"The value of branding can be difficult to measure and is often referred to as 'the icing on the cake.' No one wants cake without icing, and thus, it is pivotal."

Stephanie Breedlove has been walking the walk of a successful entrepreneur for more than twenty years. After launching a career in corporate America with Accenture, she found her true calling as co-founder and CEO of Care.com HomePay, the largest household payroll and tax firm in the country. She's traveled the full journey from start-up to successful exit and wants to help other women take the leap into entrepreneurship and grow businesses with sustained value and impact. To achieve her goal, Stephanie knew she would have to build a platform and begin developing resources to share her message of entrepreneurship and worked with Greenleaf Book Group to publish All In: How Women Entrepreneurs Can Think Bigger, Build Sustainable Businesses, and Change the World and build a brand about her book and herself.

"The book has influenced substantial deals for Hireology. We will pay for the book in the first year.”

Adam Robinson is on a mission to help business owners make better hiring decisions. As the co-founder and CEO of Hireology, Robinson has a sterling reputation in the recruiting industry and looked to use his book, The Best Team Wins, to polish it further. Understanding that speaking engagements represent a key pipeline for his business, Robinson worked side-by-side with the Greenleaf Book Group branding team to carve out his own niche as an expert in the industry, growing his audience and strengthening both his own brand and Hireology’s in turn.

"The brand strategy gave me a much clearer context for where my book/story fits. The last three slides blew me away–[the] strategy, positioning, and messaging were so on point it was scary (good)."

As the co-founder and president of an investment firm, Matt Hall was motivated to change the way people think about investing by writing a new kind of investment book: one that was both engaging and interesting—a rare combination in the investment book category. Matt partnered with Greenleaf for Odds On and immediately began collaborating with his dedicated brand strategist to detail the work necessary to build his platform, reach his target demographics, and discover the opportunities available to him and his investment firm beyond publishing his book. Since publication, the branding and book have led to a new client pipeline through which Matt can grow his business while also finding success in the retail market.

Anna Carroll came to Greenleaf looking to drive more leads to her consulting business and connect with her clients in a more impactful manner. Anna’s work with the Platform Development team gave her the tools that she needed to strategically repurpose her content and build long-term relationships with followers. Anna has continued to grow her coaching practice and keeps her clients interested in her work through a well-crafted system of online communications.

As a debut novelist, Jeffrey Deitz knew that he would need to build a strong platform before his book launched. He partnered with Greenleaf to create a personal brand that would be distinctive from his professional psychology practice. Jeffrey’s work with Greenleaf resulted in a website and social media presence that supported a successful book launch with strong buzz and positive reviews.

“The level of professionalism, enthusiasm, and personal touch they use in guiding a neophyte like myself through the world for publishing is outstanding.”

Sandra Brannan spent years trying to connect with agents and traditional publishers to find the right fit for her Liv Bergen Mysteries series. Brannan faced the same resistance as many budding authors face when submitting to traditional publishers. Advances and marketing cost money, and to take a chance on an unknown author is a considerable risk for the publisher.

Exhausted with traditional publishing and unwilling to take the self-publishing route, Brannan met with Greenleaf Book Group and was pleasantly surprised by what she learned. Greenleaf is a professional and high-quality publishing option and a competitive national distributor, counting several New York Times and Wall Street Journal best sellers among its titles. Brannan submitted her manuscript to Greenleaf’s review committee, and in less time than it took for her to receive a query response from a traditional agent or publisher, her manuscript joined the ranks of Greenleaf’s selective title list—and she couldn’t be happier. The many years she spent cultivating her writing skills and learning her craft paid off.

“Greenleaf has expertise across both the creative and business spectrum of the publishing process. They were able to take my vision for Deep Dive and make it a creative and commercial success.”

Consultant Rich Horwath, founder of the Strategic Thinking Institute, helps organizations identify holes in their thought processes. He teaches managers to develop a more strategic way to approach their business in order to improve their competitive advantage, to better use resources, and to achieve sustainable growth. Having worked with such companies as Kraft and Motorola, Horwath recognized the need for strategic planning resources at all levels of management.

Looking to bring solutions to his clients, Horwath decided to develop a guidebook on strategic thinking that his clients and other business professionals could use to supplement his services. Horwath found that self-publishing would give him the greatest amount of creative control; however, it didn’t provide him with the broad distribution reach he knew his book needed in order to be successful. After taking a holistic view of the publishing industry, Horwath found that Greenleaf would provide him with the distribution muscle he needed to connect with his audience and the creative control of self-publishing. He signed on in November of 2008, and by August of 2009, Horwath had a high-quality finished product strategically placed in national retailers.

“Absolutely first class, from start to finish. They did everything they said they would do—and often more—on time and on budget, 100 percent of the time. The finished product was sensational, and I loved working with the people. I would say it was my best professional experience in thirty-five years.”

After 15 years of teaching his strategies for achieving predictable success, consultant Les McKeown knew it was time to commit his system to paper. As he sat down to write his book, McKeown examined his publishing options, and he finally settled on Greenleaf Book Group because he wanted to maintain control over his copyright and to have a big hand in the marketing of the book—neither of which would be easy to negotiate with a traditional publisher. McKeown also wanted a transparent, open, responsive, and respectful team working with him on his project—again, not something he thought would be easy to find in a traditional publisher.

Predictable Success hit the market with a splash, quickly earning McKeown national distinction as a business thought leader. Today, he is a Wall Street Journal and USA Today best-selling author, and the impact on his professional profile has been huge. Because of his book, McKeown consistently receives invitations to speak and consult, a real plus, considering he wrote Predictable Success to help people beyond his existing client list.