Q&A
Chris Rosica, CEO, Rosica Strategic Public Relations
Q. The title of your new book is The Authentic Brand: How Today’s Top Entrepreneurs Connect With Customers (www.theauthenticbrand.com). What makes your book different, better and unique?
A. While most other books provide the reader with the insight of a single author, The Authentic Brand gives you the unique perspectives of 12 of the most unique entrepreneurs of the past two decades. This is a business book based on the practical and real-life experiences of successful, self-starting entrepreneurs, rather than academic conjecture or criteria. Because each of these people has “connected” with their customers, they created brands that appealed on an emotional level.
Q. Who are the people you interviewed for the book?
A. Jerry Baldwin, co-founder, Starbucks, and principal, Poet’s Coffee; Wally “Famous” Amos, founder of Famous Amos Chocolate Chip Cookies; Bobbi Brown, Bobbi Brown Cosmetics; Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, Ben and Jerry’s Homemade; Gary Hirshberg, Stonyfield Farm; Jim Koch, Samuel Adams Beer; David Neeleman, JetBlue Airways; David Oreck, Oreck Corporation; Roxanne Quimby, Burt’s Bees; Andy and Kate Spade, kate spade inc.; and Jeff Taylor, Monster.com.
Q. What are some of the practical tips that readers can take away from your book?
A. It provides valuable marketing and business management insights in the interviewees’ own words to help grow a company and build a loyal, even fanatical, customer base. By looking at key business issues through the eyes of these most innovative entrepreneurs, The Authentic Brand helps readers identify marketing and trade secrets to generate customer loyalty, attract substantial positive media attention, and create unprecedented brand equity.
Q. How does the book relate to public relations?
A. Each of the people I interviewed believed in the power of marketing and public relations. Whether you call it corporate social responsibility or corporate philanthropy, each believed in linking their product with a not–for-profit organization — for mutual benefit. Few things build brand devotion among today’s hard-to-please consumers like a company’s proven commitment to a worthy charity. It also improves employee morale and dedications, inspires others, and attracts considerable media coverage. I am currently writing another book entitled The Cause Marketing Handbook: How Doing Good Means Doing Well.”
Q. What made you decide to write this book?
A. The book was originally conceived while I was enrolled in an intensive course on entrepreneurship at MIT that was suitably named The Birthing of Giants, an MBA-modeled curriculum created by Verne Harnish, founder of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) in conjunction with the MIT Enterprise Forum and Inc. Magazine.
Each year, the program brings together 60 young entrepreneurs under the age of 40, who are founders or managing partners of companies grossing more than a million dollars in annual revenues. My idea was to interview several celebrated entrepreneurs and share their secrets to success, including their leadership and marketing insights.
For press release info see blog of 01/23/08 or visit The Authentic Brand Website
Public Relations Contact: Rosica Strategic Public Relations