William Bernbach Quotes

Communication is the most important skill in life. We spend most of our waking hours communicating. But consider this: You've spent years learning how to read and write, years learning how to speak. But what about listening?

The orator puts off his individuality, and is then most eloquent when most silent. He listens while he speaks, and is a hearer along with his audience.

Communicators need to figure out how well do they engage people, and they should not talk one word longer than people are engaged.

You have to be aware of who you're talking to in an audience.

I would rather speak to 500 men that would give me their attention that to 100,000 that would not.

I've long believed that if you understand how conversational styles work, you can make adjustments in conversations to get what you want in your relationships.

It's not what you tell your players that counts. It's what they hear.

Listening is the hard part. Listening is the important part. The hot button is in the prospect's response.

Great communication depends on two simple skills-context, which attunes a leader to the same frequency as his or her audience, and delivery, which allows a leader to phrase messages in a language the audience can understand.

We are a spectacular, splendid manifestation of life. We have language. . . . We have affection. We have genes for usefulness, and usefulness is about as close to a 'common goal' of nature as I can guess at.

People are interested if you tell stories well and relevantly.

I will tell you that we're all human beings, and we all care about what people think of us. But in general, their outlook is, "We're not looking at opening night numbers. We're not looking at opening night box office. We want this to be part of the reason you come to our service."

When you can assume that your audience holds the same beliefs you do, you can relax and use more normal means of talking to it; when you have to assume that it does not, then you have to make your vision apparent by shock -- to the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost-blind you draw large and startling figures.

A baby was a fact. It was a being with a mind and a nature, and you could feel about it any way you liked, but a baby wouldn't care. Just by existing, it demanded that you believe in a future: the future it would crawl in, walk in, live in. A baby was a piece of time; it was a promise you made that the world made back to you.

To endow animals with human emotions has long been a scientific taboo. But if we do not, we risk missing something fundamental, about both animals and us.

I can usually get the right connection with the crowd and I don't have to be jumping off ladders.

Persuasive communication involves enthusiasm, animation, audience participation, authenticity and spontaneity.

The audience does not need to tune themselves to you - you need to tune your message to fit them. Skilled presenting requires you to understand their hearts and minds and create a message to resonate with what's already there. Your audience will be significantly moved if you send a message that is tuned to their needs and desires. They might even quiver with enthusiasm and act in concert to create beautiful results.

The need to communicate effectively with your customers will come up again and again.

The mark of a good conversationalist is not that you can talk a lot. The mark is that you can get others to talk a lot. Thus, good schmoozer's are good listeners, not good talkers.

I knew I couldn't sing over them, so I decided to sing under them. The more noise they made the more softly I sang. When they discovered they couldn't hear me, they began to look at me. Then they began to listen. As I sang, I kept thinking, 'softly with feeling.' The noise dropped to a hum; the hum gave way to silence. I had learned how to reach and hold my audience -- softly, with feeling.

Those who talk loudly are rarely listened to.

There are prating coxcombs in the world who would rather talk than listen, although Shakespeare himself were the orator, and human nature the theme!

I’ve always believed that the way you affect your audience is more important than how many of them are there.

if you want someone to stop listening to you go ahead and yell. If you want them to listen to every word, whisper. -Mimi