William Bernbach, an American businessman, and advertising executive, revolutionized the advertising industry with his innovative approach. As a co-founder of Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB), he emphasized creativity and simplicity in advertising. Bernbach's campaigns, such as the iconic Volkswagen ads, have left a lasting legacy in marketing and communications.

"Advertising is fundamentally persuasion and persuasion happens to be not a science, but an art."



"It is insight into human nature that is the key to the communicator's skill. For whereas the writer is concerned with what he puts into his writings, the communicator is concerned with what the reader gets out of it. He therefore becomes a student of how people read or listen."



"Our job is to sell our clients' merchandise... not ourselves. Our job is to kill the cleverness that makes us shine instead of the product. Our job is to simplify, to tear away the unrelated, to pluck out the weeds that are smothering the product message."



"There is no such thing as a good or bad ad in isolation. What is good at one moment is bad at another. Research can trap you into the past."



"Forget words like 'hard sell' and 'soft sell.' That will only confuse you. Just be sure your advertising is saying something with substance, something that will inform and serve the consumer, and be sure you're saying it like it's never been said before."



"Properly practiced creativity must result in greater sales more economically achieved. Properly practiced creativity can lift your claims out of the swamp of sameness and make them accepted, believed, persuasive, urgent."



"We don't ask research to do what it was never meant to do, and that is to get an idea."

