Sam Cooper, the senior district Sales Manager for InMode, joins us to share his
remarkable journey from copier sales to becoming a leading figure in the aesthetic
medical sales industry. Hear about his engaging experiences with celebrity plastic
surgeons in Los Angeles and his insights into the Medical Sales Career Builder
program, which aims to help candidates stand out in this highly competitive field. We
explore the increasing popularity of non-invasive procedures and the advantages they
offer over traditional surgeries, alongside Sam’s personal anecdotes of working with
high-profile clients.
We delve into the intricacies of various cosmetic surgeries, including facelifts, tummy
tucks, and the ever-popular mommy makeover, offering a detailed look at their financial
implications and what patients should realistically expect. Sam demystifies common
stereotypes associated with plastic surgeons and highlights the importance of choosing
qualified practitioners to ensure optimal results. The conversation also shifts to the
rising trend of men seeking cosmetic procedures, breaking down societal stereotypes,
and discussing the evolving perspectives on male cosmetic surgery.
In the final segment, we emphasize the critical role of personal responsibility in
achieving successful long-term surgical outcomes. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle and
having realistic expectations are key, and Sam shares why some candidates might be
turned away by surgeons. We wrap up with a discussion on the ethics of cosmetic
surgery certification, stressing the importance of selecting board-certified professionals
for procedures like Brazilian Butt Lifts. Don't miss this comprehensive look into the world
of medical sales and aesthetic medicine, designed to inspire and educate anyone
interested in this dynamic industry.
Meet the guest:
Sam Cooper is an accomplished professional in the medical device industry,
specializing in the aesthetics sector. With extensive experience in non-invasive
treatments and connections with celebrity plastic surgeons, Sam brings valuable
insights into the evolving world of plastic surgery. He emphasizes the importance of
hard work, networking, and achieving natural-looking results. Sam is also passionate
about the integration of biohacking and aesthetics, advocating for self-worth and
positive affirmation in the decision-making process. His forward-thinking perspective
and dedication to the field highlight the significance of supportive team dynamics and
the increasing number of men seeking aesthetic procedures.
Best Book –
Outlive: The Science and Art of LongevityBook by Bill Gifford and Peter Attia
Best Restaurant –
Joe Fortes Seafood & Chop House
https://www.linkedin.com/in/inmodescoop/
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Episode Transcript
00:07 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Hello and welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast. I’m your host, Samuel, founder of a revolutionary medical sales training and mentorship program called the Medical Sales Career Builder, and I’m also host of the Medical Sales Podcast. In this podcast, I interview top medical sales reps and leading medical sales executives across the entire world. It doesn’t matter what medical sales industry from medical device to pharmaceutical, to genetic testing and diagnostic lab you name it. You will learn how to either break into the industry, be a top 10% performer within your role or climb the corporate ladder. Welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast and remember, I am a medical sales expert, sharing my own opinion about this amazing industry and how it can change your life. Hello and welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast. I’m your host, Samuel, and today we have with us another special guest, and he goes by the name of Sam Cooper.
01:06
Now, this is an episode you can’t miss. It doesn’t matter who you are, whether you’re someone that wants to get into medical sales, you’re someone that’s in medical sales, someone that’s leading the way or someone that’s just listening to a new podcast. You got to listen to this one because Sam works in aesthetics, and he works in plastic aesthetics, which means all of his friends because he’s in LA, are the celebrity plastic surgeons, as well as his customers and the things we get into. On this episode, we literally talk about things from how often are men or women getting whatever they’re getting? What’s their sentiment around it?
01:42
What does it really mean to be a plastic surgery sales rep? How are teams built and how do they do what they do? And where’s all this technology going? What are we going to be able to do 10, 15, 20 years from now? This is one of those episodes that’s packed full of information so much that we had to break it up into two parts, so I will say no more. As always, we’re doing our best to bring you guests or do things differently in the medical space, so I really do hope you enjoy this interview. Hey, Sam, how are you doing today?
02:09 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Doing good. How are you doing?
02:11 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I’m fantastic. Why don’t you tell the audience who you are and what you do?
02:20 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
My name is Sam Cooper. I’m the district sales manager for InMode, and InMode is a medical device company that specializes in aesthetic medical devices.
02:25 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Tell you know what I like to do when, when anybody gets on the show. What do you know about us? And and, of course, how’s your day going?
02:32 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Day’s going really good. Had a good week.
02:34 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah, I love to hear.
02:35 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
All right, yeah, so I guess you know I took a look at your after I got the LinkedIn message. I took a look at your guys’s Spotify playlist so I went through that. So it looks like you got you kind of like go through all the different medical sales industries and which was really cool, cause I’d never really seen people from like orthopedic and pharmaceutical and you know, I kind of live in like a completely different world, I guess. And then, if I’m correct, you also kind of use that for like networking and recruiting and connecting people and kind of educating people about all the different types of industries, right?
03:18 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Exactly. You know, our mission is straightforward in that I want you know, we want to get everyone educated on the world of medical sales, and when I say medical sales, I’m talking pharma, medical device, genetic testing, you know, lab, any type, any type, diagnostic, anything that’s sold in medicine. We want to be exposing people to opportunities to work within that space and we want to be exposing people to opportunities to work within that space. And then our program actually focuses on helping candidates that have no experience, helping them get positions in medical sales, a little differently than hiring a recruiter or just trying to go to the company. We actually have a network of engineers we work with and we train students on. You know how do you put your best foot forward, how do you make yourself shine so that when you’re in an interviewing pool with other candidates, you’re the one that they’re paying attention to? Yeah, Absolutely. So. Yeah, that’s what we do. That’s really smart. You said it again.
