Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Nobody ever arrives at a very big idea through a conscious, rational thought process. It comes from your unconscious.
It's the lack of ambition that cripples most people, and makes them so pedestrian in the advertising/creative business
Be more ambitious. Don't bunt. When you get a job to do a story or an ad, try and hit the ball out of the park every time
In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative, original thinker unless you can also sell what you create.
If you, my fellow copywriters or art directors, want to win the award, devote your genius to making the cash register ring.
The majority of business men are not capable of an original thought, simply because they cannot escape the tyranny of reason.
Make sure you have a vice president in charge of your revolution, to engender ferment among your more conventional colleagues.
I can't stand callow amateurs who aren't sufficiently interested in the craft of advertising to assume the posture of students.
I'd like to be remembered, as a copywriter who had some big ideas. That's what the advertising business is all about. Big ideas
Political advertising ought to be stopped. It's the only really dishonest kind of advertising that's left. It's totally dishonest.
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.
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.
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.
If you have a truly big idea, the wrong technique won't kill it. And if you don't have a big idea, the right technique won't help you
Does advertising corrupt editors? Yes it does, but fewer editors than you may suppose... the vast majority of editors are incorruptible.
The headline is the most important element in most advertisements. It is the telegram which decides the reader whether to read the copy.
Never use jargon words like 'reconceptualize', 'demassification', 'attitudinally', 'judgmentally'. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
Never write an advertisement which you wouldn't want your family to read. You wouldn't tell lies to your own wife. Don't tell them to mine.
There are now unmistakeable signs of a trend in favor of superior products at premium prices. The consumer is not a moron, she is your wife.
The worst fault a salesman can commit is to be a bore...... Pretend to be vastly interested in any subject the prospects shows an interest in.
Consumers still buy products whose advertising promises them value for money, beauty, nutrition, relief from suffering, social status and so on.
Few of the great creators have bland personalities. They are cantankerous egotists, the kind of men who are unwelcome in the modern corporation.
Don’t just create content to get credit for being clever — create content that will be helpful, insightful, or interesting for your target audience.
Great hospitals do two things. They look after patients, and they teach young doctors. We look after clients, and we teach young advertising people.
While you are responsible to your clients for sales results, you are responsible to consumers for the kind of advertising you bring into their homes.
The manufacturer who finds himself up the creek is the short-sighted opportunist who siphons off all his advertising dollars for short-term promotions.
Claude Hopkins.. maintained that nobody with a college education could write an advertisement addressed to the mass millions. That's absolute poppycock.
What is a good advertisement? An advertisement which pleases you because of its style, or an advertisement which sells the most? They are seldom the same.
It has been found that the less an advertisement looks like an advertisement and the more it looks like an editorial, the more readers stop, look, and read.
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.
In most agencies, account executives outnumber the copywriters two to one. If you were a dairy farmer, would you employ twice as many milkers as you had cows?
We like people who are honest. Honest in argument, honest with clients, honest with suppliers, honest with the company - and above all, honest with consumers.
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.
When people aren't having any fun, they seldom produce good work. Kill the grimness with laughter. Encourage exuberance. Get rid of sad dogs that spread gloom.
Set exorbitant standards, and give your people hell when they don't live up to them. There is nothing so demoralizing as a boss who tolerates second rate work.
Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it. Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.
There is one catagory of advertising which is totally uncontrolled and flagrantly dishonest: the television commercials for candidates in Presidential elections.
Madison Avenue is full of masochists who unconsciously provoke rejection by their clients. I know brilliant men who have lost every account they have ever handled.
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.
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.
I know of a brewer who sells more of his beer to the people who never see his advertising than to the people who see it every week. Bad advertising can unsell a product.
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.
Never write an advertisement which you wouldn't want your own family to read. You wouldn't tell lies to your own wife. Don't tell them to mine. Do as you would be done by.
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.
The best leaders are apt to be found among those executives who have a strong component of unorthodoxy in their character. Instead of resisting innovation, they symbolize it.
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.
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.
The most important word in the vocabulary of advertising is TEST. If you pretest your product with consumers, and pretest your advertising, you will do well in the marketplace.
A well-run restaurant is like a winning baseball team. It makes the most of every crew member's talent and takes advantage of every split-second opportunity to speed up service.
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.