Goals, Strategies and Tactics

By George Haldeman

In preparing business plan, casino operators often confuse goals, strategies and tactics. If you think about it in terms of a hierarchy, tactics are specific initiatives designed to support particular strategies. Strategies are both broad and measurable.They are tied directly to the goals of the company.

 Understanding how each of these often misused terms affect the actions of a company will not only be additive to profit but also enable senior management to focus on long term success of the company.

Goals

A well stated goal will be short and measurable. An example may be “Achieve $100 million in slot revenue for 2010″ or “achieve 90% of all room reservations online”. Goals enable senior management to focus department heads on what is important and gives them a starting point for developing their plans for the new year.

Strategies

Strategies are both broad and specific at the same time. An example of a strategy that may be engaged in support of the $100 million in slot revenue may be “grow the database by 2.5% per quarter”. It is clearly specific and it is broad enough to allow for multiple tactics to support it.

There are almost always strategies from multiple departments in support of the companies goals. Slot operations may have a strategy for replacing 10% of their machines during the year. Again, it is specific and broad enough to allow for multiple tactics.

Tactics

Tactics are akin to the initiatives that we execute on a weekly basis. Offers, events and telemarketing campaigns by player development executives are all examples of marketing tactics that can be used in support of the strategy of growing the database. In order to keep everything on track, it is important that during the planning process that due dates be added to each tactic.

In order to develop an effective plan, casino operators must have measurable goals, specific strategies and tactics that are effective and with clearly defined due dates in order to optimize its profits.

George is a Principal in Strategic Gaming Advisors