The Tooth Sleuth Podcast

Hosted by Greg Essenmacher

Business

Website RSS feed

Episodes

173

Latest episode

Nov 2026

Language

EN-US

About the show

The Tooth Sleuth podcast is hosted by Greg Essenmacher, Principal at GnA consult. "Helping Dentists and Dental Professionals Maximize Their Potential"—From vision to execution-creating business strategies that work! Want to Grow Your Full Arch Practice? -Book a Discover Call here: www.DentalConsult4u.com Or email: Greg@DentalConsult4u.com

Listen to episodes

60 recent

November 11, 2026Episode 17326 min

Stop Paying to Get Paid | Ep. 173 | Nelson Martin

A practice running $100,000 a month in card payments can hand over $36,000 a year just to get paid. This episode is about what payment processing really costs a dental practice, and how to keep more of what you collect without hurting case acceptance. Greg sits down with Nelson Martin, CEO of Aligned Payments, who has spent more than 30 years in the card payments industry. They cover why passing card fees to patients is now standard practice, how to handle fees on big full arch cases without creating a deal breaker, and what a payment platform built for dentistry should do beyond the rate. They discuss: - The class action settlement that opened the door for businesses to offset card acceptance costs, and why governments and gas stations adopted it first - What a fair processing rate looks like for a dental practice, and what absorbing it costs over a year - Surcharging the right way: which cards can carry a fee and which can't, including HSA, FSA, and debit cards - Why practices need the option to waive the fee case by case, so a $900 surcharge never costs a $30,000 case - How processing savings flow to EBITDA and practice value, and why year-end is the time to look at it - Text-to-pay, built-in patient financing, and approvals in seconds - PMS integration and automatic posting to cut reconciliation time and human error - How Nelson came out of semi-retirement to serve dentistry, and why he's going through his own smile makeover - What the Sleuth is Going On: puppy breath, lowering the fee on his own smile, and why he'd invent floss A clear look at how the right payment setup protects both the patient experience and the practice's bottom line. ABOUT THE GUEST Nelson Martin is the CEO of Aligned Payments, the dental payment experts, helping practices and DSOs increase case acceptance with an agentic Practice Management Enhancer and the Strictly payment gateway, including patient financing and compliant surcharging. He has more than 30 years in the card payments industry, going back to the days of manual knuckle-buster card imprinters. Nelson co-authored a section of Elijah Desmond's "Dental Exit Blueprint" and is a partner with DropShip Dental and DentReel. He brings an entrepreneur's view of payments: lower costs, less time spent reconciling, and more options for patients.

October 28, 2026Episode 17226 min

Break-Fix Isn't a Security Plan | Ep. 172 | Chris Gibson

Most practices don't find out how weak their IT support is until something goes down in the middle of the night. This episode is about what real IT protection looks like for a dental practice, and how to tell the difference before you need it. Greg sits down with Chris Gibson, Market President of Ntiva's Dental Division, to grill him on dental IT and cybersecurity in plain language. They cover what to do in the first minutes after a security alert, how to vet an IT provider when you have nothing to compare it to, and why emerging groups that wait to standardize their technology pay for it later. They discuss: - The first moves after a "your account was compromised" alert: confirm the message is legit, change the password, then check for new user accounts, recent sign-ins, and unauthorized apps - Why a "man in a van" break-fix provider isn't enough for a practice running high-value cases - What a full-stack IT provider should have: network operations, security operations, help desk, professional services, and field services - Why a dental-specific provider matters, from HIPAA to knowing what a CBCT is when it's down with a big case in the chair - The questions that expose a weak provider: who watches your network overnight, what happens when the firewall goes down, and what their service level objectives are - Why groups usually start feeling their IT risk somewhere between 7 and 15 locations - Missing firewalls, scattered accounts, and multiple practice management and imaging platforms in acquired practices - IT diligence: integrating early under one consistent stack costs far less than reorganizing at 30 to 60 locations - A password manager tip, plus What the Sleuth is Going On: hotel bathroom lighting and the case for inventing the handpiece A practical guide to asking the right IT questions before a breach asks them for you. ABOUT THE GUEST Chris Gibson is Market President of Ntiva's Dental Division, serving dental organizations nationally from single-location practices to group practices and DSOs. Ntiva provides help desk, cybersecurity, network operations, and professional services, along with IT advisory, vCIO, and vCISO services for growing groups. Chris came up through the technical side of the business, including technical support leadership and later COO at MBS Secure, before its acquisitions by The Purple Guys and Ntiva. He brings a straight, no-nonsense view of where dental IT breaks down and what best-in-class groups do differently. LINKS & NEXT STEPS - Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com - Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7 - Connect with Chris: https://ntiva.com | chris.gibson@ntiva.com

