Seth Godin had a post last week that is relevant in our world, and I thought I would share it with you.

He talks about the mistake of focusing on tools rather than people. All too often we get caught up in the media we choose to use for connection as opposed to the actual connection we are trying to make. In our attempt to create new strategies and utilize new tools we forget that our focus is to clearly tell a compelling story and connect with people; build relationships and provide opportunities to engage.

We don’t need to drop monikers like “email strategy” or “social media strategy.” However, it is a good reminder that tools simply help accomplish goals and are not the goals in and of themselves.

Everything we do at Pursuant follows a similar workflow (from Planning Studies to our Charitable Partners Program to Online Acquisition Campaigns to Online Newsletters). It is all about working with a client to 1) identify a problem/challenge, 2) define (campaign) goals, 3) build an execution plan to achieve those goals, 4) execute the (campaign) plan, 5) analyze the results in order to define the next challenge. Confusing tools as goals or forsaking goals for “shiny, cool” tools can break our workflow and set us and our clients up for failure.

Seth Godin – Do You Have a People Strategy?