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Larry Maslon of WLIW-FM's Broadway to Main Street joins Heart of The East End Gianna Volpe ahead of Hamptons Summer Songbook by the Sea series' Swell-agent Elegant Party Maslon will be hosting at LTV Studios on Augus 1 featuring Eric Comstock and Barbara Fasano.Listen to the playlist on Apple MusicWatch the interview on WLIW-FM YouTube
TY You're invited to a marvelous party: Eric Comstock and Barbara Fasano join us live in the studio to preview our sophisticated August 1st cabaret event at the Hamptons Summer Songbook. Greats songs by Coward, Porter, Comden and Green and lotsa laughs.
SIDE B available on WATF Patreon.Happy Grammephone Friday, mate. For this month's convening of Random Record Club, we dive into Side A of A Trip to Marineville and immediately get pulled into Swell Maps' brilliantly scrappy universe, where punk urgency collides with tape experiments, fractured pop instincts, and a sense that anything could fall apart at any moment. These tracks dart between bursts of chaos and strange, fleeting beauty, sketching out a blueprint for DIY weirdness that feels both reckless and strangely deliberate. We break down how Marineville turns limitations into a kind of freedom.Are you searching for the new episode now? Are you looking for the real thing, yeah? You may be missing out on more great Fall-related explorations… but not if you join WATF PATREON: Full A & B-SIDE discussions (Now!), special (Patreon-only) bonus episodes, side excursions into Fall-member side projects, and early access to all episodes! Join WATF Pod on PATREON and get them all! Including rare Fall content, merch, and exclusive chats with Gavin & Steve as they discuss everything Fall-related.Follow WATF Pod on: Instagram // YouTube // Twitter // FacebookFor more Fall-related info, please visit our fellow Fall-heads' great work at: TheFall.org // Annotating The FallTheme Song by Gavin Watts: https://wearethefallpod.bandcamp.com/Produced and presented by Watts Happening Records: www.TheWattsHappening.comAdvertising & Guest Inquiries - Contact: wearethefallpod@gmail.com
Marketing is different than it was five years ago, especially now that AI is firmly entrenched in so many communities. Kiera talks about how AI, online reviews, and local trust are more important than ever, and what you and your practice can do to keep patients coming your way. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera, and I hope you're having a great day. I am having a great day. I love being in office with offices. I love working with practices. I love being with our team. I love seeing my team elevate and grow. I love watching and seeing just wins. I love hearing how our clients are doing. I love to see the wins our clients are getting. Honestly, dentistry is so great and it's fun. It's fun to see the evolution of the Dental A Team. I remember when I started this, there is no way, shape, or form that I honestly thought. That we would have this many clients that I get to celebrate and love on and just rally to see them hitting production goals that they never thought they'd do, having profitability, working through leadership team issues, ⁓ revamping what they believe is their why and their power. very invigorating to see offices wanting to possibly sell to a DSO and then finding other alternatives, having offices sell to DSOs, having offices bring on partners and associates. To me, that is one of the most like rewarding parts of owning Dental A Team is to see so many people and to get to be friends with so many of you and to truly watch I would say like the good guys and girls win. And ⁓ my job and our company's mission is to truly like your success is our passion. So I'm excited. I hope that you're excited. I hope you remember the dentistry. We're so lucky to be a part of dentistry. We get the most incredible job and it's it's not just a job. I think it's a life changing experience we all get to be a part of. So today I just want to kind of like dive into like AI reviews and ⁓ trust are genuinely kind of changing how patients choose their dentists. And I've been watching this and we've been talking about it within our private doctor communities and ⁓ just recognizing that the world's changing on how people are picking dentists now and how are they finding you? And this is a little ⁓ I feel local. So some areas are gonna have more AI influence versus other areas are possibly going to have less AI influence. But I think for all of us to just kind of figure out like how are patients choosing to go to the dentist? How are patients coming and picking dentists? Cause I do believe that marketing and the AI, it's different than it was five years ago. So I'm also finding that patients truly have already figured out who they're probably gonna call before they even call you. So like they're gonna determine do they trust you or not before they even make that first phone call. And before I used to feel like we could win them over, and I still believe we absolutely can, but a lot of it's already coming. And so it's coming before they talk to you. And it's more than just having a website. It's you gotta be able to build that trust online with your patients before they even walk through the door, before they even want to make a phone call with you. So I just want to talk about like how is AI changing behavior, why our reviews like genuinely matter, how things are changing over there, things are shifting. there's some new algorithms if you're not familiar with how Google is switching it up for us, and really just trying to give you guys some preps because I believe that there are maybe some possibly three areas for a practice to focus on to really like be the choice of your community. So we're big on making sure that we work. We work across the globe. We work across the nation. So seeing practices and how patients are making decisions from small boutique country villages to very metropolitan cities to places where there's not even like more than like five team members to choose from, to little isolated islands out in the Caribbean, you name it, we've seen it all. And so just really trying to help offices ⁓ look at things differently and to be observant. And so I want you guys to to realize that there's still ways to stand out. I think there's still ways for us to make big influences. And right now, AI is so new that we don't know all the ways of how it's working. And so just giving some tips and ideas to kind of have that healthy conversation of what is the innovative way for practices as of today, knowing that it could shift and change. But I believe that when we're on the cutting edge and we're being attentive to this, we're trying to stay as up to date as possible without like killing ourselves off, I think is very important and very astute as CEOs. they have the phrase innovate or die. And I believe the practices do need to innovate. We do need to be on top of this. Otherwise we will get ⁓ dated very quickly. So ⁓ I think what was happening is patients are they used to rely a lot on referrals and I still think that that is a piece of it. But I will say it's a referrals and then it's a verify. So they're verifying referrals. They're looking to see, hey, my friend told me this dental office. I'm gonna go double check it. And the way I'm gonna double check it is I'm gonna go read the reviews. I'm gonna check their website. I'm gonna look at social media. I'm gonna search online. Do you how many people are looking? Like you guys, I just went on a trip. I asked Chat GPT. I said, build me out the best hotels, the best locations. So people are starting to use AI. It's not all algorithm from the reviews and different pieces. It's pulling from that, but it's also not there. So we're kind of all looking like AI tells me this and I'm gonna go check the reviews. So We're starting to have a lot more pieces to that. And so I really do believe like your online presence is a lot of times the exact first impression. And we're looking at evaluating trust before they come in and they're going to like evaluate your treatment. So can I trust this? Do they have a good online presence? And I know that that's annoying because not all the best practices are the ones with the highest reviews. However, society and for years of training of five stars, we're starting to learn that that's what we trust. So I believe that there can be two practices side by side, similar services. One has recent reviews and online engagement and like very clear online presence. The other one hasn't updated anything in years. Patients are gonna look at both of those side by side and they're most likely probably gonna choose the one with the great reviews. Even if they're identical practices, even if they do the great same dream, even if the one who doesn't have a strong online presence is better, people don't know that. And it like you have to be present, you have to be winning online in order for people to want to come and work with you. So For me, it's you've got to make sure you're building that trust online. You've got places where people can see you. And we have to remember different types of buyers are going to look at this differently. So if your demographic and population is going to be a more senior patient base, you might still be newspaper flyers, ⁓ having webinars, CE, things like that, where you're in person with them more. If your demographic is anything of like 60 and younger, they're probably online. not all the 60, like from the 50 to 60 range, that's still variable. But anyone pushing that 50, they are in that realm where they have been trained with reviews and looking online and things like that. So, and regardless if your patient base is older, you have to remember that next wave of patients coming that are probably going to be your patients long term. They are that younger generation. So people don't want just recommendations anymore. They want confirmation. Like I want to trust. I think that in the world of AI where people are really questioning what's real, what's not real. We're asking for referrals. We're verifying online. We're trying to put all the pieces together because we're inundated with so much noise that people are really trying to sift through the noise to figure it out. So ⁓ I think if you one one call to action on that is like re review your online presence this week as if you're a brand new patient. What's our social media look like? What are our reviews saying? When was our most recent review? What's our worst review? It's okay to have a bad review. Like it truly is. How you respond to that bad review is actually going to weed out patients and it's also going to show people a lot about you. It's okay to not have the best reviews. It's not okay to have a lot of bad reviews, but it is okay because guess what? Everybody goes on there and the first thing we do is we look for the newest and then we go for the worst. We want to see, we want to see what happened. That's what's also going to make you stand out is real. I don't want you having a lot of bad reviews, but it's okay if you do. It just depends on how you respond and also pay attention. Are there things that you can fix and change with those reviews? Sometimes even calling those patients can help with those reviews. But look at that, see, go ask people to like type into Chat GPT. Go do it on your own. See if you pull up, see where things are at. Are you the most recommended dentist? Look at those items. If you're not pushing like five, six, seven, eight hundred reviews right now. A lot of people are going to gloss over because there are other dentists that are going to whoop you because they've got like they're going to beat you in the race because they have more reviews than you. So that leads into our second thing of reviews really are becoming word-of-mouth marketing. And they're not just nice to nice to have anymore. They truly are like part of the patient experience. And so You've got to have consistent review generation. You've got to have reviews that are talking about patients' stories. You got to have team involvement asking for feedback. Now, a latest update with Google algorithm is if they have the team member's name in there, they're starting to like disqualify some of those. I did have a practice tell us that they lost like 15 reviews in one day. Now, this feels a little weird to me, and I hope Google's listening. Not that I think they care about Dental A Team podcast, but I hope they do. Because to me, I'm like, I actually want patients to talk about. their team. I understand that there's ways that we can gamify the system and we can like have our team members try to get their names and reviews. However, a lot of people are going to talk great about it. So in our mastermind, we were talking, we do have a dentist who has over 1500 reviews and she said where she's actually getting the reviews is right at the end of the appointment when they're checking out. They are asking for reviews right then and there and the text message is going to that patient while they are still in the practice. And people are like, we don't want that. Like they're busy on that. And I was like, guys, she has 1500 reviews. I think she's got something going really, really well for her. She's figured it out. She's doing an incredible job and they're going for it. So this is something where like mistakes on reviews are where we only ask occasionally. You've got to be very consistent. We've got to be asking every single time. ⁓ we don't want reviews to be an extra task. Like, we don't want to ask for reviews when there's a problem. We're like once in a blue moon. You've got to have a steady stream of consistent reviews coming through. I love Swell. Swell's been one of my best best. Review generators across the board. I've tried tons of them. I personally love Swell. You guys can tell them Dental A Team sent you. We still get like OG back at the very beginning when Zeke and Kiera met when we were just babies building our businesses. And Zeke still honors that pricing over there. So definitely would recommend them. It's Swell ⁓ dot I think it's CX. It's been a while since I've said their website, Swell dot CX. sorry, Sw Swell CX.com, I believe is their website. And Head on over there, the SwellCx.com, let them Dental A Team sent you. It is truly one of the absolute best review places, but putting it right then and there, asking for it, having them go through. Some people use their computer softwares. Regardless, you need to be attracting and getting reviews on a consistent basis. And I'm talking like one, two, three, four, five a day. Yes, I said a day, because think about it. If you have two hygienists, if you've got four hygienists, if you've got six hygienists, We are seeing eight patients a day. So minimum you're probably seeing 16 patients a day on hygiene side. Doctor side's probably pulling in at least eight more. You're seeing like 30 to 50 patients per day on a low end, up to like 100, 150 on a high end, even up to 200. Pediatric, you're seeing a ton. So think about if we're only getting like even 5% of those patients are leaving a review. That's a very small amount that I believe that we can all get trickling in there. So reviews. At scale, they are going to build trust. So think about it: the best restaurants, the best thing, but be a practice that's review-worthy. We've talked about this on so many other podcasts. We can link some of those for you. But make sure that your practice is doing an incredible experience because you want to have a consistent review process instead of hoping that reviews will happen naturally. You've got to be asking for it. And I know that that's annoying, I know it's awkward. Do believe me. Do you think I like coming on here and be like, hey guys, leave us a review? So if you want to feel good about a review, go leave us a review. Give five stars on Dental A Team, give five stars on our podcast. It feels good to leave reviews. And so that way you can also feel good asking for it. And it's something where just like working out doesn't feel good at the beginning, but then it feels real good. This is just asking people to like share their great experience with the world about you. There is nothing wrong. If you've done a great service, ask those people to share about it. It's a great way for more patients like them to find you. So that's gonna be like step two. And then step three around that is going to be like, I do believe that local trust is becoming a very big competitive advantage. So technology is growing, AI is growing, but I still believe that like trust still wins and having local people and consistent people like building that local trust. So having those reviews, having those referrals, having raving patients. I just came from an office. I'm so proud of them. They've grown from four ops into 15 ops, and now they're looking to add on to 25 ops. So it's only been a couple of years. I think we've been together about four and a half years. So really fun. And to see them, they're getting patients looking at their reviews, having people tell them that they're a great dentist and they want to go. But it's just a consistent patient experience. It's community involvement, strong referrals, team consistency, follow-through. And I'll say just being good humans, like treating patients like humans. ⁓ patients, I believe they want confidence, they want connection, and they want credibility and they want to know that you're you're authentic. Again, we talked about there's so much out there that's not authentic. We've got so many people and it's like, what's real? I went, I was doing a gym photo shoot and they're like, pick photos that you like. And I showed my trainer which ones and she's like, Kiera, you picked all AI photos. And I was like, Well, shoot, that's not even fun. Like, we don't even know what's real or not real. Things look so real and they're not. So