04:23 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Really smart, that’s what the industry needs, for sure yeah.
04:27 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah, you know, you know our mission is to, you know, can we uplift the end? Can we give the industry a facelift by pouring everything we can into these students so that when they get these jobs, they’re not just, you know, run of the mill people that are doing this to try and do it. There are people that understand why they’re there, know why they’re there, want to be there and are ready to give it their best foot forward to ultimately improve patient outcomes. Yeah, and that’s what makes us happy, man.
04:57 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
That’s cool.
05:00 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah, so talk to me about you In mode. I am a little familiar with. In mode I see you’re a rock star rep that now has been tasked to lead a bunch of other rock star reps. Talk to me, man. You know what is. What do you love about what you do and what do you want to absolutely make sure we highlight in our episode today?
05:28 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
sure we highlight in our episode today. So I, first of all, I love what I do like. It’s like you know I I got into this kind of like after doing copiers for like one year, so I was kind of like the kid out of college that did like one, like I wanted to do medical device in general but had no idea, like you know, oh, so wait a minute.
05:43 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So how did you find? How did you find out about medical sales?
05:49 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So okay, so get this. So I have a twin brother, he. He works with me here at InVote. Actually we’re on the same team.
05:54
So, when me and my brother were like young we were like 12 years old my grandma was selling her house and the guy that bought her house showed up when we, when we were helping her move, and he was like this really cool guy in a suit, like super charismatic and, like you know, talk to us like all night. And then me and my brother were like you know, what do you do? And he was like, uh, I’m a medical device salesman.
06:16 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
What, what, what, what year is this?
06:19 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
This is like when I was 12. So you know.
06:20 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Oh my gosh, you were 12. I 12, so you know. Oh my gosh, you were 12. Yeah, I’m 32 now, so like we’re talking 20 years ago, oh, wow, okay, yeah, please tell tell the whole story so 20 years ago.
06:33 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So so you know, like, uh, me and my brother, like my parents joked that, like you know, we got back from that trip. Like you know, we, like we’re like we want to be medical device salesmen, just because we have that, you know, I mean take us.
06:45 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I want to. Now I want to hear about when you were actually talking to him and you asked what do you do? What did he say? That just clearly stuck with you for life.
06:55 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Basically, yeah, my, my grandma was selling her house in Fort Lauderdale, florida. Me and my brother went to go help her move out of the house, florida, me and my brother went to go help her move out of the house. So, as we’re kind of moving all of her stuff out of the house, the guy that was buying the house came in and was offering to help, and so we, you know, he shows up basically in a suit. He’s super nice to all of us, very charismatic, and my dad is there, you know, my grandma’s son and they start talking about why he’s buying the house and he’s letting her know, or letting my dad know, that he’s really just buying it as an investment and he’s looking at kind of building a real estate empire.
07:40
So you know this is just kind of an investment property for him. So you know, this is just kind of an investment property for him.
07:45 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah.
07:45 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
My brother listening to this and we only viewed. You know, buying a house is buying a house to live, not to invest. And so I remember, at one point, you know, we asked him like you know, hey, what do you do for work? Like what’s your job that allows you to do this? And he said that he was a medical device salesperson. So um, so yeah, and then, like, he spent the whole night.
08:08 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So so you and your brother is sitting there like, wait a minute, people buy houses to buy houses. People don’t buy houses to invest in anything. He’s telling you about the investment. You’re fascinated, Go ahead, continue.
08:19 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So uh, so yeah. Then like he kind of like uh helped us move but then spent like the rest of the night with us, like you know, got a drink with my dad and stuff, and then we got to talking and you know, like he kind of told us a little bit about his job. Just said that he really liked it and he was really happy and, you know, making a lot of money and all that good stuff.
08:39 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Wow, that’s amazing. You know I’ve talked to gosh. I’ve probably talked to a thousand people about what got them into the industry. This is a first. I’ve never heard this. This is fascinating. So I want to go back to the dinner. So you’re sitting there. You’re being serenaded by this guy. He’s completely impressed you. I mean, I know you’re 12 years old, but can you like remember how you felt when you went home? Were you, did you? Do you remember I went? When I went home that day, all I could think about was that’s going to be my future. I mean, what was, what was going on?
09:11 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, I mean, I remember, you know, thinking to myself like, hey, I want to wear a suit and I want to be like that guy.
09:17 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
You know what’s so fascinating about that? You know, I make I make not even jokes, but when I talk, I have two sons, one of them’s 14. And I and I say, when I talk to him and I talk to my friends about their kids, I say, you know, my 14 year old, you know this is it Like? Whatever he’s doing right now, at 14 years old, this is this is whatever. Whatever things he gets into, good or bad, these are these might become the things that that help him succeed or plague him for the rest of his life. So so, so, when I hear that you were 12 and you got introduced to this amazing career, I mean that’s wow.
09:50 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Okay.
09:53 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
What type of sales was this guy doing?
09:55 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
You know, I, I, I don’t remember and it’s and it’s funny because you know, I guess the story from there goes that you know kind of had that in the back of my head.
10:04
Then, obviously, as I got into high school, I, you know, had a couple different ideas of things that I wanted to do and then, as I got into college, I first, like, majored in psychology but didn’t like it. Then I switched over to business school and then when I was in business school, I went through, you know, all the different routes of business, so so, accounting, finance, international business or foreign exchange, and didn’t like any of those and, in particular, like none of those were really speaking to me. And then, basically, like I had a couple uncles that are doctors and I called them and was like, hey, you know, I’m in business school, do you have any suggestions for, like you know what I should do? And their advice was hey, like you know, we’re in medicine. I definitely wouldn’t advise getting into medicine itself, but you should maybe consider being around medicine and one thing you can do with a business degree is you can get into medical device sales.