October 14, 2026Episode 17129 min

Live and Die by Your Core Values | Ep. 171 | Dr. Anushka Gaglani

Core values on a poster don't build a company. Core values you hire and fire by do. This episode is about holding a high standard while you grow, and getting people to follow you there. Greg sits down with Dr. Anushka Gaglani, co-founder and co-CEO of Areo Dental Group, a multi-location dental organization across Illinois and Indiana. They talk accountability without burnout, how Areo moved patient follow-up to a call center, the mentor and career-path structure behind their teams, and how her thinking on leadership and debt has changed as the group has scaled. They discuss: - Why Areo hires and terminates based on its core values, and what happens to the whole industry when practices lower the standard - Rolling out change one priority at a time: build the habit, hold people accountable, then move to the next thing - Moving follow-up on unscheduled treatment from the practices to a call center, and holding a 100% follow-up rate for months - The "handoff, hand up": why the follow-up call has to carry something specific from the patient's visit - Taking non-patient tasks out of the office so teams can deliver a boutique experience at group scale - A mentor for every new hire and a clear career path from assistant to patient care ambassador, and practice leader to director of operations - Moving from "tell" to "sell" to "collaborate," and why people get on board once they understand the why - How business school changed her view of debt, calculated risk, and growing fast enough to create careers, not just jobs - What the Sleuth is Going On: a puppy with a secret, smiles with character, and the case for calling it a teethbrush A candid look at what it takes to scale a dental group without losing the standard or the people. ABOUT THE GUEST Dr. Anushka Gaglani is the co-founder and co-CEO of Areo Dental Group, a multi-location dental organization serving communities across Illinois and Indiana. A dentist by training, she stepped away from clinical practice to focus on building and scaling the organization, developing leaders, and creating the systems that let teams and practices grow. She is pursuing her Executive MBA at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and is known for LinkedIn content that makes operators stop and think. She brings an operator's view of accountability, culture, and the real pressure of being responsible for hundreds of team members' paychecks. LINKS & NEXT STEPS - Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com - Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7

September 30, 2026Episode 17029 min

Hire for the Vision, Not the Vacancy | Ep. 170 | Brian Passell

Most practices hire to fill a gap. The ones that grow hire to build a future. This episode is about why the right "who" matters more than any system you'll ever install. Greg sits down with Brian Passell, PhD, an industrial-organizational psychologist with DDS Recruit and the son of a Phoenix periodontist. They dig into why recruiting should start with the owner's goals instead of a job description, what fear-based hiring really costs a practice, and why leadership at the top decides whether a great hire stays. They discuss: - Why Brian treats recruiting as a byproduct of strategy, starting every conversation with the owner's business and career goals, not the open role - Tossing out the "booked five weeks out" rule for adding an associate, and the many real reasons to bring on another provider - Creating optionality for doctor owners so they can think like a CEO, whether they're early career or planning an exit - Culture defined simply: what we value around here and how we do what we do - Why systems break, and how the right people carry a team through the internet going down, a missing case, or a full shutdown - The most common hiring mistake: grabbing the first warm body out of fear, and the damage it leaves behind - The hard truth that sometimes the problem is the boss, and why leadership starts at the top - What the Sleuth is Going On: a Tex-Mex barber, experience lines, and the plaque disclosing tablets Brian wishes he'd invented A clear look at why the people you choose, and the leader you become, shape the practice you end up with. ABOUT THE GUEST Brian Passell, PhD is an industrial-organizational psychologist with DDS Recruit, where he helps dental practice owners reach their business goals by finding associates, specialists, and team members who fit their vision and culture. Before focusing on dentistry, he spent 10 years in Big Four consulting and management in the energy sector. Brian grew up in the industry as the son of a periodontist who practiced in Phoenix for decades. He brings a psychologist's lens to hiring, culture, and leadership, and a straight answer on why the owner's goals should drive every hire. LINKS & NEXT STEPS - Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com - Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7 - Connect with Brian: https://ddsrecruit.net | brian@ddsrecruit.net