people still want to know that it's real and authentic. And so having a great patient experience, having it where you're involved in the community, ⁓ being the dentist that the community chooses, being a part of things. Being a human, having authentic connection to your patients, giving them confidence and having a team that really backs you is, I believe, a lot of great ways for you to still be competitive, even in spite of a world that's so, so advanced in technology. ⁓ and I really do believe that private practices have a huge competitive advantage of treating people like people. ⁓ I think it's like the Ritz-Carlton's tagline is ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen. Like, what if it was like, Dental professionals serving, like human beings serving human beings. We're just here to serve them and to love them and help them have this amazing experience at a place where most people don't even enjoy being. So I believe that technology might help patients find you. I believe that trust, connection, consistency, continuity is what's going to help them continue to choose you long term. And I want you to remember that just because a patient's been seeing you forever doesn't mean that they're with you forever. I do believe that every time they come to you, it is an opportunity to rewin their trust to bring them in, to help them, to help them see that this is ⁓ the the best decision that they could ever make. So really truly you've got to be visible because visibility gets attention, the trust, the connection, the community, it keeps the patients with you. So look at your practice and see like, what are we doing every week to build trust with our patients? How are we making sure that we're genuine and authentic? What is that our culture? Is that what we preach? go read the reviews, see what people are saying about you, ⁓ look to see where people are referring and just be good humans. Like I I know that seems so silly, but be a great human goes a long way. I think it's starting to become the currency that people are looking for of being kind, being considerate, being connected, being authentic. ⁓ so again, remember patients are looking for that proof before they even make the phone call. So you've got to be visible, you've got to have reviews, you've got to have things out there. ⁓ Reviews are like your modern word of mouth. So they're gonna read, people are gonna look at it, they're going to see. And then having that local trust, that community connection can be a great differentiator. So that's a great way to stand out. It's a good way for people to talk. Have your care to share cards, give them to people. We had podcasts on that. Like remind people to share you with their friends and their family because I still believe that referrals are one of the fastest ways to grow your practice and be the dentist that people want to refer. I think that that's probably my like final line. Like Be the dentist, be the dental practice that people want to refer to. And I think if that's your mantra, that's your mindset, you're gonna win every single day. I wanna be the dental consulting company that people refer to. I wanna be the consulting company that when you need help, you think about us. I wanna be your best friend in the industry. I wanna be the person that you can count on to always give you non-filtered advice to truly give you the best of the advice. I will constantly be elevating myself and I wanna be that person for you. I wanna be the dental consulting company that dentists choose and the teams choose, ⁓ that they trust that they know that are gonna take care of them. And I hope that you want to be the dental practice that your community chooses. So go out because really you can continue to win patients over. AI is coming in, technology's coming in. You've got to be visible. It's non-negotiable. You have to do it. It's just what it is. You got to check yourself there. You've got to be present there first. And then you got to make sure that that what we say online is what we really do. And in person is actually better than out there. If we can help you guys, this is what we do. We improve patient experiences, we improve. How to ask. We help get your teams on board to ask for those reviews. we help make it very fun for teams and for owners. So reach out. I'd love to help you out. As always, guys, don't fall behind. Innovate or die. Be the dentist that the community chooses. Be the dentist that you're proud of. Be the practice that you're proud of. ⁓ be authentic to you, but make sure that you're visible because I would hate for somebody who's not as great as you. Just because they have a stronger online presence, patients are going to them when I know you're the better dentist. I know that you have the great hand skills. And I'm not here to pit dentists against each other. I'm here to say, I want the best dentist, which is you listening, to win. You're the best dentist, you get the best treatment. Patients only have 32 teeth, and most of the time they only have 28. And I want those 28 teeth to be taken care of for as long as possible from the best dentist. And that's you. So get yourself visible. You have an obligation to share yourself with other people because they deserve to have the best clinician. They deserve to have that. Get the review so people know about you, post on social media, and then make sure that you've got a great connection and a great community. If we can help you out, reach out. I'd love to help you. Like I said, I want to be the dental consulting company that you choose, that you share with. And I believe that that's how most of our practices feel about us. So come be a part of it. I'd love to have you be a part of us. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. And as always, thanks for listening. And I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast.
Ripple continues expanding far beyond the narrative most people still associate with XRP. This week alone, Ripple joined the x402 Foundation as a Premier Member to help shape the future of AI-powered payments, Ripple Ventures participated in Velocity's $38 million Series A funding round, Ripple reaffirmed that traditional finance is being rebuilt on blockchain rails, and the company continued pushing for regulatory clarity in Washington. Individually, these stories may not seem groundbreaking. Together, they paint a much bigger picture. Tonight, Jeff and Chip connect the dots behind Ripple's growing role across AI, stablecoins, institutional finance, blockchain infrastructure, and digital asset regulation—and why XRP's ecosystem continues getting even bigger. We also discuss Ripple's support for veteran-owned businesses, the latest Swell 2026 announcement, the return of the Ripple Clarity Truck to Washington, our Around the World geopolitical segment, and finish the night with a few laughs. Topics Covered • Ripple joins the x402 Foundation as a Premier Member • AI Agent Payments and the XRP Ledger • Ripple Ventures invests in Velocity's $38M Series A • Traditional finance rebuilt on blockchain rails • Ripple Effect grants supporting veteran-owned businesses • Ripple Swell 2026 speaker announcement • Ripple Clarity Truck returns to Washington D.C. • Stu Alderoty on the CLARITY Act • Around the World: Biden, France, geopolitics & more • Funny segment
Three months after the biggest win of his life, Zeng Guofan tries to drown himself.Again.His fleet gets ambushed, split in half, & set ablaze by a 23-year-old nobody bothered to worry about – right up until he became the guy everybody worried about. The reward for surviving all that? A "promotion" in-name only... with no province, no funds, no friends, and a bureaucracy that somehow finds the – time mid-civil-war – to mock him personally. He loses his flagship, his files, his seal of command, and even a friend. And all the while, a much bigger disaster is assembling itself in Nanjing, completely without his input...Time Period Covered:Dec. 1854–Apr. 1856 CE Major Historical Figures:Taiping Heavenly Kingdom:Yang Xiuqing, the East King [c. 1821–1856]Qin Rigang, the Yan King [1821–1856]Shi Dakai, the Wing King [1831–1863]Lin Qirong, Taiping commander of JiujiangLuo Dagang, Taiping commander of Meijiazhou and Hukou Qing Dynasty:The Xianfeng Emperor (Aisin-Gioro Yizhu) [r. 1850–1861]Zeng Guofan, founder of the Xiang Army [1811–1872]Taqibu, Manchu commander of the Xiang Army's land forces [d. 1855]Peng Yulin, co-founder of the Xiang Army's naval forces [1816–1890]Hu Linyi, Xiang Army commander, later Governor of HubeiChen Qimai, Governor of JiangxiTao Enpei, Governor of Hubei [d. 1855]Zuo Zongtang [1812–1885] Major Sources Cited:Michael, Franz, and Chang Chung-li. The Taiping Rebellion: History and Documents, Vol. I.Platt, Stephen R. Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom.Spence, Jonathan D. God's Chinese Son: The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom of Hong Xiuquan.Kuhn, Philip A. "The Taiping Rebellion." The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 10. Audio Backing Courtesy of:TabletopAudioCLS Productions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Grab a drink (it's tradition!) and buckle into the escape pod, because the crew — Josh, Blake, Darian, Bryce, and Kirk blasting in "from down under" — is back after way too long apart for a jam-packed episode of Star Wars Escape Pod. We kick things off previewing the horror-tinged fan short Dead Echo: Tales from the 501st, dish out "Pablo points and poodoos" for the returning crew regarding The Mandalorian and Grogu, and swap "merch moments" ranging from a mysterious Japanese Empire Strikes Back theater program (complete with a cast photo that looks suspiciously like "handsome George" Lucas moonlighting as a 1900s assassin) to a Celebration flight jacket and a hotly-debated Cody helmet with questionable weathering and a rangefinder that refuses to spin. We cap off with a tease of the summer Galactic Racer multiplayer tournament we'll be having later this year. In hindsight this may have been a Cantina Banter, but alas, the wrong button was pressed! Watch Dead Echo, the Star Wars Fan Film https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hO_hr6xhr10 Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
"Fundamentally, the company is fine" when it comes to Walmart (WMT), says Charles O'Shea. On the investor side, he argues "the P/E is way up there," making some question current valuations. Charles talks about why the big box retailer's growing tech focus is taking so much attention and makes the case that Walmart is still in the best position it has ever been. Tom White offers an example options trade for the trail giant's stock. ======== Schwab Network ========Empowering every investor and trader, every market day.Options involve risks and are not suitable for all investors. Before trading, read the Options Disclosure Document. http://bit.ly/2v9tH6DSubscribe to the Market Minute newsletter - https://schwabnetwork.com/subscribeDownload the iOS app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/schwab-network/id1460719185Download the Amazon Fire Tv App - https://www.amazon.com/TD-Ameritrade-Network/dp/B07KRD76C7Watch on Sling - https://watch.sling.com/1/asset/191928615bd8d47686f94682aefaa007/watchWatch on Vizio - https://www.vizio.com/en/watchfreeplus-exploreWatch on DistroTV - https://www.distro.tv/live/schwab-network/Follow us on X – https://twitter.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/schwab-network/ About Schwab Network - https://schwabnetwork.com/about
This week we dive into the final issue of Star Wars Insider, an interview inside this issue from Kathleen Kennedy herself with a message to Star Wars Fans and readers of Insider. Along with that, we offer some casual banter right here as usual in the Cantina, lets get into it! Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
On this Thursday's Europe Today, Marcelina Burzec explains the impact of Poland and Ukraine's deteriorating relations on the Ukraine Recovery Conference beginning in Gdańsk. It takes place as Ukraine is working to cut Crimea off from Russia's supply chain, as explained by Sasha Vakulina. Also on the show, former Israeli spokesperson Eylon Levi joins host Stefan Grobe to discuss peace progress with Lebanon.Europe Today is Euronews' daily podcast hosted by Maria Tadeo and Méabh Mc Mahon, broadcasting directly from Brussels, at the heart of Europe. Every morning, we deliver the top and exclusive stories shaping the European Union (EU) and beyond.Stay ahead with the key news and insights that matter in Europe today. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Prepare for Another Happy Landing! This jam-packed episode serves as the ultimate love letter to a galaxy far, far away. This week, we are thrilled to welcome back special guest Molly for an energetic discussion that proves Star Wars magic is well and truly here to stay! Join us celebrating five years of The Bad Batch, the theatrical release of The Mandalorian & Grogu movie, and plenty of delightful "space dad" lore. From swapping wild stories about a wisdom-teeth-induced The Clone Wars fever dream to breaking down the emotional gut-punches of Kamino and Pabu, this episode covers it all. Whether you are a die-hard clone lover, a practical-effects fan cheering for the return of "Stinky" the Hutt, or a eagle-eyed viewer hunting for Disney Parks Easter eggs, this energetic discussion proves that Star Wars animation and live-action magic are well and truly here to stay! Molly Links! https://x.com/mollylorian https://www.instagram.com/themollylorian/ https://screenrant.com/author/molly-brizzell/ Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Governor Gavin Newsom claims the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating him, and says bring it on. High tides have damaged the SoCal coast line. There's a "no drone zone" around SoFi Stadium for World Cup games, but not everyone got the memo. Plus, more from Evening Edition. Support The L.A. Report by donating at LAist.com/join and by visiting https://laist.comSupport the show: https://laist.com
The Wedge got so big surfers pulled out 9-foot guns—and Blair Conklin says it was some of the biggest surf he has seen there in his lifetime. In this episode of the Pinch My Salt podcast, Blair breaks down the historic Wedge swell at Newport Beach, why it may have been the biggest in over a decade, and how it compared to Hurricane Marie.Blair takes Sterling Spencer and Cousin Ryan inside the chaos: two waves colliding, unpredictable takeoff zones, massive shorebreak, Hawaiian chargers, Koa Rothman, a bodyboarder throwing a double backflip, and the split-second positioning needed to catch one of California's most dangerous waves.The three-time United Skim Tour World Champion and legendary Vic winner also talks about growing up skimboarding in Laguna Beach and helping push skimboarding into the viral era. The conversation gets into Tfue's skimboarding roots, Bill Bryan's influence, monkey crawling, surfers versus skimmers, why unfinished skimboard waves still count, novelty waves, wave pools, and whether skimboarding might actually be harder than surfing. This is a full breakdown of The Wedge, modern skimboarding, surf culture, and the strange world where shorebreak specialists become some of the most entertaining athletes in action sports.Blair also reveals what makes The Wedge so difficult when it gets this big, who dominated the historic swell, and why positioning at the exact point where two waves collide can be both terrifying and nearly impossible.PLUS:Laird Hamilton's legendary Malibu Pier shootTfue before he became a gaming superstarThe truth about surfers versus skimboardersWhy skimboarding clips go viralBill Bryan's influence on modern skimboardingThe monkey crawl comebackBig-wave boards at The WedgeKoa Rothman charging CaliforniaThe future of skimboarding and novelty wavesWhy skimmers apparently don't have to land anythingWas this the biggest Wedge swell since Hurricane Marie? Let us know in the comments.LIKE, COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE to become a certified Pincher.Pinch My Salt is a comedy surf podcast hosted by professional surfer Sterling Spencer and Cousin Ryan, covering surfing, skimboarding, surf culture, professional surfers, viral surf clips and everything happening in the strange world of action sports.#BlairConklin #TheWedge #SkimboardingBlair Conklin interview, Blair Conklin podcast, historic Wedge swell, biggest Wedge waves, The Wedge Newport Beach, Hurricane Marie swell, skimboarding podcast, surf podcast, Pinch My Salt, Sterling Spencer, Cousin Ryan, Tfue skimboarding, Bill Bryan skimboarder, Koa Rothman, Laguna Beach skimboarding, United Skim Tour, Vic skimboarding contest, California surfing, shorebreak surfing, big wave surfing
Vielleicht ist es nur ein Klischee, aber viele Wellenreiter konzentrieren sich meist ausschließlich auf ihren eigenen Sport. Andere Surfdisziplinen wie SUP, Kiten oder Windsurfen werden aus unterschiedlichen Gründen eher skeptisch betrachtet oder sogar argwöhnisch beäugt. Und wenn kein Swell läuft, geht es oft eher in die Kneipe, als eine andere Boardsportart auszuprobieren. Für uns in Mitteleuropa gestrandete, landlocked Surfer ist das häufig eine frustrierende Situation.Im Podcast versuchen wir deshalb immer wieder, einen Blick über den surferischen Tellerrand zu werfen. Umso mehr haben wir uns über die Nachricht unseres heutigen Gastes Simon gefreut. Simon ... Dieser Podcast wird vermarktet von der Podcastbude.www.podcastbu.de - Full-Service-Podcast-Agentur - Konzeption, Produktion, Vermarktung, Distribution und Hosting.Du möchtest deinen Podcast auch kostenlos hosten und damit Geld verdienen?Dann schaue auf www.kostenlos-hosten.de und informiere dich.Dort erhältst du alle Informationen zu unseren kostenlosen Podcast-Hosting-Angeboten. kostenlos-hosten.de ist ein Produkt der Podcastbude.