11:08 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Wow.
11:09 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Connections.
11:11 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
It clicked, you said Eureka, the light bulbs turned on and you knew where you’re supposed to be. You got to get back in touch with that guy, yeah.
11:21 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I know. I wish I knew who he was.
11:23 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
You said, your dad knew him right. I mean we never talked to him after that. I mean for me, for me, just ask your dad, I gotta know he has to be if, if he’s alive and well, he has to be notified that he made this kind of impact on a young man’s life yeah, very true very true, that is fantastic. Okay, so talk to us. Then you know in-mode aesthetics, so break it down. What is the medical sales you do? How does it work?
11:58 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Break it down. So in-mode is basically in the subsection of the medical device industry known as the aesthetic device industry. We also like the colloquial term would be the laser industry OK, but really that’s kind of changed to be called the energy based device industry. So we use like a lot of different types of energy to perform aesthetic treatments. So aesthetic treatments are treatments that are not covered by insurance number one. So these are all elective procedures. They are all cash pay procedures. So kind of what we’re doing at you know what the devices are performing is something that people choose to do and are willing to spend money for and have the understanding that it’s not going to be covered by their insurance, right?
12:49
I think the second characteristic is that you know this kind of falls into different types of cosmetic treatments, the different types that are out. There are invasive treatments and I think everybody’s pretty familiar with those where these are. You know liposuction, facelift, uh. You know arm lift. You know the traditional plastic surgery procedures that are invasive. Inbode makes tools that are used that that in those invasive procedures. But the majority of our business comes from these non-invasive procedures. So like a huge trend in our industry is that patients that want to have cosmetic procedures done, are normally concerned about having surgery, whether that’s the cost of the surgery, the downtime from the surgery, because you know we’re really busy and no one really has like two weeks off work and a lot of people want to have a cosmetic procedure where no one else finds out that they had it done so you have to spend two weeks away from work.
13:48
That can be a problem. People are also concerned about complications and issues from surgery. So that’s kind of bred this whole shift in the market towards trying to offer something that’s non-invasive, that’s at a lower cost, with less downtime and less risks of complications.
14:09 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
What type of?
14:10 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
surgeries are we talking about? So surgeries mainly like for plastic surgery. You kind of have, like you know, what’s known as excisional surgeries. Excisional surgeries are where you’re taking out tissue, so like on the face that’d be a facelift, or a neck lift, or taking out eyelid skin like a blepharoplasty on the body. That’s, you know, abdominoplasty, also known as a tumpy tuck, brachioplasty, also known as lift, and then you know medial thigh lifts. So that’s where you, you know, I kind of view plastic surgery If you’ve ever heard this that, like, every surgeon is kind of like a trade, so like an orthopedic surgeon is kind of like a carpenter. Okay, you know, a neurosurgeon is kind of like an electrician.
14:51 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
All right.
14:51 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Vascular surgeon is kind of like a plumber, okay. And plastic surgeons are like a tailor for your birthday suit.
14:57 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So oh wow, he said a tailor you really said that a tailor Is that is that. Did you come up with that? Or that company really said that A tailor, did you come up with?
15:06 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
that, or is that company talk? It’s like, yeah, industry talk.
15:08 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Industry talk, surgeon talk. So that’s fascinating. Everybody wants to do what you’re doing, everybody out of all the. I think I hear two industries when it comes to medical device sales specifically, I hear two industries more than any other ortho and aesthetics. And I think with aesthetics, everybody wants to work with plastic surgeons. So your friends, all your friends, are plastic surgeons.
15:31 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
then yeah, for sure.
15:33 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
All right, and you live in Los Angeles? Yeah, we don’t know who they are, but we know of plastic surgeons that have their own TV shows for what they do. Absolutely. Are any of them your customers?
15:47 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Oh, all of them are Folks. We have a celebrity in our midst.
15:54 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
That is so cool. So you know, tell me, what is it really like? You know, I believe, I believe I’ve come to believe that when it comes, when it comes to the plastic surgery world, because it’s just so common and, I’m assuming, so so easy to get done Right Like from BBLs to facelifts to whatever you want, it seems like the access is relatively easy and it seemed, and it’s led me to believe, that the people that can afford it and do it and all that, it’s so common that it’s almost like, yeah, this is just what we do. Is that the true sentiment, or is getting work still kind of a big deal behind closed doors?
16:38 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Well, number one, I think it depends on where you are. So I did this job when I was in Washington DC, where I felt like it was a little bit taboo. Washington DC, where I felt like it was a little bit taboo when you talked about it in social circles. You know people you know thought that it was a little bit more vain or something that they would try to avoid and only would do if it was necessary. And then when I lived in Los Angeles you know everyone talks about it there Everyone’s kind of like you know, have you gotten this done yet? And so it’s really kind of like a part of you know, like no one will, you know, judge you or, you know, you know, think that it’s weird if you got something done, it’s cultural.
17:12 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
It’s cultural here Very cultural.
17:14 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So so yeah, and I also think that in general, like you know, plastic surgery is just becoming less taboo and more accepted. Sure, you know, you see it talked about in. You know songs, you know, like rap songs that you hear Almost every other one has a rap song Right.
17:30 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
We just had a season of it.
