Diary of a Real-Life Veterinarian: Good Commercials Are Sold With A Smile You Never See

Did you know the secret to selling something with only audio is to be smiling as you record?

Did you know that a smile can be heard?

Have you tried it? That smile is transcendent. It influences. Motivates. Sells.

Don't we all have to pitch ourselves every single day to someone?

Veterinary medicine is no different.

Simba. One of the 54 cats we helped last year from one home.

My job is to understand and translate my mute patient and sell their needs to their parents. Smiling while I sell, albeit the way a ventriloquist does, is the art behind the successful veterinary care sell.

I more appropriately I call it the 'building of trust to the point where the pitch is simplified to a permission versus a negotiation'.

Basil One of 5 cats we took after the owners were evicted from a motel.,
He is safe with us now, but looking for a home.

I am a terrible salesperson. All that nonsense of fluff, fake veneers, and smoky mirrors is exhausting. I am a failure as a phony. I know this. I have had to rely on my genuine compassion to build a clientele willing to entrust their pets care in my hands. Just be me and try to remember to smile every so often. Not too much teeth or arm twisting. Keep the common goal in mind. We all have to be here with the same agenda and the same endpoint. Not an easy task or small hopeful wish.

It's not just lip service. I back it up with skin in the game. I make deals. If needed I will make deals that the house loses on.

Sadie. The most influential patient in my career.
She was my defining moment. My pivot point.

I give stuff away daily. It's the glitter in my vanilla day. It is the thing I love, take greatest delight in, every single day.

Sound crazy? Counter intuitive? Maybe its the easiest way to sell my genuine belief in always putting the patient first.

Saffie. Clinic cat.
Adopted and returned 3 times.
And still loved.

Here's an example.

Miss Phillips was elderly. Small, demure, crumpled and lacking any color in her dense weighty coat. Grey stringy hair, grey overstuffed winter coat, and grey sweatpants. She was seated on the long wide wooden bench in the exam room. Composed, quiet and clutching her coat sleeves enveloping her oversized market bag I think she used as a purse. She was quiet, withdrawn and weathered. She struggled with the weight of the 7 decades she had been alive. She needed help getting into our building. The staff led her into the exam room as they carried her petite dog-sized cat carrier for her. She was soft spoken and easily overlooked. She was a new client with a cat to be seen for a spay. This is the information I am given as I walk into the exam room. "New client, new patient. Cat needs to be spayed." No other information available. Blank slate. Not my favorite place to begin.

Seraphina.
Queen of everything

I say "hello" and start collecting pieces to finish the canvas. "This is Lilly. She is about a year old. She is not spayed." That's all I have. I look up at Ms Phillips. She has no emotion. She doesn't move an inch on the bench. Nestled into her winter coat seemingly swallowing her in its over abundant quilting.

"So, she has never been to the vet before?" I ask.

"No." Volley and serve and still no emotion to guide me on where this is going to end up.

"She is here to start her vaccines and be spayed. Correct?" I repeat. Ms Phillips is not giving me any information willingly. This is going to be a Q&A discussion. I slow down. Mirror her pace and attitude as much as I am able.

I take a minute to look at her again. Switch gears from Lilly to her. "Did you drive here?"

"No, I don't drive."

"Oh," I reply. A sigh of relief washes over me. "Who brought you?"

"My friend drives me."

"Do you have other pets?"

"No."

"No other cats?" Part of my job is sizing people up. Finding common ground whilst understanding the degree to which they invite these pets into their lives. That, and I just had a sense of "cat lady" lingering. Building a relationship to help a pet for their entire life and not this one and done visit. I try to remember to smile inside my inquiries. Add a smile, slow my pace, she seems very nice. I can see myself, someday, in her.

"There is a cat. (long pause).... She is not mine. I let her inside when it is cold. I just had her at the ER over the weekend. She had a respiratory infection. It cost me $300, so now I cannot afford to much for todays exam. I am not allowed to have more than one cat."

And there it was. The shell was cracked. She spilled the beans in just a few sentences and a change of perspective.

We spoke for a few more minutes. She told me that she was renting her house. She was not allowed pets, but her landlords were going to let her keep Lilly as long as she was spayed and vetted. She was here, at my clinic, because we were the most affordable outside of the rescues and non-profits that had a 6 month plus spay/neuter wait time.

"You let this other cat into your home where she sleeps at night. You feed her and now you pay for her to go to a vet clinic, and yet she isn't yours?"

All of a sudden one cat that she couldn't afford was two.

"What is going to happen when she has kittens?"

And with this question the look on Ms. Phillips face fell to the ground. It hadn't occurred to her. This reality where her good deeds put her in a predicament she couldn't manage.

We decided together that she would leave Lilly with us at the clinic. Her friend graciously ok'd bringing her back tomorrow with the other cat, Kitty. I would spay both the next day, and she could pay me back as she could. To save financial resources that she truly didn't have we would cut out the optional items like pre-op blood work. The exchange and change of plans had taken almost 20 minutes of our allotted 30. It had included being honest with who we are. It also included asking for help from the driving friend via a flip phone she dialed to her friend parked in the lot outside, too far for Ms. Phillips to walk again.

The next day I met Kitty. Small, slender, matted and peppered with grit in her coat from the flea dirt. Underweight, under muscled, overlooked and discarded like soo many cats in our community. She was gentle, confident, and melted with any small inkling of affection. She was so grateful for a warm place and a kind heart that she surrendered and collapsed into your arms soaking it all in.

Ms Phillips called later in the day checking on how the two cats did with their spay surgeries. "Fine," I replied. I had estimated Kitty to be about 4-6 years old. She was too sweet to be overlooked anymore. I asked her if she would like us to try to find her a home of her own. I never know if I can persuade others to see the kindness in an all black cat who isn't a kitten, but, she was not a feral cat and she needed a break. Ms. Phillips agreed once again that she couldn't have two cats at her home.

Over the phone (no car to drive and sign papers, remember), she authorized Kitty to stay with us as we tried to find her a home.

You know what happened? Another miracle. Seems so crazy the way miracles find us when we give more than we have to, and offer more than the house makes money on. Ms. Phillips got brave! She went to her landlords and put her cards on the table. She told them that she loved these two cats! That with a little help she was going to take care of them and she asked for permission to have TWO!

They said YES!