Success Quote by David Ogilvy

Ogilvy’s line is motivational, sure, but it’s also a quietly ruthless piece of managerial psychology. “Don’t bunt” borrows the baseball move that trades ambition for safety: you advance the runner, you avoid embarrassment, you play for incremental progress. In advertising and business, bunting looks like conservative campaigns, timid briefs, consensus-driven work, and the careerist habit of not sticking your neck out. Ogilvy is warning that the real risk isn’t failure; it’s mediocrity disguised as prudence.

“Aim out of the ball park” sharpens the demand. A home run is inefficient on paper - lots of strikeouts come with it - yet it’s the only outcome that truly changes the score. The subtext is that creative industries don’t reward steady singles the way they claim to; they reward the rare, disproportionate win that becomes a case study, a brand myth, a cultural reference point.

Then he spikes the whole thing with “the company of immortals.” That’s not about money. It’s about legacy, taste, and belonging to a lineage of names that outlive quarterly results. Ogilvy, the consummate salesman of “big ideas,” understood that the strongest incentive for talented people isn’t a bonus; it’s the promise of significance.

Context matters: Ogilvy built an agency brand on disciplined research and elegant copy, but he sold it with a romantic self-image - the ad man as author, not vendor. This quote is the pitch internalized: take the swing, accept the strikeouts, and treat your work as something history might bother to remember.