.

[DIMITRI] (24:18):

She had a lot of hours. She worked Saturdays too. Like it was very, very popular. Here, a little slower. I think this world is so new, but it’s definitely, like her schedule right now is full. She works every five days a week, mornings, sorry, four days a week, mornings, one in the afternoon to accommodate evening patients and her schedule is full.

[MICHELLE] (24:42):

Amazing. I mean, I can never emphasize enough how important it is to know your target market and know, like, what are the trends? What are people doing? Because then you can formulate your argument and say, oh, okay, well, do you, does anybody know what happens if you decide to get Botox for the next 50 years? Like, if you start Botox when you’re 25, there’s no research that shows. And I totally agree with Anna, that if someone’s having work done and they get cosmetic acupuncture, I think the cosmetic acupuncture improves the health of their skin so that the work does look better. It’s pretty fascinating. But yeah, you got to know your target market so you know how to talk to them.

[DIMITRI] (25:25):

Yes. It was also for me, it was also because I’m really passionate about sports, acupuncture and orthopedics, like, so I love treating that stuff, for me, it’s, everything makes sense when it comes to shoulders, knees, and for Anna, it’s the cosmetic acupuncture. So for us, it was really a test. I think the universe was testing us to see if we really, because I think you have to be passionate about what you’re doing. Like you mentioned that, I forgot which episode it was, but you were talking about passion. Yes, passion is definitely important when you’re thinking about if you’re going to specialize in something and it really made it clear to us, like, no, I want to do a cosmetic action. This is what I believe in. This is what, these are my, this is my philosophy on the skin and health, and I’m going to stick with it. I’m not going to just change it just because. I’m going to do everything I can to educate people on why this is so good. I think we stuck with that and I’m glad we did.

[MICHELLE] (26:30):

So how did you build your practice? Like once you first opened your doors, what marketing was really effective?

[DIMITRI] (26:38):

Okay, so they’re a little behind here on certain things. So first off, I created a website. Now this is before I even had my own clinic. I wanted to create a website and I wanted that to be ready. So I created a nice website, professional, headshots, educating people on what we do. Blogs were on there for search engine optimization. I linked my social media, et cetera, on the website to help with the search engine. I’ve been listening to the podcast,

[MICHELLE] (27:09):

I love it.

[DIMITRI] (27:12):

So I created a really good website. I used your, I think it was episode one if I’m not, one of the first episodes where I was using it as a checklist. I’m like, okay, I got that. I got it. Like, oh, I got to add that. That’s a great idea.

[MICHELLE] (27:26):

That’s amazing.

[DIMITRI] (27:26):

Yes, yes. So we created a website. Now, a lot of healthcare providers here, they don’t have a website. They don’t. It’s a social socialist type of healthcare system. Everybody goes to whoever, everybody’s getting paid, nobody really cares to put the effort, unfortunately. So some healthcare providers use Facebook as their website, which, not a great idea, because a lot of people don’t have, maybe they don’t have Facebook or they don’t want to be on or whatever. So there’s so many people that come here and they tell me, I ask them, “How did you hear about us?” And they say, “Well, I Googled, I saw your website. It was professional, it was great and I just booked the appointment. It was easy to book the appointment.” That’s another thing they tell, it was easy to book the appointment.

(28:16):

So that was the first part. The second was having an Instagram, I use Facebook, but I’m more on Instagram now. I think my target market is more on Instagram. So I was using Instagram to not only educate people on what this thing called acupuncture is, but I wanted to show them through like stories on who me and Anna were. What do we do behind the scenes? What do we do when the door closes and that people have needles in? We make it funny. We make, because that’s what we really do. Like me and my, we’re laughing, we’re cracking jokes. I’m doing pushups like in between patients, that’s, I want to do micro workouts. I document this and I show it to our patients and they like it.

(29:05):

Today I had three people. They’re like, they commented on this reel that I made. I’m an acupuncturist. Of course, people will ask me, why didn’t I become a real doctor, things like that. I use that, the story aspect, for example, of Instagram to show people that I’m a real person too, I’m just like them. I’m trying to constantly prove myself and I’m a down to earth person and to not be scared of acupuncture. So that’s what we’re doing with, social media wise. And then I want to offer an awesome experience, just like my wife, like everybody that comes here, they get the best treatment possible. My clinic is not very medical. It looks like a nice clean clinics, like almost like a spa-like type of thing. Everybody feels good when they’re here and I want that to be, that’s really important. And I want to deliver results. So that’s another marketing, if you think about it, like great results. You have people walking around this city and they’re like, I go to this place and they’re awesome. You got to go to this place, not to the other place.

