Dr. Mo: Hello! I’m glad that you all like here. Please make sure that you put your name and where you’re from in the chat box. If you would please. So we can kind of see who we have with us today. We have a some slow connection here, so we’ll get everybody connected before we get started, probably about 1 min or 2, and we’ll get going.
Dr. Mo: It’s like we have a lot of people from South Dakota today. That’s awesome.
Dr. Mo: Last time we were outnumbered by people from California. So
Dr. Mo: alright. So it looks like everybody is pretty much logged on. So I would ask that you if you feel comfortable, please leave your video on but go ahead and meet yourself and tell you how question are till we open up for questions, and we’re going to get started. So this is our state of care, webinar. we are web-based tools for peer specialists that are built by your specialists. So the first thing I want to start with today is just getting to know our team. So I’m gonna have Jonathan introduced himself, and then David and to him, please.
Jonathan Lewis: Yes, I’m Jonathan Lewis. I am the co-founder and chief technical officer at straight up here.
David Balicki – Straight Up Care: Nina. Everybody, David Balicki. I’m the compliance manager at straight up care and welcome.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Hi, everyone! My name is Tung when and I’m a consultant for shared up care
Dr. Mo: awesome, and I’m Dr. Moe, and I’m excited to be here again. This is our third pure day, and we’ve had great feedback from people. And we’re just here to start this community. talk to you about the ecosystem that is straight up care and how we can get together to help people. So I’m going to drop a poll here real quick. Actually, I’m going to step in just for a second, because I don’t know how to do both at the same time.
Dr. Mo: And I’m going to open up this toll.
Dr. Mo: Oh, I like never mind, it’s not going to open up. How about I? Have you put in the chat? So if you are currently a peer specialist, would you put? Yes, in the chat box for me, please.
Dr. Mo: So if you are currently a peer specialist, peer, recovery coach whatever title you might have please put. Yes, in the chat box.
Dr. Mo: I know that we have a few. I recognize the names, and I know that a few of you are working on your peer specialist certification through our course. So again, we have the course to offer for people
Dr. Mo: on a grant at right right now, which we’re excited about. We’ve had people already run through the course, and we’re getting some good feedback. We are officially NAADAC accredited, which means that our course can be used for CEs for addiction specialists as well as our course can be used in other States, too. So if you decide to work in other States, if you move out of South Dakota, it looks like primarily you can utilize our course in that way, too. So
Dr. Mo: so we’re super excited about that. thank you for your feedback in the chat. I appreciate that. And so if you’re not, if you’re specialists, I’d like to just quickly talk about what if your specialist is, and what you can do so up here especially. This is a person that, unlike me, and many of you who might be an extended recovery are on their healing journey that gets a certification and is able to work with others and help them navigate their healing journey.
Dr. Mo: So a few places that you could work, you could work alongside a hospital, overdose detox centers, with medical assistant treatment with counselors mental health or addiction.
Dr. Mo: and all of the likes of. But really, what we want to talk to you today about is working independently. So in most States your specialists can work independently, definitely in South Dakota. which means that you could work using our app. So I think, instead of continuing to talk about what that looks like. I’m going to jump on over to Jonathan’s presentation here, and if you have questions as I’m playing this video for you.
Dr. Mo: I would love for you to ask them in the chat box. Jonathan is on here. He can answer all those questions, and and we can open up, and we will open up as soon as we’re done with the video, too. So here we go.
Dr. Mo: Somebody give me an okay when you can hear this, please.

Hello, beautiful people, and welcome to straight up care. I’m Jonathan Lewis, co-founder and CTO of straight up care.
Today I’m very excited to announce that straight up care is beginning to onboard peer specialist on to our
platform and ecosystem. What we will talk about today is a little bit of how we got here and where we’re going and given away some free gifts specifically for people who are already Peer Specialists, those who wish to become care specialist, or even if you want to give back and think someone will be a good peer specialist, we have gifts for them as well.
Truth to be told. We all know gifts are fun and cool, and all that, but I believe that what it boils down to for me and my co-founder, Dr. Mo. I ask her at least once a week, what are we going to do to make the world a better place today?
