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David Ogilvy

David Ogilvy Quotes

Businessman

David Ogilvy, born on June 23, 1911 in Scotland, was an outstanding businessman. He was one of the founders of Ogilvy & Mather, an advertising agency that became one of the largest in the world. Known as the father of modern advertising, Ogilvy was renowned for his unique advertising philosophy and deep insights into consumer psychology, whose works had a profound impact on the global advertising industry.

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Famous David Ogilvy Quotes

“Much of the messy advertising you see on television today is the product of committees. Committees can criticize advertisements, but they should never be allowed to create them.”

Should Today Business Design Television Products Advertising Criticize Committees Messy Advertisements

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.”

People Body Business Five Written Design Dollars Average Advertising Copies Cents Eighty Headlines Adverts Great Advertising Advertising And Marketing Online Advertising

Author:David Ogilvy

“The most important word in the vocabulary of advertising is TEST. If you pretest your product with consumers, and pretest your advertising, you will do well in the marketplace.”

Ifs Wells Important Leadership Business Products Tests Advertising Consumers Vocabulary Marketplace Important Words

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“There are very few men of genius in advertising agencies. But we need all we can find. Almost without exception they are disagreeable. Don't destroy them. They lay golden eggs.”

Men Needs Genius Lays Golden Advertising Agency Exception Eggs Disagreeable Advertising Agencies Golden Eggs

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“I have a theory that the best ads come from personal experience. Some of the good ones I have done have really come out of the real experience of my life, and somehow this has come over as true and valid and persuasive.”

Real Done Business Theory Advertising Ads Personal Experiences Persuasive

Author:David Ogilvy

“Many manufacturers secretly question whether advertising really sells their product, but are vaguely afraid that their competitors might steal a march on them if they stopped.”

Ifs Might Products Sells Stealing Advertising March Competitors Advertising Agencies

Author:David Ogilvy

“Remove advertising, disable a person or firm from proclaiming its wares and their merits, and the whole of society and of the economy is transformed. The enemies of advertising are the enemies of freedom.”

Persons Whole Enemy Economy Advertising Firm Merit Remove Disability Transformed Proclaiming

Author:David Ogilvy

“Some manufacturers illustrate their advertisements with abstract paintings. I would only do this if I wished to conceal from the reader what I was advertising.”

Ifs Painting Reader Advertising Abstract Advertisements Advertising Agencies Abstract Painting

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Experience has taught me that advertisers get the best results when they pay their agency a flat fee. It is unrealistic to expect your agency to be impartial when its vested interest lies wholly in the direction of increasing your commissionable advertising.”

Lying Interest Results Business Pay Taught Advertising Agency Flats Fees Advertisers Vested Interests

Author:David Ogilvy

“It has taken more than a hundred scientists two years to find out how to make the product in question; I have been given thirty days to create its personality and plan its launching. If I do my job well, I shall contribute as much as the hundred scientists to the success of this product.”

Ifs Years Wells Has Beens Two Jobs Given Business Taken Plans Products Personality Hundred Scientist Advertising Thirty Two Years Launching

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“There is one catagory of advertising which is totally uncontrolled and flagrantly dishonest: the television commercials for candidates in Presidential elections.”

Television Humorous Election Advertising Presidential Candidates Presidential Election Television Commercials

Author:David Ogilvy

“I never tell one client that I cannot attend his sales convention because I have a previous engagement with another client; successful polygamy depends upon pretending to each spouse that she is the only pebble on your beach.”

Successful Depends Humorous Advertising Beach Pretending Engagement Conventions Clients Spouse Polygamy Pebbles

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“To advertisers: "Do not compete with your agency in the creative area. Why keep a dog and bark yourself?"”

Creative Dog Humorous Areas Advertising Agency Bark Advertisers

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Consumers don't think how they feel. They don't say what they think and they don't do what they say.”

Thinking Feels Emotion Advertising Consumers

Author:David Ogilvy

“Good products can be sold by honest advertising. If you don't think the product is good, you have no business to be advertising it.”

Ifs Thinking Business Honest Products Advertising

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Consumers still buy products whose advertising promises them value for money, beauty, nutrition, relief from suffering, social status and so on.”

Stills Suffering Values Social Products Promise Advertising Consumers Relief Nutrition Social Status

Author:David Ogilvy

“I do not regard advertising as entertainment or an art form, but as a medium of information. When I write an advertisement, I don’t want you to tell me that you find it ‘creative.’ I want you to find it so interesting that you buy the product.”

Want Writing Art Form Interesting Creative Information Products Regard Entertainment Mediums Advertising I Want You Advertisements Copywriting

Author:David Ogilvy

“Talent, I believe, is most likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels.”

Believe Found I Believe Business Talent Advertising Rebel

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“It has been found that the less an advertisement looks like an advertisement and the more it looks like an editorial, the more readers stop, look, and read.”

Looks Has Beens Found Business Reader Advertising Advertisements Editorials

Author:David Ogilvy

“Do not address your readers as though they were gathered together in a stadium. When people read your copy, they are alone. Pretend you are writing to each of them a letter on behalf of your client.”

People Writing Together Business Reader Letters Marketing Advertising Addresses Copies Clients Behalf Stadiums Digital Marketing Marketing Strategy Content Marketing Advertising And Marketing Business Marketing

Author:David Ogilvy

“There isn’t any significant difference between the various brands of whiskey, or cigarettes or beer. They are all about the same. And so are the cake mixes and the detergents, and the margarines… The manufacturer who dedicates his advertising to building the most sharply defined personality for his brand will get the largest share of the market at the highest profit.”

