I read this book many moons ago but it is still the most powerful book I have read in terms of getting your message out, whether in print, tv and now internet. Ogilvy wrote this book long before the internet, but the principles he uses for print apply to the internet. I have used the principles in my web design company, AUDIN Web Design, with amazing results. People love my designs and the formula is so simple:
The one thing that stood out in my mind was: Picture, Headline, Copy; in that order. That's the formula that works for web design. Don't forget it! It will change your life and make the world a better place, seriously.
I use that principle in my designs and it's visually appealing and I am able to get high rankings on the search engines, because of the design principles Ogilvy espoused some 40
"Below is a collection of books that I have read over the years. They almost all pertain to Marketing, Advertising and the World Wide Web. They've all been an inspiration to me.
My career started out in advertising (I wanted to be a copywriter), so I accumulate a lot of books of Advertising, such Ogilvy on Advertising and Confessions of an Advertising Man--both great books by about David Ogilvy--the father of Advertising as we know it.
Later in my career my attention turned to Marketing where I collected and read a lot of books from Reis and Trout--geniuses in their field. Their books on branding and positioning have proved to be invaluable to the way I do business. If you own your own business, I highly recommend you check out some of their books. If you work with AUDIN Web design, you will have the advantage of getting their wisdom by proxy.
Soon my journey brought me to web design--which is really advertising, marketing, and sales all rolled up into one. I grabbed such books as Call-to-Action, and Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug. I hope you enjoy this collection of books and reviews."—Ash Waechter
I read this book some time ago, so I don’t remember the specifics, but this book is a very quick read and worthwhile book in you are interested in building a business. Although this book is about advertising it apply to business as well.
Ogilvy is a legend in the advertising world and this book pretty much proves. I liked this book because Ogilvy talks about researching his product because that’s what I do with everything I do. He states how research is more important than being creative. That’s true. If you don’t know your product, you cannot think of it in creative terms.
This book is great for anyone who wants to learn how to: get clients, keep clients, build great campaigns, write great copy, This book was written in 1967 but still holds true today and very much applies to the World Wide Web.
As title says, this book studies the wisdom of crowds which is different than the wisdom of groups. Groups usually have very bad decision making, something that is well known and usually called “group think” (see Bay of Pigs). Crowds on the other hand can actually be quite smart, smarter than the most intelligent person in that crowd.
That’s the point that James Surowieki gets across in the books. He shows examples of how a crowd can guess exactly how many jelly beans are in a jar or how Who Wants to Be a Millionaire contestants relied on the crowd (audience) for answers on a difficult questions.
While I enjoyed the first half of the book very much, the last half didn’t offer anything new in the concept and some of the last chapters seemed to be from an entirely book altogether, such as the chapter on democracy and delegates.
For the lay person I would not recommend this book but if you are really into social behaviors, I would say check it out. It’s an interesting concept (that’s been talked about on CNBC and the like. It certainly helped me understand how I approach my business.
This book really got my attention. The essential ingredient of this book is that a website is kind of like a kind of funnel. You are trying to guide the visitors to where you want them to end up. You do this by certain call to action links, such as a button that says “click here to get free shipping.” You can use these techniques in conjunction with an ad campaign such as Google AdWords.
I think this book is great for web producers out there, but would it be quite boring for the average business owner who is just overseeing his/her website. It is probably best left to the marketing professional to read this book and apply these techniques to his or her clients’ websites.
It’s not the type of book you read in bed and enjoy. It really is a call to action. I found myself shutting the book every other page and experimenting with different websites I had been working on. It’s like a text book. Needless to say, it was quite difficult to read in bed.
I thought this was an excellent book. The book explores how some people will try maximize their satisfaction by looking at every possible choice in our over abundant world. The authors go on to say that there are literally too many choices, such as decisions about your health care provider, or your 401k plan. He found that most people make bad choices when there is too many choices to choose from. And some people suffer from analysis and paralysis.
The book helped me to understand how to design websites, so that visitors can make the right choice and, most important of all, make a choice rather than leave in frustration. Some websites have way too many things going on (i.e. photos, buttons, text, call outs, quotes) that the visitor is overwhelmed by so many choice.
The book confirmed a lot of what I had already believed: too many choice leads to indecisions. The author uses an examples about going to the GAP to buy a simple pair of jeans but he finds that making a choice is not so easy because he could have 8 different cuts (easy fit, slim fit, relaxed fit, etc) with five different colors (i.e. stonewash, blue denim, unwashed, etc.) I know many people could empathize with the author’s plight.
Later in the book, the author goes to show example after example of how choices of products we have out there. It is really eye opening. For example, did you know?
I highly recommend this book to everyone. This book will help you in business and in your own personal life.
A lot of people gave this book a bad rating on Amazon but I thought this book is excellent and one that every entrepreneur, budding business owner, and veteran should read.
It is so easy to try to have your business go in five directions at one time, especially when you are starting out and need the revenue. Focus really pints out that going in many different directions hurts a lot of companies.
This book really is a nice quick read with plenty of real world examples. The author talks about PepsiCo’s lack of focus when it launches many versions of Pepsi (i.e. Pepsi Free, Pepsi Clear, Pepsi Blue, etc.).
This book helped me with my own business and handling the websites of my clients. A lot of my clients want to be all things to all people. I tell them that they need to focus on creation aspects; at very least organize website so appears you are focus but also offer other goods and services of interested. I recently helped a company focus its product line, so that the least selling items were not at the forefront but were mentioned (by back pages) so that the visitors knew that the company offered them.
I highly recommend this book to any entrepreneur who is starting a new business. For the established small business, it may not be that critical.
