Please share with me your first, the last name,
where you're located, and the name of your business.
My name is Jake Sukaw. I am the founder and CEO
of Patient Procure, a full -service marketing
agency, and I am calling from Montclair, New
Jersey, which is just a stone's throw from Manhattan.
Do me a favor. Share with me about Patient Procure
and let me know what it's all about. Yeah, so
I started Patient Procure back in like July or
August of 2024. And it came from, I had been
at a number of different agencies over a few
years and having seen what happens behind the
scenes and seeing it be demystified, I realized
I could pretty easily spin up an agency myself.
uh we focus on healthcare companies anybody from
a single individual physician who works out of
a small office concierge medicine all the way
up to large msos that have you know dozens of
brands within their portfolio and and you know
hundreds of locations so we've done it all and
um what is the you know my My reason for building
it is really wanting to be the master of my own
destiny. I worked in nine to fives for my entire
career and at a certain point realized I wanted
to stop renting. I wanted to own. And that's
really the motivation behind starting my own
company. Nice. And the medical field. Were you
in the medical field before? I've never been.
directly in the medical field. I started my career
in asset management and we were raising money
for biotech companies. And I did that for a few
years. So that was my first intro into a tangentially
related field. And then I kind of fell into it
accidentally. One of the agencies I worked for
was focused on healthcare and it brought me really
great satisfaction to help build systems that
put patients in touch with the healthcare that
they needed. So it felt like a really great natural
fit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I love when that natural
fit just happens because then you're it's a little
bit easier to be able to be the founder and guide
people and have things go a little bit more smoothly.
I understand that you also do some mentorship
as well. Yeah, I yeah, I've done lots of mentorship.
You know, I spent a few years as the as the program
director of excuse me. of WeWork Labs, which
was the incubator program within WeWork. And
at that time, I had, you know, like 70 or so
early stage companies that I was working as the
point person for all sorts of things. And in
that time, I learned a lot about the early stages
of business. And that's carried on since. I've
derived a lot of satisfaction. of advising people
on what they should be focusing on with their
businesses and especially younger folks who are
just getting started in entrepreneurship. It
brings me a great deal of satisfaction to help
them on their journey. What's the difference
between mentoring and choosing to say that you're
coaching someone, Jake? Well, I think the biggest
one right off the bat is the financial part of
it. ask people for money i don't charge them
to do it i do it because i enjoy doing it and
i do it because people did it for me and it was
you know really important for my growth as uh
as an entrepreneur um you know i think there's
a lot of overlap you know it's really important
as a coach or mentor to take this kind of socratic
line of mentorship where you're showing people
the path you're not giving them answers you're
helping them ask the right questions and pull
the answers from themselves um but yeah i mean
i think the biggest part of it is um you need
to approach it with humility and understand unless
Unless you have really specific direct experience
in the field that the person is building a company
in, it's never going to be apples to apples to
an experience that you've had. So approaching
it with, you know, just trying to problem solve
together and not position yourself as these are
the answers that you should definitely follow.
I've always found that to be the most effective
method. How many startup companies have you assisted
or guided or pretty much mentored? into? I mean,
if you consider all of those companies that we
work too many, I mean, and look, a lot of these
companies were, you know, beyond help. I mean
that in a good way. I mean that they're so far
advanced that they're, I wasn't able to offer
them anything beyond, you know, maybe a shoulder
to cry on when they needed it. You know, I, for
those companies, I tried to get them in touch
with investors and other incubators or accelerators
to give them capital. But since then, I probably
have two or three people a year who I get connected
to through various sources. The first agency
that I worked for was a direct consumer agency.
We worked with a lot of these brands. food and
beverage and fashion and apparel and beauty and
so uh and i that's what my podcast was about
when i had it so i still get people who reach
out to me even to this day about getting help
on the direct consumer side um but yeah i mean
a few here and there it's not something that
i'm active you know i'm pretty entirely focused
on growing my business right now so it's not
something that i'm seeking out at the moment
but when people reach out to me and say hey I
have this person in my network. They're looking
for some guidance here. Can you hop on a call
with them? I am always happy to do that. That's
awesome because, yes, like you said, that's not
your main focus. So when it comes to Patient
Procure and you launching this business, how
long has it been up and running? Just around
eight months or so. It's still still in the early
days and we've gotten some really great early
success, which has been very, very motivating
to keep pushing. And, you know, I my my goal
for this company is really to make it a lifestyle
brand. You know, I want this to be something
that I'm not looking to scale it and exit it,
although, you know, I'm not opposed to that.
