Success Quote by David Ogilvy

Ogilvy skewers the most expensive form of corporate superstition: advertising as insurance policy. The line lands because it admits what boardrooms rarely say out loud - that much of ad spend is driven less by conviction than by dread. Manufacturers "secretly question" efficacy, but the secrecy is the point: doubt is reputationally dangerous in a culture that treats marketing as modern oxygen. If you admit you can live without it, you sound unserious, maybe even doomed.

The phrasing "vaguely afraid" is surgical. It suggests a fear that is hard to defend with numbers, which is why it persists. Ogilvy is describing a pre-ROI world (and, frankly, a still-too-common post-ROI world) where the causal link between ads and sales is murky, but the career risk of being the person who cuts the budget is crystal clear. If sales dip, you own the crater. If you keep spending and nothing improves, at least you weren't reckless.

"Steal a march" imports the language of warfare into commerce, implying that competitors are not just rivals but opportunists waiting for weakness. The subtext is game theory: even if everyone suspects advertising is inefficient at the margin, no one wants to be the first to disarm. Ogilvy, an ad man with uncommon candor, is also protecting his craft by attacking bad motivations. He isn't saying advertising doesn't work; he's saying fear is a stupid strategy. The intent is a challenge: spend because you have a plan, a message, a product worth amplifying - not because you can't bear the thought of silence.