Thoraiya DyerDavid Ogilvy talks about good writing
November 14th 2006 09:59
It's about time I give credit to the maverick David Ogilvy. Here's an excerpt from a magazine I read a few years ago:
Memos from an Advertising Man
Brilliant, hilarious, irrepressible, daring -- picking words that best describe David Ogilvy is a task that would daunt the most creative copywriter.
The man who would start what Advertising Age ranks as the fifth largest ad agency in the U.S., and sixth largest in the world, flunked out of Oxford, worked as a chef in Paris, farmed tobacco in Pennsylvania, and served in British intelligence.
From a memo [he] drafted in 1982 for the management to circulate:
"If everybody in our company took an exam in writing, the highest mark would go to the 14 directors. PEOPLE WHO THINK WELL, WRITE WELL. Woolly-minded people write woolly memos, woolly letters, and woolly speeches.
According to Ogilvy, good writing is not a natural gift. It can be learned. Yay!
Memos from an Advertising Man
Brilliant, hilarious, irrepressible, daring -- picking words that best describe David Ogilvy is a task that would daunt the most creative copywriter.
The man who would start what Advertising Age ranks as the fifth largest ad agency in the U.S., and sixth largest in the world, flunked out of Oxford, worked as a chef in Paris, farmed tobacco in Pennsylvania, and served in British intelligence.
From a memo [he] drafted in 1982 for the management to circulate:
"If everybody in our company took an exam in writing, the highest mark would go to the 14 directors. PEOPLE WHO THINK WELL, WRITE WELL. Woolly-minded people write woolly memos, woolly letters, and woolly speeches.
According to Ogilvy, good writing is not a natural gift. It can be learned. Yay!
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