And that’s just kind of where we’re at given this data that came from Samhsa, where you can see the workforce in behavioural health is not really increasing. It’s actually
not growing very much at all, especially since schools have been closed the past couple of years, because of all the covid stuff. But the problem is. people needing behavioral health services are getting worse and worse and worse, and there’s more and more, and every day. I hear you know how it’s a wait list of
a month plus to get in to see someone or get their child in to see someone. And we looked at this and just knew that it wasn’t going to be sustainable things are getting worse. If we don’t do something about this to bridge the gap now.
they’re predicting an 87% shortage. I’m not sure if that has changed. This was in 2,020 by Samhsa, so it could have changed by now. I’m not sure which way. But this is what we look at, and what drives us for what we’re doing.
So I hope you’re not here just for gifts, but I hope you take advantage of every gift that we have.
The other thing we looked at was the accessibility like one. It’s hard enough to get in with a a therapist or any kind of behavioral health specialist.
you know, the more we look into it. Yeah. No wonder it’s such a high demand. I can. People can charge pretty much what they want. The national average of therapy right now is $182 a session.
More and more practices are stopping, taking insurance. Only nationally. 38% roughly have an in-network with a insurance company.
So we thought, Hey, there’s got to be a better way where people can get the help they need.
My answer has been right in front of us the whole time. Peer specialists there. well trained. certified a lot of times. The State goes through rigorous certification process.
And, more importantly, they have the life experience, the only profession that requires you to be a previous addict in some sort. I think that that is pretty amazing in and of itself, that the people who have made it through.
who have went down their path of recovery can turn around and pay it forward right now. There are over 30,000 peer specialists across the Us. Most working in private practice or hospitals.
but with our platform we want to get them serving that population of behavioral health seekers and help bridge that gap.
And to do so we created an entire ecosystem specifically for peer specialists. And if you go to our website straight up, care com. You will see if you scroll to the bottom of the page.
There are peer specialist rules by state section.
and on this page you will see how to become a peer specialist. You simply click whichever state you are in. and it will provide you with the information as up to date as we can provide along with the links to verify the exact steps that you need for your State, because every state is different and quite varying in their requirements.
We link this here just for you. So to become a certified peer-to-support, specialist, peer-support, specialist, peer, specialist, peer support. Every State has a different hand for it.
Most all have a cost involved. Once you have checked with your State on their requirements, and some States do offer their own training that you have to go through. But once you have checked, you can find a course online.
as you can see some costs quite a bit. This is almost $2,500, or you can come to learn at straight of care.com where we have our own course. Final stages of Nadac certification, which is a national organization
for addiction councillors. And right now you can see that it is 2, 99, so you can get started. This is a 46 h course.
and couple of quizzes download. We have some of the best teachers available. The notorious Dr. Melissa Dit burner, who is also our CEO and
a co-founder alongside me. She has put this course together to get peer supports trained and working as quickly as possible. and 2 months ago we started a Grant program to
help peer specialists or those wishing to become peer specialists. And we are going to extend that again today. The Grant program consists of full course access, and once you graduate we will onboard you onto our platform as well. So you can get started right away. We’re going to talk a little bit more about the cost of kind of what you would need if you just wanted to do this yourself, and what that looks like for other people in the addiction field and the recovery field.
But right now I’m going to pop up a link for your first free gift. Want to give this to everyone who is here today. and I want you to consider passing this on to someone you think would be a good fit. As a peer specialist. Most States require at least a year or 2 of recovery time
taking a certified course. Some States have their own courses, some have different test. You have to take. Some States even provide the training. but I would encourage you to if
if you were in a similar position that could help when you. That’s why we’re doing this for free. We’ve already had almost 50 people awarded this grant, and several people have already went through the course and become certified.
We want that number to change mainly because if the situation was different. I would hope that someone out there would do the same for someone like me.
so obviously joining straight-up cares. Ecosystem is not the only way to help people. We know that we are the only platform that offers. So much for peer specialists. There are other platforms that offer similar things.
not as encompassing, not a one stop shop. There are companies like.
Dr. Mo: and of course, the infamous and
world renowned.
Okay. So I had to beat myself out, one because my mom’s listening. But regardless, we’re going to talk about a few of the other platforms that are out there and how they operate. And then we’re going to discuss exactly how we’re different and what we do.
So first we’re going to talk about these listing platforms, directory sites. We have our own directory site. Other platforms may charge a monthly fee, the most popular one.
