Cliff's Notes

“Kodak – A Fall From Greatness” / “Where Did My Patients Go?” / “A product Review – The Florida Probe”

Cliff’s Notes for October 2, 2011

 

Cliff Marsh, Henry Schein ……Cell: 201-321-7494……Fax: 201-262-2210…..E-mail: cliff.marsh@henryschein.com

http://www.cliffsnotesblog.wordpress.com

http://www.youtube.com/cliffmarsh100

 

One of the reasons we do what we do, is so that we can to do what we want to do, when we want to do it. It’s a tongue twister, but working as a team and making informed decisions, will get us there.

 

 

“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

Benjamin Franklin

 

This Week’s Feature on the Cliff’s Notes Channel

“The Florida Probe”

http://www.youtube.com/cliffmarsh100

 

In This Week’s Issue

• Kodak – A Fall from Greatness!
• Where Did My Patients Go?
• October 28^th – Marriott at Glenn Pointe, Teaneck, NJ
• Product Review – What is The Florida Probe!
• Commentary for Sunday, September 25, 2011.

Kodak – A Fall from Greatness……………………………………………

From the Wall Street Journal – By MIKE SPECTOR & DANA MATTIOLI

Eastman Kodak Co. has hired law firm Jones Day for restructuring advice as it faces growing concerns from investors over its turnaround prospects, but the imaging company said it had no intention to file for bankruptcy protection. The 131-year-old Eastman Kodak Co. is struggling to stay in the picture.

View Interactive

From Reuters by Franklin Paul

NEW YORK, Sept 30 (Reuters) – Its legacy spans 13 decades, and boasts many American firsts, but Eastman Kodak (EK.N), best known for cameras and photography, maybe running out of options and time.

Concerns about the company’s future boiled over on Friday, after it hired a law firm well-known for bankruptcy cases, sending its shares down 54 percent to 78 cents per share.

Although Kodak said it has “no intention” of filing for bankruptcy, the fact that its shares closed under $1, and market capitalization shrank to less than $300 million suggests that even the most die-hard investors may have lost faith.

The picture began to fade in September 2003. Film sales were dying, and Kodak slashed its dividend by 70 percent, hoping to gain flexibility as it beefed up spending on commercial and inkjet printers, medical imaging devices and other digital systems. It stopped investing in traditional consumer film.

The next year, billionaire financier Carl Icahn ended a brief, but profitable stint as a Kodak shareholder, saying that the company’s business model would not work, especially since it needed to shift gears while its primary revenue source, film, was in decline. “(What Kodak is doing) certainly might not be enough,” he said. “I think it is possibly too late.”

In January 2004, the company said it would trim costs by shrinking manufacturing, and cutting some 15,000 jobs, or about 20 percent of its work force, over three years. Its work force has since been pared to about 18,800 — 9,600 in the United States — at the end of 2010, down from 86,000 in 1998.

Kodak has been an iconic name in American business. The company’s history stretches back to inventor George Eastman’s Eastman Dry Plate Company in 1881. By 1885 he had introduced the first transparent photographic film. The “Kodak” camera hit the market in 1888, with the slogan, “You press the button – we do the rest.”

It rolled out Kodachrome, the first commercially successful amateur color film, in 1935, but George Eastman was unable to see its debut. The ailing Eastman, a pioneering inventor and prolific philanthropist, committed suicide in 1932.

Nearly a century later — 1981 — its sales topped $10 billion. It even got in early to the digital camera movement, with its Professional Digital Camera System in 1991 that enabled photojournalists to take an electronic picture with a camera equipped with Kodak’s 1.3 megapixel sensor.

Daniel Carp took over as CEO in 2000, right around the time that digital cameras started to become an affordable alternative to film cameras. Taking pictures without the use of film and the option to forgo printing proved a crippling blow to the company, which sold film, photo paper, and the systems that develop film into prints.

Veteran Hewlett Packard executive Antonio Perez joined the company in 2003, and became CEO two years later. Perez was instrumental in Kodak’s shift to digital devices and services, hoping to outpace plummeting demand for film.

