"The 5 Best Things I Learned by Handwriting Ogilvy’s Masterpiece"

Here are the 5 best things I learned by handwriting David Ogilvy's "How to Create Advertising That Sells"

1. It became an addictive morning ritual

2. Handwriting beats typing

3. The jab uppercut technique

4. KISS

5. Positioning, Positioning, Positioning

Intro

David Ogilvy, often hailed as the "Father of Advertising" and the inspiration for Don Draper in Mad Men, wrote his famous piece in a 1963 booklet for his ad agency, Ogilvy & Mather. It's a product marketer's chef-d'oeuvre.

He wrote this to educate his own team and clients, but this internal piece then turned out to be his greatest sales asset. A reminder to all that education is sometimes the best piece of sales content.

I was inspired to do this after seeing a pattern of famous writers all getting the same question in podcasts, "how do you become a better writer?" They all shared a common answer as a recommended first step: "You write the work of great writers."

So I took the advice to heart. I want to become a better writer. So over the last 30 days, I spent 10 minutes every morning at my desk to re-write Oglivy's masterpiece. Here is what I learned.

1. It became an addictive morning ritual

Just like making your bed every morning for an early win, I found that starting the day at my office desk, opening the lid of my marker & pen, taking out a blank note card, and dedicating 10 minutes to writing was a pleasurable experience. It felt good to break away from the digital monotony. When my first pen ran out of ink, I paused and realized, this may be the first time in 20 years I dried out a pen. It was a surprisingly great feeling throwing a pen away.

I encourage others to explore switching up their morning practice to pen work that inspires them, whether it is scripture, songs, or poems.

2. Handwriting beats typing

I am the person who made fun of people who take handwritten notes at work. I was wrong. By handwriting this, I felt closer to Oglivy's writing. I felt his beats. Where he puts punctuation, patterns in word choices, and overall sentence structure. Also, although I struggled to read my own handwriting, I had a better recall of his 38 points. Lastly, I got tons of inspiration for future ideas that I wouldn't have realized by typing this.

3. The jab uppercut technique

It didn't take long to see a clear pattern in Oglivy's work. He jabbed then uppercut.

The jab is the headline. In #25 Headlines, he writes, "Five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy". He kept each of his headlines short and delivered a promise.

The uppercut was the last sentence. I knew I had a surprise awaiting me when the end was near. I know for a fact Oglivy thought about this last sentence with the same mental intensity as an uppercut. My favorite one is #13 Problem-Solution (Don't Cheat). "The consumer isn't a moron; she is your wife."

I loved this sentence so much, I re-wrote this sentence on a separate Post-it note and it had me thinking for days.

4. KISS

Keep it stupid simple. Oglivy documented his life learnings in less than 2,000 words. Every word is recognizable. It all has structure. He didn't write "Be conscientious about your destination". He wrote, "Look before you leap". This was written in 1963 and is still relevant today.

5. Positioning, Positioning, Positioning

I can only imagine the time and energy Ogilvy put into ordering his 38 points. He made #1 about positioning. He didn't even sugarcoat it when he called it "The Most Important Decision: Positioning".

Positioning is foundational. You need to be deliberate on what shelf space you want in your customer's mind. Advertising, sales enablement, messaging, training, etc. are all built on top of positioning.??

He uses Schweppes as his first sentence. "Should you position Schweppes as Mixer or a Soda?"

Think about the decision the Schweppes needed to make. They chose "Mixer" and alienated a whole category of carbonated beverages.

It was a bold decision until I went to my local Total Wine & More store. Schweppes' positioning impact was now easy to spot thanks to Ogilvy. They had an entire mixer aisle with no carbonated competitors around. April Dunford would call this "big fish, little pond".? ?

Schweppes just celebrated its 235th anniversary.

What should be the next piece I pen?

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