They used to have a fee structure that was just a flat fee of $3,000 a year. Several years ago they changed that to just $300 a year. plus
they had a 35 to $110 charge for new patients booking through them. And that’s based on their speciality. Obviously that makes things very difficult to have to pass that along to those who are struggling with substance use disorders or mental health issues. So we decided to change ours a little bit from that.
and then, of course, there are telehealth platforms out there. We are not the first one to come up with this idea. The idea of having online video and audio and chat is not the newest thing on the block.
There are plenty out there none specific for peer specialists that we’re aware of. And right now the pay structure is quite bizarre. I think one of the most popular ones. They have
a fee structure where the first 5 h of the week you work, you get paid one amount, the next 10 you get paid, another, and everything over that you get paid a different amount. But you really
are not a private practice. You are employed by them. so you really can’t exactly be your own boss. Set your own hours. Choose your own
clients that you work with. The other thing I found, unfortunately, the more I look into it the more depressing it gets. Not only do platforms, for example, this one here that I was talking about. Not only do they have a very
odd fee structure. but when they say that they pay you $30 an hour. they really break that down and pay you for a 45 min session, if that is the case, so instead of getting that $30 an hour.
You get 22 and some change, and that the rest is just. It’s just eaten cost, unfortunately, that eats into your hours. And what you can make is a peer specialist. And yeah, this, unfortunately, that’s what
social workers, a psychiatrist. everyone else. That’s the deals that they’ve made with these people. Again, we wanted to do something different. to empower peer specialists to be their own boss. We are not an employer. We are a software as a service.
and another great route for people to go. If they want to get into the addiction and mental health substance, use area of mental health to join a private practice, or a hospital, or a rehab center.
even a school. You know there are great benefits to that. Unfortunately, there are some setbacks. most practices. They don’t allow you to set your own schedule, and nationally, they have a 65, 35 split, or they take 35% of your pay right off the top.
Unfortunately, they do take care of a lot of things. They do the marketing. They they most of the time have the scheduling software and a secretary, and the billing is built in. You just got to show up and work out of their office.
which sounds great. If you can find a place to get on it. What most people are doing is the Diallo route
and the D. I will do it yourself is good for a few people may not be the best possible way to do it.
As a so proprietor, business owner. You have to start your own office, either rent it or buy it. If you’re going to work full time meeting with people you have to have a secretary to, you know. Take your calls, schedule everything, make sure everything works, or by some expensive scheduling software which most scheduling software are not hipaa compliant? So obviously, you have to worry about hipaa compliance.
which can be a huge slap and bankrupt a business very fast. You got to know how to build and maintain a website. You’ve got to learn marketing. You’ve got to learn a county. It’s a lot just to be in business for yourself. And again, hipaa compliance.
So you know, while the do it yourself, route sounds great.
Most people get into this area of industry to help people. They don’t get into this to learn how to market. They don’t get in this to learn how to manage an office. They want to help people.
And it’s exactly why we’ve built the tools that we have to let you help people without worrying about all of these extra fees and hidden cost and
the cost to start a business these days are outrageous.
So the average cost. if you were to start a new business
ranges quite a bit per industry. This list here is just a list of new businesses that were started
for under 3 million dollars. So everything over that the big companies not listed here you can see
health care and social assistance. The average cost to start up a business is $188,000, really making it hard to start up a private practice, the absolute lowest. You can become a construction worker for around 67,000.
So like, I said, straight up, Care’s ecosystem is like hitting the easy button.
And let’s talk about what all is in the ecosystem.
So yeah, there’s a lot going on, and you can see all the blue is what we have right now. That’s up and ready to go. The orange is things that will be rolled out very soon, and if you wait until the end, I have another surprise that is not even on this list. So we have a lot going on. We have our telehealth app
includes a lot of stuff we have videos on that. You can look at reduce the stigma. TV is a video website that we will be adding to the Roku and Amazon fire TV to basically build rapport between the people on our platform who want to have a video on Roku or Amazon fire. It builds Rip for you, get marketing for them, and helps people to
know them before they even have their first appointment. So they don’t waste time trying to tell their backstory, because hopefully, they’ve already seen it. We have virtually virtual reality in the works. Several videos that you can look up on that that we’ve already posted. We have our Peer Specialist directory that we will talk a little bit about.
We have our training, which we have already touched on a little. We have Syndicate 12, which is a free group. Help again. This is all just a turnkey system.
It’s like slapping the easy button. Most of this is a done for you service.
