All strategies are made up of 5 basic parts.

GOAL
Where do we want to go?
The only point of developing any strategy is to accomplish some specified goal. If you don’t have a clear goal, you don’t need a strategy.

ANALYSIS
What is the current situation?
You can’t get directions in Google Maps without entering a starting point. And you can’t possibly know how to get to where you’re going until you identify where you are right now and how you got there.

GUIDING PRINCIPLES
What are our guiding principles that will help us get to where we want to go?
A lot of people go straight to tactics. We’re going to do this, this and this, and that’s our strategy. However, what happens if those things don’t work? How do you determine what to do next?

The difference between strategies and plans is that plans generally just have specific actions. A strategy has a framework for determining actions that can change and fluctuate as the situation changes.

TACTICS
What are the specific actions we will take based on those principles?
Now that you have a solid framework, you can determine the best next steps to take as well as potential other ones if everything goes South.

METRICS
How do we know what we’re doing is working?
How does a plane fly from San Francisco to Tokyo? They don’t just point the plane in the right direction and hope after several hours they’ll get there. Weather patterns, other air traffic, wind direction are constantly moving the plane off course. The only way to make sure they stay on track is to constantly look at all their monitors and gauges to make small incremental corrections as they move along their path.

The same is true about all your marketing efforts.

There are a tremendous amount of factors trying to take you off course. The only way to ensure you stay on target is building in ways to measure if you’re still going in the right direction. Without them, you’ll be lost as soon you’re off the runway.