I read Ogilvy on Advertising for the 3rd time A list of ideas from...
David Senra@FoundersPodcast
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Sep 29, 2025
~4 min read
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1
I read Ogilvy on Advertising for the 3rd time
A list of ideas from the book:
1. The beginning of greatness is to be different and the beginning of failure is to be the same.
2. Down with committees. Committees can criticize, but they cannot create.
3. Search the parks in all your cities; you’ll find no statues of committees.
4. Advertising which promises no benefit to the consumer does not sell. (That is the most important sentence in this book.)
5. The more you tell the more you sell. Long copy sells more.
6. Long copy conveys the impression that you have something important to say, whether people read the copy or not.
7. You aren’t advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.
8. Include the price of your products in your ads.
9. Consider how you want to position your product. Positioning answers (1) what the product does and (2) who it is for.
10. Have humility in the presence of a good idea.
11. At the beginning good ideas are fragile. Nuture — don’t kill.
12. Make the product the hero.
13. Make the product different.
14. 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 of saying it.
15. Repeat your winners. If you write a good advertisement repeat it until it stops selling. (Most campaigns are abandoned far too early)
16. The good ones know more. I asked an indifferent copywriter what books he had read about advertising. He told me that he had not read any. This willful refusal to learn the rudiments of the craft is all too common. A blind pig can sometimes find truffles, but it helps to know that they are found in oak forests.
17. It is not uncommon for a change in headlines to multiply returns ten times over.
18. Poets see an ad as an end. Killers as a means to an end. If you are both killer and poet you get rich.
19. You are a human being writing to another human being. Neither of you is an institution. Be personal, direct and natural.
20. Friction polishes you.
21. Pressure refines you.
22. Write down your principles.
23. Don't put profit before service. (Money comes naturally as a result of service)
24. Focus on value not price.
25. Be upfront about your weaknesses. People will like you — and your product — more.
26. Five times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy. Unless your headline sells your product, you have wasted 90% of your money.
27. The headlines which work best are those which promise the reader a benefit – like a whiter wash, more miles per gallon, freedom from pimples, fewer cavities.
28. Do not address your readers as though they were gathered together in a stadium. When people read your copy, they are alone. Pretend you are writing each of them a letter on behalf of your client. One human being to another.
29. Your ads must be entertaining and informative. You can’t save souls in an empty church.
30. You cannot bore people into buying your product.
31. It pays to write short sentences and short paragraphs. Avoid difficult words.
32. Promise is the soul of an advertisement.
33. Don’t waste time on problem babies. Back your winners. Abandon your losers.
34. Concentrate your time, your brains, and your money on your successes.
35. Pricing is guesswork.
36. The higher you price your product the more desirable it becomes in the eyes of the consumer.
37. Advertising is a production cost, not a selling cost. It should not be cut back on when times are hard.
38. Study the history of your industry. Get to know the pioneers.
39. Advertising is salesmanship in print. If you can write copy that sells your product nothing else is needed.
40. Great achievements are generated in an atmosphere of dynamic tension.
41. Believe in the dogmatism of brevity. We are both in a hurry.
42. Human nature hasn’t changed for a billion years. It won’t even vary in the next billion years. Only the superficial things have changed. It is fashionable to talk about changing man. A communicator must be concerned with unchanging man.
43. Steep yourself in your subject, work like hell, and love, honor, and obey your hunches.
A list of ideas from the book:
1. The beginning of greatness is to be different and the beginning of failure is to be the same.
2. Down with committees. Committees can criticize, but they cannot create.
3. Search the parks in all your cities; you’ll find no statues of committees.
4. Advertising which promises no benefit to the consumer does not sell. (That is the most important sentence in this book.)
5. The more you tell the more you sell. Long copy sells more.
6. Long copy conveys the impression that you have something important to say, whether people read the copy or not.
7. You aren’t advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.
8. Include the price of your products in your ads.
9. Consider how you want to position your product. Positioning answers (1) what the product does and (2) who it is for.
10. Have humility in the presence of a good idea.
11. At the beginning good ideas are fragile. Nuture — don’t kill.
12. Make the product the hero.
13. Make the product different.
14. 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 of saying it.
