We were lucky to catch up with Mike Reisel recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Mike, thanks for joining us today. Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

Love a lot of these questions you offer, but picked out this one as I feel we still are more of a “Secret Society” type company because of what we do & how we market our business. My firm, Redwood Financial Strategies, spends a lot of time in the private equity/alternative investment space, which the majority of financial advisors can not access or do not understand how to implement into their practice. We also do a membership model vs. the “old fashioned” AUM/commission based models in the industry. I say “old fashioned,” but in reality over 90% of financial advisor practices use that model.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

The reason you do anything in life “should” be meaningful to you. My personal & business mission statement is, “Continue Building a Meaningful Life,” and that means something different to everyone. Identifying what a meaningful life is, has be extremely powerful in my business & overall life.

Before I got into the financial advising world, I was an 8th grade Science teacher & business owner in the mortgage industry. I loved learning & teaching what I learned to others. Unfortunately, many of us are never taught “how to learn,” meaning ways to actually understand and retain the new information you “learn” in life. Taking this ability into my mortgage company led many of my clients to ask me, “can you look at all our financial stuff?” So, I looked at the industry that allowed me to be integrated into my clients lives on all their finances, which is why I became a financial advisor.

Like many advisors, I had to learn the industry. There is a lot of good in the financial industry, but a lot of “curtains” as well. I feel these “curtains” should be open & exposed so clients can make clear decisions on who they should work with & what they should do with their hard earned money. Taking many years of “learning” the industry, I finally felt like I could create the financial advising company that the majority of people I worked with & spoke to were looking for. That’s when Redwood Financial Strategies became a reality.

What products/services do we provide? Broad question, so our broad answer to people considering our firm is to view us as their personal Financial Concierge desk. This means we don’t do everything for you internally within our company, but we pride ourselves on the network we have around us to really take on any/all questions from clients & either have the answer OR the ability to find them an answer that is reliable. Why do we do this? When I asked the question (while creating the Redwood Financial Strategies Business Model) “what would you like a financial advisor to do for you,” there were over 125 different answers. Some were more common than others, but what I discovered is people didn’t like working with financial advisors that just knew about insurance (life, disability, long term care, & annuities) OR just stock market investments. They wanted someone that would still cover these items, but really help them build their overall Net Worth, which encompasses so many other areas. Also, more ways to invest – like alternative investments (real estate, private equity, physical gold & silver, etc).

What I am I most proud of & what potential clients/followers/fans should know? Eventually, all my clients have become great friends. Of course, many of my personal family & friends have also become clients, but I love learning about what is a meaningful life to each of our clients & that, in turn, leads to a relationship that we truly view as friendships vs clients. I was once told “do not be friends with your clients!” I believe that is insane. None of us are perfect, and our clients know this, just like we know that about our clients. We know there are going to be great times in life (and their finances) and hard times. We’ll be there for both times, where the ones that “don’t become friends with their clients” almost always are only vocal in “good times.”

Our brand – Redwood Financial Strategies is important to us & is why we chose the Redwood tree as our logo & company name. Redwood trees grow larger than any other tree in the forest for multiple reasons. They absorb the fog vs. just taking up rain water from the ground. Their roots are intertwined so when storms come, the storm fights the forest vs. just a tree on its own. Finally, their bark is over a foot thick, so it’s extremely resilient to forest fires, bugs (ie hard times). Our clients absorb all that financial fog with our guidance, we’re intertwined with our membership model so one “higher net worth” client doesn’t make up for others, and we understand how to marry insurance, investments and life with overall portfolios so that it has a clear purpose to make sure we can be resilient when times are tough.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Pivoting in business is vital to growth. I refer to this as having a “liquid” business, meaning it’s always flowing, and I need to be aware at all times is it flowing forward, backward or is it stagnant. Two main pivots that stand out were from management positions I held at two firms before creating Redwood Financial Strategies. Both had me “bet” on their firm being a good choice for my career & they “bet” on me to get results. Unfortunately in both cases, the “bet” on me paid out, but the company “bet” did not. I did have to learn this twice to get the determination to create my own destiny and not get sold by another firm for a nice “short term” payday.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

There are multiple items that build a reputation, but one that is vital is your willpower. What I do with my willpower is I make sure that I do what I say. If I cannot do it, I am open & honest about that as we can’t do everything. Do what you say you will do & your reputation will grow beyond belief. If you don’t do what you say you will do, all the other stuff that build solid reputations does not matter.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.redwoodfinancialstrategies.com
• Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/michaelreisel/
• Youtube: Unshakable Living – channel youtube.com/@unshakableliving5535/videos