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I'd like to be remembered, as a copywriter who had some big ideas. That's what the advertising business is all about. Big ideas

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
Copywriter
Advertising
Remembered
Bigs
Business
Ideas
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More quotes by David Ogilvy

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If you have a truly big idea, the wrong technique won't kill it. And if you don't have a big idea, the right technique won't help you
David Ogilvy
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Our offices must always be headed by the kind of men who command respect. Not phonies, zeros or bastards.
David Ogilvy
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If you ever have the good fortune to create a great advertising campaign, you will soon see another agency steal it. This is irritating, but don't let it worry you nobody has ever built a brand by imitating somebody else's advertising.
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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We all have a tendency to use research as a drunkard uses a lamppost – for support, not for illumination.
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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No sale, no commission. No commission, no eat. That made an impression on me.
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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The secret of long life is double careers. One to about age sixty, then another for the next thirty years.
David Ogilvy
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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
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The more informative your advertising, the more persuasive it will be.
David Ogilvy
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Why do eight out of ten new consumer products fail? Sometimes because they are too new. The first cold cereals were rejected by consumers. More often new products fail because they are not new enough.
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 figure that my staff will be less reluctant to work overtime if I work longer hours than they do.
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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Can advertising foist an inferior product on the consumer? Bitter experience has taught me that it cannot. On those rare occasions when I have advertised products which consumer tests have found inferior to other products in the same field, the results have been disastrous.
David Ogilvy
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People don't buy a new detergent because the manufacturer told a joke on television last night.
David Ogilvy
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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.
David Ogilvy
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Big ideas are usually simple ideas.
David Ogilvy
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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