September 16, 2026Episode 16932 min

Risk Before Reward: Building Real Partnerships in Dental Education | Ep. 169 | Dr. Rick Kapitan

He renamed his own academy mid-conversation and it says everything about how he picks partners, trains surgeons, and decides who gets access to his cell phone number. Real partnership isn't about filling a room, it's about matching philosophy before you match calendars. Greg sits down with Dr. Rick Kapitan, oral maxillofacial surgeon and founder of the Clinicians Implant Academy (CIA), to unpack what separates a real educational partnership from a transactional one. Rick shares his "risk before reward" filter for choosing collaborators, his approach to building an academy around ongoing mentorship instead of one-off lectures, and the personal journey that reshaped why he gives back both in his Charlotte practice and on mission trips abroad. They discuss: - Why Greg suggested Rick rename his program from Clinicians Implant Academy to Connections Implant Academy - The "risk first vs. reward first" filter Rick uses to decide which companies and platforms are worth partnering with - Why one-off lectures create "data transmission" but not real education and how a curriculum-based academy changes that - How consistency across a whole team (not just the founder) signals a partnership is built to last - Rick's shift from viewing mission work as a "penance" to doing it from a place of joy - What his cadaver lab partnership with Endurance Experience Anatomy looks like behind the scenes - CIA's 2027 roadmap: more course offerings, live patient participation, and regional roadshows - Why Rick puts his personal cell phone and email on every slide he presents Bottom line: the practices and partners who last are the ones who choose relationship over transaction, every time. ABOUT THE GUEST Dr. Rick Kapitan is an oral maxillofacial surgeon based in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the founder of the Clinicians Implant Academy (CIA), a hands-on training program for oral surgeons and clinicians. He also serves as director of the Carolinas Center for Cleft Lip and Palate Surgery and is a new partner of GnA Consulting. Rick is known for building education around long-term mentorship rather than one-off lectures, and for a partner-selection philosophy rooted in shared values over shared logos. Outside the OR, he's spent years doing cleft-palate surgical mission work internationally, including recent trips to Guatemala. LINKS & NEXT STEPS - Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com - Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7

September 2, 2026Episode 16824 min

Why DSOs Are Leaving Patient Volume on the Table | Ep. 168 | Sam Gaynes

Patients don't choose org names. They choose people. And yet most dental groups are building brand equity at the organization level while leaving their individual doctors invisible online. In this episode of Tooth Sleuth, Greg sits down with Sam Gaynes, Enterprise Account Executive at rater8, for a sharp conversation on online reputation, AI search, and why the way DSOs think about doctor visibility is costing them new patients and full arch cases they don't even know they're losing. They discuss: - Why DSOs under-invest in individual doctor profiles and why that's a strategic mistake - The 10-20% of patients who search specifically for a provider -- not a location -- and what happens when that doctor is invisible online - How rater8's algorithm automatically distributes patient reviews across multiple platforms to match where they're most needed - Why AI is now reading Healthgrades, WebMD, Vitals, and verified listings -- not just Google -- and what that means for practices - The shift from Google as a search engine to Google as an answer engine, and how AI overviews are changing where patients land - How sentiment signals across the web -- not just star ratings -- determine what AI recommends to prospective patients - Why 95% of patients rate five stars but only the unhappy 1-2% are motivated enough to leave a review without being asked - The order of operations in healthcare marketing: reviews are not a final step, they are the foundation everything else builds on This episode is a clear-eyed look at what dental groups are missing in their online strategy -- and the practical framework to fix it. ABOUT THE GUEST Sam Gaynes is an Enterprise Account Executive at rater8, a healthcare reputation platform that helps dental practices and DSOs build provider visibility, generate consistent patient reviews, and increase discoverability across both traditional and AI-driven searches. Based in Venice, CA, Sam has spent over a decade in healthcare technology, holding roles from sales to VP of Partnerships at rater8, giving him a ground-level view of how online reputation is built, lost, and recovered at scale across multi-location dental groups. Sam is also a videographer, which shapes how he thinks about storytelling and how providers present themselves to the world. He brings a rare combination of operational understanding and marketing insight to a topic most dental groups underestimate until it starts costing them cases. LINKS & NEXT STEPS Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7 Learn more about rater8: https://www.rater8.com

