Cameron Hemphill– This is a medical, millionaire podcast. Helping your MedSpa increase in status visibility and profitability. Join your host as you dispels miss shares, Trends and gives you actionable steps today. That will take your medical practice to the next level. Here’s your host expert marketer and founder of Growth99, Cameron Hemphill Hey everybody, Cameron hemphill, here, your host for medical millionaires. Hey first off, thank you so much for taking the time to tune into the podcast. Our goal is to give credible value and insight for the practice owner. So,
My team and I have consulted practice owners all over the country for years. And we love helping practice owners, run their practice like a business through technology and understanding exactly what’s going to help them with their practice and move the needle in order to thrive, right? And so we see practice owners that are struggling and ones that are doing very, very well. And I have an exciting announcement. Today, I actually have a wonderful client friend colleague. We were just hanging out at the aesthetic. Next conference in Las Vegas, in Dallas, Nina Tracer. She’s the owner and founder of icons. Here’s Med Spa, she’s out of Florida. She’s been with us for a couple years. I want to say Nina. Welcome to the show.
Nina Traster – Hey, thanks for having me Cameron, I love your podcast. I love everything you do for us. It’s amazing being here.
Cameron Hemphill – I mean, I’m so happy to have you. I really enjoyed the conversations and spending time with you in Dallas is one of my favorite things. It’s great. There’s so much of this digital stuff through Instagram, and DMs, and comments, and likes, and emails, and texts. It’s really nice to just sit down and spend some time with you. After that, I’m like, we have to have you on the show. So thank you so much for your time.
Nina Traster – Well, thank you for having me. I mean, this is going to be great. I’m excited for what’s going to come from this podcast.
Cameron Hemphill – No. So when we were in Dallas, you and I had the opportunity to sit down, and we talked for like an hour. Nick was there. Nick is awesome, by the way, for the listeners. Nick is her husband. He runs the operations over there without him, and I want to talk more about that. But when we were talking,
No. So when we were in Dallas, you and I had the opportunity to sit down, and we talked for like an hour. Nick was there. Nick is awesome, by the way, for the listeners. Nick is her husband. He runs the operations over there without him, and I want to talk more about that. But when we were talking,You know, you really like, you inspired me because you talked about Aesthetics as an art and I’m like, he is an artist.
Nina Traster – Yeah. So I actually have my minors and Studio Arts. So I graduated with my bachelor’s in biomedical science and then had my minor in studio art. And I actually wanted to do art and it was hard to do art in college. And my dad basically told me that I needed to find a different career. So that’s when I went to the medical side, but always had that little inkling in the back of my head of wanting to do something with my hands and do something with art. And I heard about Aesthetics and it kind of tied the two together. I kind of was able to see both but I first knew I had to do family medicine to get that Foundation of medical knowledge before diving into that specialty. And when I was able to find Aesthetics where I was able to have my Foundation of medicine use medicine but also use products to build people’s faces, make a more beautiful and honestly sculpt them. And use my artistic side where you can do lips, you can do jaw lines, you can do cheeks, you can do all these beautiful things, it’s just trying to form all that and build that into a business that was like, the tough part of icons here was actually getting all that together and building a business off of it.
Cameron Hemphill – Yeah, that makes sense. That is the challenge changing part for sure. And what I think is really cool is you have the, the artistic background, right? Like you you that’s, that’s a passion that you have and then helping others as a passion that you have.
combining art with medicine, I would say equals aesthetics at some level, and then being able to provide value to really give someone self -confidence is really got to be so inspiring. I think that there’s people in this industry, they make it in it for the wrong reasons. When I look at you and talk to you, you got into it for the exact right reasons. You’re passionate about helping others and the artistic side, which is incredible. Right there, I’ve interviewed a lot of people and talked to a lot of people in aesthetics, and so that’s what’s going to continue to say, okay, you know what?
