What’s your passion?  Is it your job?  Do you paint?  Play an instrument?  Are you lucky enough to get paid to do what you love?

That’s okay…  I don’t either.

In college, I thought I was going to be the next superstar cartoonist - the next Berkeley Breathead, Bill Watterson, or even the freakishly odd Gary Larson or Robert Crumb.

In retrospect, I had a good start. I had a small following for my cartoons - mostly girlfriends and fraternity brothers; but the word was starting to spread.  Their parents were requesting copies of my panels.  Some (of the less offensive) panels were being reviewed by King Syndication.  I even had a professor from The University of Iowa contact me asking if he could put one of my panels onto the last page of his biology mid-term as a “stress-reliever”  for his students. Nice!

For a brief period in 1991, I was living the dream…

Then, I started listening to people.  I took suggestions (gasp). I “commoditized” my art - my passion.  I kowtowed to the masses. I stopped being creative.  I stopped trying to surprise.  It stopped being fun.

So, I stopped cartooning… I put down my pen and refused to do another silly panel.  I always intended to start it up again, but one thing led to another and, well, we’ve all heard it before.

Then, a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon this post from Brand Autopsy.  I immediately re-posted my thoughts on their video as well as ordered the book, “Ignore Everybody: And 39 Other Keys To Creativity“ by Hugh MacLeod.  I devoured the book in about 10 lunches (about the only time I get to read these days), all the time, Hugh was making me think back on my “more creative” days.

Hugh is bizarre, sarcastic, brilliant and pragmatic all at once.  His blog, gapingvoid.com, was an outlet for his passion - drawing cartoons on the back of business cards - which was quite unique in itself.  But then you add his view on corporate nonsense, marketing, social media, social networking, communication and dating, and it becomes hilariously addictive. He took his blog, the wisest and wise-ass-est of it, and made it into a perfect, creative self-help manual… just for me.

If you have a passion, a dream that you want to or wanted to pursue, “Ignore Everybody…” is a great place to start.  It succinctly provides a “how-to” on fostering the creative inspiration that led Hugh MacLeod to create gapingvoid.com and turn his professional  and personal world upside-down - in a good way…  It’s kind of a Cinderella story, but Hugh gives great reason and forethought to his success.

Here’s a little nugget that really got me thinking about my own passion:

Chapter 10: Everybody has their own Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb.

You may never reach the summit; for that you will be forgiven.  But if you don’t make at least one serious attempt to get above the snowline, years later you will find yourself lying on your deathbed, and all you will feel is emptiness.

So, after reading the book, I put it down and immediately registered two new domains that will hold my past and future cartoons, illustrations, and musings.

Will I “make it big” like MacLeod?  Who’s to say?  But I’ll start by ignoring everybody…  and listening to my passion.

What’s your passion?  Painting? Accounting? Pan flute? Are you doing it right now?

Keep Cooking! (your own brand of passion)
Andrew B. Clark
The Brand Chef

Morsels making brand history: On this day, in 1912 was the first time Rueckheim Bros. & H.G. Eckstein, owners of Cracker Jack decided to put a surprise in every box of their nutty, caramel popcorn concoction.

Until that time, the snack candy company was finding difficulty positioning themselves in their respective market – finding their product a mere commodity in the consumers’ eye…

Why? There wasn’t a hook. There was no UNIQUE brand advantage.

Enter the hook – A Surprise In Every Box! What kid (let alone most adults) don’t like a fun surprise – guaranteed?!?

And the rest is tasty history.

How many brands can guarantee that kind of draw? What brand can cement itself in the pop culture lexicon by adding one simple surprise? Ever sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game?” (make sure you turn up the volume)

What surprise does your brand offer? Can you think of one thing to add (a surprise in your brand box) that would catapult your brand like Cracker Jack?

Food for thought…

Keep Cooking!
Andrew B. Clark
The Brand Chef
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There’s a question I like to ask of myself (and others) on a regular basis:

“Is there more to the story?”

It’s never given to me immediately, but through focused observation, reading, research, discovery, and a few more questions; the answer about knocks me out of my socks, every time…

“Of course there’s more!” (You just have to reach a little…)

So below, are Resources for your story – a Baker’s Dozen from the Brand Chef:

1. Wikipedia
2. Facebook
3. Twitter
4. YouTube
5. EventBrite
6. Digg
7. Flickr
8. Ustream
9. del.icio.us
10. Last.FM
11. Google (virtually unlimited resources)
12. Yahoo Pipes (build your own feeds / mashups, etc.)
13. RSS Feeds (subscribe and update often)

I call them resources. Call them social media extensions. Call them whatever you want. But never under estimate the power of Social Media to find the answers to the questions you have. With that, you have control over the growth and reach of your personal and professional brand.

Extend your brand.

Keep Cooking - always!
Andrew B. Clark
–The Brand Chef

P.S. There’ are SO MANY MORE out there, but it wouldn’t have fit into my “Baker’s Dozen” theme… Go find ‘em and extend your brand – come back and list ‘em here!

A picture is worth a thousand words. We’ve all been told that since we could speak. But, what if you turned it around. Have you ever wondered what our thousands of words actually portray?

Let’s take a look…

I write – sometimes all day, every day – everything from ad copy to outlines for annual reports to blog posts, comments, and tweets. But not until I started reading did I learn that the words could be saying more than what was being read.

Confused? So was I until I saw a couple of posts (here and here) over at Angela Maier’s Blog, making me pause.

Are the words you’re using really portraying your message?

Wordle is a great visual tool to see if the actual words you’re using are communicating your story. Or are you using words that confuse and distract from the overall picture?

Try this. Have Wordle crawl your latest marketing piece. It’s easy, just cut and paste the copy into their Web site. Or if you have an RSS feed, just paste that into the space provided. It’s eye opening.

Here are a couple of examples:
(Click on the thumbnails to view larger images)

The Brand Chef blog:

My LinkedIn page:

This post:

Go ahead and try it. Try it on your marketing copy. Try it on your Web site. Try it on your competitors’ Web sites.

Are your words portraying your brand? Are they True, Relevant, Unique and Engaging?

Run a couple of tests and email me {thebrandchef(at)gmail(dot)com} your link.

I’d love to SEE what you have to say!

Until next time…

Keep Cooking!
Andrew B. Clark
-The Brand Chef.

There’s a segment out there for everyone. It’s YOU. It’s truthful, relevant, unique, and engaging

So, in this economy, instead of trying to bark louder than the big dogs, try something unique

Avis has a great twist on it…

Try harder at being YOU, and the rest should follow closely behind.

Food for thought…

Keep Cooking!
Andrew