This post is as much about gaining directional clarity and working with purpose as it is about the above concepts. In an article I return to time and again throughout my career, Rand, the author, outlines the difference between Strategy and Tactics in approaching a market or audience. I find that it is easy to mistake one for the other and have a difficult time stopping myself when I’m confusing one for the other.
Why is this important? His article outlines what happens when one is confused for the other in detail, so I recommend reading it. He’s a practiced communicator and I won’t try to do a better job. What follows is my current milieux of “same same but different” projects where the strategies and tactics must differ, and so I must proceed with care.
Market:
The market we’re trying to introduce our company to seems fragmented, but I’m noticing that the audience is similar. While they live in different social media domains, there is an increase in media crosstalk and interplay between them. What originally seemed like 2 separate audiences will likely begin to merge over time.
I used both Sparktoro’s audience research tools to gain this insight, and I’m noticing that our original market is increasingly appearing in industry publications largely for our new market. Obviously, this makes my life easier as we’re already fairly well regarded in our current market.
Strategy:
I’m looking to ensure we’re using our current connections to bridge the gap between the current and emerging audiences. Our CRM contains so much wealth, signaling an approach that focuses on outreach and relationships to transfer our momentum to the new market.
Additionally, I am using some audience research to identify potential advertising partners.
Tactics:
The specifics are not appropriate to disclose here, I’m generating some ad assets and content directed to the new markets, hopefully, differentiated enough from what they would see, testing TBD.
Goals:
This is intending to build enough brand awareness at this early market stage so that we become a go-to buyer in this new space.
Hopefully this little outline gives you something to think about when you’re designing a new campaign or tackling a new market! I’m certain there’s more to be said, but time is short. If I have more thoughts on this topic, I’ll update this page.