Frequently I see references to Seo strategy when it appears that people are actually referring to Seo tactics instead of strategies, so here's my 2c on the difference between strategies and Tactics. 

- - - 

First lets see what Google's mistress thinks SEO and Strategy are first so that we have a definition to work from.

"Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results for targeted keywords. (wikipedia) "

"A strategy is a long term plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal, most often "winning". Strategy is differentiated from tactics or immediate actions with resources at hand by its nature of being extensively premeditated, and often practically rehearsed. Strategies are used to make the problem or problems easier to understand and solve. (wikipedia) "

IMHO these are reasonably summaries of  the words Seo & Strategy (hey even Wikipedia can't be wrong all the time ;-).

- - -

Its does not make sense to just look at Strategy and tactics without defining Goals and Campaigns as all, all 4 are pretty much tied together. We have to be clear that a strategy can only be defined after you have a clear Goal in mind. Once you have defined your Goal then you define your strategy. Once you have your Strategy then you decide on your tactics and then you tie them all together into Campaigns.

So if we have a Goal of taking over an online business, we could then have a strategy of "Hurting the financial position of competitor X by outranking them on all there own brand terms, thus causing a major drop in there traffic to the point where we can afford to take them over".

- - - 

So I would break them down as follows: 

Business Goal: The overall business aim(s) within which you will be required to develop a strategy

Strategy: A high level plan of how you are going to approach the achievement of the Goal(s)

Tactics : Specific methods that you can use to achieve the strategy

Campaigns: These are all about co-ordinating available resources and required tasks into coherent structures to achieve specific elements of the overall Goal. This is given structure by the agreed strategy and using specified Tactics.  Campaigns could be time based, target, tactical etc. or any combination

A very simple example showing how they all fit together:



Business Goal :

To become the dominant, authority site on the web for Widgets

Seo Strategy :

Your strategy is to be the most frequently mentioned/quoted company on every popular Widget related blog and news site by ensuring that all the relevant experts / bloggers / editors not only know who you are and what you have published but see you as a friend.  Consequently your site will gain the highest level of trust from all search engines of any  Widget company.

Seo Tactics :

a) Develop widget based link bait

b) Develop the best content on widgets in the industry

c) Pay respected bloggers to mention your site/products

d) Do regular press releases on topical issues relating to widgets

e) Directory submissions

f) Establish an in-depth database of all industry contacts

March 2008 Campaign :

Duration: 31 Days, 21 working days

Available Resources : 1 content writer (100 hours), 1 Admin Assistant, £1,000, 1 SEO Junior

Tasks to be completed:

• Develop 100 pages of content on super powered widgets
• Do 500 Directory Submissions (Budget £100)
• Register 25 Blogs on blogger
• Organise a Free Lunch 50 News reporters and bloggers (budget £750)
• Gather details of 1000 contacts within the Widget industry (Budget £150)

Hope that helps anyone that is struggling as a result of the many mistaken references to Seo Strategy.

Once you get your head around the basic structure it becomes much easier to run campaigns that can actually cross over different strategies etc. but when your starting off it makes life a lot easier if you keep things as simple as possible.