The Green Leaf Group

The company I was assigned is the Green Leaf Book Group. The company specializes in helping independent authors and small presses to keep the rights to their work as they compete with the major publishing companies. A man named Clint Greenleaf started the company in 1997 from above his parents’ garage in Cleveland, OH.  Greenleaf was an accountant at Deloitte but he decided to write a book and this kick started his interest in publishing. His book was called Attention to Detail: A Gentleman’s Guide to Appearance. He became known as a helpful resource to help authors though the confusing publishing process. After publishing about forty different books, Greenleaf opened an office in San Francisco but soon moved to Austin Texas. They began to attract authors from major publishing companies because Green Leaf Book Group was known for providing an alternative for restrictive traditional publishing arrangements. He is able to compete with the bigger companies because of his unique designs, positive marketing talents, and ability to find talented authors. He has helped work on titles like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. The company’s current revenue is about eight million dollars. Their three-year growth revenue is 66 percent and they were ranked number 44 for the top media companies on the Inc. 5000 list. In 2010 the company only had twenty-nine employees.

The Green Leaf Book Group is responding to the digital world by taking advantage of the Internet to grow and market their business. The company posts their latest titles and authors on their website and users can have the option to buy the publication from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or IndieBound. This opens up a wide range of possibilities because all three websites sell digital copies of the books that can be downloaded straight from the website. In addition, they provide information on their site about how to successfully complete online marketing. They describe how to choose a URL address, register domains, use hosting services, format websites, and more.  Lastly, the company keeps up a very extensive blog called the Big Bad Book Blog. This blog connects to their twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and LinkedIn. It provides tons of information about their company, helps authors know how to publish their books, and provides links to other helpful websites. The Green Leaf Group is responding very positively to the changing technology and I think it helps that they started when technology was becoming popular. Lastly, technology helps the company to get more clients because they accept book submissions online which encourages more authors to submit their titles.