Tactics in Search of a Strategy
It’s time to clear up a few misconceptions.
1. Not everyone is a marketer
2. Not everything is marketing
3. Advertising is tactical
4. Marketing is strategic
And the point is?
When the lines blur, as they inevitably do, you end up with tactics that are in desperate need of a strategy.
So the downside is?
“Marketing” often becomes a series of unrelated advertising tactics launched to address a short-term pain in search of a short-term solution. And, inevitably the results fall far short of expectations… if they’re ever measured at all.
Then what’s the answer?
Successful marketers build strategies that are born out of a solid understanding of their prospects, their competition and their industry. These marketers build marketing plans complete with data-driven objectives, a solid, quantifiable understanding of their business environment, and advertising tactics that they can measure against campaign goals.
So, the next time someone presents him or herself as a marketer ask them the difference between marketing and advertising. The answer will speak volumes.
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“As the marketing pioneers have discovered, a more fruitful approach is to identify the critical decisions involved in successfully marketing a company’s products or services and focus on improving the effectiveness of those decisions. In essence, the leaders of these companies inject more discipline into decision making processes—clarifying roles for marketing and other relevant functions and establishing decision criteria.”
Harvard Business Review, Jul/Aug, 2014