August 19, 2026Episode 16731 min

Stop Treating Supplies Like a Set-It-and-Forget-It: The Procurement Playbook for Growing Dental Groups | Ep. 167 | Brad Freeman

Industry average for supply spend is five to six percent of collections. Most growing groups are running eight, nine, ten. And once it compounds, it is very hard to reel back. That's the problem Brad Freeman built Source Club to solve - and he is one of the few people in dental who actually came up in the supply chain before he started selling into it. Brad Freeman is the founder and owner of Source Club, a hybrid GPO and outsourced procurement solution serving around 600 dental practices across the country - from single-location private practices to multi-site emerging groups. In this episode, he and Greg Essenmacher break down what procurement discipline actually looks like at the practice level, why formulary compliance is the wrong goal, what the real number is, and how Source Club helps smaller groups compete on pricing against the largest DSOs in the country. They discuss: - Why dental supply spend is quietly running 8-10% of collections at many growing groups - and why that number is so hard to fix once it gets out of hand - The difference between a formulary and an ordering list - and why an 8,000-line-item formulary at a 40-location group is just a list with a different name - Why the goal is never formulary compliance - it is budgetary compliance, and how that reframe changes how groups manage procurement entirely - The pricing discrepancy between a 1-2 location practice and a 250-location DSO - and how Source Club gives smaller groups access to the same leverage - How to standardize composite purchasing across a 3-location group and save $40-50k a year in the process - and why most practice owners don't have that conversation with their doctors - The two-to-three-million-dollar threshold: when it makes sense to hire a dedicated procurement manager, and why Source Club's clients are choosing to keep them on even after crossing it - Why Source Club charges a membership fee and takes zero commission on products - and what that means for the advice they can give - How the ordering frequency alone - going from twice a week to twice a month - can clean up a practice's cash flow and inventory management - The acquisition-growth challenge: why practices growing through acquisition inherit purchasing chaos, and how formulary strategy has to adapt when doctors get to keep their clinical preferences The bottom line: supply spend goes directly to your bottom line when you save it. No marketing funnel, no conversion rate, no show rate. Every dollar saved is a dollar kept. Most practices are not treating it that way. ABOUT THE GUEST Brad Freeman is the founder and owner of Source Club, a hybrid group purchasing organization and outsourced procurement management company serving approximately 600 dental practices across the United States. Before starting Source Club in 2020, Brad spent nearly a decade inside dental supply chain and procurement - including a role managing procurement for a 200-location DSO on the West Coast. He is a self-described supply chain nerd, not a dental product salesman, and built Source Club specifically to give private practices and small emerging groups access to the pricing leverage and procurement infrastructure that previously only existed at the DSO level. Brad is known for his no-nonsense, operator-to-operator communication style and his willingness to show practices exactly what they would save before asking them to sign anything. Source Club offers a free savings analysis to any practice or group considering membership and is reachable at sourceclub.io. LINKS & NEXT STEPS Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7 Contact Brad Freeman directly: bfreeman@sourceclub.io Source Club website: https://sourceclub.io

August 5, 2026Episode 16631 min

Reviews, Rankings, and the Rules That Just Changed: Dr. Len Tau Returns | Ep. 166

