Elijah Desmond is the genius behind Smiles at Sea, Dentistry's Got Talent and Driven Dental Marketing (just to name a few of his projects). He's well known across the Facebook community for his big smile, positivity and abundance mindset. We'll discuss the importance of diversifying your businesses, how his team is pivoting to provide amazing experiences this fall and perhaps... some of his future projects.
Kicking off, Elijah talks about when it all got real while so many leaders in the dental space (Studio 8E8 included) were in New Orleans, Louisiana for the Delivering Wow Summit 2020. He talks about the heat from his Facebook community and when his mind started to absorb the severity of what was going on with COVID-19.
Elijah, also known as DJ Smile, has worked to marry ideas and create connections his entire life starting with his experience as a motivational speaker. Why couldn’t the same energy of a DJ hyping up high school students be present at a dental conference where he found himself scrolling on his phone?
He wanted to create something that was engaging, creative, and full of energy.
“One of our core values is fun - if it is not fun, we do not do it”
Speaking about his company that puts on Smiles at Sea - an action-packed event for practice owners and their teams - Elijah goes into why fun is such a huge part of his vision and how he’s planning to bring fun to events for years to come.
“2021 is going to be the year of collaboration”
It’s easier to join forces as a conference than to do it by yourself - he mentions plans for collaboration with other marketers and other conferences to create the ideal experience for the people who would attend - keeping their time front of mind. If there’s a word for 2020, that word is pivot. We are all being forced to pivot and be innovative for our practices, companies, events, families and mental health. A pivot from dental implant marketing, for example, has pivoted to marketing for emergency virtual consults which then pivots to marketing for virtual implant consultations - it’s time to think out of the box and put in the work to see how COVID-19 can work for you.
“Are our patients ready to break down the doorway? It’s our job to make them ready”
It’s the job of the doctors, dentists and practice owners to make their communities feel known, cared for, and understood by heading off their concerns with a response rather than reacting to what comes their way.
“It’s a good thing to work on your businesses, but the fact is when it’s time like this, you’ve got to get in your business”
Take the gloves off, take the trash out and get to work. Working on your business is great, but right now we have the opportunity to get into the weeds and hash out the minor issues piling up to come out of COVID-19 more efficient and more ready than we were before.