17:32 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, exactly, you know, bb Eldridge. Yes, so you hear it talked about in pop culture way more often.
17:39 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah.
17:40 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I think celebrities are becoming more open about it yeah, that they didn’t have anything done but saying, hey, here’s actually something that I did. So I do think that in general, the aesthetic and plastic surgery industry is getting bit bigger. You know, we see that in our, you know macroeconomic statistics that we, that we pull every single year it grows immensely.
18:03 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
It’s getting normalized. I mean, it used to be oh my gosh, you’re, you’re gonna get that done. And now girls as young as 18 are getting it done and telling all their friends and they’re doing the same thing. And and now, apparently, guys as young as 18 are getting it done and telling all their friends. I mean it’s really becoming just, at least here, it’s just what you do. Uh, wow, okay, so wait, so hold on, let’s, let’s. I want to talk about the celebrity surgeons first. So they’re your customers. What is that really like? Are they you know? Would you say that when, when it’s time to be a doctor and not on TV, it’s very much the same as the other, the other surgeons? Or would you say that these celebrity surgeons that are on TV, it’s? It’s just a whole different experience calling on them?
18:47 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, I mean you know, I think that you know behind closed doors like they’re just like very normal, awesome people. Yeah, you know, I think a lot of them kind of started, you know, from the same way that every surgeon started in Los Angeles or Beverly Hills, is that you know they really had to grow their business from scratch and somewhere along the lines.
19:02
they’ve done such a good job that you know they gotten the attention of these major networks, like like Netflix, that want to do a TV show with them, and so I will say that you know, working with them, you do have to consider, as you know, a client. You know that they’ve reached this immense amount of fame, and so one thing that I think every medical device company and every injectable company or vendor that’s going to work with them is going to say hey, you know, if you’re on these TV shows, would you mind mentioning our product?
19:33 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Oh yeah.
19:34 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
That has, you know, the the relationship between entertainment, plastic surgery and these companies that work with them has become even tighter over the years because there’s tension on these plastic surgery shows.
19:46 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah, yeah, that’s wow. Okay, I hope you’re enjoying today’s episode and I want to let you know our programs cover the entire career of a medical sales professional, from getting into the medical sales industry to training on how to be a top performer in the medical sales industry to masterfully navigating your career to executive level leadership. These programs are personalized and customized for your specific career and background and trained by over 50 experts, including surgeons. Our results speak for ourselves and we’re landing positions for our candidates in less than 120 days in top medical technology companies like Stryker, medtronic, merck, abbott you name it.
20:27
Would you run an Ironman race without training and a strategy? You wouldn’t. So why are you trying to do the same with the medical sales position? You need training, you need a strategy and you need to visit evolveyourassesscom, fill out the application schedule some time with one of our account executives and let’s get you into the position that you’ve always dreamed of. And and you know, you know, I know the your everything you say today is your own opinion. I know that. Have you been able to I mean, speak as freely as you can any cool outside of work opportunities you’ve been able to create with your, with your plastic surgeon especially celebrity surgeon, customers that have become friends that have become friends.
21:11 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, Well, you know, definitely. You know it’s funny cause I’m like from like a small town in Virginia and, and you know, grew up, like you know, only looking at celebrities and not being around them, and then I moved to Los Angeles. I didn’t ever anticipate, ever like working with celebrities, but I will say like you know, being in this industry and being around these surgeons that have really good connections like that, I have met way more, you know, a-list celebrities than I ever anticipated.
21:33 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
That’s cool.
21:34 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So yeah, like you know, you see a lot of people that you know I’ve had my mind blown multiple times where I’ve been completely starstruck in and off, Wow, and you’re like, oh my God, that is, is that is that okay?
21:45 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So you know like, oh my God, that is, is that, is that OK? So you know, you know I’m going to do it. I can’t not be talking to you and not do this. Who is the celebrity you saw that just blew your mind and we’ll say you saw them in the parking lot because they weren’t getting work done. You just happened to see one, Right, that’s right. So who was it that?
22:06 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
you were like wow, I just met. Yeah, I would say that the best ones by far were the Beavers and the Kardashians, he said the Beavers.
22:13 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So you met husband and wife.
22:15 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Oh yeah.
22:17 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I mean, were they snuck in? I mean, I’m assuming anywhere anyone spots them. There’s a. There’s a whole mass of people trying to get a signature. How is it done?
22:27 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
There’s a whole mass of people trying to get a signature. How is it done so funny? The, you know, the Bieber’s was definitely a private location that you know I had to drive to and get to security, and the Kardashians was, you know, out in office, but there was a giant convoy of black SUVs that were blocking off the park.
22:43 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
This is straight out the movies. Oh, my goodness, don’t tell you which Kardashian, but did you meet more, more than one Kardashian, or or just one.
22:52 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I’ve only met one of them, yeah.
22:54 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Wow, wow, that is fantastic. That is fantastic. I love this. So you know, be honest with us, you know, has anything changed about how you see things? Working in aesthetics, in this medical device space, whatever you expected or thought it might be and, of course, working in Los Angeles celebrities has the whole experience. What’s what’s it changed for you and how you see life, how you do things, speak as freely as you want.
23:21 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Oh man. So I think you know the number one thing that I would say, just like you know being in the business world, is that like you know it’s it, you know, if you put in a lot of hard work and you know you’re, you’re the type of person that you know dreams really big and like wants to do something big, like the medical device industry you know can do that for you. So you can, you can interact with, you know the top 1% of surgeons that you know or doctors, and you know that can take you, like you know, so far in life you know, beyond just being a salesperson that’s knocking on doors. So I think that that’s that’s probably like the biggest thing that that you know I I’ve learned, uh, over the years is that it’s like your salespeople are kind of born with what like the gift of gap.