Richard Dachtera is a fourth-generation New Yorker who grew up two blocks from the ocean in Rockaway, Queens. His photographs concern dislocation and the way perception shifts under pressure. The moment when a familiar place tips a few degrees and becomes something else. He believes some images exist before they are taken, that arriving at a specific time and place is less an act of creation than of retrieval.Follow Rich:https://www.instagram.com/richdachtera/https://www.richdachtera.com/This series of interviews is entirely self-produced and self-funded, and would not be possible without the generosity of guests' time and willingness to participate. If you'd like to support the show, I won't take your money, instead I ask you to subscribe and follow on our various profiles and of course, share with your friends.Do you want to come on the show to discuss your work? Submit to the form below to put your name in the hat.https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSchuT6Qb9e315cWyD-IMf1istYgMdx2Q1n-QDSJrGptwxk7JQ/viewform?usp=sharing&ouid=114407871888460742790
After more than 200 issues, Star Wars Insider will end its current run in 2026. The official Star Wars magazine first launched under the Insider moniker in 1994, part of an evolution that began with the Lucasfilm Fan Club Magazine. This week we take a quiet dive into some of the highlights of the final two Star Wars Insider magazines. In issue 236 we explore 10 years of Rogue One. In issue 237 we take a trip down memory lane with Shadows of the Empire turning 30 years old, explore kind comments from Star Wars writers and Lucasfilm employees regarding Insider. And more! This episode is dedicated to YOU Star Wars Insider. Thank you for all the years of service to our mailboxes and news stands. It's been a treat each time I've been given or bought one. https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-insider Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Standing out as a dental practice is easier than you might think — and thank goodness for that! Kiera gives three steps to find what makes you and your practice unique even when you feel like you're as vanilla as can be. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: Kiera Dent- Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and I hope you're having an amazing day. I am so excited to podcast with you. I get so giddy when I know it's podcasting day and I literally can't sleep at night. I get so excited for the next day and I just really want to make sure that what I'm delivering for you and all the different podcasts are exactly what you need because I do believe that my job in this world is to positively impact the world of dentistry and give you quick tactical tips that are going to change your life, change your practice and make you Remember why you chose dentistry. Dentistry should be fun, you guys. Owning a practice should be fun. And I know that it's not always going to be fun. I've accepted as a business owner, there's highs and lows, and that's just the flavor of business ownership that we sign up for. And so today I wanted to just give some quick tactical tips because I feel like so many of us are trying to figure out how can we stand out as dental practices without it being just about cost. There's so much more because we talk about marketing and you guys know my Achilles heel is marketing. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun. ⁓ But it's really truly how can you be your own brand, your own fragrance, your own style, and yet still attract the patients that you want. And I think it's actually easier than you might think because we help practices all the time stand out for who you want. And what I found is the number one most important thing when you're looking at your practice is be true to who you are. I remember I was reading the book Traction. by Gina Wickman, guys know, shout out. I'm a big proponent of that book. do a lot of Dental A Team's version of traction. We have traction within Dental A Team. And, I remember at end of the book, they were talking about how, like, know thyself and be free as a visionary. And, ⁓ if that's who you are or you're an integrator, like know thyself and be free. And I think when it comes to your own practice, know thyself and be free and make sure it's what people want. And then make sure you're talking to those people. I think about, have some friends that are. are very into nature and them getting on the podcast, I'm probably not going to attract the same type of people that I attract. I want people that are driven, growth minded, entrepreneurs, people that are seeking that next level, people that want to have fun in life. That's who Kirita is and that's my style. That's my brand. And I remember when I started Dental A Team, I had some people tell me that, Kirita, there's absolutely no way you're going to be able to impact everybody across the nation and that's not going to work for you as a consultant. And I am so grateful and thankful that I stuck true to my gut. I struck two to who Kiera Dent is. And while at the same time I can say true to Kiera, I need to also know what the market's asking for. If I'm just here to talk kumbaya with you, I'm probably going to attract a different crowd. But the people who want to be with Kiera, who want to be a part of Dental A Team, it's crazy. At the masterminds, I look at our doctors and our office managers and they are very similar to who I am and who I am on the podcast. So if that resonates with you, come be a part of our community. you can reach out, Hello@TheDentalATeam.com or go to our website, book a call. I'd love to chat with you. And I do still vet a lot of the people coming into our company. And, ⁓ I want to make sure that you're a good match for us. And so I think when I'm looking at what can you do to stand out within your own practice and how can you compete? It's who are you and what makes you different. And if you don't know, go read your reviews, go read the Google reviews, go read to see. And if you read dental, interviews, they always talk about that. They're fun, that they're positive, that they changed my life, that they make dentistry so simple. That is Kiera Dent to the core. wanted to be the Dr. Seuss of systems. I wanted to make doctors and teams have easy profitability without it being hard. And so when I look at the reviews, that is true core to Kiera. So I want you to say who's true core to you. ⁓ And a good way to do this is to go back to what your core actually is. So go back to what the core values are. Why did you even start the company? When I go back and I look at Kiera Dent, like what were my three core fundamentals? You can ask Tiff this was the beginning of day one. Like it was fun, do the right thing and ease. from the beginning of time, it's always been what I've said. I said, if we're not having fun, I don't wanna do this. Like truly, it's a hobby for me, it's a good time. And now we've created into an incredible business. Do the right thing always. Like do the right thing for the customer, do the right thing for our team, do the right thing for our clients. Like that is what I want you to do. And I'm not gonna sit here and give you a rules of do the right thing. Like as a core individual, you need to have that to your core. To me, it's a, we over deliver. We always come to the table. Like I want you just to do the right thing. And that needs to be a moral compass for you. And then ease, I don't need people who make it clunky hard, all the different pieces, I need you to make it easy. And that's been my model since the beginning of time, I wanted everything to be easy, do the right thing and fun. That's Kiera's core, that's who I am. And so for you to go back and it's core values versus aspirational values. And so I really want you to look at what are the core of your company? And is that fulfilling? I remember there's dental office I opened, me and the doctor, her core was very edgy. would say edgy is probably one of our core values of that company. We were listening to Drake at six in the morning. Like that was our core and we wanted it to be this edgy vibe. were in downtown Denver. That's what we did and it attracted the right type of people. Now my parents, if they walked into that dental practice, there is absolutely no way in their right mind that they would want to stay there. But a lot of people in downtown Denver, we knew our avatar, we knew who we wanted. So we were going to attract that. So I really want you just to think of like, How can you stand out? How can you make sure that this practice feels like home to you? So step one is go back to your core of why did you even start this business? And let's make sure that that's really incorporated in everything you do. Number two, I want you to really make sure that who you are fundamentally is what you're branding and what you're speaking to. ⁓ And then make sure the third thing is you look to see what do patients really want and what are they valuing? So. I think so many practices, the reason you get lost in the mix is because you've just got standard marketing across the board. says like, we care about our patients. We have the exact same services listed. We've got generic online presence. There's nothing that identifies or differentiates you. There's a practice in California that I really love. And she said like, we love ⁓ changing the way people feel about going to the dentist. And I have another dentist who their tagline is to be the community, the, like the dentist that the community chooses. ⁓ And I have another office that's like to change the way people feel about going to the dentist. And another one is to just be your foodie dentist. Those people, you guys, I didn't even pull up my notes. didn't look at it before I got on the podcast. Those are ones that I can just rift, repeat, remember because they stand out to me. They're not just generic marketing. And so for you, what is it that makes you stand out? I've got a doctor and he called it, ⁓ I think it's called Empower Dentistry. ⁓ and I love that because his whole model is like empowering patients to be confident about their health, to be confident about their decision-making and really spend a lot of time educating his patients. So for you, like, what is that one thing for Kiera? You guys, I'm the Dr. Seuss of dentistry. I have a good time. have a lot of fun. I am not your standard consulting company. We do things very different at Dental A Team. I want people, we get the same type of results, if not better. But we do it in Kiera Dent's way. We do it in a fun way. We do it in a way that makes team members happy. Our job is to light people up. Life's my passion, dentistry is my platform. That's Kiera Dent. And if that doesn't resonate you, then you're not gonna be listening to the podcast. But if it does resonate with you and you're like, yeah, I wanna have the best life and I wanna have team that's lit up and I wanna do it in an easy way, not a hard way. You guys, I'm not cookie cutter. If you want standard scripts on how we do X, Y, we have them, but that's not gonna be where I'm going to lead from. We're gonna lead from what's your vision and your practice to what did the numbers tell us? Then we're gonna implement systems based on that information. That's how we operate. Most people are like, Hey, you want systems? Fantastic. Here are your systems. And I'm like, no, why am I coming in and giving teams more work? Like nobody wants that. What we want is what's the vision of the practice? What are the numbers tell us? Let's put systems into place that way. Again, it's all boiling it down to that ease, that simplicity that's going to guarantee results. So what is your clear differentiator? What's your clear identifier? And so when we have it, like, I don't want to be Chick-fil-A McDonald's. like competing across the board. I want something that's going to make you resonate. I've got holistic dentists and it's like full comprehensive health for their patients is what they want them to have total wellness of health. And you might say like, but Kiera, I'm just like, like, I just do dentistry. I just want to do dentistry and I'm very vanilla. Like there is nothing that stands out about me. I do bread and butter dentistry. It's very simple. Well, I'll say vanilla is very great ice cream that a lot of people like. How can we make your vanilla ice cream better than the next person's vanilla ice cream? So I just wanna highlight that no matter what you do, there is something that's your special sauce. There is something special and unique about you and your practice that's going to drive and resonate with other people. There's billions of people on the planet. You don't need all of them. You just need your core crew of people that want to come to you as a practice. So I would say, what is it of, how are you going to make sure people stand out to you? and looking back at your core values, looking back to why, what makes you, you go look at the reviews and make sure does that speak? And if it does, amazing, keep doing more of that. And if it doesn't, let's change that and revamp it a little bit so that way you do feel like it's home. I have had so many offices try to be something they're not, they're like, well, Kiera, everyone says I need to be on social media and I don't like it. Then don't do it. Like you can be at home, you can be there, you can still like. I am the silent dentist. Like don't like social media. Great. You're going to probably find people that don't like social media. So let's do flyers and mailers and other things that could attract people in. ⁓ Or find a team member that really is great at it so you don't have to do it. For me, you've got to show up a couple of times. That's part of being a business owner and I don't love it, but I'm going to be true to Kiera. You're going to be true to you. Be true to you because the thing is I want you to just feel like you're at home. When I get on the podcast, I get to just be Kiera. This is Kiera unfiltered. It's funny when people get on our practice assessment calls or like wanting to work with us calls and we're assessing to see, are you a good fit for us and are we a good fit for you? I'm sitting in my studio. Like what you guys see is where I work every single day. The microphone, I don't usually talk to people on a microphone, but I will pull it on over so people can see it. Like I'm just Kiera. This is who you get. I'm real raw. Someone asked me a very personal question on a sales call the other day and I was like, you know what? I am so grateful that you feel so comfortable to be able to ask me those questions. I'm Kiera. This is who I am. I always want people to feel like I'm just Kiera Dent from the block. Like I'm your next door neighbor. I'm the person who's not here to judge you. I'm here to give you a hand up. I'm not here to slap your hand, tell you