So again, it’s training certification. We will have continuing education in the pipeline. We take care of a lot of the Hiba compliance and sign, Baas, for the software that you’ll be using under our platform.
Take care of the scheduling the payment processing, the marketing. and how everything a peer specialist needs. So the first step of this onboarding process will be simple.
We will work with you to select and build out your own custom website. This is branded to to you. You can use a subdomain of ours, but we encourage everyone to
purchase their own domain name. and we brand it. So you are the one that is in the spotlight. Not so much as
so once you’re inside your new website. It’ll look something similar to this. You’ll have your own dashboard that pop out, move around. You can sit your icons for quicker access. You can add post. You need to add your own media. We will work with you to add pages. Of course you can add your own. You can set templates to make things a lot quicker. When you do add new posts or pages.
We have SEO tools built in. We have a customizer. You can change your appearance around. The great thing about this is that
if you so choose. when you make a new post we’ll schedule it one. This ties into Google sites where you can have it authenticated faster. Get it showing up and indexed on Google faster. And when you make a new post or pages, it is set up to what they call ping different search engines to say, Hey, look at, look at my new page, look at my new content, which will in turn have it
quicker, ranking quicker, and get you more traffic. The other neat thing about this is every page will be set up when you go to the menu of the site where it is your page that you chose from our templates, and
we set up for you all customized with your photos, your biography you’re about, but the menus will be the homepage. You’ll have an about section which is basically your story.
You’ll have a link to the telehealth app where inside of your web page, they will be able to see your schedule, took an appointment, and meet with you all on your web page, along with the payment. Everything. Is hipaa. Secure the way that we have it set up.
Also have a link to your directory site that just added some more credibility, more knowledge about you and who you are on the directory site. You can make
more post more updates, get a little bit more in depth than what you would need on a website.
So this is the kind of the back end dashboard of our directory site for the individual peer specialist. So you can see it is very much like any other social media kind of platform. You
fill out your information, you can make posts, you can add friends with other peer specialists and message them directly and have a community among peer specialists and grow together.
It’s also where we have our matching algorithm, which I will touch a bit in the next slide. But you fill out all of the information about you. You fill out your background
and we so this is the kind of the back end dashboard of our directory site for the individual peer specialist. So you can see it is very much like any other social media kind of platform. You
fill out your information, you can make posts. You can add friends with other peer specialists and message them directly and have a community among peer specialists and grow together.
It’s also where we have our matching algorithm, which I will touch a bit in the next slide.
So our matching is very much the similar to a dating website, basically because that’s how we match people. We want that rapport to be built before your first meeting with them. So we base it on numerous the key indicators that can help them narrow down who they meet with, and hopefully that report will be established
right off the bat. One of the biggest things we found in our discovery when we were deciding to start. This is that the peer specialists out there a large majority are working in hospitals, or you know other office settings where they may only have, you know, one on staff at a time.
So if someone comes into the er overdose of, you know, some narcotic. But the peer specialist there, it’s his or her background is, and
you know, alcohol addiction, you know, it’s not that great of a fit. So we have set this up so that won’t be a problem anymore. So, like, I hinted at earlier.
the directory site that we do the marketing for it. Funnels to you. We do the marketing. We get the people there. We set up the website. We do the marketing for your website.
You will definitely need to do some of the set up yourself, because that’s you know it’s properties owned by you when you set up a Google, my business. Or you set up a new Facebook. That’s that’s stuff that you have to do yourself. But we will provide the training and simple walk through on how to do that.
One of the tools that has not been mentioned before, and I actually sprung on my partner, Dr. Moe, just today is our social auto-poster platform, just another tool to make it simpler for you and make it easier for you
and talk about that right now.
So welcome to our social auto poster, our newest addition to the straight-up care ecosystem. We’ll come to our page. Share straight up, care, comm either sign up or log in. I’m going to go ahead and sign in
what this is. It’s a social auto poster, pretty fantastic, naming convention, I think. regardless. but it is what it does. It allows you to link to all of your accounts from Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Tumbler, Pinterest, Google, my business, Reddit Instagram and Blogger.
Once you have done that, you can write a message, you can add an image or a video. add a link.
select the networks you have connected.
