Every marketer needs a pearl of wisdom or two to help guide them. That’s why we’ve put together this list of 365 marketing quotes, by or for marketers, from the best and the brightest in history.
We’ve divided the quotes into the following categories — click to jump to that section!
Advertising
Audience Engagement
Branding
Business of Marketing
Content Marketing
Creativity
Customer-Centric Marketing
Data-Driven Marketing
Digital Marketing
Failure
Innovation
Inspiration
Leadership
Marketing Jobs and Careers
Marketing Strategy
Marketing Wisdom
Providing Value
Social Media
Storytelling
Writing
Quotes About Marketing:
Advertising Quotes
“Advertising in the final analysis should be news. If it is not news it is worthless.” – Adolph Ochs
“Advertising is only evil when it advertises evil things.” – David Ogilvy
“Any strategy that gets a message to rise above the clutter is terrific from the advertiser’s perspective. Even if it’s not much of a secret, it’s still a pretty good marketing idea.” – Josh Bernoff
“Banners have 99 problems and a click ain’t one.” – Scott Sorokin
“Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing, but nobody else does.” – Steuart Henderson Britt
“Give them quality. That’s the best kind of advertising.” – Milton Hershey
“If great content is the hero, then banners are the villain.” – Michael Brenner
“If you build it… you may still need Google AdWords.” – Jennifer Mesenbrink
“In advertising, not to be different is virtually suicidal.” – Bill Bernbach
“In our factory, we make lipstick. In our advertising, we sell hope.” – Peter Nivio Zarlenga
“Never let ads write checks your website can’t cash.” – Avinash Kaushik
“Never write an advertisement which you wouldn’t want your family to read. You wouldn’t tell lies to your own wife. Don’t tell them to mine.” – David Ogilvy
“Nobody counts the number of ads you run; they just remember the impression you make.” – Bill Bernbach
“Nobody reads ads. People read what interests them, and sometimes it’s an ad.” – Howard Luck Gossage
“Stopping advertising to save money is like stopping your watch to save time.” – Henry Ford
“The only people who care about advertising are the people who work in advertising.” – George Parker
“There isn’t any significant difference between the various brands of whiskey, or cigarettes or beer. They are all about the same. And so are the cake mixes and the detergents, and the margarines… The manufacturer who dedicates his advertising to building the most sharply defined personality for his brand will get the largest share of the market at the highest profit.” – David Ogilvy
“Try to say everything in an ad and you end up saying nothing.” – Jeff Mamula
“What really decides consumers to buy or not to buy is the content of your advertising, not its form.” – David Ogilvy
“Word of mouth can be as important, if not more important, for neighborhood businesses as traditional advertising.” – Ekaterina Walter
“Advertising brings in customers, but word-of-mouth brings in the best customers.” – Jonah Berger
“Whether we millennials are all entitled assholes has yet to be empirically proven. But the data shows that people’s expectations around media and advertising does indeed change based on the technology they grow up with.” – Shane Snow
Audience Engagement Quotes
“Behind every tweet, share and purchase, there is a person. Care more about the person and less about the share.” – Shafqat Islam
“By definition, remarkable things get remarked upon.” – Seth Godin
“Don’t build links. Build relationships.” – Rand Fishkin
“Even when you are marketing to your entire audience or customer base, you are still simply speaking to a single human at any given time.” – Ann Handley
“Good marketers see consumers as complete human beings with all the dimensions real people have.” – Jonah Sachs
“It’s hard to target a message to a generic 35-year-old middle-class working mother of two. It’s much easier to target a message to Jennifer, who has two children under four, works as a paralegal, and is always looking for quick but healthy dinners and ways to spend more time with her kids and less time on housework.” – Elizabeth Gardner
“More contact means more sharing of information, gossiping, exchanging, engaging – in short, more word of mouth.” – Gary Vaynerchuk
“Speak to your audience in their language about what’s in their heart.” – Jonathan Lister
“Spending energy to understand the audience and carefully crafting a message that resonates with them means making a commitment of time and discipline to the process.” – Nancy Duarte
“The attention economy is not growing, which means that we have to grab the attention that someone else has today.” – Brent Leary
“There is a difference between listening and waiting for your turn to speak.” – Simon Sinek
“These days, people want to learn before they buy, be educated instead of pitched.” – Brian Clark
“Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people.” – William Butler Yeats
“You can never go wrong by investing in communities and the human beings within them.” – Pam Moore
“You cannot buy engagement. You have to build engagement.” – Tara-Nicholle Nelson
“You cannot get anybody to do something if they’re not paying attention to you.” – Brian Carter
Branding Quotes
“A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is – it’s what consumers tell each other it is.” – Scott Cook
“As a brand marketer, I’m a big believer in ‘branding the customer experience,’ not just selling the service.” – John Sculley
“Branded content is created for a company. A content brand is created for a valuable company.” – Drew Davis
“Brands need to take the phrase ‘acting like a publisher’ literally.” – Dietrich Mateschitz
“Making promises and keeping them is a great way to build a brand.” – Seth Godin
“People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” – Simon Sinek
“We elect and buy from people we like. Likability is number one. We also need to believe they are honest, and have our best interests at heart.” – George Farris Godin
“When people feel insecure about something, they look around for validation. Show them that other people trust you.” – Francisco Rosales
“Your brand is a story unfolding across all customer touch points.” – Jonah Sachs
“Your brand is not what you sell.” – John Iwata
“Your culture is your brand.” – Tony Hsieh
“Brand journalism is a stupid term. It’s information entertainment. It’s education.” – Shane Snow
Business of Marketing Quotes
“Because it is its purpose to create a customer, any business enterprise has two – and only these two – basic functions: marketing and innovation.” – Peter Drucker
“Business has only two functions – marketing and innovation.” – Milan Kundera
“Clients don’t care about the labor pains; they want to see the baby.” – Tim Williams
“Focus on the core problem your business solves and put out lots of content and enthusiasm and ideas about how to solve that problem.” – Laura Fitton
“I am comfortable saying right now that some of the biggest winners of this election — and probably many future elections — will be the software companies selling to everyone. In a war with many opponents and escalating weaponry, it pays to be an arms dealer.” – Shane Snow
“Non-profit organizations have to build ships – memberships, relationships and sponsorships.” – George Farris
“What helps people, helps business.” – Leo Burnett
Content Marketing Quotes
“10x content — content that performs 10 times better than competitors — must be mobile first.” – Adam Monago
“Before you create any more ‘great content,’ figure out how you are going to market it first.” – Joe Pulizzi and New Barrett Authors of Get Content Get Customers
“Behind every piece of bad content is an executive who asked for it.” – Michael Brenner
“Content: there is no easy button.” – Scott Abel
“Content builds relationships. Relationships are built on trust. Trust drives revenue.” – Andrew Davis
“Content is anything that adds value to the reader’s life.” – Avinash Kaushik
“Content is fire, social media is gasoline.” – Jay Baer
“Content is king, but distribution is queen. And she wears the pants.” – Jonathan Perelman
“Content is king.” – Bill Gates
“Content is king but engagement is queen, and the lady rules the house!” – Mari Smith
“Content is not king, but a president elected by the votes of those whom it aims to rule.” – Raheel Forooq
“Content is the atomic particle of all digital marketing.” – Rebecca Lieb
“Content is the key, because it’s how a website creates an online experience.” – Adam Audette
“Content is the reason search began in the first place.” – Lee Odden
“Content marketing is a commitment, not a campaign.” – Jon Buscall
“Content marketing is all the marketing that’s left.” – Seth Godin
“Content marketing is like a first date. If you only talk about yourself, there won’t be a second one.” – David Beebe
“Content marketing is more than a buzzword. It is the hottest trend in marketing because it is the biggest gap between what buyers want and brands produce.” – Michael Brenner
“Content Marketing is no longer a numbers game. It’s a game of relevance.” – Jason Miller
“Content marketing represents the gap between what brands produce and what consumers actually want.” – Michael Brenner
“Content should ask people to do something and reward them for it.” – Lee Odden
“Create content that reaches your audience’s audience.” – MarketingProfs
“Does your content lead readers on a journey, or does it merely stuff them as leads into a pipeline?” – Ann Handley
“Doing well with blogging is not about writing one key post, it is about performing day-after-day and helping a few people at a time.” – Aaron Wall
“Engaging content is far more about brains than budget.” – Ann Handley
