Quite often, chiropractors shy away from adding services out of fear they will cannibalize their practice. Dr. Olivia Joseph from The Wellness Connection in Missouri has been treating patients using functional medicine in her chiropractic office for almost 20 years. Not only does it provide a sizeable cash revenue stream but is also one of their best referral funnels for chiropractic care. Go to thewellnessconnection.com to contact Dr. Olivia or get more information. 

About the Guest:

Dr. Olivia Joseph received her undergraduate degree in biology at Fairleigh Dickinson University, in her home state of New Jersey. She then earned a Bachelor of Science in human biology and her Doctor of Chiropractic degree from Logan College of Chiropractic in Chesterfield, Missouri.

In addition to her passion for living the chiropractic lifestyle, Dr. Olivia is also certified in clinical nutrition and acupuncture. She regularly gives her time to community events and is qualified to help you and your family live a healthier lifestyle through the benefits of natural wellness care.

About the Host:

Dr. Joseph Esposito,CEO

Dr. Joseph Esposito, D.C., C.C.N. C.N.S., C.C.S.P., D.A.B.C.N., F.A.A.I.M. C.T.N., is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of AlignLife. As such, he is responsible for the direction of AlignLife as it expands further across a dynamic and rapidly changing healthcare landscape. Dr. Esposito has more than 20 years of experience in a broad range of businesses, including chiropractic, nutrition, technology, and internet marketing.

Dr. Esposito has extensive post-graduate academic accomplishments, as well as 15 years of experience managing successful chiropractic clinics in multiple states. He also is the founder and CEO of Aceva LLC, a service-based nutritional company providing products and services to the AlignLife clinics. As the former CFO of an internet publishing company, Dr. Esposito understands the power of leveraging the internet to impact the lives of millions of Americans.

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Dr. Joseph Esposito: Hello, welcome to another episode of align your practice podcast. This is Dr. Joe Esposito. And I have a special guest, a good friend of mine, Dr. Olivia Joseph, how are you?

Dr. Olivia Joseph: I'm great. Thanks for having me.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: Well, I'm excited to kind of break down some of the stories. And I know I have had them, I don't know if you had them. But the two big stories when you integrate in the chiropractic model other services, and we want to break those down, the first one is talking about, if I bring in nutrition or another service like this, I'm going to lose my chiropractic philosophy, they're not going to understand Cairo, they got to think it's all this other service. And the second one being, I don't want to cannibalize the chiropractic, we're going to lose our chiropractic patients, because I'm going to integrate another service, they can't afford the other serve, they're going to stop Cairo, it's going to ruin the practice. And I know I had those. So let's break those down. I want to basically first talk about your background you've been, I was gonna say 11 years, but you just told me 18 years in this practice, because I remember you leave in Peoria, I thought it was a decade ago.

Dr. Olivia Joseph: Then nutrition in car and for my first I'd say two years of practice. That was a hybrid of where I did chiropractic, acupuncture and nutrition. And that's not that easy for one doctor to do alone, right? When we transitioned into this practice, 18 years ago, I dropped adjusting now, before anybody gets angry. I've six adjusters in my clinic right now we have dropped chiropractic or chiropractic philosophy. We just kind of split up into everybody's string. Yeah,

Dr. Joseph Esposito: that's huge. So that's clarity as like you, you're still honoring his chiropractic philosophy, and you have a scaling huge chiropractic business that I want people to realize there was no compromise on the philosophy of chiropractic. In fact, it's grown exponential, your chiropractic part of your business. So so let's talk about the first one real quick. What you went to the functional side, what happened to the philosophy of the business on innate intelligence, chiropractic, the essence of what BJ talked about, give me some scoop. When you started to build this other vertical? Oh, I