But my goal is really to grow it. Right now,
I've been very fortunate that sales has not been
an issue. And so we're really laser focused on
operations, creating efficiencies, trying to
integrate AI and automations where I can to make
people more effective and make systems less fragile.
And the goal is to get it to a place where it's
no longer reliant on me and I don't have to work.
12 hours a day like I am currently and can just
kind of, you know, spend as much time on my hobbies
with my family as I can. Absolutely. So with
that being said, within eight months, what did
it take and how much of you personally did it
take for you to launch this business? Well, it's
taken everything. you know look i i'm in a i
have two small children i've got a four -year
-old and a one -year -old and my goal has always
been to never let the business take precedence
over my family and i think i've done a really
good job being present not taking phone calls
not answering emails when i'm with my kids not
excusing myself from the dinner table when we're
having a meal So generally, I've been really
good at setting boundaries. I think that's super
important because at the end of the day, that's
my goal. So it doesn't make sense to me to sacrifice
the thing I'm looking for in the short term when
I have it just so that I can get there faster.
That said, I have to be extremely, extremely
diligent. I will drop my son off at school and
then I am on nonstop until I pick him up and
then we eat dinner. we hang i put them to bed
and then i'm on you know from like 8 or 8 30
until 11 11 30 or whenever i can stand it um
and that's you know unfortunately the reality
of entrepreneurship i mean nobody's gonna help
you if you don't help yourself and at the end
of the day i am a solo founder i have incredible
people in my business who i can rely on uh and
that's a major part of building any businesses
i mean every business is just about the people
at the same time you know i'm still the bottleneck
in a lot of in a lot of places in most places
and i have to be the one to make the decisions
so um as i said earlier i'm hoping to get to
a point sooner than later where i can Excuse
myself from more of these organizations and implement
systems where it's not so reliant on me. But,
you know, early days, if you want to be successful,
you got to grind. And I think that's not a surprise
to anybody. I think that that's where I get caught
up and frustrated with media is the glorification
of entrepreneurship and looking at it as if it's
glamorous. And it's not. It is extremely hard
work. You lose sleep. It produces a ton of anxiety.
I would not trade it for anything. I really try
to keep this goal really close to my heart all
the time, which is I am battling to get to a
place where I will be free at some point. I will
not have any bosses. I will not be reliant on
a company for my well -being. It will be fully
of my own doing. And so that allows me to kind
of push past it. But, you know, especially early
on, I feel like a lot of entrepreneurs, they
or people who are aspiring entrepreneurs. I hate
the name entrepreneur. I think that's kind of
offensive. People who are aspiring entrepreneurs
are looking for an answer of like, how do I get
my first client? How do I do this? And the reality
is you have to figure that part out yourself.
You need to. It's the kind of thing where. If
me telling you that you need to grind and figure
it out yourself is, you know, deters you from
trying, then you shouldn't be doing this in the
first place. You know, you have to hustle in
the beginning. And that doesn't mean be profitable.
That doesn't mean get 10 clients. Get a client.
Just figure out how somebody will pay you. one
time for this thing and then i'll be a lot more
willing to come in and talk through it but if
you are i don't like calling people lazy because
i think that it's overused and oftentimes there's
a lot of other uh things that go into deterring
people from work that is not about being lazy
but if you can't figure out that first step this
isn't the life for you yeah yeah I honestly,
I was in, I don't even call it nine to five anymore.
I call it a nine to nine. I was in a nine to
nine and I switched from corporate into the entrepreneur.
And no one says it's going to take every piece
of you. And we end up being lazy because we're
super exhausted. It's like, you know, just don't
even want to do it. So it's crazy. It's crazy.
Lazy. I hate lazy because it implies that. It's
almost a character flaw when the reality is there
is almost certainly something that is preventing
you from doing it. Either you're afraid or you're
intimidated by the task or you just hate doing
it. There are reasons why you're procrastinating
and not doing the work that you know needs to
get done. And I think saying lazy just it. doesn't
properly address what the underlying issues are.
So I try not to. I think that there's a whole
fallacy in life about what laziness is. I mean,
there's definitely some lazy people out there,
but I think for the most part, people refrain
from doing the things that need to get done for
other reasons, not just because they're like,
you know, they can't be bothered. What would
you what tips would you have for an entrepreneur
or someone who's going into? Entrepreneurship
is about one's struggle with themselves and their
ability to overcome the habits and the characteristics
that they have that are preventing them from
being successful. Okay, what do I mean by that?
