Winning The Apprentice Was Just the Start

0:00Alex Chisnall:What stops founders from building something meaningful isn't the lack of ideas, it's the fear of getting started. I'm Alex Chisnall and this is Screw It Just Do It, the podcast for people who are ready to stop waiting, take action and make things happen.

0:14Dr Leah Totton:I never expected to win. You know, a lot about business is about timing and there's a luck element to that as well. I entered a really very booming, lucrative sector at the right time before it became saturated. The transition from working as a doctor to being a businesswoman, they're really, really different. Launching any business is so, so hard. And there was some naivety on my part that I expected that once we launched, we would open the doors of the clinic and there would be this inundation of people who were dying to use my service. And that isn't actually what happened. You don't always actually...

0:58Alex Chisnall:Before we get into today's conversation, this is genuinely relevant for a lot of founders listening. Are you running a business that pays supplies abroad, receives international payments, or operates across borders? World First helps founders manage global payments and FX more efficiently with access to competitive exchange rates and tools designed specifically for growing businesses. If your business is doing anything internationally, this is well worth a look. World First have given us an exclusive offer for podcast listeners to get 50 transactions completely fee-free for 60 days. Head to worldfirst.com forward slash screw it to create a free account and claim now.

1:37Alex Chisnall:Now let's jump into the main conversation. So to dive straight in, we'd love to know for our listeners, what was your situation business-wise before you went on to The Apprentice? Was it just an idea or was it already fully functioning clinic and you look to kind of scale that off the back of the investment

1:55Dr Leah Totton:so when I did the apprentice I was working full-time as an NHS doctor I had trained in aesthetics and I was doing some aesthetics but for other clinics not my own so it was very much a idea at that point I didn't have a business skill and in fact I had absolutely no business experience when I did the show.

2:16Alex Chisnall:Interesting okay and if you hadn't won and received the investment from Lord Sugar what was the plan was there was there a life plan for Leah?

2:26Dr Leah Totton:I yeah it was very different so I was really enjoying working as an NHS doctor I had applied to do I was working in emergency medicine at the time and I had applied to specialize in obstetrics and gynecology and I would have just began my obstetrics and gynecology career so I always knew that I wanted to work with women um and in the medical field but I yeah had a had a diversion from gynecology to dermatology um which was yeah a little bit I never expected to win I you know when you when I applied for the show and I think it's seen for a lot of people who apply for these sorts of things you don't always actually think that you're gonna win um so yeah it was it was definitely a a whirlwind of a year and yeah I won and we set up the clinic I did my master's in derm rather than in gynecology and so dermatology rather than gynecology and yeah I have been doing cosmetic medicine full-time pretty much full-time I went back and did GP training actually in the NHS it took a few years part-time in the business to do that but yeah I do a lot now of cosmetic medicine and a lot of business.

3:49Alex Chisnall:Fantastic and my research tells me that I understand that you being among the most successful winners business-wise from The Apprentice how does how does that make you feel?

4:01Dr Leah Totton:yeah I think you know a lot about business is a lot of business people don't say this but a lot of it is about timing and there's a lock element to that as well so I think I entered a really you know very very booming lucrative sector at the right time before it became saturated and the business sort of rose with with that boom that we've seen in the in the non-surgical cosmetic sector over the past decade so yeah probably more luck than judgment but I probably yeah I think I am probably one of the more successful winners what have been some of the

4:39Alex Chisnall:biggest challenges that you've had from say transitioning to to where you were to where you

4:45Dr Leah Totton:are now I think for me the hardest thing was the the hardest thing I think was from the transition from working as a doctor to being a businesswoman they're really really different and although there's some transferable skills you're not really I don't think I needed a lot of support in that first year from Alan Sugar from my business partner on just a lot of stuff practical stuff um like finding a D1 use so medical use premises in London doing a 200 ,000 pound refurbishment at that point I mean we've done the reverse ones the other two clinics were almost double that but the first one was that that was a lot of a lot to undertaking with no building experience recruiting staff finance PR and marketing and just understanding the challenges of setting up a business I'm seeing it again because I'm doing it again now with the skincare which is a completely different business because my I'm a service-based business entrepreneur and now branching into product it's very different there's a different set of challenges but launching any business is so so hard and I think you expect and I think there's some night there was some naivety on my part that I expected that once we launched we would open the doors of the clinic and there would be this inundation of people who were dying to use my service and that isn't actually what happened we we invested you get 250 000 as is well publicized after the show i can tell you even 10 years ago that doesn't go very far in central london if you think that the price of an average cosmetic laser is 100 000 so that just opened you pay six months rent deposit in central london that's also about 100 000 so you just about have enough to get your doors open and cash flow is a problem in those early, early months of the business.

