White paper writers can learn from David Ogilvy, one of the greatest copywriters

Copy is writing that sells. It includes advertising and "marcom," such as white papers.

David Ogilvy, founder of Ogilvy & Mather, and a heavy influence on the hit show, Mad Men, wrote the most famous and greatest line of copy ever:

"At 60 miles an hour the loudest noise in this new Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock."

His rival, Leo Burnett, judged it not only the best automobile ad, but the best ad of all time. The ad caused such a surge of sales that it only ran in two newspapers and two magazines, so the Rolls Royce factory wasn't overwhelmed. Written in 1960, many people can still quote the headline nearly 50 years later.

Reading Ogilivy on Advertising and a fine biography, The King of Madison Avenue, by Kenneth Roman, offers eight timeless lessons for any technology copywriter who wants to produce great work.

Lesson 1: Set exorbitant standards

Ogilvy felt life taught him two major lessons. The first was work really, really hard. The second, have "exorbitant standards" and "do everything you did better than anybody's ever done it or will ever do it again."

A two-minute dip into one of the online white paper site shows little evidence of exorbitant standards.

A white paper from Long Jump has the unmemorable title of, PaaS-onomics: A CIOs's Guide to using Platform-as-a-Service to Lower Costs of Apllication Initiatives While Improving the Business Value of IT."

This white paper does outline the business case (a great thing) but stodgily.

Lesson 2: Write around a Big Idea

Ogilvy was a firm believer in the Big Idea. Otherwise, your ad or copy will "pass like a ship in the night."

A top-notch copywriter should explain, in one- to three sentences, what is unique about a technology product, proposition, or proposal.

A white paper from Red Hat, outlining the business advantages of open source (a Big Idea if ever there was one) stumbles past the opportunity in front of them and starts with the limp title, The Perfect Storm: Why Now is the Time for Open Source."

Lesson 3: Do lots of homework

The Rolls Royce ad needed three weeks of research before writing a word. Ogilvy started by looking at every advertisement for competing products for 20 years. A process he called, studying the precedents.

For Mercedes Benx, he sent a team to Stuttgart that spent three weeks taping interviews with engineers. The resulting campaign increased sales in the U.S. from 10,000 cars a year to 40,000.

Modern white paper writers don't like homework much.  

The White Paper Report found the average freelance white paper writer spends 8 hours researching and 3 or fewer hours conducting interviews. As the report blithely points out, "this finding is surprising given the lack of topical knowledge freelance writers often bring to writing projects."

Lesson 4: Labor hard on headlines

Every decent journalist and copywriter talks about headlines. Ogilvy obsesses and offers advice:

• "On average, five times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy. It follows that unless your headline sells your product, you have wasted 90 per cent of your money."
• Headlines should promise the reader a benefit.
• Don't write "blind and dumb" headlines that require reading the body copy to be comprehensible.
• Specifics are more credible and memorable than generalities.

Headlines require hard labor. For the Rolls Royce ad, he wrote over 100 headlines and pulled the eventual choice from an article written 20 years earlier.

A little more labor would help this 25-word white paper title from Clarity Consultants, The Advantages of a Project-Based L&d Consulting Framework: How to Create Flexible and Controlled Corporate Learning Programs by Leveraging a Network of Skilled Consultants."

Lesson 5: Swing from word one

No slow wind up. Get to the point.

Ogilvy wanted ads that "got the argument up off its ass and in there swinging from word one."

The swing from the starting lines from the Red Hat white paper won't hurt (or interest) anyone, "These are unprecedented times. The global economy is in free fall, with no geogrpahic region or industry unaffected by the scarcity of capital, market volatility, and reduced consumer spending."

Lesson 6: Use facts, not fluff

Ogilivy thought long, factual copy works best.

Copy that "tells the truth and makes the truth interesting."

By long, he meant 600 to 6,000 words, not 20 pages rambling about you and your products.

You would hear his grave creak if he read some of the lines from modern white paper writers. Taking an example from the Clarity Consultants paper,"To most enterprises, the integration of cultural information, such as corporate history or shared values, in a corporate training program is the organization's unique way of imparting greater employee affinity with the L&D content."

A 34-word sentence that appears to say: our training considers your company culture?

Lesson 7: Gush first, edit later

Even if you are a fan of Mad Men, we don't recommend Ogilvy's precise writing process, even though it follows Hemingway's advice to write drunk and edit sober.

Nevertheless, the emphasis on gushing and until-it-hurts editing is admirable. From Kenneth Roman's biography:

"Finally, when he could no longer postpone the actual copy, he would start writing, usually throwing away the first 20 attempts. "If all else fails, I drink a half a bottle of rum and play a Handel oratorio... This generally produces a gush of copy." The next morning, he would get up early and edit the gush."

Lesson 8: Simple and singular

Ogilvy suffered no delusions about creativity or the purpose of copywriting. For him, there's only one purpose ever: "to sell a product or a service or an idea."

To create great advertising (and copywriting) requires "a burr of singularity," something unusual enough to sick to the reader's mind the way a burr sticks to your trousers.

In sum, to write more like Ogilivy, you need to:

• Think big;
• Be different;
• Write damn well; and,
• Generate a lead or sell something!

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