Seven hundred reviews and convinced you're ranking. You're not. You're just looking at yourself on your own Wi-Fi. That's one of the most expensive misconceptions in dental online reputation - and it's one Len Tau has been correcting for years across 11,000 practices. He's back on the Tooth Sleuth for a second time, and this episode is sharper than the first. Dr. Len Tau is a dentist, speaker, author, host of the Raving Patients podcast, and dental division lead at BirdEye. He is also the founder of Supercharge, the fastest-growing team-and-business focused dental event in the country. In this episode, he and Greg Essenmacher dig into the Google review rule changes that just hit in April 2025, what practices are still doing wrong, the velocity metric that matters more than volume, and what it actually takes to build an event that sells out vendor slots years in advance. They discuss: - The biggest myth in dental reputation management: why review count does not equal ranking - and what actually moves the needle on Google Maps - Why velocity beats volume - and the three-month-old practice with 42 reviews that was outranking an established practice with 500 - The April 2025 Google rule changes that most practices don't know about yet: why team member name-dropping in reviews is now a red flag, and why tap devices in the office need to go in the drawer permanently - Why reviews done inside the physical office are now a liability - and how to get reviews done at home instead - The Yelp loophole that still works in California - and why Meta reviews are essentially irrelevant - The negative Google review removal service Len launched in February: 300 reviews removed, $450 per removal, no charge unless it comes down - Supercharge: what the event is, why it's team-and-business focused with zero clinical content, and what's coming September 25-27 in Fort Lauderdale - including an eighties-themed concert and a yacht party that came back - Two standout products Len can't stop recommending: First In for scheduling and Sinch Pay for practice payment infrastructure - Len's personal health journey - the daily 5K walking habit, a bone-on-bone hip diagnosis at 52, and what staying active looks like when the body starts pushing back The bottom line: the rules around Google reviews just changed. If you haven't updated your strategy, you're not just falling behind - you may be actively getting yourself penalized. ABOUT THE GUEST Dr. Len Tau is a dentist, speaker, author, and the dental division lead at BirdEye, the reputation management platform used by over 11,000 dental practices across the US, Canada, and Mexico. He is the host of the Raving Patients podcast and the founder of Supercharge, a business and leadership-focused dental event now in its fourth year. After 23 years in private practice, Len retired from clinical dentistry in 2022 and shifted his full focus to helping practices build the reputation infrastructure and business systems that drive sustainable growth. He also runs reviewsdoctor.com, a negative Google review removal service that operates on a pay-per-removal model. Len is known for translating complex reputation and marketing strategy into immediately actionable practice advice - and for building one of the most in-demand events in dental, where vendor spots regularly sell out years in advance. He is a return guest on the Tooth Sleuth Podcast. LINKS & NEXT STEPS Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com Book a call: https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/booking/du9K0a2re1K4eBBk8fI7 Supercharge event registration (use code RAVING to save $100): https://superchargedentalpractice.com Negative Google review removal: https://reviewsdoctor.com

July 22, 2026Episode 16530 min

Competing Against Yourself: How Dr. Simon Oh Thinks About Full Arch, Follow-Up, and What It Actually Means to Change a Life | Ep. 165