you should have known that because you're a dentist. That's what I want people to feel. So I think it's a what's your core. And then also the second piece is what do you want people to feel when they come to your practice? Because that's going to help them laser in with you way more than anything else. So looking at those core values, how do you want them to feel? For me, it is a no judgment zone in Dental A Team. Our whole team knows this. You like nobody should ever, like I will not hire people that are snooty tooty attitudey. Like I'm just not here for that. That's not our culture. That's not our brand. That's not who we are. Our brand and our style is very much a come as you are, we love you we're gonna take you to your goal, your vision. I'm not here for everybody to get to the DSO world. I want you to live your best life. Your practice should serve you your needs in your life, not the other way around. But I will tell you, I did not have that refined on day one of opening this company. That has come over time of what do I want dentists to feel? What are people saying? What is it that sets me apart from other people? And I do believe that your practice and how you stand out is not a one and done check it off the box. My core, one and done. And as long as I don't deviate from that, I'm probably gonna be pretty solid. The second thing is who we are and our fundamentals, those have not changed. But how I talk to people, what I want people to feel when they come to our company. That's morphed and evolved. It's always been a no judgment zone, but I think it's become more and more and I market that more and more and I want people to just feel safe. I want people to feel seen. I want people to feel heard. I realize as business owners, myself included, as I morphed and evolved, gosh, that's something I wanted. You could start to listen in to what your patients say. Why do they choose you? And you might even have people that you trust a lot. I have asked certain people like, why did you choose Dental A Team over somebody else? 95 % of the time it's because we don't judge. We aren't cookie cutter. and we actually have been there, done that and do it successfully and we bring the team along. Those are typically the reasons people choose our company over someone else. And I always get energy, always. So I care, we love your energy. And I'm like, great. So they like a good time. They want somebody who's fun. That's my core value. So yeah, like we're getting it. But listen to why people are choosing you. Maybe it's the Google reviews. Maybe it's because you are the holistic dentist in your area. Maybe it's because all their friends and family trust you. Listen to that and brand with that. People will tell you if you will listen why they choose you, why you're the best in their opinion. And if that's your favorite patient, do more of that. That's how you're going to stand out. Again, you're not going for the billing and you're going for your niche community of people that want to come to you. ⁓ I know I've got a pediatric dentist. He's so popular, like one of the top of the top of the top and he's just himself and he shares his real life. Some of you may be like, that's not me. Again. You've got to do your differentiator based on who you are. If you're not loud and outlandish, don't be that online because they're going to come in and be like, it was a bait and switch. Like, wow, this person's dead in the water when I show up. Or if you're like dead in the water, but you're super outlandish in the practice, they might feel like, wow, that's very different. You need to have it where you guys are synced in. People feel like they can understand. People feel like they're on the same page with you. It feels the same. Like that's what branding is. This is how you differentiate is what our presence is online is who we are in person. And so I would just say, take an exercise today. Go through and figure out what on earth do we need to do to stand out in our crowd? Number one, what's our core value? What do we stand for? Who's the core? What is the core of who we are? Number two, what do we people to feel? Read our reviews, how do we want them to feel? And then number three, how can I do more of that and has it evolved over time? Those would be like quick, simple three steps, but make sure online presence matches in-person presence. In-person presence matches online presence. Our online presence is fun. There's dots, there's confetti, there's smiling, laughing people. That's not just pictures. When you're in an office, you're laughing your freaking head off. It's hilarious. We're having a good time because teams don't want to do hard. Teams don't want to have a non-fun. Why do I make the podcast? Yes, for a lot of value for you, but also for you to have your teams experience this before they even work with us. How can you test drive the car without test driving the car? Well, here's a great way to do it. How can people test drive your practice without doing it? How can they say, my gosh, of all the dentists out there, I wanna work with you. And then I'm gonna say this, and I know this is annoying and I'm sorry, but this is another piece that you're gonna stand out and it's through your Google reviews. You've gotta be kicking it over there. If you need, talk to Swell. Swell.co, I think is their website. Tell them Dental A Team sent you, get the best deal. Zeke and I have known each other for eight years and he has never changed the pricing on the people I refer to him, which thank you, Zeke. Shout out to you. Swell is the best one I've ever met. I know there's a ton of them out there. I have like vetted all of them. Best of the best of the best. So if you want a great one, like you've got to also be the best. And so I just did this with a team the other day ⁓ and I had all of them go leave reviews. I had all of them practice asking for reviews. And I taught them like, you can be the best dentist, but if you're not the best marketed dentist online, no one's gonna find you. And imagine me with my picket fence out there, like picketing, like save the teeth. If you're the best dentist in the best dental office, you have a moral obligation to save those teeth. People only have 28. Some might have 32, but most of us only have 28. And we only have one shot at that. And I believe that people deserve the best of the best. So you also have an obligation to get those reviews up, to ask your patients to leave your reviews, but that's gonna tell you how you stand out. Please also make sure you have fun. Do things that light you up. Marketing is like, my gosh, it's my least favorite thing to do. But I realized, Kiera being Kiera and just showcasing that is marketing. And I can have a truckload of fun with you guys on here. I can have a great time on the podcast. I can share all my wildest things. I can talk to you about whatever I want to talk to you about. And you can get to know Kiera, real Kiera. You can get to know Kiera Dent from the block. And that's where I realized like, this is fun for me. Now me going and making dumb social reels. Sorry, all you that love it. I'm not trying to diss on you at all. That's not a diss. I just absolutely loathe it. Like I would rather sit here and talk to you and give you like tactical tips than I would like making up a funny meme. I'm a freaking hilarious human, but I don't like staged humor and I don't have a great marketer next to me and it just feels hard. That's not something that I'm like, yay, marketing day. Now if I had a marketer who lived next door to me and they're like, hey, I got seven ideas for you, let's roll. I would freaking love it. But make sure it's something that you jive and enjoy. And if you don't love it and then people are gonna feel it. Now, that doesn't mean it's uncomfortable. You gotta get out of your comfort zone. But if you absolutely loathe something, you guys like, I... You have a marketer who did this and I felt like an idiot. I'm not good at remembering how to say things and being on script. Like I feel so dumb and so uncomfortable that I'd rather sit there and have you rift with me, like ask me questions like top, top dental softwares, top AI softwares, top practices, how they perform. What are the top five things that the most elite leaders do? I would rather do that. It's the same thing. I can still create reels, but they're conversations and topics that I know you guys want to hear. And I know you're going to have a good time hearing. and I know I can give you amazing value without you ever working with me. That's Kiera Dent's MO. So what's your MO? What drives you? And if you need a minute, go take like two hours at a Starbucks, figure out what your core values are. What do you want people to feel when they come to your practice? And then look to see what is the core? What are the things that light you up? Again, maybe that you're not perfect at. I love to give tactical practical. And like I said, that morphed over time. What do I people to feel has morphed over time. So maybe do a revamp. See how can we stand out a little bit stronger? and then ride it guys. Trust it, own it, embrace it, because the more confident you are in it, people are buying your confidence, they're not buying you. The reason people come to Dental A Team is because when I got on the podcast, you guys, I've been there, I've done it, I've seen it all, like you probably can't tell me something. I would love somebody to challenge me, bring me something I haven't ever heard before. But I have so much confidence that no matter which practice you are, where you're at, I know ways to turn your life around and your practice around and do it very quickly and easily. I'm that confident. That's what you're buying. You're buying my 10 years of being on the freaking road going into 500 plus offices. That's why people sign up with Dental 18 plus they love our energy. Yeah, I'm a good time. So let's do it fun and let's share all that experience. Why are people signing up with you? What is the confidence you have? Are you the best at doing those fillings? Are you the best at doing those crowns? Highlight that, get excited about it. People are buying your confidence and the more confident you can be through your reviews, through your online presence, the more they're going to spy you. It's not their dentistry they're buying. It's the confidence in you and your team. And if you can remember that, you will stand out of a crowd all day long. So I feel like I usually can do a quick wrap for you and like, here's the five things for you to take. Today, it's not, it's a rift. It's a, here are the ways that I see people stand out. Here are the ways that I've been able to stand out. Here's the ways that we've been able to change things for you. But I really feel like standing out is not about doing more. It's about doing the right thing that lights you up consistently. Getting on the podcast, do you know how many episodes I've recorded? Do know how many times I pushed play over here and said, all right, let's go? Consistency can out deliver flash in the pan. I have been doing this for seven years now. Seven years we've been talking together. Seven years we've been hanging out. Almost 10 years I've been traveling to offices. That's consistency guys. And doing consistency, doing the right things consistently. It's not about doing more. I didn't ratchet up our podcast amount, doing the same amount since the beginning of time, and that's still a lot. ⁓ But I think for you to stay consistent, speak your truth, people will come to you, I promise you. Don't think it's about doing more. Don't think it's about that. Just being aligned so where people can feel your true authenticity and your genuine love, people will buy that all day long. We're in a world inundated with noise and starving for wisdom. Be that different voice, whatever yours is. And if we can help you in any way, if I can be your cheerleader, if our team can like help you see the goodness in you, because sometimes it's hard to see the goodness in you. We do this with offices, we help them out. I've got a doctor right now in California and we're helping her see like how she's fantastic to drive more patients to her practice. So reach out, Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. Be proud of yourself. There are people that need you specifically. Not everybody wants you, not everybody wants Dental A Team, but the people who really do that resonate. They're going to find me and my voice. why I ask you guys to share because you're listening. Please share with other people just like you because odds are if you like me, your friends are going to like me and we're going to be able to help them change the world of dentistry. Same thing. If your patients like you, odds are they've got friends and family that are going to love you as well. Ask them. Don't be afraid to get the reviews from them. And for all of you, I'm asking you today, if you love the podcast, leave us a Google review. Go leave me a review share because I need more people like you listening to this podcast. I am on a mission to impact every single dental practice out there and to positively impact them and to change the world of dentistry in the greatest way possible. And I can't do that alone. I need you to share. So share and ask your patients to do the same, but it's very hard for you to ask somebody when you haven't done it yourself. So if you've never left a Google review or it's been a while, go leave Dental A Team at Google review. We'll put it in the show notes. It's very easy for you. ⁓ and the second thing I would ask is share us with somebody, share the podcast with somebody today, share this episode with somebody shared in a Facebook group. because you're gonna get more confidence and have your team do the same thing. You can have them listen to this episode, share with people, leave a review. I had an office, 10 people left me a review that day because they were having a hard time and feeling disingenuous asking for reviews. Get people comfortable, get people confident and they'll do it more often, same thing with you. And I'm a very easy person. Leave me a great review. You love the podcast, you're clearly giving your time to me. So leave a review, say how much you love it and then feel confident asking somebody and ask somebody today because more people need your dentistry. More people need you to change their lives. It's your moral obligation to show up, do the right thing, have fun and do it with ease. Did you like those core values? That was a nice wrap for all of you. Thanks for listening. I adore you. I'm here to serve you on any level I can. Reach out, join us at an event, come to our mastermind, whatever it is, do something today. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. And as always, thanks for listening and I'll catch you next time on The Dental A Team podcast.
