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An idea can turn to dust or magic, depending on the talent that rubs against it.

William Bernbach

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William Bernbach
Age: 71 †
Born: 1911
Born: August 13
Died: 1982
Died: October 2
Art Director
Economist
Entrepreneur
The Bronx
New York City
Design
Depending
Talent
Advertising
Turn
Dust
Goal
Motivation
Turns
Creativity
Idea
Positive
Ideas
Magic
Motivational
Rubs

More quotes by William Bernbach

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Don't confuse good taste with the absence of taste.
William Bernbach
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You can say the right thing about a product and nobody will listen. You’ve got to say it in such a way that people will feel it in their gut. Because if they don’t feel it, nothing will happen.
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Our job is to sell our clients' merchandise... not ourselves. Our job is to kill the cleverness that makes us shine instead of the product. Our job is to simplify, to tear away the unrelated, to pluck out the weeds that are smothering the product message.
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Let us prove to the world that good taste, good art, and good writing can be good selling.
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In this very real world, good doesn't drive out evil. Evil doesn't drive out good. But the energetic displaces the passive.
William Bernbach
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Never do anything yourself that you can hire someone else to do, especially if they can do it better.
William Bernbach
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Find the simple story in the product, and present it in an articulate and intelligent, persuasive way.
William Bernbach
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Just because your ad looks good is no insurance that it will get looked at. How many people do you know who are impeccably groomed... but dull?
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Because an appeal makes logical sense is no guarantee that it will work.
William Bernbach
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The truth isn't the truth until people believe you, and they can't believe you if they don't know what you're saying, and they can't know what you're saying if they don't listen to you, and they won't listen to you if you're not interesting, and you won't be interesting unless you say things imaginatively, originally, freshly.
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It is insight into human nature that is the key to the communicator's skill. For whereas the writer is concerned with what he puts into his writings, the communicator is concerned with what the reader gets out of it. He therefore becomes a student of how people read or listen.
William Bernbach
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The real giants have always been poets, men who jumped from facts into the realm of imagination and ideas.
William Bernbach
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All of us who professionally use the mass media are the shapers of society. We can vulgarise that society. We can brutalise it. Or we can help lift it onto a higher level.
William Bernbach
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No matter how skillful you are, you can't invent a product advantage that doesn't exist. And if you do, and it's just a gimmick, it's going to fall apart anyway.
William Bernbach
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Research can trap you into the past.
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The creative man with an insight into human nature, with the artistry to touch and move people, will succeed. Without them he will fail.
William Bernbach
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Today's smartest advertising style is tomorrow's corn.
William Bernbach
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Properly practiced creativity can make one ad do the work of ten.
William Bernbach
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Is creativity some obscure, esoteric art form? Not on your life. It's the most practical thing a business-man can employ.
William Bernbach
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It's not just what you say that stirs people. It's the way that you say it.
William Bernbach