Pick your schedule. pick the time you want it to post, then public publish the post. That’s simple. That way. Instead of spending your days writing content for every possible social media outlet there is, which is probably the best thing to do. You no longer have to do that is this fantastic and creative and totally original? I like to think so. But no, it’s not. There’s actually other companies that do that. One of the most cost-effective ones is buffer. But you can purchase yourself.
They do. They do have a free tier, for I think it’s 3 channels. It’s really by the time you pay them, you know you get signed up, logged in. Set everything up. Is it really worth it for 3 regardless we had 9. They charge 54 bucks for that every month.
a little less, if you get it yearly, but roughly, it’s going to be about 650, some odd dollars a year with our package.
We include this to our members. It’s free. If you were to sign up. There is an option to purchase it for $40 a month, but we
add you for free.
So yes, you get everything which could be for $40 a month. We’re giving you a coupon code. You get it for free.
and of course, the bread and butter and main feature of straight-up care is our telehealth app will be available as soon as we on board plenty of peer workers on our platform. We want to make sure that when
people start going there that there will be peer supports there to help them. as of right now, it is just on the website. It’s a web based app right now the android and
is app will be released shortly. Again, everything will be added to your own website, and it will be integrated where most people won’t really even notice
that it is hosted by anyone but you.
Unlike some telehealth apps. ours will have the ability to schedule either a chat meeting, an audio meeting. a video call.
or you can set a different price different time. We have plenty of videos out there already. You can look at, but you can set up individual meetings at a specific location or at your home office. So all the scheduling is done for you in every possible way.
So we talked a little bit about the cost of starting a new business. and I believe it was, you know, $188,000 was the average. Where does where does that number come from? How does that fit? In
one thing? You have the cost of, you know. building a website which most developers will charge, you know, 60, 80 bucks an hour. The average right now is 3,000 $5,000, with your hosting and your templates, and all the tools built in.
So that is one of the main cost right off of the bat that really bumps that number up.
Then, of course, there is the matter of getting clients.
You know the life blood of any business is people walking on your door. people finding out about you on average, small businesses spend, you know, as low as $2,500 to $12,000 monthly on
online advertising alone. And then, if you get into like search engine optimization, you’re looking at another, you know, grand a month there. So when you’re starting your business, this is one of the key things at getting things started.
And then, of course, there is the matter of all the tools that you need to actually run a business. If you were to do this yourself, go on the Diy route, you would need tools that allow you to video chat or at minimum a phone system. You need booking and scheduling cool tools. You need
hipaa, compliant payment processors, and then there’s disputed charges and charge backs and on and on, and that’s not even to mention. If you want a secretary, or you want to take time out of your day, that you could be meeting and helping people to do all of this yourself.
What we found most people who tried to do it themselves usually are not in compliance with hipaa. If you don’t have a sign, baa, with these companies there is a high chance that you’re not going to be EPA compliant.
So again. one of the biggest cost is your time. Yes, people will say, well, I can. I can go and get a website builder and slap something together. And you know it costs
20 or 30 bucks a month for a website builder. And I can. I can do the marketing. And I can post. And I can do this. But your time is what really makes the difference. And
our goal is to have you helping people. Our goal is not to have you becoming an office administrator or a marketer or a website builder. We want to see more peer specialists helping those in need.
So one of the favorite things that I hear about people who have become peer specialist is their story of saying, Hey, I have this background I used to be looked down upon. I used to, you know, not be proud of myself, and
since I became a peer specialist. I’m a pillar of the community. People see me out and say, Hey, he’s helping somebody, or Hey, she’s helping somebody. People will come up, shake their hands, be proud to know them. So
you know we we take that into account with everything we’ve done. We do not want this ecosystem to focus on straight up care. We want it to focus on you. And that’s how we have built this out. We have built this to focus around your website.
all the marketing, all the tools point to your website in your local community in your state. We want you to be the center of this, and we want your business to thrive.
and then doing so, of course ours will, too.
So how do we make it where everyone can thrive? Well, one. Let’s kind of look at what you could expect if you know, these different platforms actually were built and allowed peer specialists on there.
all right. So the listing directory like we said, it’s 300 bucks a year. and you know another fee for every client. They send you the telehealth platform again, very confusing to figure out. But it is a a dollar amount, pay scale even their their text. If you have chat, it’s a per word.
Pay very confusing. If you wanted to start your own practice, join a private practice. You know the average is 35, some will have a 75, 25 split. Those usually don’t last too terribly long, because it’s hard to keep the lights on at that.