Join Josh, Blake, Dr. Steve, and Matt this week for a deep dive into Master of Evil! Written by Adam Christopher, this Star Wars novel explores a young Darth Vader in his dark prime, told through the eyes of Imperial Royal Guard Halland Goth. Check out our other book reviews here! Dr Steve Ellerhoffs Podcast! May The Force Be With Jung Buy the book! https://www.amazon.ca/Jung-Star-Wars-Contemporary-Mythology/dp/1041033524 Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Six years, five months, and a whole lot of anticipation have finally led to this moment. The Mandalorian and Grogu has officially arrived in theaters, and the Star Wars Escape Pod team is analyzing our first watch. In this episode, we go deep into spoiler territory to explore the critical narrative shift from the small screen to the silver screen, breaking down executive producer Jon Favreau's choices and mapping out where the franchise heads next with future films. Was the plot line too safe? Did the genre clash from "30s gangster beachfront palaces" to sci-fi warfare actually pull it off? We unravel the inclusion of deep-cut characters, weigh the film's legacy against Rogue One and Solo, and look ahead at what to expect from home streaming release later this year. Clear your minds must be; this is the fun breakdown the galaxy has been waiting for. Star Wars is back in theaters! Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Raglan businesses are feeling the swell of visitors from the World Surf League, with up to 7000 expected to gather to watch some of the world's best. Alix Thomson, owner of The Shack cafe in Raglan spoke to John Campbell.
Ethan Haber is an inventor, founder, and CEO who built Happy Habitats—an award-winning, industry-recognized small-pet products brand—from the ground up with no outside funding. Under his leadership, the company achieved distribution across North America and beyond, brought the business to six figures in 2025, and earned multiple Best in Show awards at Superzoo and Global Pet Expo. Ethan is credited as a key inventor on Happy Habitats' Halo and Roam products, which are protected by U.S. utility patents #12,219,927 and #12,465,021, and he is launching a new product with a major big-box retailer next month. In This Conversation We Discuss: [00:00] Intro [01:49] Identifying niches with stagnant innovation [04:10] Partnering with experienced agencies [04:56] Sponsor: Migrate [06:54] Scaling into national retail chains [09:08] Finding the right marketplace partner [10:20] Sponsor: Intelligems [12:18] Shifting ad spend to marketplace advertising [14:00] Starting complementary product ecosystems [15:01] Callouts [15:11] Persisting through buyer objections [16:29] Maximizing cost efficiency in product design [17:08] Sponsor: Electric Eye [00:00] Maximizing cost efficiency in product design Resources: Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube Walk Your Hamster Anywhere happyhabitats.net/ Follow Ethan Haber linkedin.com/in/ethan-haber-124040168/ Book a demo today at intelligems.io/ Migrate and grow more klaviyo.com/honest Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect If you're enjoying the show, we'd love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!
In this final after-show episode of the Star Wars Escape Pod podcast, we dive into the dramatic conclusion of Maul: Shadow Lord. We celebrate becoming founding members of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art and successfully score tickets for next year's Star Wars Celebration—despite the chaotic online queue. As we dive deep into Shadow Lord, we analyze the "scary again" version of Darth Vader, comparing his relentless, silent killing-machine persona to horror icon Jason Voorhees, while debating the physics of his robotic limbs. Between lighthearted jokes about everyone dressing up as "Dash" (from Dash Rendar to the Mrs. Dash spice) and geeking out over new Hasbro Black Series clone helmet from ATOC. Join us as we wrap up the journey through the series with plenty of "food for thought" and a look ahead to the upcoming Mandalorian and Grogu movie. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
This week on the Star Wars Escape Pod, Josh and the crew are diving into a double-feature "Aftershow" for the latest action-packed chapters of Maul Shadow Lord! From Chapter 7: Call to Oblivion, where Maul faces off against the 11th Brother while dealing with a glitchy mechanical leg, to Chapter 8: The Creeping Fear, featuring high-octane speeder chases and dark visions of Darth Sidious, this episode covers it all. The team breaks down everything from the "Attack of the Clones" vibes during the chase scenes to the tragic backstory of Maul and Savage Oppress on Dathomir. Plus, they discuss some last-minute news about Star Wars Celebration 2027 and the major era changes happening over at Galaxy's Edge. Strap into your escape pod—it's going to be a wild ride through the galaxy! Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Strap in for a lively after-show, but before diving into the deep end, the guys swap some major Star Wars news, specifically dishing on the 50th-anniversary Celebration coming to LA in 2027—including some pretty funny sticker-shock over those VIP tickets and some more star wars news! We have Maul episode 6&7 on the menu tonight, with the Empire locking down a city to the "power partner" potential between Jedi survivors Dackey and Devon - these episodes are packed! A well-executed train action sequence has us very keen. Between the personal ratings, some hilarious banter about Anakin's lost diary and a chat about Star Wars books, it's a classic hangout session for anyone who loves the galaxy far, far away. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
The Strait of Hormuz is closed again as geopolitical turmoil between the U.S. and Iran escalates. Kevin Green talks about the social and societal impacts countries across the globe face should energy shortages continue. He says not to be surprised if the S&P 500 (SPX) retests 7,000. KG turns to tech movers in software, semiconductors, and SanDisk's (SNDK) entry into the Nasdaq-100 (NDX). ======== Schwab Network ========Empowering every investor and trader, every market day.Options involve risks and are not suitable for all investors. Before trading, read the Options Disclosure Document. http://bit.ly/2v9tH6DSubscribe to the Market Minute newsletter - https://schwabnetwork.com/subscribeDownload the iOS app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/schwab-network/id1460719185Download the Amazon Fire Tv App - https://www.amazon.com/TD-Ameritrade-Network/dp/B07KRD76C7Watch on Sling - https://watch.sling.com/1/asset/191928615bd8d47686f94682aefaa007/watchWatch on Vizio - https://www.vizio.com/en/watchfreeplus-exploreWatch on DistroTV - https://www.distro.tv/live/schwab-network/Follow us on X – https://twitter.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/schwab-network/About Schwab Network - https://schwabnetwork.com/about
In this episode of the Star Wars Escape Pod, the crew dives into the shadow-filled world of Maul: Shadow Lord as we recap the latest two chapters, "Whispers in the Unknown" and "Pride and Vengeance". Join us break down the psychological mind games between a seasoned, wiser Maul and the runaway Padawan, Devon, including a tense tea ceremony that proves the former Sith apprentice has traded some of his animalistic rage for refined manipulation. But before we chat about our favorite Zabrak, take a listen to the emotional new trailer for The Mandalorian and Grogu, Embo's iconic hat to Clone Wars-era AT-RTs included. Plus, a special announcement from Darian regarding the rebranding of the Bucketheads crew into the Twin Suns Foundation and their upcoming short film, Dead Echo. Strap into your escape pods—it's going to be a wild ride! STAR WARS CELEBRATION TICKET NEWS https://www.starwarscelebration.com/en-us/tickets-merch/ticket-information.html Check out Twin Sun Film Foundation! https://twinsunfilm.org/ Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
This week, we launch a brand-new Aftershow dedicated to the thrilling animated successor to The Clone Wars and the ongoing saga of Maul: Shadow Lord! We're breaking down the first two episodes of Season 1, diving deep into the dark world of Janix and the standout characters that caught our eye. Plus, we're serving up a hot cup of Star Wars news: is Lucasfilm really sidelining Mara Jade? We discuss what those rumors could mean for the future. Finally, we open another mysterious chapter from Anakin's lost diary. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Join the crew of the Star Wars Escape Pod as they reach an epic conclusion of the "Bogan's Advocate" series. In this final installment covering the Skywalker Saga, the hosts and special guest Dr. Steve Ellerhoff take on the challenge of debating the franchise's most divisive entry: The Rise of Skywalker. Following the unique "Bogan's Advocate" format, the participants must argue against their own personal opinions. For those who disliked the film's creative choices—such as the controversial return of Emperor Palpatine—the mission is to find the light side and celebrate the movie's strengths. Conversely, those who enjoyed the film must dig deep to find its flaws... Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Prepare for a chat about the most polarizing chapter of the sequel trilogy with the Star Wars Escape Pod's "Bogan's Advocate" session for The Last Jedi. In this episode, the crew tackles the subversion of expectations head-on, from the startling introduction of a disillusioned Luke Skywalker to the "no-twist" revelation of Rey's parentage. While the crew marvels at the film's top-tier cinematography and striking use of red in the Snoke's throne room duel, they don't hold back on the pacing issues of some Canto Bight events or the introduction of new Force powers. It's a balanced, high-energy discussion that explores whether Rian Johnson's creative risks paid off or pushed the franchise too far off the predictable path. Don't forget about the ending of our podcast as we close out with the wacky wildest chapter of Anakins lost diary we've ever seen! Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Make sure to check the rest of the description for all of our social media links, including our Patreon (patreon.com/DoNotRelent)! Slidewhistle, Immunization, and Aaron have braved the wilds of the Voidstorm yet again as they do battle with fierce foes, wax poetic about the future of our Blood Elven hosts, and go on all manner of fun lil' side adventures that'll just tickle your fancy! Please send all your love mail, hate mail, and good vibes for Persephone (her skin's getting flaky again) to @DoNotRelentPod (Twitter) or on gmail at DoNotRelentPod@gmail.com! We will respond to literally anything and read it on the pod. Find us at: Patreon: patreon.com/DoNotRelent Linktree: donotrelent.com (go here for our Discord) YouTube: @donotrelent on YouTube (the link is long and ugly) Instagram: www.instagram.com/donotrelent Twitter: twitter.com/DoNotRelentPod Livejournal: donotrelentpod.livejournal.com E-Mail: DoNotRelentPod@gmail.com Finally, if you feel so inclined, please rate us on iTunes and bonusroll.gg. We will take a shot on air in your honor! Every rating helps! :D
Step into the Star Wars Escape Pod for a spirited, "Bogan's Advocate" debate where fans take on the ultimate challenge: defending the parts of the Skywalker Saga they actually dislike. In this episode, the crew dives into The Force Awakens, grappling with whether it's a brilliant, beautiful continuation of the franchise or a nostalgic "reboot" that plays it too safe. From praising Adam Driver's intense performance as Ben Solo to critiquing the lightning-fast character shifts of Finn, no stone in the Jakku desert is left unturned... If there was any stones to begin with. It's a hilarious and insightful mix of high-praise cinematography talk and honest fan frustration, perfect for anyone who has ever felt "empty inside" after a premiere—or just really loves a good Millennium Falcon skid. Don't forget to wait to the end for our next chapter of Anakins lost diary! Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist at sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
In this episode of the Star Wars Escape Pod, Josh is joined by co-host Blake and friends Dan and Matt to revisit and re-evaluate the Disney+ series, The Acolyte. A year after the show's initial release, the crew provides fresh perspectives by reviewing the season through both release and chronological viewing orders. Dive deep into the series' technical execution, critiquing the "clunky" editing and forgettable musical score while praising the standout choreography of episode five. The team also explores the show's controversial lore implications, including the appearance of Darth Plagueis, the origins of the Knights of Ren, and Vernestra Rwoh's cover-up of the Jedi murders. Whether you're a fan of the High Republic era or a skeptic of the series' creative choices, tune in for a comprehensive breakdown of what worked, what failed, the missed opportunities of The Acolyte, and most importantly... was there underlying actually genius? Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian Matt the artist sketch to paint https://sketchtopaint.com https://www.instagram.com/sketch_to_paint/ ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Breaking Barriers & Pioneering PursuitsOn the latest episode of Rising Tide, bodysurfer David Helvarg and board surfer Natasha Benjamin sit down with photographer, filmmaker, and journalist Sachi Cunningham — a woman who has spent more than two decades pointing her lens at the pioneers rewriting what's possible in big wave surfing.Cunningham helped build the LA Times video team from the ground up, producing the award-winning Chasing the Swell series and documenting the historic first women's heats at Mavericks, the legendary big wave break that rises from the deep-water canyon just south of San Francisco. Now living within earshot of Ocean Beach, she's putting the finishing touches on her first major documentary, Big Wave Women — a film tracking the hard-won fight for pay equity among the elite athletes drawn, or perhaps driven, to ride some of the most dangerous walls of water on the planet.The conversation ranges wide: the cameras she trusts in the impact zone, the technical and physical demands of shooting from inside the surf, and a recent piece she wrote examining the geology and marine ecosystems that make Mavericks not just a spectacle, but a living seascape. It's a session that goes well below the surface. Additional Resources Seasachi.com — Photographer and ocean swimmer Sachi Cunningham has spent two decades hurling herself into the savage, churning waters of Ocean Beach and Mavericks, camera strapped to her wrist, chasing the beauty buried inside the chaos — and emerging with images she hopes will make the rest of us remember that the sea doesn't just surround us, it lives inside us.Blue Frontier / Substack — Building the solution-based citizen movement needed to protect our ocean, coasts and communities, both human and wild.Inland Ocean Coalition — Building land-to-sea stewardship - the inland voice for ocean protectionFluid Studios — Thinking radically different about the collective good, our planet, & the future.