[MICHELLE] (30:17):

Do you feel like you, like you had to do a lot of, almost like networking in the community initially to build up trust or was the website and Instagram was sufficient?

[DIMITRI] (30:30):

Well, yeah, I need opportunity. I get, like with my children’s school, I’m present there. I’m meeting people all the time. And there are, this is another actually marketing thing that I did and continue to do by the way, like, everything I say I’ve done and I’m still doing like I’ve done in New York.

[MICHELLE] (30:49):

It’s always ongoing.

[DIMITRI] (30:51):

Yes. There’s a International Woman’s of Cyprus Association, a club, I forgot the exact title, but they come together, these women from different countries, they’re not from Cyprus. They come together and they have these different events and some of them are speaking events. I told them like, if you ever have any openings and you want a speaker, let me know. And just the other day they had a, I was one of the panelists and we had a great discussion and there were a lot of people there. I got to meet them and everybody got my information, either my card or they were following me on social media. I do those things as well.

[MICHELLE] (31:31):

I love that you just let them know that you are available. And I think that is one thing that’s really hard for a lot of people to do with their marketing, is to just sort of like, show up first and say, “Hey, I’m here, if you have questions, if you have speaking opportunities, et cetera, et cetera,” whatever the case might be. But it’s so worth it to basically be brave and put yourself out there. Because a lot of times forward thinking groups or people are very interested in hearing the perspective from an acupuncturist, from an East Asian medical specialist. They want to know like, what are new ways of thinking about ourselves, our health, our internal landscape. So yeah, man, I hope people are more willing to do that now that they heard you say you just put yourself out there.

[DIMITRI] (32:24):

And just want to emphasize here that I’m very shy. I’m an introvert. I like being by myself. I feel very, very, very, very, very, very, very uncomfortable just going up to people and talking to them. But I do think that we come to this world with these little, I don’t know what to call them, like these little characteristics. And the way I look at it is like, I’m put here with this characteristic so I can overcome it. So if I’m shy and I don’t want to speak to somebody, or I just want to sit in the corner and just like not talk to anybody. I’m doing the opposite and it’s very hard. But I just do it. And it’s only help, even in New York and here it’s only help people warm up, people like being able to share what I do and spreading the word. But it’s also helped me in my personal life, not just business wise. It’s helped me with other things too. So when I have that voice telling me, just sit in the corner, don’t worry, you don’t have to do much. I’m like, uh-oh, I got to do the exact opposite.

[MICHELLE] (33:35):

Oh, you’re a better person than I am.

[DIMITRI] (33:37):

Well, listen, it takes, it took me years. My wife was constantly pushing me because she’s very the opposite of me. So she, because of her and her constantly pushing me in a good way, in a supportive way, now I just, I’m able to do it by myself. It doesn’t, like sometimes I listen to that voice and I’m like, yeah, you know what, I’m just going to sit here for now.

[MICHELLE] (34:02):

Thanks for the advice. I feel like the core of it is that your wife knows how much you have to share and how much you can benefit other people when you start talking about your expertise. So that makes sense to me. I always tell my fellow introverts, if you have a hard time being outgoing in person, which I certainly do, send an email. Like that’s a great starting point. You don’t have to walk up to someone in person that you really admire and say, “Hey, I know you’re having this conference. I’m available.” You can send an email, or there’s other ways that are a little bit lower pressure and then you can work up to it. I am in, I am recruiting my local community to help me get on a local morning show, like local television with cosmetic acupuncture and it’s terrifying to even think about this project being a success because that means I’ll have to be on television. But it’s also been like a 15-year process to get to a place where I’m like, okay, I know this well enough. I really have ideas to share, and more people need to know how cool this is and how well it works. And now I’m willing to like, try to figure out how to do it. So it’s also not like you have to dive in head first. Baby steps. Along the way.

[DIMITRI] (35:27):

And something that you just reminded me, because you said about the email, and I remember listening to one of your episodes and you said about —

[MICHELLE] (35:34):

You’ve heard them all, I love it.

[DIMITRI] (35:36):

I’ve heard a lot, lot. I mean, I have a little bit of a drive to go home and I’m listening to a podcast. So one of the things that you mentioned, like if you’re not feeling comfortable with sending somebody, asking somebody for a review, like a Google review, you just send it.

[MICHELLE] (35:51):

Oh yeah.

