Tactical Marketing vs. Strategic Marketing (2024)

It happens quite frequently at my agency, at least once a week, that a client will ask us about a new emerging tech they saw somewhere and how we can integrate it into their business. While I commend their enthusiasm for marketing, oftentimes my first question to them is, “How does this tactic fit within your marketing strategy?”

Having helped many businesses develop successful marketing strategies over the past 20 years, one thing I’ve noticed is that, sometimes, business owners aren’t aware of the differences between tactical marketing and strategic marketing. To ensure your tactics and strategies are successful, it’s essential that you know the difference between the two. I’ve outlined below the differences and why these differences are significant:

Tactics

Marketing tactics are the steps your business takes to ensure the success of its overall strategy. They are your ongoing activities that you measure with key performance indicator’s (KPIs) to determine if you are hitting your goals.

Examples of marketing tactics include the following:

  • Writing blogs
  • Engaging clients on social media
  • Attending conferences
  • Requesting testimonials
  • Sending client surveys

Your marketing tactics should focus on the details required to achieve your business’s big picture.

Strategies

Marketing strategies use your market research to define your business’s overarching mission and organize your tactics to ensure you meet your monthly, quarterly, and annual goals.

You can have several strategies at a time, each focusing on a different area of your business, including the following:

  • Content
  • Social media
  • SEO
  • Public relations
  • Networking

Your strategies help focus your business’s big picture by providing guidance. Tactics without strategies would be like wandering in the dark: you might eventually get to where you want to go, but it will take much longer, you’ll take a lot of wrong turns along the way, and you might not even realize when you’ve reached your goal

Both tactics and strategies play an important role in marketing your business, and your strategy will define what tactics you use. For example, if you’re looking to generate leads, you may choose to focus on tactics such as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising rather than producing content. Keep in mind, however, that a good combination of different tactical approaches will create an integrated approach and could possibly identify new channels for you to explore.

For help selecting the best tactics to achieve your strategic marketing goals, contact CreativeWorks Marketing today!

Tactical Marketing vs. Strategic Marketing (2024)

FAQs

Tactical Marketing vs. Strategic Marketing? ›

Tactical marketing works within a relatively short timeframe, focusing on immediate results. It's usually initiated to achieve a specific goal within a few weeks or months. Strategic marketing is long-term in its aims and focuses on the big picture.

What is the difference between tactical marketing and strategic marketing? ›

For a short summary: strategic marketing outlines what you are trying to achieve, while tactical marketing covers how you will try to achieve it. Both of these approaches are very different and can work solo. But, they won't deliver at full potential until they are combined into your digital strategy.

What is the difference between marketing strategy and marketing tactics? ›

What's the difference between strategy vs tactics? Strategy dictates the marketing activity needed to achieve your business goals and vision, whereas tactics, the 'detail of the strategy', answer how exactly that will happen.

What is the difference between strategy and tactics your answer? ›

While strategy is the action plan that takes you where you want to go, the tactics are the individual steps and actions that will get you there. In a business context, this means the specific actions teams take to implement the initiatives outlined in the strategy.

What is the difference between strategic marketing and technical marketing? ›

While strategic marketing evaluates the company's objectives, tactical marketing focuses on the details needed to achieve those goals. The actions or tactics required to complete your objective may be implemented with a plan in place.

What is the difference between strategic and tactical? ›

While strategic planning looks at long-term goals and objectives, tactical planning focuses on the short-term – day-to-day actions necessary to achieve the goals laid out in the strategic plan. The approach involves creating detailed timelines, assigning resources, and outlining specific steps.

What is tactical marketing examples? ›

Tactical marketing is the implementation of specific techniques that can help a company achieve its marketing goals. It often involves performing individual marketing activities such as publishing blog posts, conducting social media campaigns, generating leads and hosting events.

What is the difference between strategy and tactics examples? ›

Your strategy is what you want to do, whereas your tactics are how you actually do it. Strategy guides the actions you take by ensuring they lead to the outcome you want. For example, imagine you're trying to bake a cake from a store-bought boxed mix.

What is an example of strategy vs tactics? ›

If your strategy is to climb a mountain, one key component of your strategy might be to decide which side of the mountain you should climb. Your tactics would be the gear you'd buy, who you'd bring with you, your complete trip plan, how long it would take to get there, what season you'd go in, and so on.

What is the tactical marketing process? ›

It involves implementing short-term actions that directly contribute to achieving the overall marketing objectives. Tactical marketing tactics can include advertising campaigns, promotional activities, social media engagement, content marketing, and more.

What is more important strategy or tactics? ›

Both aspects are integral to the planning process. Implementing tactics without strategic planning can result in growth, but this growth is likely to be short-term. Conversely, strategy without tactical planning prevents businesses from making progress towards their goals.

What are the major differences between strategic and tactical planning? ›

Strategic planning lays out the long-term, broad goals that a business or individual wants to achieve. And tactical planning outlines the short-term steps and actions that should be taken to achieve the goals described in the strategic plan.

Why the difference matters between strategy and tactics? ›

If you were to compare strategy vs tactics in an organization, more often than not you'll find that an organization uses any number of tactics but lacks an overall strategy. You can think of the difference between the strategy and tactics as the strategy being the “what” and tactics being the “how”.

What is the difference between strategic and tactical sales? ›

Strategic Planning vs Tactical Planning in Sales: Key Differences. The primary difference between these two types of planning is their time frame. Strategic planning is about setting long-term goals in the sales context, while tactical planning is about taking short-term steps to meet these goals.

What is the difference between strategic selling and tactical selling? ›

A tactical salesperson is focused on the features of what it is they sell. The questions they ask are all geared around getting the customer to think and see why they need what it is they're selling. The strategic salesperson is focused around the outcomes the customer is looking for.

What is a tactical marketing? ›

It involves implementing short-term actions that directly contribute to achieving the overall marketing objectives. Tactical marketing tactics can include advertising campaigns, promotional activities, social media engagement, content marketing, and more.

What is the meaning of strategic marketing? ›

What is strategic marketing? Strategic marketing is a method through which an organisation differentiates itself from its competition by focusing on its strengths to provide better service and value to its customers.

What is the difference between strategic and tactical targets? ›

The main difference between strategical and tactical asset allocation is how the model looks at short-term opportunities. The strategic model does not give extra attention to those, while the tactical model will try to capitalize on the short-term opportunities. Another difference is the trading frequency.

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