#275 The 5–10% Ruining Dental Communities

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A small group of dentists may be creating a much bigger problem than anyone realizes.

After posting online for more than 5.5 years, Gary has noticed the same pattern over and over: roughly 5–10% of the dental industry attacks nearly everything- success stories, marketing wins, clinical cases, vulnerability posts, and even requests for help. In this episode, he explores why negativity spreads so easily, how it discourages dentists from participating in professional communities, and what it means for the future of the industry.

If you're a practice owner, associate, startup dentist, or DSO leader, this conversation will challenge the way you think about leadership, culture, dental marketing, professional growth, and online engagement.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Today I need your help. I'm gonna ask you a question, and I would love to understand this. I've been posting on social media for about five and a half years, and especially in the dental industry, I've been very, very active. And before that, I wasn't on social media on purpose. I'm not a huge social media person personally. Everything that I post is because of work and I need to. And so I've noticed a troubling trend in the dental industry. I've noticed that no matter what gets posted, there's five to ten percent of the dental world that are extremely negative, and they're negative about everything. Like everything. You see them, someone will post something about like, man, I've had a record month. I've seen this happen multiple times, where someone's just like crushing it, and people hop on and call them liars, and they that's not possible, or they're you know, they're scam artists, you're just trying to sell us something, and they're like, no, this is just what I had. Negative comments. Someone gets online and they post that they're struggling. Man, I'm really struggling with this. My business isn't growing, and the same people come on and complain about that and attack that person. I've seen where dentists post uh needing support around clinical issues. And guess what happens? The dentists come in and pile on and they're negative about that. I've seen where dentists post positive outcomes with happy patients and then dentists dogpile on them because they don't like the way that it looks, even though the patient loved the way that it looked, they they're super negative about that too. I've seen where people post online and say, Man, I got this many new patients and I only paid $1,000 on marketing and people dogpile on that. I've seen people post and say, I've spent $30,000 a month on marketing and I'm growing like crazy and negative comments posted on that. I've seen every kind of post, no matter how you spin it, no matter what you say, no matter what you do, and there's like five to ten percent of the dental industry that are just negative, negative, negative, negative. Why is that? Why what drives people to no matter what, everything's a scam, everything is just a problem? Why is the dental industry that way? Now, I will say, there's great people in the dental industry, and I love it, and I'm gonna continue to post and I'm gonna continue to do what I'm gonna do, and I love the people that are positive and those kind of things. I'm not gonna stop and change because 10% of people are crazy. But you know what? I think dentists experience the same thing with patients. I really do. Every time that I talk to a dentist, they're like, you know what? I love these patients, these guys are great and they're awesome, but there's like this group of patients that are just like unbearable and they're just problems. And no matter what I do, it seems to be like five to ten percent of my practice are just psychos. And I think the dental industry has the same problem. Maybe, maybe everybody's just on medication now. Maybe there's a certain percentage of uh people in the population, they're just on medication, so no matter what, they always see problems. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe, maybe it's something else. I would love to hear from you. Why does it have to be this way? And the thing that stinks is I know what happens is that most dentists don't interact online because they don't want to have to deal with those crazy people. It stinks. It stinks. This is why we can't have nice things. So, anyways, I hope you have a great day. Don't be the negative one. If you're the negative one, leave a hating comment. I would love to hear from you. All right, you have a good day.