David Ogilvy

The relationship between a manufacturer and his advertising agency is almost as intimate as the relationship between a patient and his doctor. Make sure that you can life happily with your prospective client before you accept his account.

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.

Like a midwife, I make my living bringing new babies into the world, except that mine are new advertising campaigns.

It strikes me as bad manners for a magazine to accept one of my advertisements and then attack it editorially – like inviting a man to dinner then spitting in his eye.

The more informative your advertising, the more persuasive it will be.

What you say in advertising is more important than how you say it.

It strikes me as bad manners for a magazine to accept one of my advertisements and then attack it editorially – like inviting a man to dinner then spitting in his eye.

The real story of Facebook is just that we’ve worked so hard for all this time. I mean, the real story is actually probably pretty boring, right? I mean, we just sat at our computers for six years and coded.

On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.

It is the service we are not obliged to give that people value most.

The main job of the entrepreneur is to define the mission, find and inspire the team, and lead.

A world where men ran half our homes and women ran half our institutions would be just a much better world.

Chris and I came from nothing. We’re selfmade. We started with nothing, so we have nothing to lose. And we have everything to gain.

I cannot remember a time when the Golden Rule was not my motto and precept, the torch that guided my footsteps.

What really decides consumers to buy or not to buy is the content of your advertising, not its form.

A manufacturer is not through with his customer when a sale is completed. He has then only started with his customer. In the case of an automobile the sale of the machine is only something in the nature of an introduction. If the machine does not give service, then it is better for the manufacturer if he never had the introduction, for he will have the worst of all advertisements-a dissatisfied customer.

I may be kindly, I am ordinarily gentle, but in my line of business I am obliged to will terribly what I will at all.

I was the most productive when I was in a flex situation. Do not check for me for needless meetings.

The consumer isn’t a moron. She is your wife.

As betting at the race ring adds neither strength nor speed to the horse, so the exchange of shares in the stock market adds no capital to business, no increase in the production and no purchasing power to the market.

I really don’t retain information – by the time I arrive wherever I’m going, I already forget what it is that I wanted to say.