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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

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David Ogilvy
Age: 88 †
Born: 1911
Born: June 23
Died: 1999
Died: July 21
Businessman
Businessperson
Economist
Writer
West Horsley
Surrey
David MacKenzie Ogilvy
Moments
Close
Postpone
Truth
Doors
Ads
Mean
Written
Advertising
Writing
Possible
Data
Trying
Moment
Ground
Long
Business
Rules
Something
Write
Door
Doesn
Research
Directives

More quotes by David Ogilvy

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The more story-appeal there is in the picture or in the photograph, the more people would look at your ad
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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.
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Positioning should be decided before the advertising is created
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The more informative your advertising, the more persuasive it will be. Before people making a buying decision, they have many questions. For example, why they should buy from you, why your product is better than other similar products, why they should trust you, and why they should buy it now, etc.
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Consumers still buy products whose advertising promises them value for money, beauty, nutrition, relief from suffering, social status and so on.
David Ogilvy
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Make sure you have a vice president in charge of your revolution, to engender ferment among your more conventional colleagues.
David Ogilvy
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Unless your campaign has a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night.
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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.
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Every ad is an investment in the long-term image of a brand.
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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.
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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When you advertise fire extinguishers, open with the fire.
David Ogilvy
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Tell the truth, but make the truth fascinating.
David Ogilvy
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It is flagrantly dishonest for an advertising agent to urge consumers to buy a product which he would not allow his own wife to buy.
David Ogilvy
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I admire people with gentle manners who treat other people as human beings.
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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My motto has always been: Only first class business and that in a first class way
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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Big ideas are usually simple ideas.
David Ogilvy
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Great hospitals do two things. They look after patients, and they teach young doctors. We look after clients, and we teach young advertising people.
David Ogilvy