When Don Draper isn’t accepting raises, he’s drinking like a fish, smoking like a chimney, and dressing like a boss. In between, you’ll find him at his agency’s conference room, seducing clients with his vision for their products. He’s even better though at getting (married) women out of their clothes. We want to be like him, at least a part of us does – that part that wants to be confident, persuasive, and successful.
“You're our Ogilvy,” a business partner says to Don Draper in Season 3 of Mad Men, trying to woo the Creative Director with partner status. Competing firms had begun trying to poach him, but Draper was already growing restless in an agency too small for his work. In fact he'd previously rejected a contract offer, of course taking the pay raise that accompanied it, because he’s that cool.
If we know the truth though, Draper’s juicy confessions lose their appeal. Beneath his masks, he’s unhappy. Draper is chronically dissatisfied with whatever he has: his wife, his clients, his secret girlfriends, his creative team, his second wife, himself. He shuffles through them and then loathes himself afterwards behind closed doors. Despite his conquests in and out of the office, he’s falling, like the credits have shown since the beginning.
Who is Don Draper? His business partner’s answer: David Ogilvy, couldn’t be further from the truth, because Ogilvy, ‘the father of advertising’ confesses a completely different secret. The story of his rise from his humble Scottish origins as the son of a blue collar family to Madison Ave. power house is rife with a dogged commitment to honesty.
In his bestseller, Confessions of an Ad Man, Ogilvy’s main focus is the practicality of being honest with your customers, coworkers and yourself. He only sold products that he truly believed in, going so far as to call the consumer his “wife”.
“If you tell lies about a product you will be found out – either by the Government which will prosecute you, or by the consumer, who will punish you by not buying the product for a second time. Good products can be sold by honest advertising. If you don’t think the product is good, you have no business advertising it.”
Ogilvy damned much of the petty Game-of-Thrones-style power lusting in the business world and hired only what he called “gentlemen with brains”. Each of these gentlemen was expected to adopt his strategy. Ogilvy began this (re)education by giving each new-hire a powerful illustration of his strategy a Matryoshka doll (the Russian dolls that open up to reveal a slightly smaller one, which opens up to reveal – you guessed it – a smaller one, etc.) But inside the smallest doll, the new employee found a note: “If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, Ogilvy & Mather will become a company of giants.”
That’s exactly what Ogilvy’s company became. In just 15 years, he and his colleagues turned a $6,000 “shoestring” agency into a power house that boasted $55,000,000 in billings. Those “gentlemen with brains” were on to something. It certainly was hard work to earn that title of ‘the father of advertising’ but think how much harder would be – perhaps impossible – if he’d run his business like Draper runs his life: scheming up a web of lies vs. investing in a solid foundation of quality products and truthful spokesmen.
The difference between Draper and Ogilvy is the difference between a lie and the truth – between the appearance of greatness and greatness. We can’t all be like the original Mad Man, but we can all benefit from hearing Ogilvy’s confessions. In the end, his are much juicier than Draper's.
“You're our Ogilvy,” a business partner says to Don Draper in Season 3 of Mad Men, trying to woo the Creative Director with partner status. Competing firms had begun trying to poach him, but Draper was already growing restless in an agency too small for his work. In fact he'd previously rejected a contract offer, of course taking the pay raise that accompanied it, because he’s that cool.
If we know the truth though, Draper’s juicy confessions lose their appeal. Beneath his masks, he’s unhappy. Draper is chronically dissatisfied with whatever he has: his wife, his clients, his secret girlfriends, his creative team, his second wife, himself. He shuffles through them and then loathes himself afterwards behind closed doors. Despite his conquests in and out of the office, he’s falling, like the credits have shown since the beginning.
Who is Don Draper? His business partner’s answer: David Ogilvy, couldn’t be further from the truth, because Ogilvy, ‘the father of advertising’ confesses a completely different secret. The story of his rise from his humble Scottish origins as the son of a blue collar family to Madison Ave. power house is rife with a dogged commitment to honesty.
In his bestseller, Confessions of an Ad Man, Ogilvy’s main focus is the practicality of being honest with your customers, coworkers and yourself. He only sold products that he truly believed in, going so far as to call the consumer his “wife”.
“If you tell lies about a product you will be found out – either by the Government which will prosecute you, or by the consumer, who will punish you by not buying the product for a second time. Good products can be sold by honest advertising. If you don’t think the product is good, you have no business advertising it.”
Ogilvy damned much of the petty Game-of-Thrones-style power lusting in the business world and hired only what he called “gentlemen with brains”. Each of these gentlemen was expected to adopt his strategy. Ogilvy began this (re)education by giving each new-hire a powerful illustration of his strategy a Matryoshka doll (the Russian dolls that open up to reveal a slightly smaller one, which opens up to reveal – you guessed it – a smaller one, etc.) But inside the smallest doll, the new employee found a note: “If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, Ogilvy & Mather will become a company of giants.”
That’s exactly what Ogilvy’s company became. In just 15 years, he and his colleagues turned a $6,000 “shoestring” agency into a power house that boasted $55,000,000 in billings. Those “gentlemen with brains” were on to something. It certainly was hard work to earn that title of ‘the father of advertising’ but think how much harder would be – perhaps impossible – if he’d run his business like Draper runs his life: scheming up a web of lies vs. investing in a solid foundation of quality products and truthful spokesmen.
The difference between Draper and Ogilvy is the difference between a lie and the truth – between the appearance of greatness and greatness. We can’t all be like the original Mad Man, but we can all benefit from hearing Ogilvy’s confessions. In the end, his are much juicier than Draper's.