“Fifty-six percent of traffic comes from 10 percent of content. Invest in your home runs.” – Lymari Morales
“Good content isn’t about good storytelling. It’s about telling a true story well.” – Ann Handley
“Good content should be at the heart of your strategy, but it is equally important to keep the display context of that content in mind as well.” – Tim Frick
“If your content isn’t driving conversation, you’re doing it wrong.” – Dan Roth
“I think the hardest part for any startup is to rein in the desire to ‘throw shit against the wall and see what sticks’ versus being more strategic in their focus and truly iterating. A content-first approach is a lower-cost, lower-risk way of achieving the same.” – Stephanie Hay
“It’s a great time to be a content creator. There are so many highways and not enough cars.” – Scooter Braun
“It’s probable that the most successful content programs will always contain a mix of owned and sponsored. And while both media and advertiser make out well in this model, the real winners are consumers.” – Shane Snow
“Make the prospect a more informed buyer with content.” – Robert Simon
“Marketing is telling the world you’re a rock star. Content marketing is showing the world you are one.” – Robert Rose
“No content should be a dead end. Plan for where to put it next.” – David Beebe
“Power doesn’t come from content, power comes from the content that moves.” – Mark Schaefer
“Pro tip: Watch political campaigns. That’s where innovation is happening in content marketing.” – Devon Hopkins
“Revenue is king. Tying your content to revenue and lead gen is critical to success.” – Elizabeth Clor
“Stop publishing things just because you always have.” – Lymari Morales
“Stop vomiting your content on every channel.” – Andrew Davis
“The future of content marketing is in your hands.” – David Hahn
“The key ingredient to a better content experience is relevance.” – Jason Miller
“The next evolution of content marketing is not more content; it’s better distribution.” – Christopher Penn
“The only way to win at content marketing is for the reader to say ‘This was written specifically for me.’” – Jamie Turner
“There are three objectives for content marketing: reach, engagement, conversion. Define key metrics for each.” – Michael Brenner
“The ultimate content strategy is listening.” – Marcus Sheridan
“The way content is evolving is that brands can now tell narratives that can expand in many, many different ways because the technology is there to help them do it.” – Karin Timpone
“Think bigger, braver, and bolder. The biggest missed opportunity in content marketing is playing it too safe.” – Ann Handley
“Traditional marketing talks at people. Content marketing talks with them.” – Doug Kessler
“What is quality content? Ultimately, the consumer decides.” – Joe Chernov
“What makes content engaging is relevancy. You need to connect the contact information with the content information.” – Gail Goodman
“When it comes to content and content marketing, you probably want to err on the side of making things SUPER amazing, not MVP.” – Rand Fishkin
“You need to create ridiculously good content – content that is useful, enjoyable and inspired.” – Ann Handley
“Your top of the funnel content must be intellectually divorced from your product but emotionally wed to it.” – Joe Chernov
Creativity Quotes
“An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” – Edwin Land
“An idea can turn to magic or dust, depending on the talent that rubs against it.” – Bill Bernbach
“Bad artists copy, good artists steal.” – Pablo Picasso
“Creativity about life, in all aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” – Leo Burnett
“Creativity is intelligence having fun.” – Albert Einstein
“Creativity may well be the last legal unfair competitive advantage we can take to run over the competition.” – Dave Trott
“Creativity without strategy is called art, creative with strategy is called advertising.” – Jef L. Richards
“Curiosity about life, in all its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” – Leo Burnett
“Don’t be afraid to get creative and experiment with your marketing.” – Mike Volpe
“If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn’t thinking.” – General George Patton
“Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes
“Nothing begets creativity like constraints.” – Christopher Mims
“Passion is one great force that unleashes creativity, because if you’re passionate about something, then you’re more willing to take risks.” – Yo-Yo Ma
“To think creatively, we must be able to look afresh at what we normally take for granted.” – George Kneller
Customer-Centric Marketing Quotes
“Conversation with customers will increase sales, even if the product or service is never mentioned.” – George Farris
“Don’t find customers for your product. Find products for your customers.” – Seth Godin.