Dr. Olivia Joseph: feel like I fell in love with chiropractic philosophy. As a teenager, I started going to a chiropractor prophylactically. And I remember, you know, this is like 1994 or five, going to my high school guidance counselor and talking to her about I was explaining like this, what I wanted to get into, and she's like, that doesn't exist, that doesn't exist, that doesn't exist. So you want to be a dietitian? I'm like, No, do you want to be, you know? Or I'm like, No. And I was kind of explaining it. And it didn't exist. Well, I found this chiropractor. He was an AK doctor. He did nutrition completely changed my life. I didn't have a musculoskeletal issue. I had chronic digestive issues since I was old enough to talk. You know, I was I was it was great that I grew up in an era where we weren't pushing all these medications and procedures on children. And my pediatrician was like 70 years old, so he was even more conservative. So I just fell in love with chiropractic philosophy, and it made so much sense to me. So I knew I was gonna go into nutrition, I knew it. And what I found was chiropractic as, as a as a philosophy and as an art had the best scope of practice. So I remember, I did my undergrad and then I went to I came to Logan and I remember running into a DC that also was a natural pass. And he was like, Olivia, based on the path you want to go on, you should really consider naturopathic school. And I was like, no, because they're not. At that time. They were not regulated in so many states. So I, you know, I adjusted I was a pretty decent adjuster. I was subluxation based. That was the philosophy just after a couple years of doing that I realized was so many great chiropractors out there that can adjust. I was in practice with my husband. He's a phenomenal adjuster, like, why am I focused on this when I have this gift, and this passion, and a lot of people in chiropractic didn't like that or hadn't like that over my 20 year career. I find now it's becoming a lot more open minded and integrative than it was even just a decade ago.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: So So talking through that, like let's say someone's listening and they're a chiropractor, and they want to integrate another level, long term, getting a practitioner or even starting with that, like what we do in a line life is we have a health coach under the doctor's discretion to do 85 90% of functional service where we're looking at deficiency vitamin D, we're looking at baseline gut issues we're looking at remove inflammatory diet, things that may not be the level that you've taken your current practice, but do you agree with me that the first step is having somebody a practitioner health coach, it could be naturopathic doctor could be a Cairo that specializes in it. But some practitioner and I think starting with a health coach will get you to this differentiate a department of the office to enable scale because what I always make fun of our profession is if a chiropractor opened up a hospital, a new wing in a hospital, they would ask the oncologist to do the pediatric service, just go and do that, like a chiropractors thinks that they can do all the nutrition stuff and all that. No, it's another department, you can't do it. All right. I mean, isn't that the truth,

Dr. Olivia Joseph: that's how it is in our practice. And I tell you doing it all, my first three, practice, it doesn't work, it doesn't. And it even got to the point, I remember, when we had to drop the acupuncture part, it was really a business move, I believe in I'm trained in Chinese medicine, you know, I'm one year away from a naturopathic degree I, you know, all that jazz. I really, I, we got rid of it. Because an accreditor was gonna be thinking this business wise, like active, took up a lot of time and space. It wasn't that it didn't help people. When you look about what you can do with chiropractic volume, removing subluxation, in a short window of time, how many people you can see, when you look at nutrition, nutrition can be really efficient, too. You could do it with a health coach, you could do it in groups. When we when we opened 18 years ago, we launched this group called a group visit, it wasn't just for patients just opened, it was open to the public, where we were going to teach them about chiropractic, moving their body, what they were thinking what they were eating detoxification deficiencies. So we taught a group of 85 people, probably within two months of opening about all of this and did it bring new patients in the practice? Yes, some for multiple services, some just for nutrition, and some just for chiropractic. But what I will tell you in what my team will tell you, we've got like nine practitioners right now, is the people who come for nutrition are the easiest people in the world to refer to chiropractic, all day, every day. Because on our nutrition side, it's no insurance, we're not doing verification, you know, it's all text so that when they can go to chiropractic, and pay for an adjustment, that's a fraction of the cost that our nutrition is which you guys don't have, like we're advanced nutrition. So we're building out functional treatment plans, and but to be a Cairo and not understand the foundational nutrition for reducing inflammation for allowing tissue to heal for mobility. Like, you're crazy to miss that piece of the puzzle. Yeah,

Dr. Joseph Esposito: and that's, that's huge. So the second big story that we tell ourselves on an integrated model, is they'll cannibalize the chiropractic. So you're saying what you just said, is your nutrition side of business is the best referral mechanism for the Cairo's what you're saying is they let go of that story. It's not going to destroy your chiropractic practice, right? Yeah,

