Some definitions we can all agree on — right?
Published on 03/04/2002 under Ad Management
Marketing people throw around terms so casually. We assume everyone understands what our terms mean and they define them the same way we do. It’s not true, you know.
In one of my seminars on planning, I surprise participants with a pop quiz: I ask whether the following statement is an objective or a tactic: “To introduce the Bob-O-Matic 2000 in Europe and Latin America during calendar year 2002.”
You might be surprised to learn the group is usually split about 50-50 on this simple question. It sounds like an objective because it starts with the word “to,” but it’s not measurable, so therefore it can’t be attainable (two of the three requirements of any good statement of objectives).
The proper objective would be something like, “To increase bobbing equipment sales by 10% during calendar 2002.” How are we going to do this? By introducing the Bob-O-Matic 2000, of course. See? It’s a tactic!
If marketing professionals can disagree on terms this basic, think how complicated things can get when you’re dealing with managers who have been schooled in other disciplines, such as engineering or economics. That’s why I like to keep the terminology in marketing plans as simple as possible.
My favorite abstract marketing term these days is “branding.” Put that word in a search engine and duck for cover. You’ll get everything from logo designers and corporate identity program consultants to name development companies, specialty advertising suppliers, ad agencies and maybe even a few specialists who actually profess to have experience in establishing and building brands for companies and their products and services.
Ask people for a succinct definition of branding and it gets even more amusing. You’re inclined to think everyone just returned from a stint as ambassador to some foreign country, because the language is so flowery and vague.
At least people are willing to offer a definition of branding, however. There are other basic words in our profession that bring only blank expressions and pregnant pauses.
I’m reminded of an orientation course in marketing communications I taught to chemical engineering graduates who had been hired into the marketing department of a chemical company for which I was employed. My “trick” question for each class of bright, smiling faces was to define marketing. I thought since they had chosen marketing as a career path that they might have some idea of what the term involved, but I was wrong, wrong, wrong.
A lot of my time is spent preaching about the need for marketing communications practitioners to be strategic vs. tactical, but I can tell often the advice is flying about 5,000 feet over my listeners’ heads, partly because they don’t understand the difference between strategic and tactical.
So, I’ve decided to define a few basic terms for the benefit of marketing communications professionals everywhere. These are not definitions you’ll find in any textbook, so please, all you academics out there—try not to dissect them too much. These are, however, definitions that work nicely in meetings when people are trying to set direction for marketing communications programs.
Objective. This is what you are trying to accomplish. Objectives should be measurable, attainable and time-specific. It helps me to break them into marketing objectives and communications objectives, so that we’re sure to identify a few measurable things we want the communications program to accomplish.
Metrics. See “objective” above.
Tactic. How you intend to go about accomplishing the objectives. If you have a tactic that doesn’t relate to any of the stated objectives, toss it out. You’re not going to have enough money to do everything anyway. Again, it helps to have marketing tactics and communications tactics.
Strategy. Same as “tactic.”
Action step. Same as “tactic.”
Brand identity. The expectations one has when exposed to a particular company, product or service name; they can be positive, negative or neutral. If a potential customer has no expectations about your company, product or service, then you have no brand identity with that person.
Branding. Any program designed to build expectations for a company, product or service and induce sales, or at least start someone down that path. A good name and logo help, but it’s a lot more than that.
Strategic vs. tactical. This is where it starts getting a little messy. A strategic person is one who determines what is done; that person is also concerned about why and when. A tactical person only cares about how it gets done. For example, a strategist decides to introduce a new product with trade journal advertising and a new brochure, while the tactician is primarily concerned with producing a really good ad and brochure.
The conflict, of course, is that when you’re describing marketing activities, the words “strategy” and “tactic” should be synonymous. That is, when you use them as nouns, they’re the same. However, when you use strategic as an adjective or a verb, the meaning broadens to include the what, when and how aspects.
(I touched on this issue in a 1999 column, “Simple marcom plans are your best bet” (February 1, page 8). In it, I used the term “objectives” to describe what we want to accomplish and “strategy” to describe how we do it. I recently switched “strategies” for “tactics” because tactics more clearly denotes implementation. So you see, even the experts can get tongue-tied.)
Please understand, the purpose here is to ensure we’re using terms that everyone can understand and interpret the same way. Only then can we get on with the more important business of deciding what needs to be done and how we’re going to do it.
And, more importantly, we can put real thinking in our plans instead of words designed to impress.