Right About Now - Legendary Business Advice - The Riches Are in the Niches: How a Beverly Hills Surgeon Built a Luxury Empire with ZERO ads | Dr. Deepak Dugar

Episode Date: January 6, 2026

Luxury isn’t accidental—it’s engineered. On this episode of Right About Now, Ryan Alford is joined by Dr. Deepak Dugar, one of the world’s most respected surgeons and the architect behind one of Beverly Hills’ most exclusive medical brands. Dr. Dugar shares how he built a global reputation by going all-in on a single niche, refusing to compete with mediocrity, and designing a business that prioritizes quality over volume—in clients, hiring, and brand positioning. This conversation goes far beyond medicine. It’s a blueprint for entrepreneurs who want to: Stand out in hyper-competitive markets Build premium brands with demand built in Create exclusivity without paid advertising Hire elite performers and avoid energy vampires You’ll Learn: Why “riches in the niches” is more than a cliché How luxury brands intentionally repel the wrong customers The difference between good revenue and bad revenue Why elite operators pick their competition carefully How to build a brand that attracts the world’s best clients Connect with Dr. Deepak Dugar Instagram: Deepakdugarmd Website: www.Scarlessnose.com 🎧 If you want to build something elite—not average—this episode is a must listen.

Stop chasing every lead and start engineering exclusivity. Today, we're joined by Dr. Deepak Dugar, the world-renowned surgeon who scaled a Beverly Hills empire by mastering the riches and the niches philosophy. From operating on global icons to building a luxury brand that commands attention without spending a dime on ads, he's revealing the exact blueprint for high-performance hiring and elite market positioning. Get ready to ditch mediocrity and learn how to treat every. every single day like a championship win.

Starting right about now. One thing that everyone should learn is you have to be so wise about picking your competition. Do not compete with losers. Do not compete with idiots. Do not compete with mediocrity. I pick the best in the entire planet at this craft. I picked the three, four people, and I said, that's my competition. And people think that's crazy.

But what you do is you rise to their level to be able to compete with them. This is Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a radcast. Network production. We are the number one business show on the planet with over one million downloads a month. Taking the BS out of business for over six years and over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping next and cash in checks? Well, it starts right about now. What's up guys?

Welcome to Write About Now. Your number one marketing and business show on Apple Podcast. We thank you for that. If you're listening to first time, I'm Ryan offered your host. I'm blessed to be here, get to do what I love and love what I do. It's a benefit and I don't take it for granted. We want to thank you for tuning in. And, you know, I get to talk to people I like.

I get to talk to people I respect. And sometimes I just get to talk to the best in the world at what they do. It's just the benefit of sitting in this chair. And I get to today, we're going to talk business. We're going to talk to business of science and medicine and surgery. We're going to bring it through the lens you may not expect. But I can just tell you, I've received. respect the hell out of people that build their business the right way and understand human

nature, behavior, and the principles of marketing better than doc knows it. But let me just tell you, he does. He is a brilliant doctor. He is the world's best rhinoplasty doctor. He's in Beverly Hills. It is. Dr. Deepak, Dugar. What's up, Doc? I always want to say, what's up, Doc? Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you for helping me. I'm excited. Thank you, Ryan. I'll always say, you know, they say you can't hide money, but you can't hide good marketing and good PR and good understanding. As a marketer, it was like a marketer's dream. It was brilliant. How you've built it.

Every touch point, luxury, everything just felt right. That's the best compliment I can give you as a professional marketer. One of the keys was starting a practice in such an elite place like Beverly Hills, which is one of the most competitive markets for what I do. So no matter what business you run, no matter of what business you're starting up or continuing to dominate it, The key is figuring out your angles and niches. I think for me in Beverly Hills, coming with a niche was really important because there's so many famous, articulate, well-marketed plastic surgeons. So how do you even create a little wave, like a small one, not even a big one?

The way I figured that that was by going really hard into one singular procedure. Tesla, when they started, people forget that Tesla started out as a roadster company. That was it. They sold one car. They were Tesla Roadster. That was it. That was the entire company. That was their strategy.

