It's the time of year for holiday parties and social gatherings of all types, so we've collected some of the best wisdom and quotable quotes from leaders and legends in advertising to make sure you're never at a loss for words. Think of it as our gift to you this week...
- “The real fact of the matter is that nobody reads ads. People read what interests them, and sometimes it’s an ad.” – Howard Luck Gossage
- “What really decides consumers to buy or not to buy is the content of your advertising, not its form.” – David Ogilvy
- “I have learned that any fool can write a bad ad, but that it takes a real genius to keep his hands off a good one.” – Leo Burnett
- “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.” – David Ogilvy
- “Creative without strategy is called ‘art.’ Creative with strategy is called ‘advertising.” – Jef I. Richards
- “Creativity may well be the last legal unfair competitive advantage we can take to run over the competition.” – Dave Trott
- “Creativity is like washing a pig. It’s messy. It has no rules. No clear beginning, middle or end. It’s kind of a pain in the ass, and when you’re done, you’re not sure if the pig is really clean or even why you were washing a pig in the first place.” – Luke Sullivan
- “Creativity and innovation are about finding unexpected solutions to obvious problems, or finding obvious solutions to unexpected problems.” – Rei Inamoto
- “There are a lot of great technicians in advertising. And unfortunately, they talk the best game. They know all the rules … but there’s one little rub. They forget that advertising is persuasion, and persuasion is not a science, but an art. Advertising is the art of persuasion.” – William Bernbach
- “Big ideas come from the unconscious. This is true in art, in science, and in advertising. But your unconscious has to be well informed, or your idea will be irrelevant. Stuff your conscious mind with information, then unhook your rational thought process.” – David Ogilvy
- “There is a great deal of advertising that is much better than the product. When that happens, all that the good advertising will do is put you out of business faster.” – Jerry Della Femina
- “Facts are irrelevant. What matters is what the consumer believes.” – Seth Godin
- “I am one who believes that one of the greatest dangers of advertising is not that of misleading people, but that of boring them to death.” – Leo Burnett
- “We need to stop interrupting what people are interested in and be what people are interested in.” – Craig Davis
- “Don’t tell me how good you make it; tell me how good it makes me when I use it.” – Leo Burnett
- “Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing, but nobody else does” – Steuart Henderson Britt
- “Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it.” – S Leacoc
- “Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.”-Mark Twain
- "When your message is relevant to someone it ceases to be advertising and becomes information." - Brent Shedd
- “A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is — it is what consumers tell each other it is.” – Scott Cook
Now that you've got the tools to amaze your friends and family with your wit and wisdom, make sure your agency has the tools to amaze your clients and competition with its capabilities and competence. Advantage's AQUA agency management system provides a comprehensive and fully integrated operating system for Media, Project Management and Accounting that will give your agency the edge in information and productivity. Schedule a free online demo to see for yourself how easy to use and customizable the system is to your agency's needs and workflows.
Next year can be the best year ever for your agency and Advantage can help make that happen.