Dr. Olivia Joseph: I think it's the easiest referral source, right, like your existing patients are your best referral? Well, from department to department, like functional medicine to Cairo, transitions are so easy, you know, and, and it's not always the other way. Right. And I think if Kira went into, if you added nutrition, like you said, with a health coach or in like group visits, with some basic foundational nutritional principles with creating content that lives online, maybe VIP groups, things of that nature, you're not cannibalizing your time, and you're certainly not cannibalizing your practice, how I did it when I started is I had adjusting hours, and I had nutritional counseling hours. And that's how I started now, I probably not recommend that that's not an easy way to do it, the better way to do it is to have a health coach, or naturopath or, you know, somebody in that regard, or to do it in a group visit. That was a little different for me, I removed subluxations you know, by removing chemical subluxations so for me it was always going to be one on one patient care.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: Yeah, I think that's that's a smart move is first for the chiropractor to delineate in their brain that this is another in a sense business. It's another vertical it's another service offering and treat it as such. And what I was saying earlier, joking around, a chiropractor is going to just do all of it like in a hospital you can have a pediatrician, run ecology department, you can't have a Cairo that's adjusting, run a nutrition department, you're not respecting it, you're not doing quality care, you're not driving the vertical of revenue. So on Align life, what we teach is start with a health coach. But like you said, if you're really confident you have the cash flow, and you want a naturopathic doctor, great, bring in a great clinician, but at least start with a health coach right off the bat. So you have a separate department. I think where we get caught is where I'm going to Do it until we get to a certain level. And then you cannibalize your Cairo. Right? You probably did that cannibalize where you're doing Cairo to do a lot on the trician. And you've never get the revenue to grow and you're stuck doing both. That's what I've seen.

Dr. Olivia Joseph: Yeah, I think I caught it early enough where it never got to cannibalize Cairo because I was blessed enough to not be a single Cairo, right, I have my husband, I'm like pulled up, he can take 20 of my adjustments. And that allows me an opportunity to take however many more one on one cases per day, and that's still how we run our business, like, our departments feed each other. So we do sell multiple services. And I would never say one rubs the other unless you've got a really confused philosophy, or you're not clear on what your products are, like, if your product is clear, your philosophy is clear. It's chiropractic, it's removing subluxation. Awesome. Then you figure out the nutritional layer that honors that.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: Yeah, what I love about your practice is Brian was telling me it's pretty siloed evenly and you guys looking at it, like a seven figure business and nutrition. So we're not looking at playing games, a little bit of nutrition, we're looking at it's a viable true business. That's about equal to the Cairo which is pretty pretty powerful. That's that's the dream we have in integration is that you have a vertical of people coming in because they're overweight, because they're tired because they're depressed because they have autoimmune disease. And all those people are most likely have subluxed subluxation physical subluxation on top of the chemical subluxation that need the Cairo care, it's been my experience as the same as yours is I was doing a lot of even work with cancer patients and all kinds of people and guess what? They need chiropractic care and 90% of those cases and the referral was, it was a no brainer, and I didn't see a lot of cannibalizing on money where it was like, they got to nutrition care. And they stopped Cairo. I don't know if you did, but I don't

Dr. Olivia Joseph: know think about it this way. Okay, so there was like, you know, Panera Bread CO, and they realized as a business, you know, they were clear on their philosophy, they were clear on their products, they realized that as a business, like volume wise, they can only do so much so like they figured out business wise, if we offer everybody a pastry for 99 cents, it's going to increase our revenue by that much like that, that works. You know, it's, it's, it's not that you're up selling people, you're you're choosing these things that are good for them. These people are going outside of your practice and buying nutritional products. They're buying them on Amazon or they're buying them, God forbid, Walmart, you know what I mean? Plenty of people are buying stuff at Costco. People know there's a need for this, these nutritional supplements, people know that they need to live a healthy lifestyle. They're trying to do it, but they're doing it blind, like we are the most qualified to lead them. That's it. And if you have a health coach, like, that's your that's your synergy. It's synergistic. It's not robbing Peter to pay Paul. Yeah,

Dr. Joseph Esposito: I'm glad you said that. Because I only saw to just catapult the business. And I, you know, I built six clinics, my first year, six years in practice, one a year because of this synergy, and I keep talking as loud as I can. And the common thread is what we're breaking down now is no, it doesn't hurt, hurt the chiropractic. So why do you think it's created, in my experience creates so much success with it and your experience? It's unbelievable. You probably didn't dream the level of success you had in in business, as you have now, do you attribute it to this integration of philosophy or your husband's a great business guy? I know a lot of it plays a role. But isn't this a really the philosophy that you have? And I have one of the main pieces, forget the marketing for a second. And the business isn't just this ability that we're really truly helping people with so many facets of their issues. It's not just they have a subluxation they're also overweight and inflamed. Do you think that's a big piece of why you gain that much success?

