David Oglivy: Oglivy On Advertising

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. 

When Aeschines spoke, they said, 'How well he speaks.' But when Demosthenes spoke, they said, 'Let us march against Philip.”

Advertising can actually reduce sales of a product. 

George Hay Brown, head of marketing research at Ford, inserted ads in every other copy of Reader's Digest. 

At the end of the year, the people who had not been exposed to the ads had bought more Fords than those who did. 

They had spent millions on an ad that had un-sold their product. 

Oglivy's definition of "positioning" - What the product does, and who it is for. 

He could have positioned Dove as a detergent bar for men with dirty hands, but chose instead to position Dove as a toilet bar for women with dry skin. 

Brand image means personality. 

Products, like people, have personalities, and they make or break them in the marketplace. 

The personality of a product is an amalgam of many things - its name, its packaging, its price, the style of its advertising, and, above all, the nature of the product itself. 

Unless your advertising contains a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night. 

Make the product the hero. 

Whenever you can, make the product the hero of your advertising. 

Convey that your product is "positively good".

If the consumer feels certain that your product is good and feels uncertain about your competitor's, he will buy yours. 

If you and your competitors all make excellent products, don't try to imply that your product is better. 

Just say what's good about your product - and do a clearer, more honest, more informative job saying it. 

You aren't advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade. 

A good advertisement can be thought of as a radar sweep, constantly hunting new prospects as they come into the market. Get a good radar, and keep it sweeping. 

The hallmarks of a potentially successful copywriter include:

• Obsessive curiosity about products, people, and advertising. 
• A sense of humor. 
• A habit of hard work. 
• The ability to write interesting prose for printed media, and a natural dialogue for television. 
• The ability to think visually. TV commercials and videos depend more on pictures than words. 
• The ambition to write better campaigns than anyone has ever written before. 

In your day-to-day dealings with clients and colleagues, fight for the kings, queens and bishops, but throw away the pawns. 

A habit of graceful surrender on trivial issues will make you difficult to resist when you stand and fight on a major issue. 

Said Winston Churchill: "PERFECTIONISM is spelled PARALYSIS"

Oglivy on How To Apply For A Job (published in 1981):

Don't telephone - write to 3-4 agencies, and enclose your curriculum vitae. 

Be sure to type your letter. 

1. Spell all names right. 
2. Identify the sort of job you are applying for. Say it clearly and at once. Say what lead you to apply. 
3. Be specific and factual. Touch on your chief qualifications. Avoid egotistical abstractions like: "ambition mixed with a striving for excellence is one of my strongest assets"
4. Be personal, direct and natural. 

You are a human being writing to another human being. You should be businesslike and courteous, but never stiff and impersonal. 

1. Propose a specific next step. 

Close your letter with a clear and precise statement of how you wish to proceed toward an interview. Avoid such mumblings as: "thank you for your time and consideration" or "Hoping to hear from you soon". 

Instead do the job like this: "I'll call your office on Wednesday afternoon to see if you'd like me to come in for an interview." 

How to run an advertising agency:

Running an agency requires midnight oil, salesmanship of the highest order, a deep keel, guts, thrust, and a genius for sustaining the morale of men and women who work in a continuous state of anxiety. 

The executive is inevitably a father figure. 

What can you do to keep sibling rivalry under control?

It requires that he be understanding, that he be considerate, and that he be human enough to be affectionate. 

The best fathers are nurturing rather than controlling. 

In most agencies there are twice as many account executives as copywriters. 

If you were a dairy farmer, would you employ twice as many milkers as cows?

Interesting:

When someone is made head of an office in the Oglivy & Mather chain, I send him a Matryoshka Doll from Gorky. 

If he has the curiosity to open it, and keep opening it until he comes to the inside of the smallest doll, he finds the message: If each one of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we 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. 

Even a mature agency with a pool of potential leaders does well to refresh its blood by occasionally hiring partners from the outside. 

Who not to hire:

Never hire your friends. 

Never hire your clients children, if you have to fire them, you may lose the client. 

Never hire your own children, or the children of your clients. Ambitious people won't stay in outfits which practice nepotism. 

Crusade against paper warfare. Make your people settle their fights face-to-face. 

When someone comes to your office and denounces his rival as an incompetent rascal, summon the rival and make the denouncer repeat what he has just told you. 

Don't play favorites. Don't play politics. 

St. Augustine has this to say about pressure:

"To be under pressure is inescapable. Pressure takes place through all the world: war, siege, the worries of state. We all know men who grumble under these pressures, and complain. They are cowards. They lack splendor. But there is another sort of man who is under pressure, but does not complain. For it is the friction which polishes him. It is pressure which refines and makes him noble". 

Pressure makes diamonds. 

Personal:

It is a good idea to start the year by writing down exactly what you want to accomplish, and end the year by measuring how much you have accomplished. 

McKinsey imposes this discipline on its partners and pays them according to how many of the things on their list they accomplish. 

Good leaders:

• There appears to be no correlation between leadership and academic development. 
• Great leaders always exude self-confidence. 
• They do not suffer from the crippling need to be universally loved. 
• They have the guts to make unpopular decisions, including the guts to fire non-performers. 
• Good leaders are decisive. 
• The final test of a leader is the feeling you have when you leave his presence after a conference. Have you a feeling of uplift and confidence. 

Tell your prospective client what your weak points are before he notices them. This will make you more credible when you boast about your strong points. 

Physician, heal thyself. 

Few agencies advertise themselves. 

You need to advertise your agency. But don't start unless you mean to do it consistently. 

Don't forget that Young & Rubicam advertised in every issue of Fortune for 40 years. 

If your headline doesn't sell your product, you've wasted as much as 90% of your money. 

Headlines which contain news are sure-fire. 

Use tried and true words like amazing, introducing, now, suddenly

Headlines which work best promise the reader a benefit - like a whiter wash, more miles per gallon, freedom from pimples. 

Specifics always work better than generalities. 

When you advertise locally, you get better results if you include the name of the city in the headline. 

Often times, the photographs which work the hardest are those which arouse a reader's curiosity. You want them to ask "what's going on here?" And glance at the copy to find out. 

Before and after campaigns are very, very effective. 

When writing copy, do not address your readers as if they were gathered together in a stadium. 

When people read your copy, they are alone. 

Pretend you are writing them a letter on behalf of your client. 

Testimonials for celebrities get high recall scores, but don't use them because readers remember the celebrity and forget the product. 

Instead, testimonials or endorsements from experts can be very persuasive. 

Like an ex-burglar testifying that he has never been able to crack a Chubb safe. 

Don't put a period at the end of a headline unless absolutely necessary.