Strategy vs Tactics in Communications: Why Most Brands Get It Wrong
It’s concerning how often the words “strategy” and “tactic” are used interchangeably in marketing meetings. More concerning still is how often this confusion results in shallow campaigns, mixed messages, and wasted effort.
In communications, failing to distinguish between strategy and tactics isn’t just a semantic issue, but a structural one. It affects how teams operate, how leaders prioritise, and how audiences experience your brand.
A clear strategy aligns. A collection of tactics distracts. And in a world where trust is fragile and attention is fleeting, that distinction is foundational.
What Strategy Actually Means?
Strategy is about direction. It’s the guiding framework that ensures every message, channel, and action serves a long-term goal. A communications strategy defines what you’re trying to achieve and why it matters to your audience, your brand, and your organisation.
It connects vision to action, and it’s not something you change on a whim. Strategy holds the centre when crises hit, when teams grow, and when campaigns evolve. It creates the discipline to say “no” to clever ideas that don’t fit and “yes” to consistent execution.
In short, strategy answers:
• What are we trying to achieve?
•Who are we speaking to?
• What truth do we want to reinforce?
If it doesn’t answer those, it’s not a strategy.
What Tactics Actually Do?
Tactics are the how. They’re the executions: the emails, the press releases, the LinkedIn posts, the internal town halls. They are where ideas meet audiences. Tactics bring the strategy to life but they are not the strategy itself.
Used properly, tactics are adaptive and responsive. They can change week to week based on feedback, opportunity, or necessity. But without a clear strategy behind them, they become scattered, inconsistent, and often contradictory.
When organisations chase tactics without anchoring them in a strategy, they might do more, but they rarely achieve more.
Why the Confusion Persists?
Most organisations don’t confuse strategy and tactics because they are careless, they confuse them because they are under pressure. Pressure to “get something out.” To “be visible.” To “do what competitors are doing.”
The result? A comms calendar full of disconnected outputs and a team constantly chasing the next deliverable rather than building cumulative trust.
In a previous article on building a strategic communications plan, we explained why clarity and consistency are key. This is where that starts – in understanding what governs your actions, and what simply executes them.
A Real-World Example
Imagine a startup is launching a new product:
• A press release is a tactic.
• Sponsoring an industry podcast is a tactic.
• Creating an explainer video is a tactic.
But the strategy might be: “Position the product as the most transparent and ethically built tool in the category, targeting early adopters who care about data integrity.”
Without that strategic anchor, the tactics risk being flashy but forgettable – or worse, contradictory.
With that anchor, every tactic is evaluated on both creativity and alignment.
Strategy + Circular Marketing: Where They Intersect?
In the Circular Marketing Model™, we recognise that buyers don’t move predictably. That makes strategy more critical than ever because it’s what holds consistency across scattered touchpoints.
Whether someone encounters your brand through a paid ad (Performance), a whitepaper (Content), or a keynote (Event), they should hear the same strategic message, not a rotating cast of tactical ideas.
Without strategy, Circular Marketing falls apart. You’re just spinning channels. With it, you build a cycle of trust.
Stop Planning Posts. Start Building Platforms.
Comms is a reputation system, not a to-do list. If your messaging is reactive, fragmented, or overly campaign-led, it’s not that your team lacks creativity. It’s that they lack clarity.
Define your strategy. Then let your tactics dance within it.
Iskren Lilov
iskren@lilov.com
Marketing and communications expert specialising in strategic consultancy and sustainable brand building. Author of the Circular Marketing Model™ that offers a paradigm shift for marketers in the age of AI, replacing the classic understanding of the funnel with a sustainable circular model.
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