In this episode of the Star Wars Escape Pod podcast, Josh and the crew dive into the "Bogan's Advocate" segment to take an honest, critical look at Return of the Jedi. A massive 85-foot Lego Venator project intrugues us this week, and a breakdown of the Mandalorian and Grogu Super Bowl teaser! The heart of our episode this week features a deep dive into fan-favorite controversies, including the "Yub Nub" versus "Celebration Finale" ending , Boba Fett's unceremonious exit , and whether the deleted scene of Luke building his green lightsaber should have made the final cut. Whether you're a die-hard defender of Ewoks or a critic of the Special Editions, this episode covers the best and worst of the galaxy far, far away. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Amanda of Swell Entertainment returns to review Maggie Gyllenhaal's The Bride! We discuss Lead Actress favorite, Jessie Buckley and whether she will Norbit her Oscar chances, and we also dive into the Frankenstein lore and what this film adds to the legacy. NON-SPOILER REVIEW OF THE BRIDE! Our Frankenstein Fandom & Expectations - 2:37 Our Thoughts on Maggie Gyllenhaal & Her Influences - 10:30 Review of the performances - 20:42 Review of the production values - 26:09 Oscar Lens - 31:08 SPOILER REVIEW OF THE BRIDE! - 31:48 The Spirit of Shelley - 32:36 Views on Sex, Gangsters & Oscar Voting - 40:21 Let's Talk About Frank - 48:55 Let's Talk About Frankie & The Bride - 54:54 Superfluous Plots, But Themes That Land - 59:25 Finale & Mid-Credits Scene Thoughts - 1:06:00 Grades - 1:11:25 OUTRO: We discuss her upcoming coverage of Formula 1 and her next trip to Japan to visit the Miyazaki Museum! So make sure to follow Amanda on YouTube and social media. Swell Entertainment on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@SwellEntertainment https://beacons.ai/swellentertainment Girly Pop Go for all her F1 Coverage https://www.youtube.com/@GirlyPopGo https://www.tiktok.com/@girlypopgoxo And here's all our links at Mike, Mike and Oscar https://linktr.ee/mikemikeandoscar
Welcome back! The "Mandalorian and Grogu" trailer has finally hit YouTube, and the crew is here to analyze every frame like a pack of hungry Jawas. After a year of waiting, the Razorcrest is back (with some snazzy new yellow accents!), and the hype is reaching lightspeed. A Cinematic Cameo?: Is that legendary director Martin Scorsese we hear as an alien? We debate the surprising (and hilarious) possibility of this Hollywood titan joining the Star Wars universe. Bogan's Advocate: The Empire Strikes Back: It's time to tap into the Dark Side. We take on the impossible task of finding "nitpicks" in what many consider the greatest Star Wars film ever made. The Wampa Debate: Why the original horror-inspired cut might be superior to the Special Edition. That Infamous Kiss: Our crew weighs in on the Luke and Leia moment that aged... interestingly. The Masterpiece: We celebrate the stop-motion magic of Phil Tippett and the timeless score that defines the saga. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
The boys are having a tough time lately. Jordan's still recovering from having his wisdom teeth removed and is drooling everywhere, whilst William has ‘misplaced' his passport - and it's really not the sort of admin he wants to be dealing with right now. There are also plenty of dilemmas to tackle, including how to tell your mum her wedding outfit is horrible and what you should do when you get probed in the wrong hole.If you want to get involved you can email us, and for more Sexted fun sign up to our free VIG&Diva newsletter. You can follow us and DM on Instagram and TikTok, and watch the latest episode every Tuesday and Friday on YouTube.Help I Sexted My Boss is presented by William Hanson and Jordan North. It is an Audio Always production. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Time to abandon ship! Welcome to the Star Wars Escape Pod, the podcast that crashes head-first into the galaxy's biggest news and takes. Today we're checking out the latest Galactic Racer gameplay trailer and more! Join hosts Josh, Blake, Kirk, Dan, and Darian for our signature 'Bogan's Advocate' segment. It's the show where we dare to criticize the masterpieces we love, even if it makes us feel like total liars. From debating the return of the legendary Ben Quadinaros to acting out chaotic, impromptu scripts from the 'old diary of Darth Vader,' we tackle the franchise with zero filter and maximum hype. We're covering everything from the frustration of decade-long game delays to the pure joy of seeing a pit droid's head kicked off. Grab a drink, get into the pod, and let's make another happy landing Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
Welcome back to the Star Wars Escape Pod! In this installment of our "Bogan's Advocate" series, we dive deep into the final chapter of the prequel trilogy: Revenge of the Sith. The rules of the game remain the same—we challenge our own perspectives by finding things to love in movies we might dislike, or offering "friendly criticism" of the films we absolutely adore. Before we get into the main event, Blake shares a mini-review of his recent journey through Force Collector, a junior novel set shortly before The Force Awakens. We discuss the "campy" nature of junior fiction and debate the convenience of a main character whose psychometric abilities lead him to artifacts from the most pivotal moments in George Lucas's films. Check out the Star Wars Archives link in our description for a database of all 400+ episodes! Orbitkey Disney Collection Add a sprinkle of Disney magic to your everyday carry. The Disney x Orbitkey Collection features fun, functional accessories inspired by Disney characters, designed to make staying organised feel like magic. https://www.orbitkey.com/pages/disney?srsltid=AfmBOorl0UJrj6Skr7fWecL5ZzpxJ6tt757WShCMY3XcCGsLaXPwzBUw Kirk is on YouTube: @kirkmihelakos https://www.youtube.com/designedbykirk Darian is on YouTube: @TheManDarian https://www.youtube.com/@TheManDarian ———————————————————————— Star Wars Escape Pod
You don't have to be anywhere near an ocean storm to feel its power. Big waves can travel far across the ocean, causing damage thousands of miles from the storm itself. These waves are called swells. They're much longer from one peak to the next than typical waves. They can reach monstrous heights close to a storm, but they calm down as they move away from it. The waves are created by winds inside a storm. They push the water, building peaks. Individual waves overlap, creating even bigger waves. The waves can organize themselves into smooth, evenly-spaced groups. Scientists recently analyzed the swells produced by storms in 2023 and '24. They used measurements made by a satellite that studies the surfaces of both the oceans and bodies of fresh water. It takes images of the surface, and uses a laser altimeter to measure its height. The scientists compared the results to those from other satellites dating back to 1991. They found that a storm in the Pacific Ocean in 2024 produced the biggest swells ever seen from space. The average height of the waves was 65 feet. Individual waves could have been much higher. And the waves were up to three-quarters of a mile long. The swell still packed a wallop when it hit the Americas, causing damage and deaths from Canada to Peru. Scientists tracked it as it rippled outward for more than two weeks. It ranged from the northern Pacific to the tropical Atlantic—a span of 15,000 miles for some really “swell” ocean waves. The post Swell Waves appeared first on Marine Science Institute. The University of Texas at Austin..
A former predator control officer is hired by two desperate ranch owners because something is killing their cattle. And it seems *very* good at killing in particular. Find more of my narrations: https://www.eeriecast.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
01-07-26 - Listener Did Research On John's Theory That Women Swell During Sex - In Setting This Year's Rock Wars Rules Brady Gets Salty When We Try And Help Him Get Some Wins FinallySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
01-07-26 - Listener Did Research On John's Theory That Women Swell During Sex - In Setting This Year's Rock Wars Rules Brady Gets Salty When We Try And Help Him Get Some Wins FinallySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chris recaps a busy holiday weekend, including Coronado igloos, firepit hangs, family Christmas parties, and a competitive round of Family Feud. Cassidy shares his latest adventures, from a family watch party of Zootopia to getting ready for a Buffalo visit this week.We also hit some local sports talk, including Padres news and what we're watching as the offseason unfolds.In our New, To Do, and Adieu segment:• NEW: Milton's under new ownership and what that could mean• TO DO: Oceanside Eats and why it should be on your radar• ADIEU: Saying goodbye to 2025 and looking aheadWe wrap with a classic San Diego history moment, diving into Carlsbad's origin story and the alkaline water roots that helped put it on the map.To close it out, Cassidy reflects on 2025 with a “Rose and Thorn” and shares what stood out most from the year.
The Clippers turned the ball over 29 times against the best team in the league, awesome! Clips n Dip reacts to the worst ball security game since 2000, talk the weird Swell situation for the Lakers game, and discuss the ever-bubbling trade rumors
Let's all sing the holiday classic: “All I want for Christmas… Is Something Not Made of Plastic.”Easier sung than done. Plastic is now ubiquitous in toys, electronics, tools, air, water… and us. And don't forget the plastic Baby Jesus in Christmas tableaus.What is plastic, anyway? It's a toxic synthetic material mostly manufactured from petroleum by such giants as ExxonMobil, the globe's top purveyor. So much is produced by these profiteers that plastic trash is now a planetary disaster.But not to worry, for Big Oil's lobbyists assure us gabillions of plastic bags, bottles, and such are being recycled, keeping them out of our landfills, water, bodies, etc. Swell! Except… they're lying.After all, Exxon is the same for-profit contaminator that lied for years that fossil fuels were not causing climate change, even though top executives knew they were. Their ethic of deceit continues today – Big Oil knows that 94 percent of US plastics are not recycled. Indeed, they can't be.Faced with growing public alarm about the ever-growing glut of plastic pollution, the industry has doubled down on deceit by offering a snappy new PR slogan: “Advanced Recycling.” They say it's a magical process dubbed “pyrolysis.” Only… it doesn't work, it's inordinately expensive, and it increases climate change emissions. Still, Exxon exclaims its AR will soon be processing half a million tons of plastic waste! But that's not even a drop in the plastic bucket, for more than 400 million tons of plastic waste is discarded each year –and the oil industry is planning to double plastic production by 2040.The only real way to stop runaway plastic pollution of us and our planet is to use less plastic. To learn more and help, go to Beyond Plastics: BeyondPlastics.org.Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe
For more than two decades, Sachi Cunningham has been training her lens on women and the pioneers of big-wave surfing. After earning a BA in history from Brown University and a Masters of Journalism from UC Berkeley, Cunningham started the first video team at the LA Times, where she produced the award-winning series Chasing the Swell, which documents the first ever Big Wave World Tour. She was the first person, male or female, ever to have water shots published of wily Ocean Beach. Other "firsts" include serving as the first female board member of Save the Waves Coalition and first woman to receive the Wave Saver Award from the non-profit. She documented the first women's heats at the Mavericks WickrX Invitational, the Puerto Escondido Big Wave Challenge, the Da Hui Backdoor Shootout, and The Eddie. Cunningham has been included in both Surfline's list of top filmmakers and Surfer magazine's list of top photographers. Her feature-length documentary, SheChange, about the quest for pay equity in big-wave surfing, is presently in post-production, and has been featured in the New York Times and on the Today show. A mental health advocate and cancer survivor, Cunningham lives with her husband and daughter in the Outer Sunset neighborhood of San Francisco, where she's a Professor Emerita at San Francisco State University. In this episode of Soundings, Cunningham sits down with Jamie Brisick to talk about shooting from the water at Ocean Beach and Maverick's, the importance of journalism, her quiver, motherhood, and her battle with cancer. Produced by Jonathan Shifflett. Music by PazKa (Aska Matsumiya & Paz Lenchantin).