Dr. Olivia Joseph: For sure. So if you had me and my husband on here, or if you talk to him about business in a chiropractic practice, like we're talking about synergy, there's no doubt there you're gonna meet very few people that are in health care. I don't care if you're an MD and MD A Cairo a nurse, a health coach that are as passionate about nutrition as I am. That passion was in me long before I went to chiropractic school it just so that was my driving force. And my husband being business systems procedure guy also Cairo also in health care. He was like, okay, lift, but you got to make it a system and you have to make it profitable the end and I could give you so many stories of where I was about to burn myself out crash and burn in you know, nutrition and chiropractic and Brian saved And then we would hockey puck to the next level hockey puck to the next level. It's like it's the same. It's the same rules and principles in chiropractic apply to nutrition. It's one in the same. It's really hard. And I've coached so many medical doctors that have transitioned into integrative and functional. They've got a really hard time because they're still one foot in this philosophy. And now they're stepping one foot here. Yeah, it's the same philosophy for us. You know what I mean? Like,

Dr. Joseph Esposito: there's no cool lawsuit, there's no contradiction. That's a good point. Because they think well, they're gonna know it's the same story. It's a neat human potential, giving the body what it needs to to thrive. Do you think when I look at what we do, and I look at like the Walmarts, the big Superstore, why did those get so successful? Versus when we were kids? Everything was separate? I think because that's what's happening in healthcare. Right? We're doing the supercenter Is it time Is it money? Or is it all of it because I like going to Walmart to get a bicycle and and some fruit and being able to check out my daughter needs something and it's like, okay, she got a bicycle, and I got some whenever we're out of here, or target where you have multiples in health care. I think it's timing that and clarity of I have I've trust in you. I'm going to GNC anyway. Why don't I just get it here? Do you think that's the it's time and trust? Bought

Dr. Olivia Joseph: on your spot on I literally was at the oh well woman visit. And I see they're selling vitamins. And I'm like, and I'm like, that makes sense to me. Like I'm going. You're at an OB GYN office to be getting high quality prenatals choline, vitamin D, great quality products that support hormone health. Hell yeah. versus me as a consumer, having symptoms, walking up and down these aisles in health food stores, talking to somebody in retail, and taking their advice on what I should be taking. Like, that doesn't make sense. You said it perfectly. It's not a contradiction. It's not a contradiction. This is so synergistic, that it's just, I feel like we're missing the mark. You're missing the mark if you're not doing it.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: Yeah, that's so huge. Awesome. Awesome. Well, I appreciate you getting on. So those of you who are listening, listen, Olivia is one of the most passionate people in functional medicine. I've known her for a couple of decades. I'm sure if you have any question you can reach out support airline life.com. And we can put you in touch maybe with Olivia or any of her programs, if you're sick, if you're hurt. If you need help you have a chronic condition as a practitioner, I would I would urge you to reach out to Olivia and engage in her services. An amazing clinician, good friend, thank you so much for forgetting on and I just want people that understand and align life what we're doing is the integrated model. We're proud of it, we stand we stand for it, we believe in it. We know it's the right model for chiropractors, so if you're interested, please reach out. We'd love to love to help any final thoughts, Olivia?

Dr. Olivia Joseph: No, I think you nailed it. I really do. I we've always kind of agreed upon it. And I've seen a lot of people see the light so to speak, you know, people completely abandoned chiropractic to jump to this side and and I mean, you know, in your heart of hearts it you don't have to pick one or the other. Right? Like you have a mom and a dad. Maybe you have a favorite or but like they go together.

Dr. Joseph Esposito: Awesome. That's awesome. Well, I appreciate it. And hopefully I will have you on again soon. And again, guys. If you want to reach out to her services. She'll have a link in the show notes. Thanks so much. Thanks.