I’m Nina. Maybe the business side is going to be hard but I love what I do. I’m passionate about what I do. And when you love what you do in your passionate about it, it’s going to continue to help you. You know, stay in the business longer like through all the challenges that we face and run the med spa or Aesthetics practice like a business. I agree. So clear. Yeah, and so I want to talk like, okay? Let’s talk about those challenges, right? Because for the audience specifically, A lot of them are educated on anatomy and medicine and, you know, they’ve gone through a lot of Shadows and courses but taking that to running a business like help us understand those challenges from when you started to Growing to where you are now.
Nina Traster – Yeah, so the hardest part is honestly taking that leap and opening up your business because it’s, it’s gonna be hard. I was in Family Medicine, where patients were brought to me. I was not searching for clients and I worked in family medicine and opened this thinking I would be like a side gig. I didn’t know how I could make it into a whole full-time job but having no patience, that’s probably the hardest is going in and knowing that you’re going to have to start from scratch and have people trust you and come and let your art show, right? Show them even though you don’t have your portfolio yet, you just have to grind it out. My, my biggest thing I tell everyone that talks to you about it is you have to go into your business and work in the hours even if you have no clients. So I would come after work 8 to 5, I would work Family Medicine, then come here at 5:30 and work till 10 p.m. Monday through Friday and Saturday and Sunday at 12 hours. If I didn’t have patience here, I was still working on my business and that’s the grind of it is putting yourself out there, working on your business when you’re in here, telling people about yourself, and then the clients will start to come. You don’t have to put all this money in marketing. You just need to show that you’re actually passionate about your business and you’re talking to people around you and slowly they’ll start to come and see you and then you’ll slowly get your before and afters. You’ll be able to post them and then people start to kind of see the transitions and they start to trust you, but definitely takes time. The one thing is it’s not overnight. Everyone thinks it’s like you open up a med spa, you have a million people coming in and it’s all about making money. It’s definitely not about making money. I would tell anyone who wants to get in this for money, it’s not it because it takes time to actually start seeing a profit come in. And then you get a profit and you put it back into your business because you want it to build, because you want it to be the best place for your patients to come to.
So it’s, you know, it’s definitely that you have to grind, you need to be working in your business, not at home, because you have no clients, you need to be in there, doing things working on, social media, talking to people around, you figuring out a way to get people in. Do educational videos, do something that someone sees you, and then maybe you can get the person to come in and give like, take a chance on you.
Cameron Hemphill – Yeah no well said I mean that this what you just hit on is pure gold, you know? So like for the audience you know to hear that right? You were at family medicine you then come to your business as a call, it side gig in the beginning after hours, right? Think about it. Working eight to five and then working and and there is there’s an unknown, like okay, is this gonna work? Is this not? I don’t know, but I’m gonna put myself out there and I’m gonna give it my best shot my best effort.
And you know, for the audience, if you think that, you know, hey I’m gonna go to work from eight to five and then kind of work on my business here and there, that doesn’t work. It’s the discipline. It’s showing up on the weekends, it’s doing the stuff that you don’t want to do. It’s it’s having the late after hours, the late nights, the frustration. And then continuously like you said, grind, right? And take it organically because as you start to, you know, bring in clientele organically and you have that creativity, you have that graph, right? The Aesthetics craft And and they feel that they tell everybody, like I bet your word of mouth referral is just huge at this point.
Nina Traster – I honestly think that’s most of my clients are Word of Mouth. Like when people ask me how they hear about like how do I get more people? It’s, you have to make the best impression on every single client that comes in and every single client should get 100% of you. And that person will tell someone
about you, and then that person will bring someone else in. And that’s the best clientele because you’re not just getting these random people walking in and wanting specials and all these things. And they’re only going to try you out for a little bit because they’re going to go to the next person with a better special. If you have someone that already has their mom or their sister talking about you, you’re going to have a good appointment and that’s going to be a forever client. You’re going to be a household name. And that’s like my whole thing is you have to put your whole self out there and it will get you more word of mouth.
