Quote

We all have a tendency to use research as a drunkard uses a lamppost – for support, not for illumination.

David Ogilvy

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

David Ogilvy
Age: 88 †
Born: 1911
Born: June 23
Died: 1999
Died: July 21
Businessman
Businessperson
Economist
Writer
West Horsley
Surrey
David MacKenzie Ogilvy
Research
Support
Lamppost
Use
Drunkard
Drunkards
Illumination
Tendency
Uses
Tendencies

More quotes by David Ogilvy

Image
A lot of today's campaigns are based on optimum positioning but are totally ineffective - because they are dull, or badly constructed, or ineptly written. If nobody reads your advertisement or looks at your commercial, it doesn't do you much good to have the right positioning.
David Ogilvy
Image
Encourage innovation. Change is our lifeblood, stagnation our death knell.
David Ogilvy
Image
Compete with the immortals
David Ogilvy
Image
A good advertisement is one which sells the product without drawing attention to itself.
David Ogilvy
Image
If you can’t advertise yourself, what hope do you have of advertising anything else?
David Ogilvy
Image
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.
David Ogilvy
Image
I don't believe in tricky advertising, I don't believe in cute advertising, I don't believe in comic advertising. The people who perpetrate that kind of advertising never had to sell anything in their lives
David Ogilvy
Image
I admire people with gentle manners who treat other people as human beings.
David Ogilvy
Image
...consumers do not buy one brand of soap, or coffee, or detergent. They have a repertory of four or five brands, and move from one to another. They almost never buy a brand which has not been admitted to their repertory during its first year on the market.
David Ogilvy
Image
People don't buy a new detergent because the manufacturer told a joke on television last night.
David Ogilvy
Image
The trouble with many copywriters in general agencies are that they don't really think in terms of selling. They have never written direct-response they have never tasted blood
David Ogilvy
Image
The worst fault a salesman can commit is to be a bore...... Pretend to be vastly interested in any subject the prospects shows an interest in.
David Ogilvy
Image
Candor compels me to admit that I have no conclusive research to support my view that jingles are less persuasive than the spoken word. You'd run like hell if a salesman came to your door and began singing at you. Why do it in advertising?
David Ogilvy
Image
Big ideas are usually simple ideas.
David Ogilvy
Image
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.
David Ogilvy
Image
If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, we shall become a company of giants.
David Ogilvy
Image
The mission of a great school is not to cram you with facts so that you can regurgitate them...This gives many boys such a distaste for learning that they never read another book as long as they live. No, the mission is to inspire you with a taste for scholarship - a taste which will last you all your life.
David Ogilvy
Image
No sale, no commission. No commission, no eat. That made an impression on me.
David Ogilvy
Image
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.
David Ogilvy
Image
There are now unmistakeable signs of a trend in favor of superior products at premium prices. The consumer is not a moron, she is your wife.
David Ogilvy