“Everyone is not your customer.” – Seth Godin
“Increasingly, customers are associating brand not with a message but with their entire experience surrounding the product or service.” – Bryan Eisenberg
“Make the customer the hero of your story.” – Ann Handley
“People shop and learn in a whole new way compared to just a few years ago, so marketers need to adapt or risk extinction.” – Brian Halligan
“People spend money when and where they feel good.” – Walt Disney
“Sell the problem you solve. Not the product you make.” – Unknown
“Strong customer relationships drive sales, sustainability, and growth.” – Tom Cates
“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.” – Peter Drucker
“The buyer journey is nothing more than a series of questions that must be answered.” – Analyst Firm IDC
“The consumer is not a moron; she is your wife.” – David Ogilvy
“The importance of gratitude is never forgotten.” – Deborah Lee
“The marketing funnel can give marketers funnel-vision. In focusing on the transaction over the relationship, marketers can lose sight of the actual consumer the funnel was designed to reach.” – Tom Fishburne
“The static snapshot of a single buyer is a key problem with buyer personas today. Organizations need to watch the continuous film of their buyers – instead of just looking at a snapshot in time – so they can see how the full story unfolds.” – Tony Zambito
“Think like a customer.” – Paul Gillin
“To be successful and grow your business and revenues, you must match the way you market your products with the way your prospects learn about and shop for your products.” – Brian Halligan
“What people want is the extra, the emotional bonus they get when they buy something they love.” – Seth Godin
“When you start with what’s at stake for the buyer, you earn the right to their attention.” – Jake Sorofman
“Whether B2B or B2C, I believe passionately that good marketing essentials are the same. We all are emotional beings looking for relevance, context, and connection.” – Beth Comstock
“You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.” – Steve Jobs
“You can’t be everything to everyone, but you can be something to someone.” – Drew Davis
“You can’t convince anyone of anything. You can only give them the right information, so that they convince themselves.” – Eben Pagan
Data-Driven Marketing Quotes
“Data beats opinions.” – Anonymous
“Every trackable interaction creates a data-point, and every data-point tells a piece of the customer’s story.” – Paul Roetzer
“Marketers have to stop reporting on activities and start reporting on business outcomes.” – Allen Gannett
“On average, people should be more skeptical when they see numbers. The should be more willing to play around with the data themselves.” – Nate Silver
“The things we perceive as creative brilliance are often a product of a system.” – Allen Gannett
“What you prefer or what your designer prefers doesn’t matter if it’s not getting you conversions.” – Naomi Niles
“Without actionable data and clear metrics driven strategy, the marketing organization is being paid to guess.” – Team Position2
Digital Marketing Quotes
“Google is the new corporate homepage.” – Jeremiah Owyang
“Google only loves you when everyone else loves you first.” – Wendy Piersall
“Google will know that you are hungry for sushi before you do.” – Ben Kunz
“Ignoring online marketing is like opening a business but not telling anyone.” – Anonymous
“Important people may be busy, but the same principles for winning their trust and attention apply to the most to least busy person you’re emailing. Be personal, and do your homework.” – Shane Snow
“In 2004, good SEO made you remarkable on the web. In 2014, good SEO is a result of being remarkable on the web.” – Rand Fishkin
“Inbound marketing and account-based marketing are like a taco and a burrito. They have the same ingredients, they’re just shaped differently.” – Joe Chernov
“Incorporate easy email marketing strategies with your Facebook efforts to see bigger results (aka profits!).” – Amy Porterfield
“Instead of one-way interruption, web marketing is about delivering useful content at precisely the right moment when a buyer needs it.” – David Meerman Scott
“It’s much easier to double your business by doubling your conversion rate than doubling your traffic.” – Bryan Eisenberg
“Not viewing your email marketing as content is a mistake.” – Chris Baggott
“Search, a marketing method that didn’t exist a decade ago, provides the most efficient and inexpensive way for businesses to find leads.” – John Battelle
“Search engine marketing and search engine optimization are critically important to online businesses. You can spend every penny you have on a website, but it will all be for nothing if nobody knows your site is there.” – Marc Ostrofsky
“Search marketing, and most Internet marketing in fact, can be very threatening because there are no rules. There’s no safe haven. To do it right, you need to be willing to be wrong. But search marketing done right is all about being wrong. Experimentation is the only way.” – Mike Moran
“SEO is a marketing function for sure, but it needs to be baked into a product, not slapped on like icing after the cake is baked.” – Duane Forrester