Cameron Hemphill – That brings up a good point because you said something that’s interesting. I really like being present and giving them the best experience. Can you can you walk us through that experience like from when this person enters I concierge? What’s that like to doing the treatment? And then and then like, as they’re leaving, I’m curious to understand that.
Nina Traster – Yes. So when my client comes I actually will come to the front and I walk them back. When I walk them back, I always know something about them and I talked to them about either. They just had a wedding or if they are just moving somewhere or how their job is asking about their day. I walk them back, I do the pictures, I’ll take their pictures, I’ll have my assistant, make sure all her forms are done and all these things are done and then I’ll have them Place their things on the side on our couch. Well so offer them a water or any other beverage that we have. And then I will put them in my gown. I will put a nice little headband on them and they’ll sit down. I put a blanket on them. I always have Gossip Girl on TV because
Most my clients love Gossip Girl and I make the room seem more like, it’s like they’re living room, right? There’s the Gossip Girl on, there’s nice lighting. All my procedural medical things are behind them so they don’t see it. I sit in front of them, I sit down and I look at them and I look over their forms, but I also kind of asked them what’s going on, because that kind of tells you more of where the treatment plant is going to go. If they’re like right now about to go to college or they’re about to be moving or they’re gonna do something, you kind of want to cure their treatment plan around it. Like let’s say they have a big event coming up and they just now mentioned to you that they have their wedding this weekend. Well, you can’t do a treatment, right? You can’t do anything that’s going to cause issues that’s where I’m going to push them over to like Dresden to get like a Hydra. Facial, mix your skin glowing or they are telling you that they just gonna engage, and they want to do a whole treatment plan, for making sure that their skin is perfect for their wedding. So it is really important to talk to them. I do a full 30 minute consultation.
if they are not sure what they’re gonna do. If they’re my regulars, I still give them same amount of time. We talk the whole time. And then during that time, I kind of get things prepped while they’re talking. I do all the prepping and then I’ll start cleaning off their face and then we start going. But it’s definitely feels like it’s friends catching up the whole time during the whole appointment.
Cameron Hemphill – So they’re getting an experience, right? So when they come in, obviously they’re getting a treatment done but at the same time, they’re excited to be there. They’re getting an experience. It’s like a spa -like environment, almost hanging out with their, call it friend in a way, right? So that it’s welcoming, right? Yes. Which I think is super important. Like you said something that resonates with me well in terms of customer experience. When you must have notes or some sort of a system on like. Hey, we talked about this. Maybe it was like something that happened in their personal life. They’re moving or they’re getting married or something happened during that like consultation and so do you chart that down? So you can kind of pick up that conversation next time.
Nina Traster – Yes. So we use Boulevard and Boulevard, you can add little notes to each client. So if I see anything happening to them, let’s say on social media on Instagram or anything, then I’ll quickly just go on the app and write a little note. Just to make sure that I remember to like mention it in their next visit or if they say something like a key thing during their like, while they’re checking out, I’ll have my assistant attitude to the note as well. So that way, we remember it and just make some more personable.
Cameron Hemphill – Yeah, absolutely. You know, that’s, that’s you, I think a lot of people miss that because, you know, hey, you can be seeing a lot of clients. And as the practice grows like you’re like, okay, how do I do this with every client and really, when it comes down to is taking notes on a technology, like a tech platform and so it makes it personal and you may, you know, might remember some things in your head and some you won’t because there’s there’s so much velocity that’s taking place in these practices, right? And so I think that’s that’s well said, okay, so when they’re exiting the practice, do you like, do you ask for a Google review? Do you ask for referral, do you sell them a product? Do you rebook them membership, them curious to hear about.
Nina Traster – I’m so bad with that and that’s probably it’s good that I have my assistant with me when I’m leaving I’m still in conversation most likely about something that they’re talking about. I walk them out I get their next appointment booked and then my assistant will grab everything up product wise I used on them any skincare products anything that I mentioned they’ll have it at checkout which really helps for the upsell at the end. I keep it book they have any products they want and they have also their whole treatment plan for the year ready for them.
