About this episode
Bruce Troll, who started Gentle Heart Transportation in Gainesville, Florida at 59 and a half and is now 61, priced his first rides off national averages he found online and then discovered every competitor near him charged more. He now moves quotes up $10 at a time until he meets resistance, and defends the number with perceived value: immaculate Ram ProMaster vans, foam dampeners that kill the slideboard squeak, and stretcher service included. Facilities pay every two weeks or monthly, so receivables climb fast, and he treats private pay, facilities and brokers as three legs of one stool.
Key takeaways
- Carrying oxygen required an online course plus an in person class at a Jacksonville scuba shop, the same regulator training divers take. Troll ran without it at first and lost work.
- He Googled the brokers operating in Florida and applied to nearly all of them. Two or three produce real volume, and they fill the dead time around private pay and stretcher trips.
- Ride count is a bad metric. Troll pulls the same date range month over month and compares gross revenue instead of chasing eight or ten rides a day.
- Facilities will not prepay, so line up a line of credit or a cash float. Receivables run from zero to five or ten thousand dollars before the first check arrives.
- For Google reviews he hands passengers a QR code card and walks older riders off Yahoo and AOL onto Gmail, because most of them have never left a review before.
Chapters
- 0:00 Introduction to Private Pay NEMT Secrets
- 0:30 Plans for Organic Growth and Expansion
- 1:55 The Evolution of Pricing Strategy
- 3:30 The "Half a Loaf is Better Than None" Philosophy
- 4:45 Creating Perceived Value for Your Service
- 6:15 Unexpected Lessons: The Oxygen Requirement
- 7:20 The Importance of Public Speaking and Securing Contracts
- 8:20 Managing Billing and Accounts Receivable for Facilities
- 10:55 Leveraging Brokers to Fill in Your Schedule
- 11:55 The Three Legs of a Successful NEMT Business
- 13:10 The Importance of a Professional Website and Google Reviews
- 15:05 The Human Side of the NEMT Business: An Unforgettable Passenger Story
- 18:15 Why "Number of Rides" is a Poor Metric for Success
- 18:50 Measuring success with Bambi's Reports feature
- 20:05 The SEO and AI Optimization Game
- 21:36 Bambi's software pricing and support is awesome
- 22:00 The Benefits of Using the Right NEMT Software (aka Bambi)
- 24:53 RUN BAMBI RUN!!