I'm not a morning person. you know i operate
best at night i'm not super organized you know
i am a talker i'm a salesperson i love operations
i love implementing software and figuring out
how things work i'm not prompt it's hard for
me to get to places on time and over my career
i've had to figure out how can i be successful
despite my shortcomings in certain areas? How
can I overemphasize the things I'm good at and
avoid the things I'm bad at? So the biggest piece
of advice that I would give is first and foremost,
figure out what you're great at and try to like
really focus on getting better there and having
that be the cornerstone of what you're doing
and get help in the areas that you're deficient
in. I have a VA, I have a fleet. of people who
I contract to, you know, at this point, around
15 or so individuals who are working, you know,
between almost full time to, you know, a couple
hours a week that I'm delegating the things that
I'm bad at. Also, you can't run a company and
scale by yourself. You need help. But so first
and foremost, there's a fallacy in trying to
get better at the things you're bad at. If you're
bad at them, just you're bad at them. You're
almost certainly. You're going to be much more
effective by focusing on the things that you're
good at than the things that you're bad at. So
first and foremost, that. Secondly, and this
was kind of what I was alluding to in my intro
here, it's entrepreneurship is just a mental
struggle. Everything is happening between your
ears. It's all it's such a like a trope, but.
It's just it's. You just have to overcome your
limiting beliefs. And it can be so cheesy. I
know a lot of people don't want to listen to
these like Tony Robbins, like, you know, I the
Tiger, Grant Cardone, like you can do it. But
like, it's real. I mean, if you can keep pushing,
if you can persevere, the only thing that's going
to prevent you from being successful is you quitting.
Now, of course, there's many instances where.
you should quit and then try something new i
mean there's no um there it doesn't serve you
to be so stubborn that you are um continuing
a dying company just out of pride but you know
one of the biggest unlocks that i had over the
past eight months of building this company is
uh understanding that the company can only be
as successful as like i can be from a mental
standpoint in other words you know if i can get
rid of my self -doubt if i can get rid of my
fears of failure if i can get rid of my limiting
beliefs that are preventing me from doing the
things i need to do in a day to be successful
i am head and shoulders more successful than
i would have been Had I sat there at the computer
and said, oh, I'm not good enough. I can't do
it. Is this client going to call me out? Are
these people going to think that I that I don't
know what I'm talking about? Like that imposter
syndrome is real. And I've struggled with it
a lot and I still struggle with it to this day.
But being able to just ignore those those voices
in the back of your head that are telling you
you can't do it. Why you there's no way. It's
going to work and just putting one foot in front
of the other. That's that is crucial. You'll
never succeed if you can't do that. And so I
know it's a little cheesy, but, you know, I am
a huge believer in that. And that's really transformed
my business over the past year. What are the
greatest joys of what you do? I love people.
My whole career has been. partnerships, biz dev,
sales, that human element. How do you create
deals and make, you know, make partnerships that
are mutually beneficial. I love working with
people and building this company. Even when I
was first starting and I had two contractors
who were working five hours a week each, I was
really aggressively adamant about creating a
company culture even though they had a bunch
of other clients and i wasn't the only person
they worked with and to this day it doesn't matter
if the person is working 40 hours a week for
me or if they're working five hours a week for
me i have them join uh calls i treat everybody
like they're a full -time employee i i my goal
is to make every single one of these contractors
a full -time employee i want this to be a real
And so I just love. I love finding people that
I think are going to be really good fits for
a role and then watching them prove me right.
That's one of the greatest joys that I have when
I get a person and I'm like, oh, man, this this
person is going to transform my company. I'm
I'm allowing them. to live the life that they
want to live they have the flexibility and they
have the ability to you know in many cases i'm
working in most cases i'm working with folks
who are abroad who are in other countries who
don't have an opportunity to earn a living in
their own town you know they're working in remote
parts of the world where the local economy and
infrastructure is not very good and by working
with me it gives them an opportunity to have
a life that they couldn't have otherwise and
just feeling that responsibility when an employee
tells me that I'm changing their life because
of this opportunity it's the most gratifying
possible thing I can hear and so that's really
one of the greatest joys I had in building a
company is finding incredible people all over
the world giving them an opportunity to be successful
and watching them like turn into this rock star
employee when I had a hunch that they would Thank
you for being here today. I'm really happy that
you tuned in to Vision Pros Live. I'm looking
forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes
continue to move forward. This is going to get
more and more fun. We'll have more and more engagement
as well. We'll invite people to participate in
the show. And thank you for giving us your time
and attention. Have an excellent time building
out your vision and becoming a vision pro yourself.