And then they perfected the concept of it. They never even released it. They perfected the concept of it to get the waves in the car world. And that's how Tesla became where it is today. But the same thing. We went in really heavy with one singular procedure. I do what's called a scarless nose rhinoplasty. So traditional ronoplasti, you make a cut at the base of the nose,

lift up the hood of the nose, take it apart. You're reconstruct it from the strapped. Just like tearing a house down and rebuilding a brand new glass box. Like most modern homes today, they all look the same. Versus, if you have like a beautiful French chateau, you don't tear it down. You just restore, refine, improve. And so coming out of it from a more natural lens, scarless technique, all internal incisions, it got a lot of attention really fast, really early on.

And I think that's probably one of the biggest success pillars I had, you know, one of many. But that was one of the biggest ones, was finding a little niche. It's like those restaurants that have really small menus, and they just get really good at that one type of burger. Riches in the niches, baby. That's what they say. It helps when you're all so damn good at it. You got to have the goods. There's a saying in marketing, putting lipstick on the pig, only lasts so long.

But when you're the world's best at what you do and you're in a niche, it's magic. And judging by the clients you work with, I'm going to ask you to name drop a little bit. Everybody likes the stars. Who can you name that you've worked on? The ones that have gone public recently, we were just featured on this Bravo TV show called Denise Richards and her Wild Things. Charlie Sheen and Denise Richards' daughter, Sammy Sheen, she did her nose job with us. And we got to document the entire thing.

And she put it on the shows on two of the episodes. We worked with a lot of other celebrities like Danielle Monnet, Mia Khalifa. I spend a lot of time working with some of my friends on content that are really famous. Influencers' space, not necessarily patient, but just close friends in my like Adam W. And Hannah Stocking and Kingbatch and some of the most famous influencers in the world that you'll see me in a lot of their videos. So, you know, we have a lot of organic relationships, a lot of really high-end celebrity patients, and then influencer friends that I get to have the privilege of being around and working with. And the world is full of mediocrity.

It's really easy to get rewarded in this life for being mediocre. Most mediocre people, even in business, it's a good life, you know, because even mediocrity takes a certain amount of work. It's not like mediocrity is easy. It's told it. There's a good amount of work to be mediocre, but it's a lot of work to be great. And it's insane amount of commitment and excellence to be the best in the world and what you do. It really want to be one of the best in the universe. Business is tough because you really have to break down niches because what is the best businessman of the world? Is it the richest, right? That it's all, okay, Elon Musk. That's it. No one else can't be how life works. So it's got to be within your branding of business and how you do business that you become

the best in your cycle. So for me, when I look at competitive energy, I don't want to be like the best plastic surgeon in the world. I want to be the best scarless rhinoplasty surgeon to have ever lived. And that's kind of the way that I approach it within that niche. And so yeah, it's kind of how I think about what I do and how I put that mindset to it. Lebrities and all that stuff is just, it's a privilege and it's an honor because they truly have the ability to go to anyone in the world. So when they come to us, whether it's a billionaire, whether it's a Saudi shake, whether it's one of the most famous celebrity children in the world who comes to us, Those moments being a lot because it shows that the skill and craft has earned beyond just the marketing reputation.

Talking to Dr. Deepak Duguer, he is the world's best rhinoplasty surgeon. I like to get underneath the hood a little bit with how people tick. I'm trying to imagine Doc growing up. You're clearly competitive. You're clearly driven to excellence. So I always like to unpack for audience those characteristics or things you identified that you worked on. I don't know that you can build grit and drive. But there's probably things that make Doc who he is.

Talk to our audience a little bit about that journey was for you. And what are those characteristics you feel like that are uniquely yours? I'm one of three siblings. My older sister, older brother, both definitely smarter than me. One thing I had was I had a little bit more dream power. I put that energy, you know, almost a competitive edge with my own mentality of how to be the best. I also take everything personally in a good way and bad way. You know, taking things personally in business as stressful as you to take every pain point home

with you at night and you're sitting there at the dinner table thinking about every pain point. But it's also good too because when you watch Michael Jordan in The Last Dance, he's like, everything they said, I took that personally. One thing that everyone should learn is you have to be so wise about picking your competition. Do not compete with losers. Do not compete with idiots. Do not compete with mediocrity. I pick the best in the entire planet at this craft. I picked the three, four people and it said, that's my competition. And people think that's crazy. But what you do is you rise to their level to be able to compete with them. always say don't meet your idols because your idols become your enemies. That's only if you're really

