Pitch David
Issue 20 | September 2011
Agency
Ogilvy Beijing
Creative Team
Creative Director: Doug Schiff; Art Directors: Wang Fei, Teonghoe Teng; Copywriters: Doug Schiff, Sascha Engel; Technologists: Sascha Engel, Rita Wang
Production Team
Kevin Yeh Axis 3D
Date
June 2011
Background
David Ogilvy’s 100th birthday was about to be celebrated throughout the advertising world and, in fact, it fell in the week of the Cannes Festival of Creativity, so the agency wanted to remind the industry of David’s passion for ideas but in a way that was both fun and contemporary.
Idea
An iPhone app was created which lets you pitch an idea directly to David over a videoconference. You open the app and see that you have a new contact—David Ogilvy! With one touch you’re able to call him and at once a virtual David is ready to listen to your idea (through voice recognition).
After presenting your concept, he gives you an honest, straightforward, immediate critique. And you can feel free to try out more than one idea on David, as his passion for big ideas will last forever.
Results
A lot of press and enthusiasm, but no solid numbers yet.
Our Thoughts
I asked DO once how I could make Ogilvy London a really great agency again.
“Become fashionable,” he offered.
“How do I do that?”
“I have no idea.”
He claimed to be mystified by the wave that had picked him up when he launched in New York but he certainly rode it for all it was worth.
What he would have made of this, I’m not sure. He had a genuine distaste for puffery and may well have thought an app like this rather too vainglorious for his own tastes. He may also have asked, what exactly is it selling?
He was against advertising award shows, believing that great results were the best advertisement for an agency. But he also realised that culture had changed and with it the way people accept and respond to advertising. His was never a closed mind so, on balance, then, I think he would have been intrigued if not convinced.