“Without strategy, execution is aimless. Without execution, strategy is useless.”

– Morris Chang

I didn’t come across this quote before I finished writing my book; Brand You Economics, but I can with certainty say that this is the whole reason I wrote the book in the first place.

Over the years as a creative strategist, business advisor and mentor to various startups and entrepreneurs, I became more and more aware, and yes at times extremely frustrated about the fact that most brands, companies and individuals are so caught up in the constant chase to create content on the various platforms, executing marketing tactics without having a solid strategy in place first. So the execution is aimless, it has no longevity and no clear vision on why said brand, company or individual is doing what they are doing. It is all for the sake of just being there, be it on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Tik Tok, Snapchat, YouTube, Clubhouse (is that even a thing anymore) and Pinterest.

It’s content for the sake of content, but without any direction, objective or end goal. No defined KPIs or ways to measure because that requires a strategy and a zero-point analysis; where are we and where are we going, and WHY.

On the flip side, there are also companies that create strategies for the sake of having that document as a bandaid, to make the statement of “yes — we have a strategy” but fail to execute it on an operational level, it ends up just being there for the sake of having a strategy, but with no enforcement, embraced by the employees, so that everyone is pulling in the same direction, and working towards executing on the strategy — rendering it useless.

Which camp do you belong to? Are you in the camp of just getting as much content out there in the hopes to get attention and enough conversions to justify the efforts? Or have you invested time and energy on a strategy, but ended up with fatigue, and not having the gusto to actually implement and execute the strategy?

Both require a certain kind of skill set; thinkers and doers — and both are needed to create a legacy brand.