Break Time- Thank you for listening to Medical Millionaire. I wanted to take just a few short moments and tell you all about Growth99 University. Naturally if you’re listening to Medical Millionaire the success of your med spa is extremely important to you and as it should be and if you’re listening to Medical Millionaire you are
Obviously looking for the best most effective ways to take your meds spot to the next level in both profit and customer success. Enter Growth99 University ranging from online education courses, all the way to the full Suite of marketing and web services Growth99 has your MedSpa covered. No matter the challenges that you’re facing. We are ready and able to help you achieve your next level in business profit and freedom to inquire about all of our support services and products, please visit Growth99.com. And while you’re there, click the university link and check out the companion. Course to this very podcast. To the show.
Cameron Hemphill – Got it. And so like the assistant team members really just help with, you know, just I mean, so it gives you the ability to focus, right? You have the ability to make it personal, enjoy the experience of treatment from a professional standpoint, right? From a personal standpoint. But then you have team members and you have systems and operations, that really, you know, help you behind the scenes so that you can just focus on like the next patient that comes in right. 100%, they keep me organized. That’s The Power of having a wonderful team right there. Yes. All right, so I know that you and Nick are, you know, you guys are do. Well, you guys are. An amazing couple and, you know, power couple if you will. So talk to us about how
how important it is to have someone like Nick that just helps out with the operations, like a great operations person.
Nina Traster – What an interesting story anyways of Nick. So we’ll start with where he even came from into the business. So my husband is Nick and he was actually a firefighter for the city. And when I opened up my business, I put a lot of stress on him because basically I left my full -time job family medicine as a PA and found out I was pregnant and said I’m opening up a new business but it’s not gonna make any money probably for a good time. And basically he’s gonna have to take over the burden of all our bills until something happens.
Well luckily I grinded a lot really hard the first year and it got really busy and we got it had a baby and it was actually really hard to find a nanny to take care of the baby and Nick during that time when I was pregnant was actually doing a lot into the business, he wasn’t hired as any position. He was just kind of taking on the stuff that I was not able to do because I was treating patients. So he was working on websites and he was actually one to contact a Growth99 and he’s the reason why we have a beautiful website, but this was all behind the scenes and he still wasn’t actually an employee or anything. For me. He was just trying to help me grow and make sure I don’t make any mistakes on the way.
And then when I had Sophia and he was taking care of her, my baby. We’ve made the hard decision of. If he needed to go back to the fire station. And that’s when we thought it would be actually best. If he worked in the business as first like my office manager, keeping everything like organized and making sure I’m doing everything correct on the outside versus like inside the business and then I don’t know. He just started going, he does a lot of research, this guy when he gets a job, he goes all in, so he actually researched everything that is data and Tech for MedSpa. He looked into the marketing aspect. He looked into everything and honestly, I would say, the reason why we’ve grown so much since then is because of him. He just took over all the operations and stuff that I could not well be in the office.
That’s amazing. I mean, I’ve gotten to know Nick over the over the years. He’s a total stud Congratulations to both of you. We call him a Karen Well, it is nice because you know when you’re working so hard you’re busy and you’re injecting people It’s so hard to get on the phone and make sure the orders are correct for like Drugs and make sure the shipments are coming in and also doing the interviews for all the employees and making sure Payrolls going all those things like he took over and it’s been so much better
Cameron Hemphill – So nice to have I mean geez like
There’s there’s the side to it of running the, the practice, you know, from the Aesthetics, the medicine side, the treatment side, you know, which is fun for you, right? You love it and then yeah. And for him, he’s like, I’m not injecting, I’m not doing that stuff like in you and for you, you’re like, I don’t want to run the practice like from all the tech and the inventory and payroll. So it’s a perfect fit. I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s very unique to have, you know, a partnership like that, and obviously be your your other half. So, I mean, that’s just that’s awesome. Congratulations to you guys. And, and I know that when we were talking, you’re opening up another, a new location, right?