[DIMITRI] (35:51):

So one thing I do, which also helped boost my marketing is that I have people, you know those patients that come out, they’re like, “Oh, my God, I feel amazing and you’re the best. Hey by the way, can you do me a huge favor? Can you write a quick five-star review, preferably five-star review on Google for me?” And they’re like, “Yeah, absolutely.” I was doing the same thing in New York and I had before I left over a hundred and something just on Google alone. I’m not talking about the other ones, Yelp and all the other ones. But right now I’m doing that and my goal is to get a couple of reviews each week to, especially after listening to the podcast, because that’s another thing, no healthcare provider, not only do they not have a website, but they don’t really have anything like a Google page where they can write reviews about and when people come in, they’re like, well, I googled, I saw you had the best reviews and I called you and you had the most reviews.

[MICHELLE] (36:52):

I am such a huge advocate of putting that on your marketing calendar, having a plan, exactly like you’re saying. Like if your goal is to get a couple reviews a week, that means you have to actively ask for those things. You got to think about which patients are like consistently so happy that I haven’t already approached. And I find that people are always like, yeah, I’d love to write you a review and then they forget. So then the follow-up email is where you’re saying like, “Hey, you mentioned you’d be willing to leave a review. Here’s the link to do that.” Because I find that, a lot of us are just so nervous to ask for anything at all. If someone says they’ll leave a review and then they don’t do it, we very rarely follow up. We’re like, is that appropriate? I don’t want to be pushy. I’m like, they said yes. Then definitely follow up and be like, “Hey, remember how you said this? I’m so happy you’re enjoying your treatments. Just wanted to touch base. Here’s the link.” I think it’s a numbers game. Like if you decide, and you can figure out these numbers on your own just by trial and error, but it’s like, if you ask 10 patients for a review, I think you’ll get five reviews at least. So if you know like, oh, I want to outpace this neighbor who’s got 50 reviews, now you know how many people you need to ask. You can extrapolate how many weeks is it going to take? It’s got to just be as strategic as possible. It can be very successful.

[DIMITRI] (38:16):

Yes. And here, a lot of people use things like WhatsApp, it’s like an app, like you, such thing which I didn’t know about until I moved here, I’ll just send them the link. I’ll be like, hey, as they’re even in front of me, I’m like, “Hey, let me just send you the link right now.” So now they have it on their phone. All they have to do is click on it. It takes two seconds. It’s very effective.

[MICHELLE] (38:39):

Well, I have one more question for you that I ask everyone, and that is, what is your definition of success?

[DIMITRI] (38:47):

Yes, I’ve heard this question. So I think it changes, honestly. If you asked me 10 years ago, I’ll be like, oh, opening up X amount of clinics and having people working for me. For me right now, I just, I want, when my kids get older, like they’re young now, so nine, eight, I want, when they grow up and they’re like 18 plus and they’re out of the house, success for me is like, if they want to hang out with me, that’s for me the most —

[MICHELLE] (39:20):

That’s so nice.

[DIMITRI] (39:22):

Yeah, like this stuff, I love it, it’s cool, but I felt like in New York, I was almost a little bit sacrificing the time, the quality time with my family because I was, I had so many things on my plate. And in New York, like as you get closer to New York City, you have to, because you can’t survive if you don’t. It’s expensive and you need to have a lot of these things going for you to make a good living and I felt like I was sacrificing that quality time. And during that time of Covid where we were thinking, that’s one of the things I’m like, if we make this move, I’m going to drastically change a lot of things. I’m going to have a smaller clinic. I’m going to make sure, health-wise, I wasn’t doing well, what I mean is that I was, I needed six coffees, large coffees just to function.

(40:15):

It got to that point and then even that wasn’t enough, I had to add espresso to the large coffee. It got to the point, the last couple of years, like my doctor for blood work always had to call me to tell me something like, “Oh, this is, oh, this is high, you got to work on this.” I’m like, this is not, this is, I don’t want to do this. Like, this is not a good trajectory. So when we moved here, I made sure that I have plenty of time to be with the kids and my wife of course, even though we’re like, we work together. So we’re always together. So I want to have enough time with the kids, do things with the kids, spend the quality time, not overdo it with work, have a smaller clinic and have a good relationship with them. Because what we do now is shaping them for who they’re going to be. So I want them to, when I call them to be like, oh, I want to answer this. Not like, I’m not going to call back for another week. So that’s my —

[MICHELLE] (41:14):

Pretend they don’t see your name come up on the screen.