24:13
So other people were born with the gift of extreme intelligence. Other people were born with the gift of extreme athleticism A lot of our salespeople type. We were born with the gift of the silver tongue. Like, we’re good at talking to people and you know you can. You can both monetize that and make a good career out of that, and you can also use that as having like really good connections and, like you know, you know sometimes that it’s not just about sales, but you know it’s like about you know, the people that you’re interacting with, building those connections over time.
24:47
So I’d say like that’s, like you know, changed my perspective on, you know, life and the business in general more than anything is that I never felt like I was like good at anything really. You know, I was kind of like you know, uh, you know I’m not smart enough or I’m not athletic enough to get to like a high level of the business world, but you absolutely can. You know you have, as long as you work hard, in combination with you know, recognizing your skill, I think that that can take you way further than you ever imagine.
25:11 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Hey, that’s a man hey, look at, look at just dropping knowledge today. I love it. That’s, that’s a message to remember, absolutely so. Are we going to be seeing you on any tv shows anytime soon?
25:22 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
no, I’m not a tv guy. This right here is about as far as I’ll go in terms of being on camera.
25:29 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Well. So he says now, folks. So he says now, ok, so let’s talk about it. You know I want to talk about a touchy subject and I want your opinion. You know surgery is is something that a lot of people have opinions about. Right, some people feel like you said, in Washington DC, it’s still taboo. In Los Angeles it’s like well, you’re slacking, you haven’t done something yet, so talk to me about with talking to all these surgeons. Do you guys have conversations around the sentiment of the patients that are getting this work done and what’s going on? Or is it strictly the mechanics of this is my product, this is what you do with it and I’m here to help.
26:15 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So I think that yeah, like kind of going back to the Taylor thing, is that you know when in this industry, you know like these people are really good with their hands, really good at you know, the plastic surgery, I think, has a negative connotation because of the word plastic, sure, so, uh, plastic, the word plastic and plastic surgery doesn’t come from, you know, using silicone and doing breast augmentations right and that it actually comes from the latin word plasticos, which is to change or transform, and so these people, you know, I think, view themselves, as you know, artists and sculptors, and I said taylor, but, you know, when these people are very highly skilled in that sense, like not all plastic surgery, I think plastic surgery kind of gets the, you know, the bad rap overall, but the majority of the plastic surgery patients that we see are not people that have, you know, that are super insecure or looking for something drastic to change, like 99% of the plastic surgery that you see is, you know, normal, I would say middle class people that have either minor insecurities or sometimes an actual functional problem.
27:42
Sure, the outside world, and that you know there’s a lot of misconceptions, but on the inside, I think a lot of us know that, like, what we do is life-changing for so many people and there’s such a.
27:54
You know necessary, there’s a need for it. There’s a reason why it’s a part of medicine. There’s a reason why aesthetic medicine is, you know. Uh, you know there’s a. There’s a board certification for becoming a plastic surgeon. Is that it’s not 100? You know just popping in implants and making tons of money and you know riding around in Lamborghinis. So it’s, it’s a. There’s a whole, there’s a side of it that really is medicine and I do think that you know looking good can mean feeling good, but also functioning better can mean feeling better as well.
28:25 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I love that. I love that. On that note, do most plastic surgeons have Lamborghinis or is that just totally? I mean, some of them are the most modest people that I’ve ever met. That’s what I would think. I would think that that Lamborghini thing is just not true. Yeah, yeah.
28:42 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
No, I mean, some of them do extremely well and like they charge very high for their services, and rightfully so. You know if you that’s. One thing I’ve noticed about plastic surgery is that there really kind of is like no limit to you know how much. You know people charge and you know when people charge a lot, you know good for them. You know they’re they’re the best artists of the human body in the world. So you know people pay money and fly from all over the world to go you know right person right if that person’s buying a lamborghini.
29:20
You know, I think rightfully so that’s what you get for being so good at your trade right, right, I love it.
29:24 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I love it. So what would you say? The most common you know? I love what you said about how the reality of what plastic surgeons spend their time improving are actual, real insecurities that you know. You termed it as middle class Americans Middle class Americans I love that because that’s that captures a large portion of Americans and and functional issues that people actually have to do something about. What would you say? Let’s hang out in the middle-class America insecurity space. What would you say is just the most common issue that you normally see someone wanting to do something about?
30:02 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I think the most common thing that you know I’ve noticed is you know a woman, normally that has had multiple children and that has caused both you know cosmetic things that she wasn’t anticipating, that she didn’t have a lot of control over at all, and also functional issues.
30:22
So I think, like the most common example that I can give you is you know three you know babies, that she’s had, three pregnancies that she’s had. You know that’s causing things like condition of, you know, stretching of the abdominal muscles from having a baby underneath the muscle for so long and exerting pressure on the underside of the abdominal wall. So there is a procedure called the mommy makeover, which is just basically an abdominoplasty combined with a mastopexy or a breast lift, where the abdominoplasty or the tummy tuck is, the is the the more known term. You see that a lot in where you know you have to remove some of that skin, get, get rid of a little bit of that fat, tighten up the abdominal wall and uh, and then really just improve the contour and the function of the the abdomen. So I would say, like you know, every plastic surgeon probably does a lot of that you know, and sees a lot of that coming from middle-aged women that just had a big change very fast in their body.