15. Repeat your winners. If you write a good advertisement repeat it until it stops selling. (Most campaigns are abandoned far too early)
16. The good ones know more. I asked an indifferent copywriter what books he had read about advertising. He told me that he had not read any. This willful refusal to learn the rudiments of the craft is all too common. A blind pig can sometimes find truffles, but it helps to know that they are found in oak forests.
17. It is not uncommon for a change in headlines to multiply returns ten times over.
18. Poets see an ad as an end. Killers as a means to an end. If you are both killer and poet you get rich.
19. You are a human being writing to another human being. Neither of you is an institution. Be personal, direct and natural.
20. Friction polishes you.
21. Pressure refines you.
22. Write down your principles.
23. Don't put profit before service. (Money comes naturally as a result of service)
24. Focus on value not price.
25. Be upfront about your weaknesses. People will like you — and your product — more.
26. Five times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy. Unless your headline sells your product, you have wasted 90% of your money.
27. The headlines which work best are those which promise the reader a benefit – like a whiter wash, more miles per gallon, freedom from pimples, fewer cavities.
28. Do not address your readers as though they were gathered together in a stadium. When people read your copy, they are alone. Pretend you are writing each of them a letter on behalf of your client. One human being to another.
29. Your ads must be entertaining and informative. You can’t save souls in an empty church.
30. You cannot bore people into buying your product.
31. It pays to write short sentences and short paragraphs. Avoid difficult words.
32. Promise is the soul of an advertisement.
33. Don’t waste time on problem babies. Back your winners. Abandon your losers.
34. Concentrate your time, your brains, and your money on your successes.
35. Pricing is guesswork.
36. The higher you price your product the more desirable it becomes in the eyes of the consumer.
37. Advertising is a production cost, not a selling cost. It should not be cut back on when times are hard.
38. Study the history of your industry. Get to know the pioneers.
39. Advertising is salesmanship in print. If you can write copy that sells your product nothing else is needed.
40. Great achievements are generated in an atmosphere of dynamic tension.
41. Believe in the dogmatism of brevity. We are both in a hurry.
42. Human nature hasn’t changed for a billion years. It won’t even vary in the next billion years. Only the superficial things have changed. It is fashionable to talk about changing man. A communicator must be concerned with unchanging man.
43. Steep yourself in your subject, work like hell, and love, honor, and obey your hunches.
2
I was planning on making another episode on Ogilvy on Advertising but I didn’t think what I had was good enough
So instead I made an episode on this Ogilvy book:
So instead I made an episode on this Ogilvy book:
David Senra@FoundersPodcast
This little book is the company building philosophy of David Ogilvy broken down into bite-sized pieces.
Buffett called Ogilvy a genius and this is a list of ideas Ogilvy wanted to pass on:
1. Discovery consists of seeing what everyone has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.
2. Those who live by their wits go to work on roller coasters. The ride is exhilarating, but you need a stomach of titanium.
3. Rule #1: There are no rules. Rule #2: Never forget rule #1.
4. Only dead fish go with the flow.
5. God is with those who persevere.
6. Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius. (Peter Thiel)
7. Fear is a demon that devours the soul of a company.
8. Self-doubt is the enemy of creativity.
9. How great we become depends on the size of our dreams. Dream big dreams.
10. If you asked an oracle the secret to doing great work and the oracle replied with a single word my bet would be on “curiosity” (Paul Graham)
11.If you have to choose between agreement and conflict, take conflict every time. It always yields a better result. (Jeff Bezos)
12. It's the cracked ones that let light into the world. (Talent is likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels.)
13.The leader of the company has one principal responsibity: provide an atmosphere in which creative mavericks can do useful work.
14.Bureaucracy has no place in an ideas company.