Differences Share Building Personality Highest Marketing Profit Various Significant Advertising Defined Brands Beer Cake Cigarette Whiskey

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“If you can’t advertise yourself, what hope do you have of advertising anything else?”

Ifs Advertising

Author:David Ogilvy

“Big ideas come from the unconscious. This is true in art, in science, and in advertising. But your unconscious has to be well informed, or your idea will be irrelevant. Stuff your conscious mind with information, then unhook your rational thought process. You can help this process by going for a long walk, or taking a hot bath, or drinking half a pint of claret. Suddenly, if the telephone line from your unconscious is open, a big idea wells up within you.”

“On the average, five times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy.”

People Body Five Average Advertising Copies Cents Eighty Headlines Adverts Copywriting Great Advertising Advertising And Marketing Online Advertising

Author:David Ogilvy

“You aren’t advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.”

Moving Standing Army Advertising Parades

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Most agencies run scared, most of the time. . . .Frightened people are powerless to produce good advertising. . . . If I were aclient, I would do everything in my power to emancipate my agencies from fear, even to the extent of giving them long-term contracts.”

People Ifs Giving Long Running Term Produce Scared Advertising Long Term Agency Frightened Contracts Powerless Advertising Agencies

Author:David Ogilvy

“Give people a taste of Old Crow, and tell them it's Old Crow. Then give them another taste of Old Crow, but tell them it's Jack Daniel's. Ask them which they prefer. They'll think the two drinks are quite different. They are tasting images”

People Thinking Giving Two Different Asks Drink Taste Advertising Crow Tasting Jack Daniels

Author:David Ogilvy

“The business community wants remarkable advertising, but turns a cold shoulder to the kind of people who can produce it. That is why most advertisements are so infernally dull.... our business needs massive transfusions of talent. And talent, I believe, is most likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels.”

People Want Needs Believe Kind Turns Found I Believe Community Talent Produce Cold Shoulders Advertising Dull Remarkable Massive Rebel Advertisements Cold Shoulder

Author:David Ogilvy

“Managing an advertising agency isn't all beer and skittles. After fourteen years of it, I have come to the conclusion that the top man has one principle responsibility: to provide an atmosphere in which creative mavericks can do useful work.”

Men Years Can Do Responsibility Principles Creative Conclusion Advertising Beer Atmosphere Agency Fourteen Advertising Agencies Maverick Skittles

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“I know of a brewer who sells more of his beer to the people who never see his advertising than to the people who see it every week. Bad advertising can unsell a product.”

People Knows Week Products Sells Advertising Beer Brewers

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Nobody has ever built a brand by imitating somebody else's advertising.”

Built Advertising Brands Irritating Imitating Great Advertising Advertisement Negative

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Ninety-nine percent of advertising doesn't sell much of anything.”

Business Percent Sells Nine Advertising Ninety Ninety Nine

Author:David Ogilvy

“Our offices must always be headed by the kind of men who command respect. Not phonies, zeros or bastards.”

Men Kind Office Command Advertising Phony

Author:David Ogilvy

“Few of the great creators have bland personalities. They are cantankerous egotists, the kind of men who are unwelcome in the modern corporation.”

Men Kind Modern Personality Creator Advertising Corporations Bland Unwelcome

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Nowadays it is the fashion to pretend that no single individual is ever responsible for a successful advertising campaign. This emphasis on "teamwork" is bunkum - a conspiracy of the mediocre majority.”

Individual Successful Fashion Responsible Majority Campaigns Advertising Teamwork Conspiracy Mediocre Emphasis

Author:David Ogilvy

“When you have nothing to say, sing it.”

Author:David Ogilvy

“Never write an advertisement which you wouldn't want your own family to read. You wouldn't tell lies to your own wife. Don't tell them to mine. Do as you would be done by.”

Ifs Thinking Want Writing Done Government Would Be Lying Found Business Wife Honest Mines Products Advertising Consumers Buying Advertisements

Author:David Ogilvy

“The psychiatrists say that everybody should have a hobby. The hobby I recommend is advertising”

Should Should Have Advertising Hobbies Psychiatrist

Book:Confessions of an advertising man

Source: Confessions of an advertising man

“Why should a manufacturer bet his money, perhaps the future of his company, on your instinct?”

Should Business Company Instinct Advertising

Author:David Ogilvy

“If you have all the research, all the ground rules, all the directives, all the data - it doesn't mean the ad is written. Then you've got to close the door and write something - that is the moment of truth which we all try to postpone as long as possible.”

Ifs Writing Trying Mean Long Moments Business Written Doors Research Advertising Data Ads Moment Of Truth Ground Rules

Author:David Ogilvy

About the Author

Born: June 23, 1911
Died: July 21, 1999
Known for: Businessman
Quotes: 223

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Advertising Ifs People Business Products Advertisements Consumers Economy Marketing Agency Clients Men Writing Advertising Agencies Great Advertising Ideas Brands Headlines Knows Thinking

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Books & Sources

Confessions of an advertising manRelated source material

The Unpublished David OgilvyRelated source material

An autobiographyRelated source material

Blood, Brains and BeerRelated source material

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