31:41 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Gotcha. Okay, so you know. So you say that’s the most common. That is the middle class America issue. So basically, women that have had kids that want to kind of get back to it. On that note, let’s talk about that Is a BBL, a mommy makeover, or are they completely separate things? Do they have overlap or how do you actually address that?
32:08 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, bbl is different. So BBL is stands for a Brazilian butt lift and basically it involves liposuction of any body part where you’re removing fat, so mainly like, let’s say, for the from the abdomen, let’s say the arms, you know, taking fat out of that area and then using that fat or repurposing that fat to be placed in an area where you want more volume.
32:37 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Oh, okay, see, look, I live here. I didn’t even know that. Okay, I get it. So it really is getting skinny somewhere else to make the butt bigger.
32:41 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Okay.
32:41 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Exactly, exactly, all right, well, it still supports the question I want to know. So we’ll talk about both, I guess the mommy makeover first. You do all this work. Does this mean that you still now need to be in the gym? Does this mean that in 10 years stuff’s going to redistribute and it’s not going to look so great? Talk to us a little bit about, I guess, the after effects and what it really means for your quality of life after a woman gets something like a mommy makeover woman gets something like a mommy makeover.
33:11 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So yeah, I mean, I think in general, in terms of the best long term surgical outcomes come from when people do their part. So meaning that you are doing, you’re going to the gym, you’re doing as you know, as good as you can to keep up like a normal, you know activity, routine and also eating healthy, and so you do that preoperatively and you do that postoperatively and those are the people that end up having the best long-term results because basically you know, think about it as your home care and the surgery going hand in hand. Same way that if you go to the dentist once a year and you don’t brush your teeth every day, then that dental work that you get once a year is not going to be nearly as effective as if you brush?
33:49
your teeth every day and do your part. So you know, we see that a lot. And then I think most surgeons try to warn people that you know, if you don’t do your part and in this case it would be, you know, let’s say that you have, you know less like a, you know an abdominoplasty or a tummy tuck, but then you go immediately back into you know not exercising and eating very unhealthy and you put on a lot of weight. That’s where you can see that bad surgical outcomes.
34:12
And it really doesn’t matter in the surgery itself, as much as it has to do with how that person responded after the surgery.
34:19 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So is there ever a situation in which someone can say, man, you really should not have gotten that surgery because of how you aged. Or is it always a situation of no, any surgery you get if you take care of yourself and you as you and you age, it’s going to. It’s going to, it’s going to maintain, or it’s going to, it’s going to be better than if you hadn’t done it.
34:38 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Right, yeah, I mean, I think there’s certain surgeries where, you know, I’ve seen a lot, for example, where a patient will come in for a consultation with the full intention of moving forward with surgery, but the surgeon will decline them, and so that’s if they’re doing it for the wrong reasons, or if they’re not physically or mentally ready for this.
34:57
So, you know, I think I see that like actually quite often more than you would imagine of patients either getting declined for surgery altogether or being told that they do have to make modifications in their life first, before they can have surgery, so I think this is elective. You know there’s still criteria for being a good candidate for this.
35:19 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Right.
35:19 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So yeah, and then you know, I think for your second question, like, yeah, you know, I think you still see, like you know some people that you know have complications and stuff like that. You know it’s a part of life, it’s a part of medicine. Still see, like you know some people that you know have complications and stuff like that. You know it’s, it’s a, it’s a part of life, it’s part of medicine, it’s part of surgery.
35:34 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
but uh, so so so so I guess what I’m and I’ll be direct about it. So, a b, a bbl, you know, is it. Does it ever happen where a woman gets a bbl, it goes to her butt and, you know, a couple years later her butt looks misshapen because it just, you know, it just happened. Or if that happened, it’s because she didn’t go to the gym, she did something on her own and that’s why that’s happened.
35:59 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, so I mean, I think we see that I think BBL is the one of the highest rates of basically a surgery either number one not being performed correctly or well or number two you know people not getting those good long-term results.
36:19
where you know people, other people are saying, hey, that looks bad or that doesn’t look natural. I think that partially comes from, you know, I think a lot of people want it so and they may not be a good candidate for it and they have unrealistic expectations about what can be done in the operating room. And so you know, I think you see a lot of people kind of forcing it upon themselves.
36:41
So, you know, I, I think I see that a lot. And then the second thing would be the you know, the, the not them, not, you know, keeping up with their own maintenance of this. But I think, like most of the bad BBLs that you see out there, you look at this person and you’re like, okay, that was either way overdone or you just were not a good candidate for it in the first place and shouldn’t have forced the issue and gotten it done. So I think a lot of surgeons out there kind of have a you know mentality that this is a trend.
37:11 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
So let me, let me get, let me get my, let me get my share of this trend.
37:19 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Exactly Like. If you think back into, like the Pamela Anderson days, you know a trend in plastic surgery was to have very large breasts and that became a thing, and then I think you saw a lot of what we would call bad breast augmentations, because people really wanted that extra large look and then now the trend currently is a really large uh.
37:34
But so you know, you see a lot of pressure to. You know, adhere to the societal norm of having a huge butt and it doesn’t look good on everybody and not everybody should have it right the sad thing about it in general is that we know that this is a trend and then in 10 years having a big butt might not actually be the it’s not in anymore.
37:54 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
I don’t think anyone’s thought about that. No, that’s interesting. What’s the common reason? Surgeons deny a patient whatever they’re asking for, because they don’t feel they’re ready.
38:05 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
What’s the?
38:05 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
most common.
