Strategies vs Tactics

“Look at question 3, if you think this is an example of a strategy, and not a tactic, raise your hand.”

My hand went up, along with a few others in class, only to be disappointed when the professor said, “Unfortunately, this one’s a tactic…”

I spent a lot of time in business classes getting questions wrong when trying to define what a strategy is compared to a tactic. Naturally, being an all-knowing 22 year old, I assumed that this was pointless and wouldn’t apply to real life.

Of course, I was wrong.

Understanding the difference between strategies and tactics has helped to shape how I’ve structured my business, and how I work with clients.

In this post I won’t go into detail providing you with definitions, but instead I’ll be sharing frameworks related to:

• Platform agnostic strategies and the impact to client service

• Testing differences between strategies and tactics

• Repeatable frameworks for developing new strategies

My goal is that these concepts can help you more effectively position and execute your own marketing services.

Strategies Require More Than Selecting A Marketing Channel

Simply choosing an ad platform to run a campaign doesn’t necessarily qualify as a strategy. It’s missing a few pieces.

Marketing strategies often require a combination of:

• The goal you’re trying to achieve

• Who you’re planning to talk to

• What you’re planning to say

• Where you’re planning to say it

For example, you could recommend a strategy like, “We’re going to introduce prospects to our brand by promoting a free offer that solves a portion of their core problem to an audience that has traits A,B, and C.”

The interesting dynamic here is that many paid media professionals position themselves as a {insert ad platform here} expert. This limits the quality of service they can provide to clients because most marketing strategies are platform agnostic.

Audience ABC might be found on Facebook. Those prospects might also be found on TikTok, or YouTube, or even a combination of these platforms.

By only thinking through the lens of a singular platform, it can be difficult to generate a more robust strategy. This is why I continue to diversify my platform expertise so that I can provide more value to clients as a strategist, rather than a strictly executional expert. I don’t have any incentive to make one platform appear as though it’s performing well when it really isn’t. I’m happy to recommend shifting budget around as needed.

Strategies And Tactics Can Be Tested Differently

If we carry over the strategy example from above, we can evaluate how testing a strategy is different from testing a tactic.

When working with clients, I like to determine if the strategy is working by evaluating performance against our main KPI(s). In the example we’re working through, this would be prospects taking advantage of the free offer by filling out a form. If the target audience here is filling out the form at all, we know we have some traction.

If we’re seeing form completions at a better efficiency than expected, we’ve probably also launched with some decent tactics. Our ad hooks could be grabbing attention, and our landing pages might be highlighting the value of the offer clearly.

If we’re seeing form completions at a higher cost per lead than expected, this doesn’t mean we have to throw out the strategy and go back to the drawing board. We might just need to revise our tactics.

When working with my clients, I might suggest changing the creative or landing page in this scenario. Sometimes I might even suggest testing a different platform like YouTube instead of Facebook based on what the data is telling me.

I use any sort of traction against the campaign’s main KPI to understand if the strategy is sound, then I adjust the tactics being used to improve efficiency against that goal. This prevents me from painstakingly recreating an entirely new strategy deck every single week.

Developing Strategies Can Be Broken Down Into A Process

There are times when “being strategic” can sound ambiguous. Certain connotations almost make it seem like developing strategies requires random inspiration bestowed upon you by a higher power.

Fortunately, this isn’t the case, and I’ve developed a process that helps me to routinely put together strategies for clients. I use an analysis framework to evaluate our current strategies, and determine how we should create a testing plan moving forward.

I’ve broken this framework down into three components:

• What’s happened here (observation)

• Why do I believe this happened (hypothesis)

• How can I set up a test to prove my hypothesis true or false (next steps)

By routinely analyzing the performance of main KPI(s) using this framework, I put together strategic testing plans for my clients. This helps to ensure that we’re always moving the ball forward with their paid media programs.

Wrapping Up

Despite what 22 year old me believed, understanding the differences between strategies and tactics can actually be helpful. It’s helped me to:

• Better position my services to clients so that I can provide more value

• Understand the scope and impact of different testing levers

• Break down strategy development into a repeatable process

My hope is that you can apply these frameworks to your own day-to-day work so that you can add more clarity around the marketing services you provide.

Have questions, considerations, or critiques? I’d love to hear them! If you’re reading this via email, just hit respond. Otherwise, you can find me on LinkedIn and X (Twitter).