09/22/2026
Marketing a specialty startup isn’t like marketing a GP.
You’re not chasing new patients directly. You’re building relationships with the GPs who send them to you. That’s the whole game.
Dr. Paula, opening North Star Implants and Periodontics, TMO’s first ever specialist startup, has spent the last several months doing exactly that. Study clubs, lunches with local GPs, dropping off a folder at every office she visits: a little about her, the insurances she accepts, and a sample communication letter with her actual cell number on it.
Her promise in that letter: she sends it the day after seeing your patient, before any treatment happens. As a general dentist herself, nothing irritated her more than referring out one tooth and getting the patient back with four implants and zero explanation.
Even her hygienist relationships matter. She’s already got 15 patients scheduled next month, half of them referred by hygienists she’s built relationships with.
New episode of The Making Of, link in bio.
If you’re a specialist, how are you building your referral network?