“SEO is like a resume, you polish it so you have your best foot forward.” – Matt Cutts
“Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.” – Coco Chanel
“The future of SEO is here: understanding and marketing to specific and defined audiences through search engines.” – Adam Audette
“Today it’s not about ‘get the traffic’ – it’s about ‘get the targeted and relevant traffic.’” – Adam Audette
“You can’t expect to just write and have visitors come to you – that’s too passive.” – Anita Campbell
“You can’t just place a few ‘Buy’ buttons on your website and expect your visitors to buy.” – Neil Patel
“Your website is your greatest asset. More people view your webpages than anything else.” – Amanda Sibley
“Your website should be your calling card, or your business front door.” – James Schramko
Failure Quotes
“‘Humans of New York’ did not result from a flash of inspiration. It grew from five years of experimenting, tinkering, and messing up.” – Brandon Stanton
“Failure is an option.” – Matthew Schwartz
“Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” – Henry Ford
“If you don’t have room to fail, you don’t have room to grow. – Jonathan Mildenhall
“If you’re not failing now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything innovative.” – Woody Allen
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas Edison
“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.” – J.K. Rowling
“The cost of being wrong is less than the cost of doing nothing.” – Seth Godin
“This is a learning process and sometimes you have to fall in order to learn things.” – Christine Korda
Innovation Quotes
“Almost overnight, the Internet’s gone from a technical wonder to a business must.” – Bill Schrader
“Holding back technology to preserve broken business models is like allowing blacksmiths to veto the internal combustion engine in order to protect their horseshoes.” – Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams
“Instead of using technology to automate processes, think about using technology to enhance human interaction.” – Tony Zambito
“New ideas are sometimes found in the most granular details of a problem where few others bother to look.” – Nate Silver
“Our digital future is about enabling better productivity and decision-making to enjoy a better quality of life.” – Yacine Baroudi
“Take two ideas and put them together to make one new idea. After all, what is a Snuggie but a mutation of a blanket and a robe?” – Jim Kukral
“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” – Socrates
“Those who build and perpetuate mediocrity…are motivated more by the fear of being left behind.” – Jim Collins
“You have to stand apart by offering high quality, relevant experiences to audiences that you truly understand.” – Adam Audette
Inspirational Marketing Quotes
“A year from now, you’ll wish you had started today.” – Karen Lamb
“Be interesting. Tell the truth. And if you can’t tell the truth, change what you’re doing so you can. In other words, live the truth.” – Jonah Sachs
“Be where the world is going.” – Beth Comstock
“Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken.” – Oscar Wilde
“Bring the best of your authentic self to every opportunity.” – John Jantsch
“Don’t bunt. Aim out of the park. Aim for the company of immortals.” – David Ogilvy
“Don’t let people tell you your ideas won’t work. If you’re passionate about an idea that’s stuck in your head, find a way to build it so you can prove to yourself that it doesn’t work.” – Dennis Crowley
“Don’t settle. Don’t finish crappy books. If you don’t like the menu, leave the restaurant. If you’re not on the right path, get off it.” – Chris Brogan
“Do one thing every day that scares you.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“Do or do not; there is no try.” – Yoda
“Every day I feel really great to work with the team I work with and the clients I work with; it’s like my job is just to match great clients with great people.” – Will Reynolds
“Find your spirit, and no challenge will keep you from achieving your goals.” – Christopher Penn
“Focus on the present…It’s the best gift you can give yourself.” – Carrie Kerpen
“How can you squander even one more day not taking advantage of the greatest shifts of our generation? How dare you settle for less when the world has made it so easy for you to be remarkable?” – Seth Godin
“If you’re a good marketing person, you have to be a little crazy.” – Jim Metcalf
“If you aim at nothing, you will hit it every time.” – Zig Ziglar
“If you are an artist, learn science. If you are a scientist, cultivate art.” – Karin Timpone
“Inspiration doesn’t respond to meeting requests. You can’t schedule greatness.” – Jay Baer
“Inspiration is difficult to measure, but the results driven by that inspiration are powerful.” – Scott Harrison
“It’s quite fun to do the impossible.” – Walt Disney
“I’d rather apologize than to be so timid as to never try to do anything smart or brave.” – Lee Clow
“Leverage the strength that you have: that no one else can be you.” – Todd Wheatland
“Never doubt a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead
“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Nothing is impossible; The word itself says ‘I’m possible!'” – Audrey Hepburn
