David Ogilvy Thinking Quotations

The creative process requires more than reason. Most original thinking isn't even verbal. It requires 'a groping experimentation with ideas, governed by intuitive hunches and inspired by the unconscious.' The majority of business men are incapable of original thinking because they are unable to escape from the tyranny of reason. Their imaginations are blocked.

People who think well, write well

Give people a taste of Old Crow, and tell them it's Old Crow. Then give them another taste of Old Crow, but tell them it's Jack Daniel's. Ask them which they prefer. They'll think the two drinks are quite different. They are tasting images

Develop your eccentricities early, and no one will think you're going senile later in life

Consumers don't think how they feel. They don't say what they think and they don't do what they say.

The trouble with many copywriters in general agencies are that they don't really think in terms of selling. They have never written direct-response; they have never tasted blood

Good products can be sold by honest advertising. If you don't think the product is good, you have no business to be advertising it.

I don't know the rules of grammar... If you're trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think. We try to write in the vernacular.

Develop your eccentricities while you are young. That way, when you get old, people won't think you're going gaga.

Many people - and I think I am one of them - are more productive when they've had a little to drink. I find if I drink two or three brandies, I'm far better able to write.

The best ideas come as jokes. Make your thinking as funny as possible.