Some have as much as a 50 50 split, but the average is the 35%. Then you look at the Diy route and you say, Hey, that 1 88 number you had was pretty outrageous, and yes, it. It was pretty outrageous. But you look at it. 3,000 for a website.
you know, bare minimum on marketing bare minimum for staff, and that’s minimum wage for one staff, and then you think about rent. Then all the tools that you have to have. The good thing is you you do get to keep 100% of that that you’re not throwing out on your expenses. So just this not counting rent is $69,000 a year. And then you ran on top of that. Then, of course, you will need certain licenses.
and registering with either. You know the Secretary of State, or, however you want to form your actual company. And of course. while we’re all here, is straight up cares route
for the website.
$200 a year for the marketing. We take care of that and teach you how to do the rest for staff and office space. You really don’t need it. If we do the bookkeeping. We do the scheduling, we do. The payment processing
got most all of it covered for you, all the tools included. So the Directory fee something very much like this. We have it set up for 249 a year. And then, to use our telehealth app, it’s just a flat, 20%
a lot less than going into a private practice. And right now we’re for the first 5 people in each State. We’re waving these fees. No cost to get started when we send you clients and you start using our telehealth app, we will just have 20%.
So again, the key thing is your website, the Directory forces people to your website. If you upload a video and we put it on either our video channel or
Roku Channel or Amazon fire channel that will push people to your website. You can actually go on our telehealth app and search for peer specialists by their specialty and their state that sends them to your website, and then all the web presence we help set up for you. It all goes back to your website. You’re the star here, not straight up care.
So the first step that we will be starting immediately is building your site for you. We have a form that you can fill out. depending on where you’re watching this, you can message us, and if you are one of the first 5 in your state, we will build your site for you for free.
What money it’ll take is if you want to buy a domain name. you can purchase that, and we can have it added to your domain. That’s step one. Once you get into the dashboard of your website, you’ll have all the training materials. You need to build out everything that you need to build your profiles to ensure that you are everywhere you need to be. At which time, if you so choose. Again, you can
edit a video. We actually can do a lot of the editing for you. You just make a simple hey, this is my story kind of video. and we’ll get it pushed out for you and added to your site.
It was time we will get you onboarded on the telehealth app itself, and get all of that integrated for you, and really start ramping up the marketing and promoting your business.
because, like I said, you are the star here. You’re the one going out there doing the work and helping you’re the ones who can help. We’re just the tool to help you get there.
So again, thank you for your time. I really hope that you consider sharing at least the training and the the coupon code that we have for that training to get more peer specialist working and helping people. It’s it’s sharing things like that that really can bridge the gap, get people the help they need. And if we have more peer specialists out there we all win.
So again, thank you for your time, and let me know how we can help you.
Dr. Mo: All right. So what questions do we have?
Dr. Mo: You can free feel free to unmute yourself. You can put in the chat box. I I wasn’t checking the chat box as I was playing, so did anything come up as we were going along there, too.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: No, no questions right now. Just some positive feedback.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: you were saying, and lots of emojis so got a question just popping right here. So
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: so the first 5 certified, or first 5
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: that apply from Taylor Roberts. I think he’s or I think this person is probably speaking about the Perks.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Something with the first 5 users, the first 5 certified.
Dr. Mo: yeah. So, Taylor, you’re already certified. Correct. So you would just need to. Did the link get dropped in the chat.
Dr. Mo: Yeah, for the website built. So you’d be in the ring for that. So we’ll get the link in the chat so you can put your info in there for the
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: got another question that popped in. How can we get access to the business plan.
Dr. Mo: Jonathan. I’m not sure what they’re asking them.
Jonathan Lewis: Yeah, we don’t. We don’t have our business plan publicly available to everyone.
Jonathan Lewis: if you want to message me and let me know what you’re looking for. I’d be happy to help you.
Dr. Mo: So those are you that are not your support. Does anybody have any questions about what it takes to be coming for support, or what that looks like any questions about the course.
Brandi: When I went to go look after. I signed up, did the Grant stuff, and was waiting for
Brandi: emails with like instructions or anything like that. I went to the site and the only courses that they had were for September. So I didn’t know that.
Brandi: there is anything started right now.
