Success Quote by David Ogilvy

Ogilvy’s line reads like a permission slip for mischief, but it’s really an operating manual for persuasion. In advertising, “funny” isn’t garnish; it’s a stress test. If an idea can survive being turned into a joke, it’s probably clear enough to repeat, sharp enough to cut through noise, and human enough to travel by word of mouth. Humor forces compression. You can’t hide behind jargon when you’re trying to land a punchline.

The subtext is ruthlessly pragmatic: laughter is a proxy for attention, and attention is the scarcest currency in commerce. A joke makes an audience lower its guard, which is exactly when a message slips past the internal fact-checker. That’s not cynicism so much as tactics. Ogilvy built his reputation on research and discipline, yet he understood that people don’t experience brands as spreadsheets; they experience them as stories, shortcuts, and social signals. Comedy is the quickest route to those circuits.

There’s also a creative-director warning embedded here. “Best ideas” rarely arrive as solemn pronouncements; they show up sideways, sounding slightly wrong, even risky. The joke is often the first draft of a truth you’re not yet brave enough to state plainly. Ogilvy’s context - mid-century mass media, crowded print pages, the rise of TV - rewarded anything that could earn a second glance. Making your thinking funny wasn’t about being cute. It was about being memorable, testable, and, above all, usable.