38:07 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Number one reason by far is unrealistic expectations. So a lot of people you know you see this in consultations is that they come in and they’ll show you a picture of their favorite celebrity and they’ll say I want to look like this. And that usually is not going to work.
38:25
And so you have to be, you know, really realistic about what can be be done and to what extent that can be done. And so I noticed that the best consultations happen where someone brings in now a picture of themselves with like a little small filter on it. So that’s more realistic about what can be done. Is that you want to look like a refined version of yourself, but you still want to look like yourself. You don’t want to look like somebody that is not you, right?
38:54 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Well, I mean, are you telling me there’s no software that exists that people are using to just do that at the doctor’s office?
38:59 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So yeah, they do use software. That’s a huge thing in the plastic surgery industry is visualization software. There’s cool companies actually that you should consider interviewing them. Canfield is like a big one where the uh, you know uh will show like, for example, if you’re getting a rhinoplasty, you can show hey, this is how we’re going to bring the hump down, this is how that’s cool tip yeah, so this is an approximation of what you’ll look like after surgery, so the surgeon and the patient can get on the same page about what is what can be.
39:29 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Wow, okay. So let’s go back to the surgeon themselves. You know you said something earlier that makes me really wonder. You said that when there’s a trend for example, right now there’s the BBL trend you know a couple surgeons, not even a couple. I’m sure a large number of surgeons want to get in on that trend, whether they have the experience or the wherewithal for lack of a better word to do an amazing job. So what is it like in the plastic surgery world, you know? Is it really? Are there standards? Is it just like the? Of course there’s standards. What I’m really asking is is it kind of like the wild, wild west where, because there’s so much nuance, because there’s so much individualization on what somebody wants, and because there’s so many incoming and outgoing trends, that plastic surgeons are always like I can just do whatever I want as long as I know how to do surgery, and it’s just a wild west and there’s no real standard for any procedure?
40:27 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Oh man, this is a controversial subject. I know We’ll be on a podcast. Okay, why else?
40:31 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
This is where we oh man, this is a controversial subject. We’ll be on a podcast, okay, why else? This is where we have them. Please share.
40:37 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So everything I’ll say is my opinion. So the truth is is that any doctor can technically perform a BBL, but do they have the credentials or the experience to do it? We see all the time. Absolutely, in my opinion, no, there’s a lot of people that should not be doing BBLs. And starting with the fact that this is a big thing is that plastic surgeons need to be board certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery. So that means that they went through extra training.
41:11
You know, know, we’re talking about a lot of training for a lot of years to get that board certification in plastic surgery and be recognized by that board, sure? So there is a huge amount of cosmetic surgeons out there that are not board certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery, that are performing cosmetic surgeries, including BBLs. So basically what this means is that this doctor got board certified in something else, so they could be board certified in internal medicine, family medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, and they at some point can basically say even though I’m not trained in this surgical procedure, I can get trained. And they there’s a like a kind of like a fly by night board called the American Board of Cosmetic Surgery, which is kind of like a weekend course that they can take to get this certification, but it’s not a real recognized board certification from the American Board of Plastic Surgery. So what this does is it creates a ton of confusion with patients about who is a plastic surgeon, who is real and who is actually not a plastic surgeon, and so it’s kind of like a branding thing.
42:23
And then I would say that you know from there most of the complications that we see from things like BBLs actually come from doctors who aren’t plastic surgeons, that are doing this for the first time. So that is. That’s in los angeles. There was, you know, a month ago, a patient died from liposuction after getting liposuction from a pediatrician, so meaning that this person has absolutely zero surgical experience. They were advertising themselves as a cosmetic surgeon, which is your way of getting around saying, yeah, you know, you’re not a plastic surgeon and yeah, the person died from surgical complications.
43:03
So that is a huge thing and I think most plastic surgeons would absolutely agree with me on this that patients need to be educated on what to look out for when looking for a plastic surgeon. I think a lot of plastic surgeons tirelessly try to explain this to people, but the problem is that people don’t understand. Then, also, within people that are board certified in plastic surgery not everyone’s good at every surgery. So you see, people that you know can do it all. Some people specialize in certain things, like, for example, they’ll become an expert in breast or an expert in body or an expert in face.
43:42
So, and then you know, so you’ll see that even though there is a plastic surgeon performing BBLs, it doesn’t mean that that plastic surgeon is good at performing BBLs. It doesn’t mean that that plastic surgeon is good at performing BBLs, even though they have the proper credentialing and training. So I think that there’s a contingent within the you know society of plastic surgeons that are people that, because this is a newer procedure, right? So this is not something that we were even doing 15 years ago, right so this is not something that we were even doing 15, 20 years ago. So, uh, so you know, I think there’s there’s, uh, a focus when you go to these like american society of plastic surgery meetings that are national, that there needs to be extra training done, actually focus on safety and extra focus on you know how to properly do this in order to get good results. So that that’s a you know version, honestly, of what’s going on.
44:34 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Yeah, no, that’s that’s good. That’s some insight there. Thank you for that. What? What happens to the providers that you know make these types of errors that don’t have the proper training? Are they relatively protected from the, the, the bad outcomes, or is it pretty, you know, get intense for them and it kind of discourages other physicians to not go that route?
44:58 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
So I mean I think you know a lot of these surgeons can kind of get away with not having good results as long as no one’s getting super hurt or dying. And that’s the scariest thing for me is that there’s a lot of patients around that are walking around with they don’t even realize, I think, that they had a bad result, and so basically what I’m saying is that a lot of these surgeons kind of get away with not having any consequences for doing this. Then there’s the patients that have complications and you know they can get dinged with. You know license issues. They can get their license revoked.
