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The consumer isn’t a moron; she is your wife.

David Ogilvy

First, make yourself a reputation for being a creative genius. Second, surround yourself with partners who are better than you are. Third, leave them to go get on with it.
DAVID OGILVY

Creative Genius Leaving Reputation Surround Yourself
Advertising reflects the mores of society, but it does not influence them.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Influence Reflection Society
In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative, original thinker unless you can also sell what you create.
DAVID OGILVY

Business Creativity Original Thinking World Yourself
The headline is the ‘ticket on the meat.’ Use it to flag down readers who are prospects for the kind of product you are advertising.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Head Kind Product Reading Ticket
Much of the messy advertising you see on television today is the product of committees. Committees can criticize advertisements, but they should never be allowed to create them.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Committee Creation Mess See Television
The advertisers who believe in the selling power of jingles have never had to sell anything.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Believe Power Sale
Our business is infested with idiots who try to impress by using pretentious jargon.
DAVID OGILVY

Business Idiot Infest Ourselves Pretend
Remove advertising, disable a person or firm from proclaiming its wares and their merits, and the whole of society and of the economy is transformed. The enemies of advertising are the enemies of freedom.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertising Economy Enemy Freedom Person Removal Society Transformation
There is no need for advertisements to look like advertisements. If you make them look like editorial pages, you will attract about 50 per cent more readers.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Editor Need Yourself
Develop your eccentricities while you are young. That way, when you get old, people won’t think you’re going gaga.
DAVID OGILVY

Development People Thinking Young Yourself
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

Abstract Illustration Manufacturer Myself Painting Reading
Like a midwife, I make my living bringing new babies into the world, except that mine are new advertising campaigns.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Campaign Exception Live Wife World
There are very few men of genius in advertising agencies. But we need all we can find. Almost without exception they are disagreeable. Don’t destroy them. They lay golden eggs.
DAVID OGILVY

Agency Egg Genius Gold Man
Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ball park. Aim for the company of immortals.
DAVID OGILVY

Company Goal Immortal
Every advertisement should be thought of as a contribution to the complex symbol which is the brand image.
DAVID OGILVY

Advertisement Brand Complex Contribution Image
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

Advertisement Consumer Himself Honesty Wife

The consumer isn’t a moron; she is your wife.

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The consumer isn’t a moron; she is your wife.

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