“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing. That’s why we recommend it daily.” – Zig Ziglar
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.” – Peter Drucker
“The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.” – Ayn Rand
“Think big and don’t listen to people who tell you it can’t be done. Life’s too short to think small.” – Tim Ferriss
“Too often, feeling intimidated becomes our excuse not to be awesome.” – Scott Stratten
“Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
“We’re here to put a dent in the universe. Otherwise, why else even be here?” – Steve Jobs
“You have brilliance in you, your contribution is valuable, and the art you create is precious. Only you can do, and you must.” – Seth Godin
Leadership Quotes
“If you are the CEO, you are the brand.” – George Farris
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you’re a leader.” – John Quincy Adams
“I know of no single formula for success. But over the years I have observed that some attributes of leadership are universal and are often about finding ways of encouraging people to combine their efforts, their talents, their insights, their enthusiasm and their inspiration to work together.” – Queen Elizabeth II
“Money coming in says I’ve made the right marketing decisions.” – Adam Osborne
Marketing Jobs and Career Quotes
“Creating marketing that works should not be rocket science.” – Allen Gannett
“Marketing’s job is never done. It’s about perpetual motion. We must continue to innovate every day.” – Beth Comstock
“Marketing is really just about sharing your passion.” – Michael Hyatt
“Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department.” – David Packard
“Marketing takes a day to learn. Unfortunately it takes a lifetime to master.” – Phil Kolter
“Marketing used to be about making a myth and telling it. Now it’s about telling a truth and sharing it.” – Marc Mathieu
“Marketing wants ‘Mr. Right’ but Sales but wants ‘Mr. Right Now’.” – Unknown
“Our job is to connect to people, to interact with them in a way that leaves them better than we found them, more able to get where they’d like to go.” – Seth Godin
“Our job is to find the truth and present it well.” – Leo Burnett
“Our jobs as marketers are to understand how the customer wants to buy and help them do so.” – Bryan Eisenberg
“Success is making those who believed in you look brilliant.” – Dharmesh Shah
“Switch it off, get away from it all, and stop reading marketing on your holiday.” – Will Harris
“There are no magic wands, no hidden tricks, and no secret handshakes that can bring you immediate success but with time, energy, and determination you can get there.” – Darren Rowse
“The sole purpose of marketing is to sell more to more people, more often and at higher prices. There is no other reason to do it.” – Sergio Zyman
“What’s much more effective than hammering in process and incentives? Making work purposeful and fun.” – Shane Snow
Marketing Strategy Quotes
“Competition commoditizes competency.” – Jay Baer
“Don’t optimize for conversations, optimize for revenue.” – Neil Patel
“Going viral is not an outcome; it’s a happening. Sometimes it happens; sometimes it doesn”t. Just remember, fans are vanity and sales are sanity.” – Lori Taylor
“Good marketing makes the company look smart. Great marketing makes the customer feel smart.” – Joe Chernov
“Great execution is the ultimate differentiator.” – Margaret Molloy
“I don’t care much for best practice. I care about conversions. That’s why I test.” – Michael Aagaard
“If you have more money than brains, you should focus on outbound marketing. If you have more brains than money, you should focus on inbound marketing.” – Guy Kawasaki
“Inbound marketing is a powerful tool. I’ve spent sizable chunks of my own career helping companies improve in this arena, which is why I know that the power of frame-of-mind awareness isn’t absolute.” – Jay Baer
“Increasingly, mass marketing is turning into a mass of niches.” – Chris Anderson
“Just because you can measure everything doesn’t mean that you should.” – W. Edward Deming
“Less is more. Keeping it simple takes time and effort.” – Jeff Bullas
“Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it inviting to look at.” – Leo Burnett
“Make your marketing so useful people would pay you for it.” – Jay Baer
“Marketers need to build digital relationships and reputation before closing a sale.” – Chris Brogan
“Market like the year you are in.” – Gary Vaynerchuk
“Markets are conversations.” – Levine, Locke, Searls and Weinberger in The Cluetrain Manifesto
“Master the topic, the message, and the delivery.” – Steve Jobs
“Smart brands don’t just ride trend shifts. They start them.” – Ann Handley
“Sometimes you have to experiment with a lot of ideas and see which one sticks. If you’re unsure, let the market decide.” – Dorie Clark
“Take a risk and keep testing, because what works today won’t work tomorrow, but what worked yesterday may work again.” – Amrita Sahasrabudhe
“Testing is the biggest no-brainer, and the killer of most stupid ideas.” – Avinash Kaushik
“The tactics drive the strategy.” – Marc Benioff
“You are everywhere, but you don’t have to be. Strategy is a decision to take a path, to say no.” – Kristina Halvorson