But some say that was already too late, since consumers had become enamored with the ease of digital cameras, which allowed then to snap hundreds of photos without film or the need to make prints.

Today, most snapshots are taken with phones and viewed on Facebook, and its tough to remember when Kodak’s brand was stronger than that of the social media site. Most iPhone-toting teens have never purchased a roll of film, and have no interest in carting around a stand-alone camera.

In recent years the company has relied on licensing of patents related to photography and printing, as well as sales of commercial and consumer printing systems. In July, Perez said Kodak would sell part of its patent portfolio, which is estimated to be worth more than $2 billion in its entirety.

A dearth of news about the patent sale has contributed to the stock’s weakness. The fact that no sale has been announced shows that the patent’s values are a fraction of Kodak’s hopes, according to a source close to the matter.

Clock Ticks as Kodak Burns Cash, Sept. 27, 2011

Kodak Struggles to Find Its Moment, Aug. 11, 2011

Stock Quote: EK

Where Did My Patients Go? ………………………………………………

September 2011 is now in the record books and if you are like most north Jersey dental practices you’re not to up-set to see it go, state wide dentistry was down. Now, I’m not saying that to make you feel better I’m saying it so you know you’re not alone. The bigger question is why weren’t you prepared better?

The best time to grow or start a business is in a down economy. I could go on for an hour telling you why, but the bottom line is that today, money is cheap! Any planned expansion will never be cheaper than right now, but we’ll get into that another time.

Your patients didn’t go away, they’re priorities have temporarily shifted. Think about how you’re feeling right now. You’re tiered and need a battery re-charge, so do your patients. Our industry has defined cycles but this year there were natural circumstances that occurred that altered the chart. Things are usually a little quieter right after Labor Day. The summer is over, kids are going back to, sports are starting up, and everyone is pre-occupied in “getting back into routine”. By the 3^rd week of September things start picking up and the schedule fills up, but this year it didn’t happen. We just came off a very hot summer and before we had a chance to get back into routine why got hit with a massive storm and weeks of flooding. Dentistry fell of the priority list. So, maybe it’s time to push it back on.

What is your “internal” marketing plan? Internal marketing is the least expensive and most effective way to increase your production, revenues and standard of care. Use this formula – every patient is worth a minimum of $850.00 in annual production. This is a real number. If you take the number of active patients you have had over the last 18 months and multiply it times 850, you will get a good idea of what your practice should be doing at minimum. These figures are based on gross production, not collections, so that’s why you need 1200 active patients to sustain a million dollar practice. The key word there is “sustain”.

Take a look at your patient base and present yourself in a format they want to see. Stay engaged through e-mail and customer loyalty programs, become a systemic healthcare advisor. As an example: This is a back to school month, sports are big, have you alerted your patient about preventing jaw injury & concussions by advising a Brain Pad Mouth Guard that they have to come into the office to pick up? What about advise on “sleep medicine”? Your patients don’t even know that you do these things.

Collect e-mail addresses, set up a Face Book page, and open a YouTube channel. None of this is hard and I would be happy to help you at any time. But, please don’t be foolish and not grab any of the opportunities in front of you.

Take a look at this video and think about what your patients are thinking when they are watching your channel.

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Brain Pad Protective & Performance

Available in Adult or Youth – Colors: black, blue or clear (available through Henry Schein). Cliff’s Notes Intro. Price $17.99. Patient Retail $24.99 and they have to come in to pick it up.

Let’s get into the social media and connect with your patient base. You have a website, now you need patients. Please feel free to contact me at any time with any questions or concerns or to arrange a time to get you started – 201-321-7494 or cliff.marsh@henryschein.com.

October 28^th – Marriott at Glenn Pointe…………………………………

5 Great Seminars – 50 Manufacturer Exhibits – All ADA & NY Convention Specials.

Call Cliff for more details….201-321-7494 0r cliff.marsh@henryschein.com. 