good at what you do. The key was picking the right strategic partners. And these aren't partners. These are enemies and these are not really, facetiously, but they are my competitors that I take personally. So when I see them do something, I say, I want to do it more. When I see them do something good, I say, I got to do it twice as good. If you look at Federer, Jokovic and you look at Nadal, that energy, they hated each other at one point. You see this camaraderie today and they're all hugging and kissing. That didn't exist during the 15 years they were playing competitively against each other. They used each other's ammunition to get better and better and better. So that's my biggest success secret I think is I picked the best and most competitive people in the world to be my

competition. I didn't go for the people at my level. I went to people at the top. I used to be really good at hiring people than I seem to get bad at it. And then now I'm back to good. I realize like the characteristics. If you don't like to win, I don't want you on the team. Competitive people typically get what they want. If they're channeling it the right. way. Sometimes it can totally go the other direction, but that's something I really respect and feel from you, Doc. I completely agree with you. The team around you make such a difference. The problem is that mediocrity doesn't look mediocre sometimes. Mediocrity can put itself in a nice facade, say the right things. But what is success? What's the difference between an NBA player who's the worst in the NBA or the NBA player is the best in the NBA?

They both practice their butts off. They both work out hardcore. They all have six packs. They all eat healthy. they all train, they all work nonstop. So what's the difference? It's not the facade of the NBA player and seeing how tall they are. It's that at 4 a.m., the mediocre player's sleeping, and at 4 a.m., Kobe Bryant's already on his way to the gym. It's the stuff you don't see,

and that's the problem, I think, with hiring, is that mediocre can look superior, really easily trick us. And then you really got to get to... So one thing I've been doing lately with hiring is I do what it's called skills assessments. First interview is always for, like, the vibe. I want kindness.

I want empathy. I want politeness, because I do think it's important in a workspace for everyone to feel comfortable. I don't want people being diminutive to each other. And then the second thing I do with the skills assessment, we actually put them to work. We let them see for a few minutes,

give them some tasks, get them some skill sets live in the moment. And we see how quick or smart they are. Because what I found toxicity comes from is having really smart people around people who aren't as good at their job. And it's not their fault. The problem is that the doers, the killers,

they get dragged down sometimes energy-wise. There's energy vampires that happen in the workplace. And I think you've got to really separate those people and try to give the winners the best team around them. otherwise their performance starts to draw away too. What Doc just described is a masterclass in hiring the right people and blending together. Because it's not just the hire.

It's the blend of the team, the makeup of the team. Because it's hard to have all type A's or like all. You will get brought down if everyone's not at least on a similar plane. It's just it doesn't work because your B players will pull, you're not in B. Let's call them D players, will pull your A players down. They don't have to be A's. You need A's and B's. Your Ds are going to pull your A's down.

It's important. And look, everybody's got a different skill. And so it's the blend of talents. But everybody needs to be on the level playing field of at least great in what they are and what they do within the skill sets that are needed for your office to run or any business to run. The other big thing that I've learned too over the years, I'm sure you know this for sure, right? You know, you can't say yes to everything. Being a yes, man, it seems the right thing to do when you're young entrepreneur. You just say yes to everything, every meeting, every moment, every dinner, everything.

You just go to anything. and you end up wasting so much time and energy, you got to be really selective in who you work with, what you do. Saying no to the wrong clients will save you so much time and money and saying yes, the wrong clients will literally suck the life and energy out of you. Be really being selective, starting to get that confidence. And I think young entrepreneurs, they get nervous of saying no. Well, any revenue is good revenue. And it turns out it's not true. There is such a thing as good revenue and bad revenue. I've learned that lesson. I still learn it every now and then from time to time. You and I can get lured in.

You get the confidence that you can change them. I know what problem I might be getting, but I think I can work my way through it. I call it be greedy with your energy. That's what it is. It's not literally being greedy, just with your energy and where you apply it. Because it's a finite resource for like new businesses, the idea of exclusivity is like just like what you just said. Oh, any revenue is good revenue.

Like, oh, I got to get it. But maybe not when building your brand. Talk to me about your perspective on luxury experience. One of the biggest things with luxury experience is you got to have. a funnel that weeds out the waste of time leads. When you're starting out, you create these funnels and you want every single lead. You don't want to lose a single one. You're getting mad at your employees that they missed the email on that one and they didn't get the right phone number on that one versus worrying about the high level useful leads. You want quality leads. You don't want to just

want every lead. That's what a lot of young entrepreneurs get wrong too, is they want to create these massive email lists, these massive things. And again, at some point, there's a scale to those things when you sell your list or do things like that. But in a medical space, especially for luxury concierge branding, where I'm trying to create myself as the Hermes of what we do in our business, you know, not even a Chanel-Louisitan, like straight up to the Ermas-Burkin bag of what we do. This is the Rolls-Royce. This is the Berkin.