Dr. Mo: So brandy, the course is online. So asynchronous. So you can jump. You should have got an email saying like your access code to the course and that’ll tell you everything that you need to do to get logged in, and if not, we’ll we’ll get that to you. and the course is asynchronous. So you can take it just like any other online course at your own leisure.
Brandi: Awesome. Alright, thank you.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Got another question or a couple here. So
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Florence is asking, How can we get assistance for the business plan. So I guess if a peer specialist needs help with the business plan or some additional guidance on how to do that.
Dr. Mo: we can definitely give you some of the resources that we had to create our business plan and what that looked like for? Sure.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Mark is asking, what is the approximate cost of a business domain?
Dr. Mo: That’s Jonathan.
Jonathan Lewis: Yeah, it’s usually
Jonathan Lewis: There’s several different places you can buy most everything I use. I just use name tea, or Amazon has their own domain, name reseller. If you we, we’ll send you a link to our site, and on that we have a a discount code where for the first year you can get
Jonathan Lewis: a domain, for I think it’s
Jonathan Lewis: 6 bucks plus or minus a few cents.
Jonathan Lewis: and that will be sent to you. That was the on the screen where you actually go to. choose your
Jonathan Lewis: your template, which will be sent once you verify all your information that you are working on getting certified and becoming up here.
Jonathan Lewis: Specialists are already are, and we’ll have that link there.
Jonathan Lewis: Do you have the link for them to sign up for the founders piece. I don’t have it on. My, that’s what I was digging up. That’s why it took me a second to get back on here. I apologize
Jonathan Lewis: alright. Thank you very much.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Elizabeth is asking me to Elizabeth is asking, can I do the course on my phone or on it? Or do I need a computer
Dr. Mo: you? I believe you could be able to do it on your phone. It’s just through
Dr. Mo: a site just like anything else, either is a couple of video creations that you need to upload. That might get a little tricky, but I would think it would be easily accessible through a phone as well.
Ruth: Hello.
Dr. Mo: Hello! Do you have a question?
Ruth: Yeah, please. You know, at times. we have ideas on what to do.
But at times the access for us to get to get assistance. you know, like these,
Ruth: computer and online business. we always been kind of being affected by
Ruth: domain and website.
Ruth: So yeah, I don’t know if you can change some years, or if there will be a kind of tutorial online for us to know how to maybe create our own domain. You know how to create website. It will really be of help to us know most. We we do a lot of things to do. But the idea is always the problem.
Jonathan Lewis: Yes,
Jonathan Lewis: in our in our software, when we initially
Jonathan Lewis: build your website for you
Jonathan Lewis: and you go into the back end of your new website. it will have
Jonathan Lewis: several training videos to walk you through the specific steps that you have to take to do that. It’s just the over the shoulder. Click. Here, go here, do this.
Jonathan Lewis: and that’s what you need to do. All the training will be in there and it also will have training. for.
Jonathan Lewis: you know, not only just getting a domain name and setting it all up. But it will, you know, show you how to create a Google my business account and
Jonathan Lewis: what you need to do on your Facebook account. It’s a full training course. I’ve actually seen courses with a whole lot less. Just sell for hundreds of dollars. But it’s all going to be
Jonathan Lewis: video style inside of your own website, where you can access it anytime.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Robert is asking, how long will it take the course to be completed.
Dr. Mo: So it does say it’s a 46 h course. but it doesn’t. I don’t think it takes that long to create the course. it kind of depends on how much I’ve written time you put into the assessment. So we have things in there like creating a crisis plan. It might be different for you if you’re in New York.
Dr. Mo: and what that crisis plan might look like for all the different resources versus South Dakota, where that crisis plan might not be as large because we are a smaller space, and we don’t have quite the access to resources. So I kind of just it kind of just depends. But I would set out at least 46 h. I know the people that have been doing it are just kind of taking a piece by piece, doing the readings, watching a couple of videos and then doing the assignment at the end. So I feel like it may not take all of those hours
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: John is asking, how can we get assistance to start the business? So I guess someone can kind of share some more features of the platform to kind of help enable peer specialists kind of get started.
Jonathan Lewis: Yeah, I’ve I’ve dropped the link to kind of, I guess. Step one into the chat.
Jonathan Lewis: and
Jonathan Lewis: I’ll drop it in there again. So it’s a little more fresh at the bottom of the the chat string there. but after that there will be
Jonathan Lewis: that basically nerves it down to if you have
Jonathan Lewis: already been certified, or if you need certification.