6:41Dr Leah Totton:So you end up not taking a salary or you take a very, very minimal salary, which is difficult because you're living in central London and you're trying to build your clientele. For me, that was the hardest part, building my customer base. And it takes time, especially in something like aesthetics, because it's based on trust. And, you know, you have to earn the consumer's trust. We have now with Dr. Leah Clinics, we've WAMP, Best Clinic London, consecutive years. We've got a massive client database. We've got a great team of award-winning doctors, but that isn't something that happens overnight.

7:17Dr Leah Totton:That's something that took many years to grow. And I think that I probably was not prepared for how hard it was going to be to get customers. That's the truth. I think that was my biggest challenge in business, getting customers. And it will be as well for the skincare. So I've spent seven years making an amazing skincare there's the best moisturizer and cleanser ever but you know i'm still not gonna i still need to get that out there and get that to people and they need to experience that for themselves use the products they're largely using the clinics um in order for them to see the quality so you can have a great quality product or service but getting people to utilize it i think

7:59Alex Chisnall:is the biggest challenge that's really interesting and and given the situation you're in now with launching the skincare range so so so maybe talk us through that i think this would be really helpful for people listening and who are either thinking of starting a business or have a relatively new business but how what do the plans look like then what's the marketing look like for actually going out and um introducing the range to to new customers and then you know those strategies around repeat business which is obviously what you're looking for do you have like a subscription model anything like that um tell us a little bit about that so with the product we're coming from

8:40Dr Leah Totton:a slightly a slightly privileged place in launching this product and that we have three sites who see hundreds of women per week who are all our target audience so and actually if i'm being really honest when i launched the apprentice i had just done a national tv show we had all of the the we had huge huge amount of press interest especially because of controversy at that time valentine sugar invested in the Botox clinic um so there was a huge amount of coverage huge huge um amount of PR and it was still hard so when I'm giving this advice I understand I'm coming from a place of privilege there and I cannot imagine and it was still hard for me so I cannot imagine how I have the utmost respect for entrepreneurs who do that without any of that and I because it's hard to do it even when you do have that so from my point of view I'm launching I've got a massive client database that we're obviously selling the products to and they're doing very well we need to get it out to mass market though and that is what we that is that is where the challenge is for us so we are doing PR around the products and online sales so I believe that the future is online we are selling by our website we've built a new website drleaskincare.co.uk which is linked to our existing website or you can just put it in google and we're doing a big digital marketing campaign around that there will be a subscription service where we post you out you can calculate your dose of your cleanser and moisturizer on the website so we'll get there's a questionnaire you complete it and we tell you it's it's dose dependent depend it's for every skin type but everyone and on your skin type you need a different amount so you and i would use different amounts yeah and we will know when your product's going to run out and if you sign up to a subscription service we'll send you another one um which i think will be really useful and their core product so you'll always need a cleanser you'll always need a moisturizer but even with that it's you know it's a heavily heavily saturated marketplace and it's going to take time again to to build that audience to get the product out there um social media is the other thing i think you've got to be careful with social media because you can end up paying influencers i mean obscene some of the quotes that we've been given i have nearly fell off my seat i mean that i just we just could not make a return on that you know it would there is not they couldn't sell enough product that it would ever make a return yeah um for us so i think you have to be careful of that and we've always had that with the business i remember this is 10 years ago so market was a bit different then when we launched the murgate clinic in the city i did some advertising in the metro which at that point was like 10 000 for a double page spread i think it's probably a lot cheaper next a lot of things we have went online um but you know i paid that several times before i realized we're not gonna ever make a return on this so and i think now that market has moved towards instagram and your influencer market.

11:50Dr Leah Totton:So it's about getting, managing the budget carefully and doing as much as you can yourself.

11:56Alex Chisnall:So that's it for today's bite-sized episode of Screw It, Just Do It. Make sure you follow or subscribe for more game-changing conversations. And remember, the only thing standing between you and your business breakthrough is the decision to screw it and just do it.