Most full arch surgeons measure success at final restoration delivery. Simon Oh is still seeing the same patients eight years later. That long view - what it actually reveals about complication patterns, outcomes, and clinical truth - is what separates the chest pounders from the operators who are genuinely trying to get better. Dr. Simon Oh is a full arch and All-on-X surgeon, co-founder of ORCAA, co-founder and surgical lead at Smart Arches, and one of the most grounded voices in implant dentistry. In this episode, he and Greg Essenmacher go deep on the clinical mindset behind real full arch mastery, the mental health dimension of edentulism that most practices never address, the life-altering impact of what this surgery actually does for patients, and what it means to compete against yourself instead of the surgeon next to you. They discuss: - Why full arch case volume numbers at conferences are almost always inflated - and what the mindset behind the chest-pounding culture actually costs surgeons long-term - The two buckets of people in full arch: those competing against others and those competing against themselves - and why Simon is firmly in the second - How eight years of long-term follow-up has made Simon a better surgeon than any single technique or training course could - The mental health and comorbidity dimension of edentulism that is almost never discussed: depression, dental phobia, social isolation, and the "dental orphan" patient population - Why full arch is life-altering and not just life-changing - and the patient who came in that day not to look better, but just to be able to keep up with his friends at dinner - How COVID accelerated patient isolation and what that means for the full arch patient population showing up to consults today - The Smart Arches model: six locations across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland - and what the first three years have looked like building a surgical group from the ground up - What Simon tells every doctor entering full arch: be responsible, be self-critical, and know that you are holding your patient's livelihood in your hands The bottom line: full arch surgery done right is not a volume play. It is a long game - and the surgeons who understand that are the ones worth listening to. ABOUT THE GUEST Dr. Simon Oh is a full arch and All-on-X surgeon, co-founder of ORCAA, and co-founder and surgical lead at Smart Arches, a multi-location full arch practice group operating across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland. With approximately eight years of full arch experience, Simon has built his clinical reputation not on volume claims but on long-term patient follow-up, honest self-assessment, and a commitment to understanding what actually works over time. He is also active on Instagram with over 30,000 followers, where his feed reflects the same unfiltered, authentic approach he brings to clinical practice. Simon is known for his grounded, competition-against-self philosophy in a specialty often dominated by performance posturing. He brings a rare combination of surgical depth and intellectual humility to the full arch conversation - and his work at Smart Arches reflects a deliberate effort to build a surgical group on a foundation of clinical integrity rather than speed to scale. LINKS & NEXT STEPS Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com Book a call: Click here

July 8, 2026Episode 16428 min

The Lead Management Gap: Why Full Arch Practices Lose Cases Before the Consultation | Ep. 164 | Tim Hines

The marketing didn't fail. The lead management did. That's the conversation most full arch practices never have - because it's easier to blame the ad spend than to look at what happens after the lead comes in. Tim Hines is the founder and president of Brightline Dental Lead Management and a four-time entrepreneur. His company sits in the gap between lead capture and consultation booked - providing dedicated patient advocates who work full arch and big case leads until they convert or go cold. In this episode, he and Greg Essenmacher break down exactly where practices are losing cases they've already paid to generate, and what a human-first lead management model actually looks like inside a high-volume full arch operation. They discuss: - Why the biggest area of attrition in full arch is not marketing or closing - it's the lead management stage in between, where most practices have no real system - The "director of first impressions" model: how Brightline trains patient advocates to conversationally sell the consult in a single 10 to 15 minute phone call - Why Brightline runs a one-to-one advocate-to-practice model rather than a call center - and what a patient actually experiences when they always reach the same person - How AI is being used inside Brightline to remove manual friction from call notes and scheduling - freeing advocates to focus on the human side of the conversation - The three-tier AI spectrum: mechanical AI, thinking AI, and feeling AI - and why full arch lead management belongs firmly in the human-first category - Why practices default to blaming their marketing partner when cases aren't converting - and what the data actually shows about where the ball gets dropped - The volume and touch-point reality of full arch lead management: multiple attempts, multiple platforms, and the speed-to-lead window that decides whether the lead ever converts - What it means to do things that don't scale - and why Brightline has built its entire model around the belief that this one thing cannot be automated The bottom line: you can have great marketing and a great closer. If the gap between them is unmanaged, you're losing cases you already paid for. ABOUT THE GUEST Tim Hines is the founder and president of Brightline Dental Lead Management, a company specializing in dedicated patient advocate services for full arch and big case dental practices. A four-time entrepreneur, Tim entered the dental industry through his wife's two-decade career in dental office administration and built Brightline around a simple belief: the lead management stage is where full arch cases are won or lost, and that stage requires real humans, not bots. He is also the author of The Marketing Starter and host of the Marketing Starter Podcast, focused on entrepreneurial thinking across industries. Tim is known for his position that high-value, high-trust cases cannot be managed by automated systems - and for building a company structure that operationalizes that belief at scale. His one-to-one patient advocate model is a direct challenge to the call center approach, and his team comes exclusively from dental backgrounds to ensure they can represent a practice credibly from the first call. Learn more: https://www.dentalconsult4u.com