45:32 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
They can get a bad.
45:34 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I think, ultimately, the biggest thing is that they get a bad name in the community and people figure it out pretty quickly.
45:41 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Right, wow, wow. So I want to switch gears a little bit and I want to talk about just sentiment here between men and women. You know, again, the BBL jersey thing, I think, is perfect for this conversation, because one of the reasons why it’s such a big thing is because, as a man, you know why are you getting a BBL? What do you mean as a man? Why would you do anything to remove fat from a part of your body and especially make your butt bigger? What’s the sentiment, though, like with men and surgery? Is it that, on the surface, men don’t get surgery, that’s women’s work, and behind closed doors there’s more men than women getting these procedures done? Or is it the surface cliche of men don’t do that, just really not existing anymore and it’s 50-50?
46:29 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
I see more men year over year getting these procedures done behind closed doors or being open about it than ever before wow okay, you know that segment of the market is growing fast, very fast, one of the fastest growing, and I think men are starting to do things like non-surgical service, like Botox and filler and these small adjustments, that, or even just having good skincare. So, like the joke with men is that you know men use kind of like a three in one.
46:57 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Uh, shampoo, body wash, and when it comes to to, to aesthetics, we cut corners in every department.
47:05 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
That’s the joke Absolutely so, like men, you know, can kind of be gross in that sense. So and you know, I think men are getting educated now on like the importance of like having good skincare and good maintenance and, you know, not only taking care of your body, collagen in your skin, laser procedures like having laser hair removal or doing a laser facial or removing brown spots from your skin or getting rosacea away from your cheeks.
47:42
Things like that, and then so those are kind of like what I would call mid-level cosmetic procedures. And then I think you know men are also, you know, having surgeries done, cosmetic procedures. And then I think you know men are also, you know, having surgeries done, so they’re getting things like rhinoplasty to make their nose look better, blepharoplasty to make their eye bags look better.
47:57
Sure have. They’re having facelifts later in life because they want a sharp jawline. You know a lot of men are like you know, back in the market. You know they’re single again.
48:04 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
He’s like I just had my divorce and it’s time to.
48:11 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
Yeah, and then you see it, even with liposuction and even you know something like a bbl is that you know like, yeah, men, you know, want to have a better figure, and so I think that, uh, the the thing about men is that we don’t we, in particular, are too proud to ever admit these sort of things right right to our male colleagues, but I think that, like over the years, I’ve seen that we’re getting a little bit more open about it, but we’re not all the way there yet for sure, right?
48:34 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
No, I mean I mean, you know, every everything. It has to start somewhere, and I guess what you’re saying is that the explosion of men getting 10 times more comfortable than ever been has started now. So that’s that’s. That’s a good thing, and that was Sam Cooper. Wow, I don’t even know what to say. I mean fascinating stuff. I don’t want to talk too much on it because we have a whole nother episode for you to listen to where we go even deeper. So I don’t want to give anything away, but I will say this You’re listening to this episode. You’re hearing about this fascinating world of aesthetic medical devices.
49:07 – Sam Cooper (Guest)
You hear that he lives in Los.
49:08 – Samuel Adeyinka (Host)
Angeles’s working with celebrity surgeons. It’s just really cool stuff. If you’ve wanted this lifestyle, if you’ve wanted to look into this kind of sales, if you now just want to get that much deeper and that much more serious about getting a medical sales position, then you need to go to evolve successcom. Fill out the application. Fill it out, schedule some time with one of our account executives, take our assessment and let’s get you to where you want to be. We have an amazing program’s get you to where you want to be. We have an amazing program that gets you to where you want to be, regardless where you’re coming from. So get to evarvisaccesscom. Let’s make it happen for you.
49:40
As always, we’re doing our best to bring you guests. We’re doing things different in the medical sales space, so make sure you tune in next week for part two. I hope you enjoyed today’s episode and remember I have a customized and personalized program that gets you into the medical technology industry as a sales professional or any type of role for that matter. Become a top performer in your position and masterfully navigate your career to executive level leadership. Check out these programs and learn more at EvolvesAssesscom by visiting our site, filling out an application, scheduling some time with one of our account executives and allowing us to get you where you need to be. Stay tuned for more awesome content with amazing interviews on the Medical Sales Podcast.
Medical Territory Manager!
I was a Regional Sales Representative for Long-Term Care pharmacy services. I had dreamed of getting into the med sales industry when I went into my career as a nurse, but the pharmacy sales job came to me, and I had just settled. Fortunately, I had a job shakeup that allowed me to determine that now was the time to pursue my original vision.
I absolutely would not have this position without Samuel and the Evolve Your Success community. A lot of people my age would just stop trying, but EYS believed in me.
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Sports Medicine in Phoenix! I extend so much gratitude to the Evolve Your Success group as I land this role and get ready to pursue my dream job. I am a Physical Therapist who became a little stuck in the profession due to issues with reimbursement and the difficulty for continued growth upwards. I turned to EYS to assist me in learning about the medical sales industry and gain knowledgable mentors who were able to help coach me in this process. I am a strong believer in surrounding yourself with the best and good things will happen. I did work hard, but with the support of my mentors and other colleagues going through a career change, I felt a sense of community and it confirmed my drive to get into this industry. I have already learned so much through the interview process, and feel very blessed to have had the resources this group provided. I have made lifelong friends and I cannot wait to continue to follow others’ journeys to pursue this incredible field. I urge you to give Evolve Your Success a try to gain mentorship, guidance, and support through any career transition.
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