 Hello everybody, Andrea here. So I have had my own dental hygiene mobile practice for about two years now. I've been in the dental profession for 15 years. So I definitely have experience on what to do, how to get started when you are a dental hygienist who can now start your own business, which is very exciting. I do teach a course. It's called Mobile RDH Academy. I'll leave the link for you guys down below if you want more information and if you want more. But in the video today, I want to talk to you guys about five things that you really should not wait to get in your business, like get them right away. Don't wait to spend the money later, spend the money now. But I'm also gonna talk about five things that you really might want in your business right now, but you truly don't need until you make the money. Because when you go to start your own business, as with any business out there, you need to budget. So let me talk to you guys about that a little bit at the end as well. So five things what you do need in your business right away, in my opinion, and you can ask others about this too. But definitely open up a business bank account, okay? You might think that seems very simple, but it truly makes a big difference and I'll tell you why. If you just use your regular bank account or if you open up a different bank account that's not necessarily for business or labeled business, you can run into a lot of problems later. If you get audited, if you get sued, if just things don't match up, it will be very hard to prove your purchases later. You might have to end up owing a lot of money back. Whereas if you open a business bank account, it not only keeps you organized, you can bring all of your income into that account only and your business expenses will come out of that account only. That makes it so much easier to come tax time for your accountant, but it also makes it easier for you because as a business owner, you should be comparing per month, per year, your expenses and income, how you can improve and how you can maybe spend less and that's the best way to do it. I do have a full module about that actually in my course if you wanna hear more, but I'm not going to bore you about that yet. The second thing that you really need to get is kind of related to the business bank account aspect is getting a business credit card, sorry, a business credit card. That's very important and it's the same thing. I don't want you guys to just get a separate business card that you're using or sorry, a separate credit card that you're using for your business. I want you to get a business actual card, like one that's a business credit card. Yes, you might have to pay a little more fees but those fees is a business expense. So keep that in mind, okay? I want you guys to get a business credit card because again, it makes it easier come tax time, it makes it easier for your accountant, it makes it easier for you to track things. So anytime you buy something for your business, use that business credit card. Believe me, it makes it so much easier. Number three, and I did leave notes on my other monitor here so I didn't forget anything. Number three is at the very least, I want you guys to get a bookkeeping software. So I'm not talking about a dental software right away. When I first started my business, I didn't have the money to get a dental software. I did all of my charting, bookkeeping, everything on paper, on the computer, on Excel spreadsheets, things like that. But at the very least, I want you guys to get a bookkeeping software. The one that I use is QuickBooks. QuickBooks, it's worth every penny. I think I pay about $10 a month and QuickBooks, I don't have my cell phone with me but every time I use my business bank account, every time I use my business credit card, it goes onto my QuickBooks app. So if I'm in the car waiting for a patient, if I'm in bed doing nothing, if I'm just hanging out and I'm on my cell phone, I can quickly go into my QuickBooks app and look at my income for that day, look at my expenses, put everything through, and then come tax time. All you have to do is go online. I believe it's under the reports menu and print off per month or per year, your income and expenses. You can make categories for different expenses to make it easier for your accountant. It literally took me half an hour to do my taxes this year. Whereas in previous years, without my QuickBooks bookkeeping software, oh my gosh, it took me probably a month to get the paperwork together, to get the forms together. Oh my goodness, it's impossible. Get a bookkeeping software, you will thank me later. Don't wait until your business takes off. Don't wait until you get more patients. Your business will take off. You will get patients. So don't think about that, okay? Get a bookkeeping software. The next one would be get an accountant. So I'm sorry that kind of ties into the business credit card, the business bank account, the bookkeeping software, but get an accountant. Being a small business owner, you cannot do this on your own. You will end up spending more money if you're cheap and don't wanna pay a good accountant because you don't know what to claim. You don't know how to claim it. Your first year, your first couple years in business, certain expenses, you won't get full credit on that right away, such as a sterilizer. I paid about $10,000 for my sterilizer. My accountant explained to me that they take portions of that per year so I get credit on it. They don't do it all year one because they realize a sterilizer is going to last more than one year. But this has saved me a fortune. When I first got an accountant that was the first year in my life, they owed me money. So the government owed me money back. I had always had to pay probably $2,000, $3,000 in taxes at the end of the year. Now they pay me, so it's fantastic because my accountant knows what they're doing. Plus they can set it up so that you pay taxes every three months or every four months from your business so you don't owe a big chunk of change at the end of the year. Get an accountant. You might be wondering how much do I pay for mine? I pay about $500 per year. It's worth every penny. When I just had like a personal accountant, when I first started my business, I just kind of kept the same accountant. I was paying $99 and they made a big mess of things. When my other accountant took over, they had to redo a ton of stuff. So get a good accountant, okay? So number five, what I actually have down here is I do have a dental software. So remember how I said just a couple moments ago, you do not need a dental software right away? Well, you don't. You can do everything on paper like I did but I paid $3,000, that's it. For my current dental software, I wish I had found it sooner. There are other dental softwares out there where you pay $10,000 and you don't even own it. I pay $3,000. It has everything I need, not too much, not too little. Has the odontogram, has the peri-o charting, has the billing payments. You can send things electronically. I talk about it more in my course but get a dental software if you can. Because what happened to me was I got a dental software maybe eight months after I started my business because I did want to save money but I ended up having to go back, put patients into the software like just to kind of keep things organized to get everything to balance out. And that was, it just took too much time. Whereas if I had the software right away, it would have saved me hours in paperwork before. I can't even tell you. It's just if you can afford it, please get a dental software. So those are five things. This video is long enough. So I'm actually gonna stop the video here. This is part one. Part two is going to be five things you might want in your business right away but you don't necessarily need. So stay tuned for part two you guys and thank you so much for watching. If you want to hear more, if you are a dental hygienist who is starting your own business, I do have a full course for that where I talk about everything in greater detail and I help you step by step. I help you with bank accounts. I help you with a business plan. I help you with budgeting. I help you with how to get certain supplies off of Amazon for a lot cheaper. Where to shop for your dental supplies for the best deals. How to get the best deals. I go through everything. So if you're interested, I'll leave the info for my course below and I'll talk to you guys very soon and stay tuned for part two.