What is the Florida Probe?…………………………………………………………….

For those of you who are of more tender years than me, let define a product that was 20 years ahead of its time. The Florida Probe was always looked at as “too complex” for the dental office or staff. Well, in this case, the industry needed to grow and technology needed to catch up and now it has. The system will smoothly integrate with your “industry standard” practice management software.

I always said that the single piece of equipment that generates the most revenue in a dental office is a Panoramic Unit. The #2 piece is an Intraoral Camera and #3 would be the Florida Probe.

The Florida Probe System with FP32 Software

This is how we will do perio moving into the future. The computerized probe (FP Handpiece) and Footswitch work with our FP32 software to transform your computer into a computerized probing station!

What Can You Do With It?

You can Probe, Chart, Educate and Motivate your patients to accept needed treatment with this all-inclusive System.

Increased Productivity

The System acts as your computerized assistant for the periodontal exam – only one examiner required. This ultimately increases office productivity, because you won’t need other staff members to chart while you are probing.

 Improved Accuracy

The System’s constant-force, computerized probe allows measurements to be consistent between examiners who likely probe with different amounts of force (which could mean different readings for the same patient). Our probe’s precision is 0.2mm., which also improves the accuracy of measurements and assists the clinician in determining the correct diagnosis and follow-up for the patient.

Automatic Charting

Instead of having to try and read the thin bands on a regular periodontal probe and estimate pocket depth just bring the blue sleeve of the FP Handpiece down to the gingival margin, tap the Footswitch and your numerical data is recorded. There is also no need to say the number – the System does this for both the patient’s benefit as well as your own (sound can also be turned off or customized).

Customizable Exam

The exam can be customized to record all or some of the following information: dentition, medical history, risk assessment, recession and hyperplasia, gingival attachment, pocket depth, bleeding, suppuration, furcation, plaque, mobility, MGJ, and diagnosis.

Practice Protection

The Florida Probe System provides exceptional clinical and legal documentation. Use the resulting periodontal chart to create a “treatment map” for scaling and root planing, subgingival antimicrobials or even laser use. When combined with the patient diagnosis sheet, the duo becomes a legal record and informed consent to protect your practice.
Increased Patient Treatment Acceptance

The real value of the Florida Probe System is in its ability to increase patient acceptance of periodontal therapies for a disease that has few typical or motivating (pain, aesthetics) symptoms. 

Generate New Revenue for Your Practice

Did you know that just 1 more quadrant of scaling and root planning acceptance per day at $250, working a 4-day week, adds $50,000 per year to your bottom line? This is only the beginning: 3-month re-care, adjunctive therapies and diagnostic fees add to this hygiene-driven increase in production. This means an incredible return on investment opportunity. The typical practice will increase hygiene and perio production by $10,000 per month.

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Introduction to the Florida Probe

www.floridaprobe.com.  The computer-integrated Florida Probe® is the only “complete” system for periodontal probing and charting.

Florida Probe on NBC news (see more videos herE)

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Sunday October 2, 2011………………………………………………..

The leaves are starting to turn and a chill in the air comes with the sunset. Get into the Halloween theme, it will help you and everyone around you smile. As a manager, your team’s moral and loyalty is your greatest business asset. Give them reasons to laugh and you’ll help relieve some of their stress that will lead to increased productivity.

Sam Walton was the founder of Wal-Mart. At the corporate Christmas parties he would purposely targeted himself. One time he did a dance in a hula skirt. He felt that loyal employees had a right, once a year, to laugh at the boss. Have a costume contest and enhance your team harmony.

As always, I am available at any time for any of your questions and concerns.

Enjoy the day,

Cliff

Cliff Marsh

Henry Schein Dental

P.O. Box 663 / 45 Rt. 46 East, Suite 605

Pine Brook, NJ 07058

Cell: 201-321-7494

Fax: 201-262-2210

cliff.marsh@henryschein.com

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October 2, 2011 - Posted by Cliff's Notes Blog | Uncategorized