Jonathan Lewis: and after that we will either
Jonathan Lewis: get you into the training course, or if you’re already certified, we’ll go ahead and
Jonathan Lewis: start getting your website set up for you.
Jonathan Lewis: You do verify. You are who you say you are, so you know you will need to provide a little bit of documentation, and there is a simple, you know.
Jonathan Lewis: Drop the file on top of a upload box and it’ll be there.
Jonathan Lewis: Now that that said. After that we’ll directly contact you
Jonathan Lewis: via email or phone. It’s your preference
Jonathan Lewis: and get started on the website. And then we’ll move forward from there. That’s kind of the first step. Once we get people through that.
Jonathan Lewis: we’ll move on to the next step.
Dr. Mo: And, Taylor, I did drop the link in the chat for you. I know you said you wanted to be able to share that. So I dropped the link to Jonathan’s presentation in there.
Dr. Mo: Let me know if you need to, in another space other than the chat
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: Matthew, saying, I was less interested in the business than the education. What other
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: education is there
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: meaning peer specialist education
Dr. Mo: like above and beyond hours, or I guess I’m a little confused.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: I guess, just like What are the resources there that people can learn more about what is the peer specialist? Or, you know, continuing education or that kind of things? Yeah, absolutely. So. Samsa has their core competencies, which is what we created our
Dr. Mo: our course around. So Samsung would be a wonderful place to Go and explore some more about your specialist and what it looks like to be a peer specialist. You can easily google their core competencies and find that and they have some really wonderful resources about best practices for their specialists as well.
Dr. Mo: Thanks, Matthew. Hey? Your response about I’m not doing this for money is what a lot of people have told us when we were doing our customer discovery and trying to figure out what we needed to do for peer specialists, and how we could truly help them. A lot of people were working for free, which is great, and I admire that. And I love that. There are people that will, you know, share their experiences and do their thing for free. But I also love that. There’s a space where people can choose to make money, too. Sometimes I feel like when we’re in recovery, and I’m totally speaking for myself right here.
Dr. Mo: I feel like I have to try and not save the world, but try and help the world right, at least put myself out there. And for a long time I forgot that. Oh, yeah, I also did go to college for a really long time, and need to pay for that, too. So I have to get, you know. Some. Some things have to be reimbursed for people in order to make it, and I feel like as we are fresh in the recovery, and we start to feel like we want to help and get back. And we’re ready for that step we forget. And again myself, we forget that you know it. It is okay, and that our skills are very much there for us to be able to
Dr. Mo: use our experience, and that experience is worth something too. So, not taking away from what you said, I totally admire that, but I also love that. There’s a space where people can make money in this field. because I love that a person with a felony can
Dr. Mo: use our platform, take our training and make a living wage, where oftentimes in the real world today it’s extremely hard to even get housing. But I want to get a job. And so we just want to be able to to be there for people who are in recovery who may have have somewhat of a past that that might not look like everybody else’s.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: it looks like brandy, is Saying the site is not allowing her to register.
Tung Nguyen – Straight Up Care: so, Jonathan, did you want to take a look into that, please.
Jonathan Lewis: Brandy. We we already have. You registered for that. You’re already on the list.
Dr. Mo: Boom! That was that
Dr. Mo: any other questions before we give you all some of your time back. I never like to hold a meeting till the end.
Dr. Mo: Yeah, brandy. You won’t be able to log in, and so we get everything verified for you. So we’ll get you taken that course, and then then you’ll be able to get all on board.
Dr. Mo: Whoo! I’m excited any questions, remember, there’s no such thing as a dumb question, either, so I feel like holding on to something now. It’s a wonderful time to ask it. I’ll even turn off the recording if you don’t like that.
Dr. Mo: Okay? Well, hearing that silence, I feel like that tells me that there are no other questions. So our next

Dr. Mo: here meeting our peer Webinar, is July 20 seventh at 6 pm. So you’ll see an email

Dr. Mo: potentially with the right date. If I remember what the time zone I’m in, and we will. We’ll meet together again on July 20, seventh, at 6 Pm. Central Standard time.

Dr. Mo: So thank you all. I appreciate your questions, your feedback, and your time. Very much so. And I look forward to working with each and every one of you, and just making a difference together. I’m pumped.

Jonathan Lewis: Yes, thank you all.