Nina Traster – Yeah, we’re expanding. So, I’m right now in two Suites in a My Salon Suites. So I started off in not even 200 square feet, little tiny sweet, that was basically all by injectables were done in this little room and then in I think it took me six months I ended up getting one across the hall, to get my double bookings in and now we’re actually we’re so happy. We opened it in August 2021 and now we’re gonna be expanding to a five treatment room Standalone, brick, and mortar build out. And it’s gonna be gorgeous, it’s good to probably, we might be able to fit even another room, but it’s gonna be great because we’re gonna expand, we’re gonna get more employees and now hopefully be open in November.
Cameron Hemphill –Wow. That’s amazing. You said August 2021 is when you opened. What I hear a lot of times, and this is where I hear practice owners that struggle, is they think that they have to come on the map and immediately have 100 ,000 followers and build out the state -of -the -art facility, and buy all this amazing expensive lasers and equipment, and really just finance themselves to the brim. Now, they’re just like, have all the stuff, but now they have to get patients. You have done it very correctly.
A lot of other very successful, practice owners that I’ve talked to over the years interviewed over the years, have a very similar story. Right? You you come in you like hey less than 200 square feet. Cool. We’ll figure it out. We’ll see if it works. Okay cool. This is working. Okay second room got it. Okay this is working now this is year two right it’s you know we’re talking today is septembar. So like basically year two and you’re now doing your build out and so you know you guys have done it very very strategically and I’m excited to see this location. It’s going to be in Saint Pete Florida. Right, excited.
Nina Traster – Yes. I it’s me fun because it’s gonna be, you know, I have more space for employees. I was basically crammed to rooms in my purse, assistant at slash esthetician is crammed in with me. So now we’re going to have space and we’ll finally have a front lobby and it’s just it’s been perfect. I can hire more people. The next hiring process is most likely going to be at injector. So, So it’s just it’s evolving and I’m excited to see what happens.
Cameron Hemphill –Sony very cool. And so from going from where you are now when the space is gonna be done and what a month or two?
Nina Traster – Yes, so probably I would say, two months. Give it two months.
Cameron Hemphill – And are you guys, you plan? Oh sorry. Obviously on the contractors. Yeah, oh yeah. Oh yeah. I know I saw your pain there. Um are you guys I was gonna say, are you guys going to expand your services when you go to this new? This new location.
Nina Traster – So currently we have injectables, we do all injectables and we have some high energy devices and we do all skin care services, esthetician Services, I believe. What we may bring on, is Ivy therapy but I don’t, I’m not sold on it yet.
I just think I need a little bit more room for my double booking. So I think keeping it like that, I don’t know if we want to expand that much more.
Cameron Hemphill –But I was asking, okay, not make sense. I was asking curious because everybody that we work with at Growth99, we just constantly see people opening up the wellness side. And that’s like the latest trend. And I’m over here, I’m like, yeah, that is a completely other business to run. There’s a lot going on in the wellness side as well. Are you guys thinking of getting into that at some point?
Nina Traster –Well, my foundation is family medicine and I love family medicine. So I was picking at that idea actually when I first started. I thought I could do everything. I could do family medicine and aesthetics.But I don’t know. I feel like if you brought in it too much, it’s just I like everything to be a niche. And I feel like if I’m an Aesthetics and doing everything I really like to do, I’m just only gonna get better in that if I start taking on more Family Medicine clients, I don’t know if it’s gonna dilute the stuff that I’m bringing out with my aesthetic side, I would have to probably hire out, and see if there’s like a family medicine physician that would want to join, if I would do that route.