Marketing Wisdom Quotes
“A goal without a plan is just a wish.” – Unknown
“Best practices don’t make you the best. They make you the average of everyone else who follows them.” – Shane Snow
“Go the extra mile; it’s never crowded.” – Unknown
“If dogs don’t like your dog food, the packaging doesn’t matter.” – Stephen Denny
“If you can’t explain it to a 6-year old, you don’t know it yourself.” – Albert Einstein
“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” – Tony Robbins
“If your dreams don’t scare you, they’re not big enough.” – Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
“If you want to understand how a lion hunts, don’t go to the zoo. Go to the jungle.” – Jim Stengel
“If you’re looking for the next big thing, and you’re looking where everyone else is, you’re looking in the wrong place.” – Mark Cuban
“In the long history of humankind those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed.” – Charles Darwin
“Investigate. Innovate. And then communicate.” – George Farris
“Invest in yourself. When you do this, you press the fast-forward button on your success.” – John Lee Dumas
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou
“Know thyself. Know the customer. Innovate.” – Beth Comstock
“Learn to say that you need help and don’t see it as a weakness. See it as a point of strength.” – Hiten Shah
“Money follows passion – not the other way around.” – David Siteman Garland
“Most of us have experienced wow moments. We just haven’t taken time to think deeply about them.” – Michael Hyatt
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” – Leonardo Da Vinci
“Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.” – Dr. Seuss
“Start with empathy. Continue with utility. Improve with analysis. Optimize with love.” – Jonathon Colman
“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.” – Tom Fishburne
“The purest treasure mortal times can afford is a spotless reputation.” – William Shakespeare
“The urgent can drown out the important.” – Marissa Mayer
“We’re all learning here; the best listeners will end up the smartest.” – Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff
“What you don’t do is surrender. You might retreat occasionally, but you don’t give up.” – Chris Brogan
“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” – Henry Ford
“You can’t sell anything if you can’t tell anything.” – Beth Comstock
“You can have everything you want in life if you just help enough people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar
“You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else.” – Albert Einstein
“You will never have a second chance to make a first impression.” – Will Rogers
Quotes About Providing Value
“Always provide value. Value builds trust. Once you have that trust, you have the ability to do some selling.” – Mike Volpe
“As marketers, we should be changing the mantra from always be closing to always be helping.” – Jonathan Lister
“As you go about creating new customer engagement programs and direct marketing packages for your brand, look for opportunities to give rather than to get. Whoever makes the first kind gesture, as studies show, tends to gain the most.” – Jeanette McMurtry
“As you’ve noticed, people don’t want to be sold. What people do want is news and information about the things they care about.” – Larry Weber
“Don’t tell me how good you make it; tell me how good it makes me when I use it.” – Leo Burnett
“Today it’s important to be present, be relevant, and add value.” – Nick Besbeas
Social Media Quotes
“As social media grows and matures, showing a return becomes critical.” – Heidi Cohen
“Empower your readers with social sharing buttons.” – Mike Stelzner
“Get social. Go deep. Give back.” – Joshua Weinberg
“Getting the Like is easy. It’s a light action. Anything else requires trust.” – Jon Loomer
“I am all for conversations, but you need to have a message.” – Renee Blodgett
“If you get bored with social media, it’s because you are trying to get more value than you create.” – Fast Company
“It’s a dialogue, not a monologue, and some people don’t understand that. Social media is more like a telephone than a television.” – Amy Jo Martin
“Just as you don’t need to be on every single TV channel, I don’t believe a brand needs to be on every single social media one in a big way.” – Shiv Singh
“No matter what, the very first piece of social media real estate I’d start with is a blog.” – Chris Brogan
“People share, read, and generally engage more with any type of content when it’s surfaced through friends and people they know and trust.” – Malorie Lucich
“Put your energy into making things that are likeable, not some douchey social media strategy.” – Matthew Inman
“Remarkable social media content and great sales copy are pretty much the same – plain spoken words designed to focus on the needs of the reader, listener, or viewer.” – Brian Clark
“Sell-sell-sell sales methods simply do not work on social media.” – Kim Garst
“Social media allows big companies to act small again.” – Jay Baer
“Social media are tools. Real time is a mindset.” – David Meerman Scott
“Social media creates communities, not markets.” – Don Schultz