When it comes to assessing practice success, understanding various returns on investment is critical. Kiera and Kristy explain what the Dental A-Team is looking for when it comes to understanding the success (or lack thereof) of various investments. They specifically touch on the power of five different KPIs that'll keep your practice in line. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: K iera Dent (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and today it's the KK podcast. Kiera and Kristy hanging out today. Kristy, how you doing today? DAT Kristy (00:10) Good, it's a good day. Kiera Dent (00:12) It's a great day. you like, I feel like I want to like KK. I mean, it's not, it's only two K's everybody listening, but I feel like it's like the Kit Kat. I don't know. It feels kind of like that between you and me. don't know why, but yeah, double the, or we could be like double mint, like double the flavor, double the fun. It's Kieran Kristy on the pod. Like there's just the two of us cause there's no other K names in the consultant world. It's just Kieran Kristy. So I mean, we got DAT Kristy (00:36) That's right. Kari and Kristy, you got it. Kiera Dent (00:40) Kiera and Dana, so that could be my initials, cute. Then there's Kiera and Trish, but there's Trish and Tiffanie. Then there's Kiera and Brittany, no BS, Britt, she's on her own realm. And then we've got Monica. So, see, it's the two Ks, it's the double the, like, we're just gonna have fun here. Like, you get two of us, two brilliant brains. And believe it or not, Kristy and I actually might just be rivaling for like some of the biggest gains this quarter, so. DAT Kristy (00:55) Yes, it does. Kiera Dent (01:07) ⁓ not that we're here just for gains on clients, but Kristy does give me a run for my money, which all the consultants do. And Kristy's just like, she's, she's coming on hot this, this quarter. So I thought it'd be really fun, Kristy, for us to kind of dig into. Like either quarterly or twice a year annual reviews that we kind of do with clients and how you assess it. And we show the ROI that clients are getting, just cause I think it's important for clients to see like, what should you be assessing in your practice quarterly or two times a year? How's the practice going? And Kristy, I think you're really, really strong in this. And I think you're really talented at looking at the practice and about their numbers and about, like, you love that. You and I will geek about numbers all day long, which is why it's the KK club, the KitKat club. Like we're here for the numbers. We're here for the fun. ⁓ But yeah, Kristy, kind of take it away of how do you set this up? What do you look at with clients when you're assessing their practices? Because always client style is like, I want ROI on consulting. And you do like, amazing job at showing that ROI. So kind of take it away of what do we look at? How do we determine ROI? And I know this is your jam. This is what you love to do. DAT Kristy (02:15) I love it. You're right. I do. You know, we all. Kiera Dent (02:18) Do hear that little giggle? I hope everybody heard that. Like that's Kristy's like. Kristy lives for this stuff and it makes me so happy because I do too. Like it's fun. It's fun to get the gains. DAT Kristy (02:28) Yeah, absolutely. Well, you and I have talked about this before. So many doctors just look their bank account to see if they're on track or off track. And it's such a false sense of security looking at or lack of security, one of the two. with that being said, ⁓ there truly is like five Kiera Dent (02:36) you Mm-hmm. DAT Kristy (02:48) KPIs that we're going to look at. And a couple of them are lag measures. A couple of them are lead measures. ⁓ first view would be production net production collections. Yeah. Kiera Dent (03:01) Yeah, don't even get into that gross. We don't want gains that are fake all y'all, okay? Like get out. ⁓ Jason and I were talking the other day about guys, there's this, okay, Kristy, I'm gonna go on Tanger for a second. There's this really attractive actor on this show we're watching and I'm like, truly I was so disappointed when they kind of cut him from a couple episodes. I was like, no, she's gotta get back together with this guy because he's so good looking. And my husband and I, we look, because he looks pretty short. DAT Kristy (03:13) you Kiera Dent (03:28) So I like scoped him and I was like, how tall is this guy? And he says he's six foot and Jason's like, there's no way he's six foot. He's like, but do you ever hear some guy come in and they're like, yeah, I'm like 5'11". He's like, no, they all push them to the six foot. And I feel like that's what gross production is. It's like all of us are like, yeah, like I'm basically six foot. Yeah, I'm basically like a millionaire. Yeah, I'm basically there. Like, so we're talking, no, get out. We're here for like actual gains that you're actually getting net production. my little side tangent, it's okay. It's okay if you're 5'10". It's okay if you're 5'9". It's okay if you're 5'11". We in production want to know the real number that we can actually collect, not the artificial one that makes you feel good when you're chatting with friends. You can fluff your height, but don't fluff your production. DAT Kristy (04:15) love that 100%. So we got the net production and then the collections, Kiera Dent (04:16) you DAT Kristy (04:22) dollar for dollar percentage. Obviously we want them to be 98 % or higher. And then on the flip side, where are we diagnosing? What's our case acceptance? And so many people just look at the percent of case acceptance, but I also want to look at the dollars of what you're diagnosing because is it enough to reach your goal? you know, where's your profit point at and what do we need to hit? Because we can celebrate 100 % case acceptance, which I don't think anybody ever has 100%, but you know, if you're getting 50 % case acceptance, which is still a very good percentage, 50 % of what? If we need to hit 150 every month and we're only hitting 100, it's not enough to get us there. So those would be the main five KPIs that ⁓ tell us the health of your practice, right? And go ahead, care. Kiera Dent (05:18) I was gonna say, and Kristy, as you said that, diagnosing, don't think people realize is as important as it is. For whatever goal you wanna hit, there's a industry standard that you need to diagnose three times what you wanna produce. So if you wanna produce 100 grand, you need to be diagnosing 300,000 minimum to be able to get there, and you better hope you've got a great treatment coordinator who can close. And this is actually like... I'm gonna like give a little secret away that we'll see if people are smart enough to pick up on in future years. This is the number one thing I actually look for in a consultant. I look to see, do an interview, we give them some stats and if a consultant cannot pick up this practice like without fail, they come in and they wanna talk block scheduling, they wanna talk other things. But I need a consultant to be able to see that a lot of times the reason a practice is not hitting their goals is due to a lack of diagnosis. And another reason we do that is because Kristy and I are not dentists and we're not here to tell you how to diagnose. We're just here to help you see that based on industry standards and what you should be diagnosing of a healthy practice. If you're not getting enough diagnosis and doctors, you've got to hear this. If you are not diagnosing enough, this is a doctor issue and we're not saying to overdiagnose, but you have to diagnose enough. If you're not diagnosing enough and there's not enough treatment coming through, your practice will not grow. And that's not your team's fault. That's a you problem. And so making sure that you, your hygienist, you use AI, but Kristy, I'm so glad you brought that up because production collections are always easy. But what impacts that, like you said, is the diagnosis, then the case acceptance, the new patients. And that's where it says lead and lag. Like everybody's looking at the lag of production collection, but it's like, what did we do to get there? And Kristy, I love that you bring these five things up every single quarter, every single, like twice a year with your clients, because people don't realize your bank account is a lag measure. of what you've been doing in the practice. And then like another one is your overhead and what are you spending? Because if those things are in check, but we're spending everything we're making, we're not saving for taxes. Well, yeah, that's a real fun moment. Your bank account's really gonna look bleak, even if everything's working in the practice. So I really hope people take note because it's such a good thing for people to be aware of. DAT Kristy (07:09) . Absolutely. to that point, Kiera, like so many people think if that number isn't where they want it, let's go get more new patients. And then they want to spend more money on more new patients. And nine times out of 10, this is exciting time of the year because we're halfway through the year. Take a look at what you did treatment plan. I mean, I see a lot of practices, you know, let's for easy math, they're diagnosing a million dollars and we've closed 500,000. Holy cow. Even if you captured, you know, percent of that difference like what would that mean to your bottom line and this is a perfect time to take a step back and go my gosh we have five months left in the year what would that look like break it down chunk it down to simple pieces that your team can digest and you guys have fun with it. It's all about getting patients healthier. Let's face it, you're not diagnosing things patients don't need. So let's go get it. Let's get our patients healthy and gamify it. See one more crown a day or one more implant a month. What is it? Right? Kiera Dent (08:35) Yeah. And Kristy, I think something you do so well that I hope people heard is you're not going for the big gains. You're going for the little like squeeze the juice, like get the last bit of toothpaste out of the tube of toothpaste. And I don't think people like that's not sexy. It's like, hey, I heard this podcast that I'm supposed to like go look at these small things versus we're getting all these new patients and we signed up for marketing. Well, but like this is where the elite practices shine. This is where the like really superior Practices go people are like here. How do you do it? How do you guys like add? 20,000 40 that I Kristy I was looking at some of your stats girl. You're like, like I said, I love a good hustle and some of your practices you're adding like 50,000 a month to their practices and that's Incredible and people like how you do it Kristy's literally telling you it's through squeezing the tube of toothpaste in these small little moves that actually are not that hard going and getting new patients and signing up for marketing and all that that to me is actually hard fixing your diagnosis getting your whole team on board, looking to see at what our production collections are, making sure our collections are tight. Those things are way easier. They're not as fun, they're not as sexy, but way easier than having to go like hunt and fish for new patients, even though it's way more fun to tell people you signed up for marketing. It's not fun to be like, yeah, we got a new billing thing in place. Like we got our AR fixed. That's not fun to admit, but it's way fun on the bank account and the profitability side too. DAT Kristy (09:58) Yeah, 100%. And again, ⁓ so going back to the new patients, they want to spend more money to get it. But then have you looked at like, how are we answering the phone? How are we capturing the patients that are calling? Maybe you really don't need to spend any more money to cap, you know, they're coming in, we're just not capturing them, you know, and I'm always a fan of, you know, there's the internal marketing and external. everything Fred Joyle said it best right everything is marketing we are marketing so get real intentional and get in relationship with your patients figure out what they want and tie their care back to it you know Kiera Dent (10:39) Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think it's brilliant. And I think it's like you said, everything we do is marketing. And so if we realize that and so many people want external marketing, and I think to me, the reason people want external marketing, and I'm not here to say not to do external marketing, I think it's a, it is a piece and a part of it. But I think it feels like a diet pill sometimes, like, let's just let's just throw money over there. And let's hope it fixes our problems. Let's out produce our problems rather than fixing our problems. And I really want people to realize like, elite business ownership and being part of the elites, and we're not talking big practices, there's no right size to it. That all comes actually from doing these small little things and internal marketing, once again, is so good. These patients already love you. You already have a base of people that love you. And if you treat those people really well, rather than constantly going to try and swoop and get more people in, those people then refer, they refer better people to you. It's easier. I have a practice and it was wild. They're like, Kiera, we signed up with marketing and we're trying to get it. And again, this is not a bash on any marketing companies. It is definitely necessary. ⁓ but they're like, but we're just not getting more, more new patients. Talk to another client. They're like, we, we just signed up with a marketing company and it's actually gone down. And I'm like, well, tell me what were you doing before to get patients? And they're like, we were at the church, we were in this magazine. And I'm like, well, get back in that because it was, it was showcasing the good things you're doing. It was being this like, more B2B, it was being more connected rather than just trying to go for the masses and it's wild because internal marketing can be so much more effective if done right. And like you said, be in a relationship with your patients and know what they want. And great Google reviews, great Google reviews are your fastest, easiest marketing. So pay with Swell, like let's throw another plugin for Swell. It's been a few months since I put them in. Go to Swell, SwellCX.com. Tell them Dental A Team sent you. Literally Zeke and I met when he founded the company. So you still get like founding prices, because that was the promise he and I made that you guys would get that. But honestly, just get your Google reviews up. Save the money. I don't know. Kristy, you and I are such birds of the same feather. That's why we're KitKat over here. We just think very similarly. And I think that's why we get very similar results as well. DAT Kristy (12:55) Yeah, I think that the other big thing here is to recognize so many people are afraid of numbers. The members just start to tell a story and what we fail to realize is there's a system behind every one of those numbers. And if the number isn't where we want it, we need to pull up that system and figure out the system's a recipe, right? It's our cookbook. If it's not where we want it, then let's go back and figure out, did we mess up the recipe? You know, or is the recipe, we're following it to a T and we just need to change up and find a new recipe because it's not getting the result. So ⁓ I love digging into those numbers because that tells us where we need to focus on this quarter to get the results we want. Kiera Dent (13:40) And I really love that you said numbers just tell a story and there's a system behind the number and this makes it so much easier like going back There's a podcast I did a little while ago where I talked about the yes model and Dental A Team to help you say yes to more It's focusing on you as a person your vision which Kristy alludes to like are we on track or not for that vision and then E stands for earnings and profitability and S stands for systems and if you put them in that order So you've got your vision then we look at the numbers just like Kristy said then you put into place the systems based on what those numbers tell you, it becomes a much more manageable and easier to digest process rather than being like, I need all the systems. And it's like, no, no, no, you just need the systems based on what the numbers tell you because I'm sure you're doing a lot more right than you think you are. DAT Kristy (14:25) Absolutely. And I also think, you know, it's a good time to take a step back and evaluate where you are on the culture scale too, right? Happy team creates happy patients and happy patients pay and refer. So it all goes hand in hand. Kiera Dent (14:39) Good thoughts on there. Okay, so what else do you go? You go through the production collections, diagnosis, case acceptance, new patients, lead lag measures. Then you move into, we on track, off track for our goals of where we're at this year? What are the things that we could do now to get there by end of year? Are they still relevant? Are we still on track? What else do you look at with your clients when you're doing these assessments, Kristy? DAT Kristy (15:02) Yeah, well, I always like to start the year off with projecting where we're going. And so also calculating back to that. And you and I talked about overhead. If we take what our average overhead is for the year, are we on track for meeting that or not? Right? Because we can project all day long. I can want to make $3 million, but this $3 million cover overhead expenses and our savings for the year. So always measuring back to that. And