How Good Is Your Marketing Strategy? (And How Would You Even Know?)
Here's a question that keeps travel marketing leaders awake at 3am: Is our strategy actually working, or are we just busy?
It's a fair concern. In an industry where everyone's got an opinion on your campaigns, where seasonal swings mask underlying problems, and where "brand awareness" often gets confused with actual business impact, it can be genuinely hard to know if your marketing strategy is driving growth or just driving activity.
The Uncomfortable Truth About Marketing Strategy Assessment
Most travel brands think they're evaluating their marketing strategy when they're actually just looking at campaign performance. They're measuring opens, clicks, bookings, and conversion rates. All important metrics, but they don't tell you if your underlying strategic approach is sound.
A good campaign can mask a weak strategy. A strong strategy can survive a few poor executions.
The difference matters because fixing tactics is relatively easy. Fixing strategy requires stepping back, asking harder questions, and sometimes admitting that the fundamental approach needs to change.
The Real Questions That Reveal Strategic Health
When we work with travel brands on strategic assessment, we're not starting with performance data. We're starting with these questions:
About Your Customer Understanding:
Can you clearly articulate why your ideal customer chooses travel experiences like yours?
Do you know what triggers their decision to start looking?
Can you map their entire journey from first consideration to post-trip advocacy?
About Your Market Position:
What's your defendable competitive advantage that isn't just price or location?
Can you clearly articulate what customers would lose if they chose a competitor instead of you?
Are you fighting on your strengths or constantly playing catch-up?
About Your Strategic Coherence:
Does every major marketing initiative ladder up to a clear strategic objective?
Can your team explain how their work connects to business growth?
Are you making decisions based on strategy, or reacting to competitors and opportunities?
About Your Resource Allocation:
Is your budget split based on strategic priorities or historical precedent?
Are you investing in building long-term brand equity or just chasing short-term performance?
Can you quantify the business impact of your major marketing investments?
Warning Signs Your Strategy Needs Attention
We see these patterns repeatedly when marketing strategy has drifted off course:
The Busy-But-Not-Growing Syndrome: High activity levels, lots of campaigns, decent execution, but flat or declining business performance relative to market growth.
The Shiny Object Trap: Constantly chasing new channels, tactics, or trends without clear strategic rationale for why they fit your brand and customer base.
The Internal Chaos Pattern: Marketing team can't clearly explain the strategy, departments are pulling in different directions, and every stakeholder has a different view of priorities.
The Competitor Copycat Cycle: Most decisions are reactive to what competitors are doing rather than proactive based on your own strategic advantages.
What Strategic Health Actually Looks Like
When marketing strategy is working properly, you see:
Clarity of purpose: Everyone knows what you're trying to achieve and why
Consistent decision-making: Choices about campaigns, channels, and investments follow clear strategic logic
Measurable progress: You can track not just campaign performance but progress toward strategic objectives
Competitive differentiation: You're building distinctive market position rather than just matching competitors
Resource efficiency: Budget and effort are focused on the activities that drive the biggest strategic impact
The Reality Check Process
This is where an external perspective becomes valuable. It's difficult to objectively assess your own strategy when you're living inside it every day.
Our marketing health check process involves spending two intensive days with your business, looking at everything from customer data and competitive positioning to internal alignment and resource allocation. We're not auditing your tactics - we're stress-testing your strategic foundation.
The output isn't a pretty PowerPoint deck. It's a clear diagnosis of where your strategy is strong, where it's weak, and what specific changes will drive the biggest business impact.
Why This Matters More Than Ever
Travel is becoming more competitive, not less. Customer expectations are rising. Digital channels are fragmenting. Economic pressures are increasing.
In this environment, "good enough" marketing strategy is a luxury you can't afford. You need strategy that gives you sustainable competitive advantage and efficient growth.
The brands that thrive over the next few years will be the ones that get their strategic foundation right first, then execute brilliantly on top of it.
Starting Your Own Strategic Assessment
Before bringing in external help, you can begin this process internally:
Audit your strategic clarity: Can every senior team member articulate your marketing strategy in the same way?
Map your decision patterns: Look at your last 10 major marketing decisions. What strategic logic drove each one?
Assess your competitive differentiation: List what makes you genuinely different from competitors (beyond price and location).
Review your resource allocation: Does your budget split reflect your stated strategic priorities?
If these exercises reveal gaps, you're not alone. Most travel brands discover their strategy isn't as clear or coherent as they thought.
The good news is that strategic clarity, once achieved, makes everything else easier. Better resource allocation, clearer team alignment, more effective campaigns, and stronger business results.
Want a professional assessment of your marketing strategy? Our 2-Day Marketing Health Check provides a comprehensive diagnosis and actionable roadmap for strategic improvement. Learn more about our health check process or take our free marketing quiz for a quick strategic assessment.