[DIMITRI] (41:17):

I didn’t see it, yes

[MICHELLE] (41:18):

Well, that’s amazing and thank you so much for sharing all of that with us. I just want to commend you for being bold enough to just, I mean, to close down an incredibly successful clinic, start over somewhere else because you had a vision for a different life and being able to pursue that and make it real, I think is incredible. So hopefully everyone feels inspired to pursue whatever their vision is for the best version of their life as well

[DIMITRI] (41:51):

For whoever’s listening, it’s very easy to be comfortable. You might not like the situation that you’re in, but you’re comfortable so you end up staying there. That’s where I was in New York. I didn’t like it, but I was comfortable. I was making money, I had employees, I had a successful practice. Imagine like in New York, like when you’re close to New York City, you go to the ATM and the person next to you’ve never seen before, they know who you are. That’s pretty, if you think of like successful business-wise. So that happened to me and I was like, it was crazy. But a little bit of being uncomfortable is a good thing and once you overcome those, that obstacle or those obstacles, you just grow so much as a person and you have, you’re going to be just so much more happier. So if it’s something that you think about, really think about it and then don’t think about the comfort. Think about what’s over that obstacle.

[MICHELLE] (42:46):

Yes, what’s on the other side.

[DIMITRI] (42:49):

Yes.

[MICHELLE] (42:50):

Can you tell us a little bit about your orthopedic class online, which is called the Oak Point Method?

[DIMITRI] (42:57):

Yes, my old clinic, which is still there, I actually sold it to someone

[MICHELLE] (43:02):

Conversation for another episode.

[DIMITRI] (43:05):

So I had a employee that was with me almost from the beginning. So I ended up selling the practice and I trained the acupuncturist that’s there now to do what I was doing. The office name, the clinic was the Oak Point Clinic, Oak Point Health and Vitality Center, so I created the online course called the Oak Point Method, so what I was essentially doing in the clinic. It’s videos on assessment and treatment of the most common musculoskeletal injuries that you’re going to see in an acupuncture clinic and how to integrate contemporary acupuncture like more electro-acupuncture with TCM and to do that in an efficient manner, which is not going to take too much time, you’ll be able to see a good amount of patients. And then there’s a small marketing portion to that as well, but the main point of the course was to educate our colleagues on how to effectively treat pain, what people were coming in, and I didn’t have the confidence to treat them when I got out of school. because I felt like we were focusing so much on herbs and internal medicine and we didn’t really get a good understanding on how to treat the common orthopedic issues that people seek out acupuncture for.

(44:26):

So after taking a lot of continuing education courses and all these things, I took different things that I saw worked really well in my clinic and I created that online course. So yeah, it’s available. And of course, anybody that signs up for it, they always have access to me. So the other day somebody asked me about how to meet a specific point. I made a quick little video, I sent it and they, now they know how to needle that point very safely and effectively. So they have access. If somebody has an issue like a marketing or practice management or treatment issue, I’m here for that. So it’s not like something that you buy and then you don’t see me anymore, but it’s something that I take it very personally to help whoever is close to me and to do anything possible to help their practice as I’m creating something new as well.

[MICHELLE] (45:18):

Amazing. So we’ll put the link to that in the show notes along with your website and where people can follow you online. I think you said there is a discount code as well.

[DIMITRI] (45:28):

Yeah, so if you put discount code [PODCAST], you’ll get $50 off of the course. And just, I just remembered this and I really want to mention this, because, this is an awesome podcast. I want to thank you for doing this.

[MICHELLE] (45:44):

Oh, my pleasure.

[DIMITRI] (45:45):

The other day I was feeling down, let me just say that. There’s days that I’m like, man, what’s going on? It’s not always rainbows. And what I did is I went onto to your website and I’m like, let me see if I can get some ideas. Because you kind of get stuck in your own thoughts. You want to see what other ideas that other people have. I saw this article that you wrote a while ago about Instagram. I think you mentioned like the top Instagram, acupuncture Instagram accounts

[MICHELLE] (46:17):

Oh, yes.

[DIMITRI] (46:19):

I’m like, oh, let me see what other people are doing. Guess what I found? I found my clinic in New York that you had mentioned, one, gave me like, okay, I’m doing the right things. It gave me that reassurance and it also that you put this together for our colleagues and our community, our acupuncture community. It’s needed, it’s necessary. It’s awesome. Keep doing what you’re doing. I know, maybe you do or maybe you don’t. Maybe you have also those days where you’re like, man, this is so much.

[MICHELLE] (46:55):

Oh, for sure.

[DIMITRI] (46:57):

Yes, you might feel overwhelmed, but just remember this story that I just told you right now and just keep going.

[MICHELLE] (47:05):

Thank you. Thank you so much. That means a lot. We’ll put the links for everything in the show notes, including how people can follow you online and get in touch with you. Thank you again so much for your time.

[DIMITRI] (47:18):

Awesome. Thank you so much.

[MICHELLE] (47:25):

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