Cameron Hemphill –Yeah, that’s a great Point. That’s what I’ve seen people. You know, when they’ve expanded the server, sign the higher, a specialist, you know, like okay you come in, you know, and you work on that will expand the services and that I’ve seen that be be very successful know. That’s, that’s a great point. I think sometimes people need, you know, they feel like they have to do everything, you know, versus be specialized and Niche and so not. I, I totally agree with you. So, you know, talking about like,
How do you continue to to specialize like because this industry? And Specialty, if you will is always evolving, I feel like there’s always a new technique, there’s always like a chorus or like, I don’t know. I, I don’t do injectables, right? How to I’m a nerd. I have it. I have a tech background. Like, I, I know just from talking to people and being at the events, but how do you keep up with all of the changes and advancements in technology and products and skills and techniques?
Nina Traster – I mean the conferences are amazing like aesthetic next I learned so much a snack next by I make sure I go to all these larger conferences. Just not only to hear what else is going on in the market because when you’re have your head down working all day, you don’t really get to hear about the new advances that’s happening in medicine. But when you go to conferences, you kind of get exposed to, I wouldn’t say those are the ones that you learn any good techniques. That’s where you would probably have to venture out and that’s where I do trainings. Like, I like to do private trainings with
well -known injectors around the country and kind of seeing from them how they do different techniques. I feel like if you aren’t going out and educating yourself about what’s going on in the market, you’re going to be stuck doing the same procedures and everyone is evolving and you want to evolve with them. Like how we’re learning now that under eye filler that used to be done superficially is now definitely not done anymore and everyone’s going deep and you want to be below the snaz. Like there’s so many techniques that keep evolving and changing that if you stayed doing the same thing three years ago you’d be doing the wrong procedure and the wrong thing for your client. And the main thing is not just to be be up with like the techniques that people are talking about in TikTok but being the safest for your patient doing the thing that’s going to be safest for them. So I feel like you have to be on it with going and educating yourself about all the conferences and all the news journals. All the journals are being published all the time for there’s Durham journals. There’s plastic surgeons that always post things like you should always just constantly be evolving to be the best for your patient.
Cameron Hemphill – Well said, I mean you have to continuously just like Learn and Advance yourself in this specialty, right? I mean, it’s It’s it’s it’s a continuous thing. I mean there there’s people that are you know, have these techniques and you set it, you know very well said and in terms of going to the conferences with intention.
Um, you know, being present at them understanding, what people are using, what are the new, you know, technology devices coming out strategic ways of how people are injecting and, and going and really like learning from other injectors around the country in the world as well. I mean, that’s that’s phenomenal. And for the audience, I mean, that’s what it takes to stay. Let’s call it in the game for long term, right? Is continuously being like on The Cutting Edge and understanding the advancements. All right. Okay, so we’ve been on here for a while. I know that you’re super busy Nina. I really appreciate your time. And, you know, I I want
I’d love to come visit you guys. I mean I’m here in Florida. I’m just like, I’m not far away. So I’m gonna make it, I’m gonna make it happen. When you guys open the new… Come to the open house. Okay, send me something on the open house. I want to know the date, the time, and my wife and I will come down there and we’ll visit you guys at St. Pete. I mean it’s only like five hours from here, I want to say something like that, so not too far
Nina Traster – It’s not too bad. And yeah, we’ll have a place for you to stay. It will be super fun. Definitely need to come down.
Cameron Hemphill – Okay, you got it. Alright, there you have it guys. This is Nina Trasher, Icon Sears Med Spa. So if they want to find you, learn more about you,
What’s the best, like what’s the best way for them to find you?
Nina Traster – I say so my Instagram handles icon series MedSpa and it’s Unscored Med. Spot. And also icons, here’s medspa.com or they can email me at icons gmail.com.
Cameron Hemphill – Okay guys email her follow her visit her website. Go visit her like, reach out to Nina. She’s incredible. She loves what she does. She’s inspired me. She’s inspired my team and it’s so great to have you. I know you’re super busy. So Nina, thank you so much for your time and until next time, happy injecting
