A review of David Ogilvy’s book “Ogilvy On Advertising”

Who Is David Ogilvy And Why Should We Listen To Him?

• David Ogilvy is commonly called “The Father of Advertising”.
• He was referred to as “the most sought after wizard in today’s advertising industry”, Time Magazine, 1962.
• He started his company Ogilvy, Benson & Mather in 1948 with $6,000 and sold it in 1989 for $864 million.
• Adweek magazine asked people in the business “Which individuals—alive or dead—made you consider pursuing a career in advertising?” Ogilvy topped the list. And the same result came when students of advertising were surveyed. His best-selling book “Confessions of an Advertising Man” is one of the most popular and famous books on advertising.

 

A Foundation For Successful Advertising

1. Results Are More Important Than Trying To Be Original Or Creative
2. Make Decisions Based On Research Not Gut Instinct
3. Create Big Ideas That Sell
4. Better Is Not Enough
5. Let Your Winners Run
6. Write Headlines That Sell The Copy
7. You Can’t Bore People Into Buying Your Product

1. Results Are More Important Than Trying To Be Original Or Creative

• “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. When Aeschines spoke, they said “How well he speaks.” But when Demosthenes spoke, they said “Let us march against Philip”.
• Good advertising results in people taking action i.e. People buy your product, service or idea.

2. Make Decisions Based On Research Not Gut Instinct

• “I am sometimes attacked for imposing “rules”. Nothing could be further from the truth. I hate rules. All I do is report on how consumers react to different stimuli. I may say to a copywriter “Research shows that commercials with celebrities are below average in persuading people to buy products. Are you sure you want to use a celebrity?” Call that a rule? Or I may say to an art director “Research suggests that if you set the copy in black type on a white background, more people will read it than if you set it in white type on a black background”. A hint perhaps but scarcely a rule.”
• Research shows you what works and what doesn’t work, do what works, don’t do what doesn’t work.

3. Create Big Ideas That Sell

• “You can do homework from now until doomsday but you will never win fame and fortune unless you also invent big ideas. It takes a big idea to attract the attention of consumers and get them to buy your product. Unless your advertising contains a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night.”
• Big ideas make people gasp when they see it, make people wish they had thought of it themselves, are unique, fit into the overall strategy and last for a long time.

4. Better Is Not Enough

• “If you and your competitors all make excellent products don’t try to imply that your product is better. Just say what is good about your product and do a clearer, more honest, more informative job of saying it.”
• Everyone says that their product is “better”, “better” is generic, specifics are what differentiate you from your competitors.
• Don’t just say that your product is better, prove it.

5. Let Your Winners Run

• “If you are lucky enough to write a good advertisement, repeat it until it stops selling. Scores of good advertisements have been discarded before they lost their potency.”
• Often advertising is removed in favour of something fresh and new because of the appointment of a new advertising agency or managing director therefore replacing something that is potentially working very well with something that doesn’t work.
• It helps to test the new advertising against the old under similar conditions to be certain that the new advertising is actually better.

6. Write Headlines That Sell The Copy

• “On the average, five times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy. It follows that unless your headline sells your products, you have wasted 90 per cent of your money.”
• People are busy, they rarely open a magazine or newspaper and read it from cover to cover, instead they skim through the major headlines until they come across something that interests them.
• People won’t read what you have to say if the headline doesn’t answer the question “what’s in it for me?”

7. You Can’t Bore People Into Buying Your Product

• “You can not bore people into buying your product. You can only interest them into buying it.”
• People are motivated by emotions and they justify with logic.
• Logic alone does not motivate people into taking action.

Examples Of Some Of David Ogilvy’s Best Performing Advertisements

• “Guinness Guide To Oysters”

• “Darling, I’m having the most extraordinary experience… I’m head over heels in DOVE!

• “At 60 miles an hour the loudest noise in this new Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock”

Most People Ignore Advertising

• 80% of advertisements get ignored.
• When you create an advertisement that looks like an advertisement you are saying “I only want 20% of people to read what I have to say”.
• When you look closely at David Ogilvy’s advertisements what you will notice is that they don’t look like advertisements – they look like news, informational or editorial copy.
• The best marketing is not marketing but good quality content.

Cosmopolitan Magazine

• Pick up a copy of Cosmopolitan magazine and you will see that they have lots of articles which have provocative headlines e.g. “The 8 Pairs Of Shoes That Every Girl Must Have” and interesting editorial but that are actually advertisements for products such as books, CDs and movies.
• People who hate SPAM and normally would never touch a book in their life will happily spend hours flicking through pages and pages of advertising without even realising it.
• David Ogilvy wrote the “Guiness Guide To Oysters” back in 1950.
• That is the power of modern advertising.

Conclusion

• David Ogilvy’s “Ogilvy On Advertising” is a must read for anyone interested in advertising, marketing, communication or persuasion.
• It not only gives you a good understanding of successful advertising but also provides useful information for finding work in advertising as well as tips for managing people and running your own advertising agency.
• I got it from Amazon.com for around $20 and it’s easily one of the best investments I’ve ever made.