That's the branding we took from day one. So the concept is we want quality leads. In order to book an appointment with me, first of all, just to talk. It's $500 to spend 10 minutes with me, basically, to get to do the consultation. And that $500, I'm not trying to make a business off of $500. That's not how this works. It's a quality lead generator where if you're not willing to spend that, then you're probably not going to be comfortable spending 20 to 40,000 on a surgery. So it's okay to let those go because a lot of patients will call them.

Like, oh, we'll either do a free consult or what happens if I don't do surgery, can I get the money back? And listen, I understand if you don't go to Hermes, you don't go to Rolls-Royce, if you don't have the budget for it. And that's totally fine. There are lots of options. There's lots of surgeons out there. So there's nothing disrespectful about it. We tell the patients of grace, like, oh, my God, God, God. There's so many good options out there for you.

Do not worry. However, to book a consultation. with Dr. Dugard is $500 and that is non-refundable. And we make it very clear. We're just very, matter of fact, the other thing I've learned is you've got to have employees who are comfortable talking about money. Money is such an awkward thing for the average person

because they're not trained in sales. But when you're in sales, you have to be very comfortable talking about money. Money's just a commodity. It's just something you use to get what you want out of life. So it's not some weird, scary thing. It's just money. It's just pieces of paper that you collected

and now you spend it on something you want. It should be a good thing. It should be an exciting moment to spend your money on something like me because I'm an exciting moment for most people in their lives. That's number one and two is funneling them through quality lead generation, having the concierge's ability to talk to them with a really respectful way, make sure they feel heard, make sure they feel listened to, and have people not overworked with the minutia of your business. Every business, how much minutia is there? Look at your current podcast. There's a giant TV behind

you. Someone has to make sure it works. There's an audio guy making sure the audio works. There's a video guy, makes sure the video works. There's seven, eight people doing minutiaeer right now for Ryan to be able to do what he does, which is deliver message to the person listening right now. The key is we have to look at our employees that way too is I don't want the video guy worrying about the audio guy's work. And I don't want the audio guy worrying about the video guys work. Everyone's got to take care of their thing so that the luxury person who is selling can just talk, just focus on that client eye to eye, give them confidence, influence in a way that makes them feel out home. And then we took a lot of inspiration from hotels and from some more luxury brands that we identify with.

And we have hotel-infused sense in our lobby. We have minimalistic restoration hardware, minimalized decor everywhere. So it kind of has this inviting feel and you have like this cleanliness to it. So like you get that medical sense with like this calming sense as well. It kind of fuses together.

And we kind of create this like holistic energy of concierge medicine, one level above whatever other office they went to. And my whole thought is that if we put that level of attention into this, imagine how much attention I'm putting into the surgery. Where can everybody keep up with all you're doing with your practice and obviously a lot of wisdom to share in business as well? My website is scarlessnose.com and my name is Dr. Deepak Duggar, Dugar, D-U-G-A-R. I'm on Instagram at Deepak D-B-D-Gar-M-D. I'm on Twitter X and I'm on TikTok under the same name, Deepak D-B-D-G-R-M-D. Love to share. If anyone has any questions, just shoot me a DM and anywhere on my team is amazing, we get hundreds of DM some days depending on where in the world and what I posted and what people liked.

But shoot us a DM will always respond. We'll try our best to get through them all. us, best as we can. It's a pleasure having you on, Doctor. I look forward to continuing the relationship. Yes, sir. I'll see you in LA soon. We'll go to Nobu. I love that.

Hey, guys, you're going to find us. Ryanisright.com. We'll have highlight clips links to all of the content. No, it won't be pretty people and beautiful women, but it will be drops of wisdom and knowledge from Doctor, the best in his field, and we appreciate him. We appreciate you for making us number one. We'll see you next time.

We'll see you next time. We're right about now. This has been right about now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network production. Visit Ryanisright.com for full audio and video versions of the show or to inquire about sponsorship opportunities. Thanks for listening.