15.Have a habit of divine discontent with your performance. It is an antidote to smugness.
16.Dogged determination is often the only trait that separates a moderately creative person from a highly creative one.
17.We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act, but a habit. (Aristotle)
18.Our character is a composite of our habits.
19.Habits constantly, daily, express who we really are.
20. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. Before them, obstacles vanish into thin air and mountains crumble into atoms.
21. People don’t have ideas. Ideas have people.
22. The best leaders give their people permission to practice magic. They get rid of sad dogs who spread gloom.
23. Habit is overcome by habit.
24. If we avoid candor we destroy trust.
25. You fight against the tyranny of politeness by telling the truth.
26. Making great work requires us to be brutally honest and totally dedicated to the truth.
27. In the absence of courage, nothing worthwhile can be accomplished.
28. Intense curiosity keeps you young. When we're green we grow, when we're ripe we rot. (Ray Kroc)
29. DON'T BOW YOUR HEAD.
30. DON'T KNOW YOUR PLACE.
31. DON'T SIT BACK.
32. DON'T GIVE IN.
33. DON'T GIVE UP.
34. DON'T WIN SILVERS.
35. DON'T BE SO EASILY HAPPY WITH YOURSELF.
36. DON'T BE SPINELESS.
37. DON'T BE GUTLESS.
38. DON'T BE TOADIES.
39. DON'T GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT.
40. DEFY THE GODS.
41. We are the people we have been waiting for.
Buffett called Ogilvy a genius and this is a list of ideas Ogilvy wanted to pass on:
1. Discovery consists of seeing what everyone has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.
2. Those who live by their wits go to work on roller coasters. The ride is exhilarating, but you need a stomach of titanium.
3. Rule #1: There are no rules. Rule #2: Never forget rule #1.
4. Only dead fish go with the flow.
5. God is with those who persevere.
6. Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius. (Peter Thiel)
7. Fear is a demon that devours the soul of a company.
8. Self-doubt is the enemy of creativity.
9. How great we become depends on the size of our dreams. Dream big dreams.
10. If you asked an oracle the secret to doing great work and the oracle replied with a single word my bet would be on “curiosity” (Paul Graham)
11.If you have to choose between agreement and conflict, take conflict every time. It always yields a better result. (Jeff Bezos)
12. It's the cracked ones that let light into the world. (Talent is likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels.)
13.The leader of the company has one principal responsibity: provide an atmosphere in which creative mavericks can do useful work.
14.Bureaucracy has no place in an ideas company.
15.Have a habit of divine discontent with your performance. It is an antidote to smugness.
16.Dogged determination is often the only trait that separates a moderately creative person from a highly creative one.
17.We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act, but a habit. (Aristotle)
18.Our character is a composite of our habits.
19.Habits constantly, daily, express who we really are.
20. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. Before them, obstacles vanish into thin air and mountains crumble into atoms.
21. People don’t have ideas. Ideas have people.
22. The best leaders give their people permission to practice magic. They get rid of sad dogs who spread gloom.
23. Habit is overcome by habit.
24. If we avoid candor we destroy trust.
25. You fight against the tyranny of politeness by telling the truth.
26. Making great work requires us to be brutally honest and totally dedicated to the truth.
27. In the absence of courage, nothing worthwhile can be accomplished.
28. Intense curiosity keeps you young. When we're green we grow, when we're ripe we rot. (Ray Kroc)
29. DON'T BOW YOUR HEAD.
30. DON'T KNOW YOUR PLACE.
31. DON'T SIT BACK.
32. DON'T GIVE IN.
33. DON'T GIVE UP.
34. DON'T WIN SILVERS.
35. DON'T BE SO EASILY HAPPY WITH YOURSELF.
36. DON'T BE SPINELESS.
37. DON'T BE GUTLESS.
38. DON'T BE TOADIES.
39. DON'T GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT.
40. DEFY THE GODS.
41. We are the people we have been waiting for.