if we're off track figuring out how can we get on track, right? Did doctor take off more time or do we need to add in a Friday to get to goal? You know, those types of things. Or are you, ⁓ okay with where we're projected to land and you feel confident about that. You know, once in a blue moon, well, I shouldn't say once in a blue moon because you and I do get them up there, but you know, it also relieves them and they can maybe even take an extra week off or a few days off because they're ahead of goal. Yeah. Kiera Dent (16:06) Totally. And those are the fun ones. That's what we want. We want to be ahead. We don't want to always be behind. And I agree with you, Kristy. The offices that are ⁓ diligent and consistent at looking at these, we look at these monthly, we look at these quarterly, we look at these annually, we assess, we redirect. It's like, I don't know. I feel like what you do is there's a plane. I just flew back from Greece, which was a very long flight. And it was very fun. This is where I watched. DAT Kristy (16:13) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (16:35) so many of these shows of this very good looking actor. I thought I was like, how tall is this man? While my husband's sitting next to me, it's okay, it's all right. We're allowed to have a few celebrity crushes. ⁓ But on our flight back, it was like a 12, 13 hour flight home. And I think about if that pilot would not have checked to see if we were a few degrees off, I could have easily ended up somewhere else. And that's just by a few degrees. And so what I feel you're doing, Kristy, on these quarterly, these monthly, these annual check-ins is making sure that we're still navigating towards Greece or towards wherever we're trying to get. And are we on track or like you said, do we need to do a small navigation at a Friday, change this, look at our spending to be able to end up there at the end of the year or like, are we so far off course? So we need to like correct a little bit and then get back on track for next year. But the hope is that we catch that soon enough because we're never gonna go in a straight line. It will never be perfectly across. There will always be hiccups, there will be turbulence, there will be. things that you gotta go around, you gotta redirect places. But if we're constantly looking at it, we stay much more on course and charter to where we want to go rather than like hoping and wishing we end up where we actually set out to go. DAT Kristy (17:43) Yeah, 100%. And sometimes it's also looking, where are we spending? Right? Is there something that crept in there? We talked about this before too, with, you know, the subscriptions or, I mean, it's funny because the very first doctor that I remember him telling a story about an airline and I was just sharing this recently with a client. I think it was like American, you guys could probably Google it and find it, but it's back in the day when they would serve meals to everybody and this airline decided that they could cut one olive. Kiera Dent (18:17) Hmm? DAT Kristy (18:17) and it cut their bottom line by a ton. Like what is the cost of one olive? So where can we tighten the ship a little bit? Those things are kind of, again, have fun with it, gamify it. Get your team involved. Let them be part of the solution. Kiera Dent (18:37) Yeah, and Kristy, I love that because we talk about this olive, the FedEx trucks and then chicken nuggets. And going back to it, the black olive airline cut, it was one olive, saved them $40,000 annually. I just pulled it up to sea and it was on American Airlines. And Tiff and I talk about the chicken nugget, like they used to serve five chicken nuggets, which was the right amount. Well, they dropped it to four. Four is not enough, so now you... Upsell to 10 and I'm like that's one chicken nugget. This is one olive and I agree with you Kristy for me This is the fun of business like how can I go find that one olive or that one chicken nugget Tim and I get really excited when we find a whole chicken farm. Like that's a good one I'm like, wow, that was that was like a really good idea or a whole salad But again, it's to cut costs but improve patient care. Like what are they? mean even today Kristy, Shelbi, Britt and I were going through our expenses in dental a team DAT Kristy (19:25) Mm-hmm. Kiera Dent (19:30) and we looked and we have Adobe and we still use Adobe for contracts. But Shelbi looked at it, we're paying 65 and we use Canva and our marketing team doesn't need all the entire suite of Adobe anymore. But that was something we put into place like five years ago. We've been paying 65 bucks every single month when we only need to be paying 19. Not that that matters. And so many people are just like, well, here it's 40 bucks. And I'm like, okay, you want to play a game with me? I'll play a game. It's 65 minus 20. DAT Kristy (19:57) me. Kiera Dent (20:00) Okay, so 45 times that by 12 times that by five years is 2,700 bucks that I've been overpaying just on a subscription that's doing nothing for our company that I could have cut. And I'm like, I know you might not get out of bed for 2,700 bucks, but I'm like, you find that subscription, you find this subscription, you find that one, all those little, do you think someone really was excited on American Airlines to save $40,000 when it's a multi-billion dollar business? But 40,000 here, 20,000 there. DAT Kristy (20:26) Right. Kiera Dent (20:29) 50 bucks here. also think Kristy, to me, it's the discipline of auditing, of looking. It's more than I think the olive or the Adobe subscription or the chicken nugget. It is the constant innovation to look, to be the most savvy business that we can possibly be. And then we flip to the other side and give the best service that we can as well. DAT Kristy (20:51) 100 % I agree with you, Kiera. Yeah, it's just those small incremental things. And it's about being intentional versus doing it by default, right? Let's do it intentionally so that when we get to the end, there's no surprises. Kiera Dent (20:52) you love that because I hate surprises in December as a business owner. Oh, I used to dread December's like and it's a great time to travel. It's a great time to hang out with family. But I used to cry like beginning of December, it was tears every single year. And then by the end of the year, I was exhausted. had nothing left for family and it's supposed to be such a fun time that I agree with you, Kristy. It's like no tears. The projections are there we were prepared. I don't know there really is a saying like if you are prepared, you will not fear and I'm like, it really is that case and also Like CPAs, I'm gonna rag for a second. They rag on consultants. This is a love relationship we have with CPAs and consultants. I get so annoyed that like CPAs don't tell you till December. And I'm like, no, have the meeting in July. Have the meeting in October. Figure it out because you still have time to pivot. And that's what Kristy and I wanted to come on today is there's still time to pivot if you look at these items, you look at the things we're discussing, you look to see what can we do. There's still time. It's like, we're not at the 11th hour. hoping to try to make up time in such a short amount of time. call your CPAs, find out where you're at on your tax liabilities. Are you on track for saving that? There's so many times that we have our meeting with the CPA and he's like, Kiera, I need to up and increase and start cutting. And I'm just annoyed every time, but I'd rather do that over the course of six months rather than one month, because I still have time to make that correction with it, not hurting as much as it could. DAT Kristy (22:30) It's so true, so true. And the efforts to get there are a lot smaller when we can dilute it over five months versus two weeks, because we didn't look till the end of the year. Kiera Dent (22:42) especially the two weeks in December where we're not producing so we're not even collecting and we have to pay more. It's just a really like nasty path. So I'm like, no, no, no, just don't plan for December. Have that be your gravy slush time. Get it all done in 11 months. But like even that kind of thinking, Kristy, I don't think is common. I think it's very abnormal to think, well, if my December is only going to be two weeks, why am I banking on that as a full month? Why don't I bank on? And this is back to mine and Kristy, like we love the projections. We love to think of like DAT Kristy (22:59) No. Kiera Dent (23:12) How could I get this done in 11 months? How can we give you vacations? How can it be done in this many weeks? And that's something, Kristy, I really do feel like it's the Kit Kat Club over here. Like we really do think in such a similar way, but I want you to realize like this is how Kristy and I are able to throw gains. We're able to help practices get to where they want to be, but also with it being easy, happy teams, happy culture, not a lot of stress, ⁓ and just kind of doing the small minutiae things that actually make insane gains. for a practice. We help find the olives, Kristy. Every so often we might get a tomato, but it's the small olives that actually make the huge impact for a practice. DAT Kristy (23:42) Right? Yeah, let's get the olives. Yeah. 100%, 100%. And hopefully we can show it's easy. It's not hard. It truly isn't hard. It's one patient at a time and just capturing a little bit more. Kiera Dent (24:03) Yeah. And then Kristy, I think it's really fun what you do for your clients too, is you show them the ROI that you brought to them through AR, through production, through overhead savings. So that way a client, regardless of their bank account saying, can literally see that in the course of working together, this is what we've been able to accomplish together. Because I think as a business owner, it is so easy to forget like what it felt like when I couldn't lift 20 pounds, now that I'm lifting 50 pounds. Like it's so easy because 50 pounds becomes your new normal, but you're like, no, no, no, no. Remember how we started and you couldn't even lift like five pounds. Then you got up to 20, then you got up to 50. I think it's very easy for clients to forget where they started because their new norm is where we've grown them to. DAT Kristy (24:48) Yeah, it's so true. mean, you know me, I love analogies and it's almost like your periopatient that's been coming in every three months and now they're healthy and so they want to push it back out and it's like you forgot it's this effort coming every three months that's gotten you healthy and the minute we change it, things start to slide, you know, so. ⁓ Yeah, mean, hopefully, hopefully we can always show that value in it. They still have to do the boots on the ground hard work, but you know. even Tiger Woods has a coach, right? And that coach can see around corners to see things a little bit faster maybe when things aren't moving the same. You your swing's off, what's happening, what's going on, you know, and to keep you back on track. it's fun, it's fun partnering with clients and being able to see that and course correct and help them achieve their goals. Kiera Dent (25:43) ⁓ I love it. Kristy, I agree with you. And I think that that's why we have the passion for consulting. We have the passion for practices. We have the passion for wanting you to strike. It's crazy because like, I don't know, we have a tagline, which marketing told me I need to get rid of because it's more about me than it is about you. And it does not make sense to me. ⁓ where it says like your success as a practice is truly Dental A Team's passion. Like this is what gets me and Kristy up out of bed. This is what makes us want to get on a podcast and share with you is you being successful, you getting your dreams, you hitting these goals is what we are obsessed and so passionate about. So I think it's so fun. So I'd say, Kristy, if practice is listening right now, what would be kind of like your bow on our podcast today that you'd say like, okay, from everything we've talked about, what do they take away? What can they go implement? ⁓ Because sometimes it can feel like, well, what's my first step to be able to get on this path of slight course corrections to get to my final destination with ease. DAT Kristy (26:42) Yeah, well first off, if you haven't figured out your goal, maybe look at what you finished at last year and at least strive for 10 % above that because we know that that's at least keeping up with inflation. Again, I don't know if that's meeting your overhead needs, but at least it's a good point. And then reverse engineer it. See how far you're off track from that for the year. and ⁓ what's one more day or one more thing every day. Hopefully you're doing some sort of morning huddle and ⁓ inside of the morning huddle, everybody has a part to play, right? So admin, look, is there any balances that need to be collected? ⁓ patient wise in doctor's schedule, is there anybody that could come back in through hygiene? Hygiene, if we have undiagnosed treatment and we know there is, because we see those numbers every day in morning huddle and it's almost like crazy alarming the amount. Usually it's more than what you're even producing for the day. So, gamify it and try to turn those patients into healthy patients by converting their treatment. ⁓ know just those simple things right there is going to make a big difference to your year end. Kiera Dent (27:55) I that. I love it, Kristy, so much. And I love that you have the passion and the love. I love that you will also sit down with your clients. And I think that that's the discipline and maybe like the fast track of using a consultant is, Kristy, you prepare these for your clients. You think about it. You're looking down the line of things they're maybe not even considering doing. They're not thinking about midway. How are we doing? What are our projections? Are we on track? Are we off track? Where are we at? And I think having a consultant, like you said, with even Tiger Woods, looking around the corner, looking down the line. Kristy and I are both like, we're watching the clock. We know we only have so many more months in the year. Where are you at? How can we make sure that we're constantly keeping you on track to get to your goals? Where maybe you're just having a fun summer vacation or you're just coming back. Like we know that that's our job is to be looking down the line for you, watching out for you, projecting for you, course correcting with you. ⁓ Even when you're in the day to day problems. And I think Kristy, that's just a a shout out to you and a shout out to consultants because this is why we do what we do. So if you, if you are like most business owners, including myself, when I first started and you hate numbers, that's why there are people like Kristy and myself that exist because we love to get into the nitty gritty. We love to look for those olives. We love to help you go do the dentistry and we're going to sit here and help make sure your business and your team and your practice is flourishing. So that way the hard work you put into being a dentist pays off for you in the end. So Kristy love this, love what you do for our clients. Love being the, the KK Kit Kat, whatever we want to be over here. mean, it might stick. We might be Kit Kats for Halloween. You never know, but Kristy just super appreciate you and all that you do for our clients and for our company and you as a human being, you're just a gem. And I'm so freaking lucky to work with you. DAT Kristy (29:28) Yeah. Thank you. It's my honor and you know what? We're stronger as a team, I have to say. So no matter what consultant you have in our company, you get all of us. So we collaborate, we cheer each other on, just like hopefully you're cheering your team on. So happy to help. Kiera Dent (29:49) Bye. Kristy, you said that so well and it is true. I see you and all the consultants like have little meetings on your calendars of connecting and chatting and I do agree. We all help each other out. We want all of our clients to succeed no matter who you're working with. So for all of you, if you're struggling or you're like, gosh, I really would love that help or just having someone, I'll just put our arm around you and like, we're here to help you. We're here to support you. We're here to guide you. We're here to look around that corner. Reach out, Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. And as always, Kristy, thanks for being with me. Thank all of you for listening. and we'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team Podcast.
In the U.S., there will soon be more people over 65 than there are under 18 — and it's not just lifespan that's improving, it's “healthspan” too. Unfortunately, the American approach to aging is stuck in the 20th century. In less than an hour, we try to unstick it. (Part three of a three-part series, “Cradle to Grave.”) SOURCES:James Chappel, professor of history at Duke University.Katy Fike, co-founder of Aging 2.0 and managing partner of Generator Ventures.Kristen Fortney, co-founder and C.E.O. of BioAge.Celine Halioua, founder and C.E.O. of Loyal.Kyla Scanlon, economic commentator.Andrew Scott, professor of economics at London Business School. RESOURCES:In This Economy?: How Money & Markets Really Work, by Kyla Scanlon (2024).Golden Years: How Americans Invented and Reinvented Old Age, by James Chappel (2024).The Longevity Imperative: How to Build a Healthier and More Productive Society to Support Our Longer Lives, by Andrew Scott (2024). EXTRAS:"Off Leash," by The Freakonomics Radio Network (2022)."Are You Ready for a Glorious Sunset?" by Freakonomics Radio (2015).