David Ogilvy – “Research has saved me from some terrible mistakes. It’s given me the courage to sometimes run a campaign which I thought would have flopped.”
Scott: What would you say to students starting out right now in the business that would be the best way to open themselves up to the lightbulb – to the insight that sparks?
Winston: The insight is everything … Without a strong insight idea, you’re never going to get to anything provocative that’s going to turn [the consumer’s] head. And advertising has to be head turning … And creativity is messy – it’s chaotic as we talked about. Ultimately, I really believe it is creativity that wins, it is the answer to most business problems.
Scott: Talk a bit about what the ARF David Ogilvy Awards represent to you, and why you think it is part of the advertising ecosystem.
Winston: What I like about this [awards show] is that insight is at the core of it, but it also about the research that goes into it … We want to celebrate great case studies and teach.
Scott and Winston also discuss a case study for Taco Bell capitalizing on market trend connections that research was able to uncover.