“Social media has changed marketing. Now it’s not just about what you say. It’s also what your customers are saying to everyone else.” – George Farris
“Social media is about sociology and psychology more than technology.” – Brian Solis
“Social media is about the people. Not about your business. Provide for the people and the people will provide for you.” – Matt Goulart
“Social media is a contact sport.” – Margaret Molloy
“Successful companies in social media function more like entertainment companies, publishers, or party planners than as traditional advertisers.” – Erik Qualman
“The best way to engage honestly with the marketplace via Twitter is to never use the words ‘engage,’ ‘honestly’ or ‘marketplace.’” – Jeffrey Zeldman
“The next time you hear a social media myth, question it. Ask for the proof, and ask out loud.” – Dan Zarrella
“We have technology, finally, that for the first time in human history allows people to really maintain rich connections with much larger numbers of people.” – Pierre Omidyar
“We need to stop interrupting what people are interested in and be what people are interested in.” – Craig Davis
“When it comes to social media, focus on advice and education first, information second and entertainment last.” – George Farris
“Women tend to make 85 percent of household health care decisions. Facebook is where they make them.” – Angie Teates
“You can’t push your sales messages on your fans too often.” – Andrea Vahl
“‘Build it, and they will come’ only works in the movies. Social Media is a ‘build it, nurture it, engage them and they may come and stay.’” – Seth Godin
Storytelling Quotes
“By listening, marketing will re-learn how to talk.” – Doc Searls and David Weinburger
“Connect with your audience through stories people love.” – Shafqat Islam
“Find authentic stories, not just because people can sniff out authenticity, but because they’re simply better.” – Rajiv Chandrasekaran
“If something is top of mind, it’s much more likely to be tip of tongue.” – Jonah Berger
“If your stories are all about your products and services, that’s not storytelling. It’s a brochure. Give yourself permission to make the story bigger.” – Jay Baer
“Marketing dilutes the power and impact of a story told live. So get that right first.” – Michael Troiano
“Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories you tell.” – Seth Godin
“Storytelling can be a powerful force for good or evil, and we—consumers of content, creators of stories, and businesses hungry for results—need it to be good.” – Shane Snow
“Storytelling is the oldest profession.” – John Hazard
“Successful storytelling builds brand equity, and businesses with high brand equity don’t need to draw as much attention to themselves and their achievements as those that are still establishing their value to the customer.” – Gary Vaynerchuk
“Take the human perspective and make it understandable and digestible.” – Angie Teates
“The most pivotal moments in people’s lives revolve around emotions. Emotions make stories powerful.” – Brandon Stanton
“There is a craft to storytelling.” – Patricia Travaline
“The stories that spread today empower us and give us belief in our own heroic potential.” – Jonah Sachs
“Use tone-of-voice to attract the like-minded and avoid the timid.” – Ann Handley
“We talk a lot about content, but we often forget that story is the root of what makes content memorable. You have to think about stories pervading everything you do.” – Shane Snow
“When people put their kids to sleep, nobody tells bedtime facts.” – Jonah Berger
“You have to love something to want to frame it. So there’s a story in each custom product we make.” – Susan Tynan
Writing Quotes
“A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.” – Comedian Steven Wright
“As a rule, if you want to be a great writer you have to be a great reader.” – Mark Gilroy
“Do not address your readers as though they were gathered together in a stadium. When people read your copy, they are alone. Pretend you are writing to each of them a letter on behalf of your client.” – David Ogilvy
“Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing about.” – Benjamin Franklin
“I don’t know the rules of grammar… If you’re trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think. We try to write in the vernacular.” – David Ogilvy
“If you steal from one author, it’s plagiarism; if you steal from many, it’s research.” – Wilson Mizner
“Martin Luther King did not say ‘I have a mission statement.’” – Simon Sinek
“My goal is to spark something within the reader and allow it to initiate an idea they then can grow.” – Warren Whitlock
“On average, 8 out of 10 people will read your headline copy, but only 2 out 10 will read the rest.” – Brian Clark
“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.” – David Ogilvy
“Start an editorial calendar that everyone involved in your blog (writers, editors, marketing team, etc.) can access.” – Kristi Hines
“The #1 tip for asking better questions? Cut them off at the question mark.” – Shane Snow
“We should aim to reduce complexity in our writing as much as possible. We won’t lose credibility by doing so. Our readers will comprehend and retain our ideas more reliably. And we’ll have a higher likelihood of reaching more people.” – Shane Snow