Drawing fame and fortune

Provided to China Daily

Another "Zoo" member, Zhang Shaojie, has also developed his cartoon into an online celebrity, but he spent longer figuring out how to market his character.

Zhang's cartoon image, a cat with a toilet plunger, was published in a storybook in 2009. The story focuses on the lives of office workers and single men and women.

The original model for the cartoon was a cat owned by Zhang. The cartoonist had named his cat "toilet plunger" in Chinese because the connection of the cat's tail and rump looked like a plunger.

Soon after publishing, Zhang invested all his earnings from the book on T-shirts with the cat on them, but says, "few people bought them".

It was not until 2011 when Zhang turned to the Internet, creating more than 100 different cartoon expressions for the yellow cat that he found fame.

But just as Zhang's cat started to get lots of attention online, the cartoonist decided to devote himself to writing a cartoon book and comic strips for cartoon magazines.

Zhang now regrets not spending more time developing his character's online presence. He says he didn't take advantage of the best time to promote his cat on the Internet.

"Now my cat has a weibo account. It also uses WeChat. These are all good ways to attract fans," says Zhang. He upgrades the cat's weibo frequently, uploading comics or his cat's funny images.

Zhang's is not the only cat to find fame on the Internet.

Zhang Shaojie, who creates the cartoon image of a cat with a toilet plunger. [Photo by Deng Zhangyu / China Daily]