The strategy is to decide what goal you’re going to pursue and how you’re going to combine your limited resources (money, time, people, and reputation) to achieve it in the face of competition. In an SME, a strategy is effective when it achieves the goal while spending as little as possible and aligns three things: what you want, what you can do, and what you know how to do.
What is strategy, in one sentence?
Strategy is choosing a goal and coordinating your resources across time and space to achieve it, despite the intentions of your competitors.
French General André Beaufre put it in more academic terms in his book Introduction to Strategy (1963): Strategy is “the art of the dialectic between wills that use force to resolve their conflict.” In business, you don’t use force; you use budget, product, price, distribution, and reputation. But the idea is the same: there is another will facing you—that of your competitor—and it’s not going to stand idly by.
Sun Tzu begins The Art of War saying that war is of vital importance to the state and that it is an issue that cannot be neglected under any circumstances. Replace “state” with “company,” and there’s your first lesson: strategy isn’t just a luxury for large corporations. It’s what sets apart the SME that grows from the one that merely survives.
What is the purpose of strategy in a business?
The purpose of the strategy is to achieve or maintain objectives by making the best possible use of available resources. This involves two tests:
- Effectiveness: Did you achieve your goal?
- Media Economics: Did you pull it off without wasting more money, time, or people than necessary?
There are three types of objectives:
- Offense: win over customers, enter a new city, take business away from a competitor.
- Defensive: retain your best customers when a cheaper competitor enters the market.
- Maintenance: maintain your margin and your position while you invest in something else.
In war, achieving your objective means breaking the enemy’s will. In the marketplace, it’s not about destroying anyone. It’s about getting the customer to choose you and making your competitor conclude that competing in your market segment isn’t in their best interest.
Will, ability, and knowledge: the three pillars of any strategy
Every strategy rests on three components. If one is missing, the strategy fails, even if the other two are excellent.
| Pilar | Key Question | From a strategic perspective | At Your Small Business |
|---|---|---|---|
| To love | What do I want to achieve, and how long am I going to keep it up? | The Will to Win | A genuine commitment from management, a written budget allocation, and patience to measure results |
| Power | Do I have the resources and the freedom to do that? | Freedom of action | Cash flow, delivery capacity, permits, contracts, and not relying on a single supplier or platform |
| Saber | Do I know how to run it? | Ability to Execute | An experienced team, clear processes, customer data, and tools such as a CRM |
It's no use knowing how to beat a competitor—or wanting to—if you can't do it, whether because of a lack of resources or because something beyond your control is preventing you from doing so. And it's no use being able to do it if you don't know how—or if, deep down, you don't really want to.
Four Historical Lessons and What They Mean for Your Business
Military history is useful because it shows—with enormous consequences—what happens when one of the three pillars fails. It is not about glorifying war, but about learning from well-documented decisions.
Desert Storm: When the Three Pillars Align
On August 2, 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait. The UN condemned the invasion, and the United States led a coalition of 35 countries (some sources put the number as high as 42 when all contributions are included). On January 17, 1991, Operation Desert Storm began with an air campaign. The ground offensive began on February 24, and a ceasefire was declared on February 28—less than 100 hours after ground operations began.
The coalition had a clear and specific objective (to liberate Kuwait), the means to achieve it, and a workable plan. Will, capability, and knowledge were all aligned.
For Your Small Business: “crecer” no es un objetivo. “Recuperar 40 cuentas industriales en el Bajío antes de diciembre” sí lo es. Un objetivo concreto te permite calcular qué medios necesitas y saber si los tienes.
Yom Kippur: Wanting and Knowing, but Not Being Able
On October 6, 1973, Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel. Egypt crossed the Suez Canal and occupied a narrow strip along the eastern shore of the Sinai Peninsula—not the entire peninsula. Syria advanced into the Golan Heights, but within three days it was pushed back to its pre-war lines.
Después Israel contraatacó: cruzó el canal a partir del 15 de octubre, cercó al Tercer Ejército egipcio y al terminar las hostilidades estaba a unos 101 km de El Cairo y a 40 km de Damasco. La ONU aprobó la Resolución 338 el 22 de octubre para el cese al fuego. El 24 de octubre Leonid Brezhnev envió a Richard Nixon un mensaje en el que planteaba que la URSS podría tomar “medidas apropiadas” de forma unilateral; Estados Unidos respondió elevando su alerta militar a DEFCON III y presionó a Israel para que respetara la tregua.
Israel wanted to and knew how to proceed, but it couldn't: its freedom of action depended on the superpowers.
For Your Small Business: tu libertad de acción también depende de terceros. Si el 100% de tus ventas viene de Mercado Libre, de una sola cuenta publicitaria en Meta o de un distribuidor exclusivo, cualquier cambio de reglas te deja sin “poder” de un día para otro. Diversificar canales es una decisión estratégica, no técnica.
Hannibal: Winning battles doesn't mean winning the war
En el año 216 a.C. Aníbal aplastó a los romanos en Cannas. Según Tito Livio, su oficial Maharbal le reprochó no marchar de inmediato sobre Roma: “Sabes vencer, Aníbal, pero no sabes aprovechar la victoria”. Muchos historiadores modernos matizan esa crítica: su ejército estaba agotado, Roma tenía murallas sólidas y capacidad para levantar nuevas legiones, y Aníbal no contaba con equipo de asedio. Es decir, quizá no era falta de querer, sino de poder.
Rome, on the other hand, did have a strategy. Publius Cornelius Scipio landed in Africa (near Utica, around 204 B.C.), Carthage was forced to recall Hannibal to Italy, and in 202 B.C., Scipio defeated him at Zama. A peace treaty was signed in 201 B.C. Carthage was not destroyed then, but only in 146 B.C., at the end of the Third Punic War.
For Your Small Business: A campaign that goes viral or a record-breaking month of sales is a battle won. If you don't have the capacity to fulfill orders, follow up, and turn those customers into repeat customers, that victory evaporates. That's where the tactics and the principle of building on success.
Little Bighorn: Having resources doesn't mean knowing how to use them
El 25 y 26 de junio de 1876, en el río Little Bighorn (Montana), guerreros lakotas (sioux) y cheyenes derrotaron al 7.º de Caballería de Estados Unidos. George A. Custer dividió su fuerza en tres grupos de ataque. Las cinco compañías bajo su mando directo fueron aniquiladas, unos 210 hombres; en total murieron alrededor de 268 soldados y acompañantes. Las compañías de Reno y Benteen sobrevivieron, así que no murieron “todos sus jinetes”.
For Your Small Business: Underestimating a smaller competitor and spreading the budget across six channels at once is the business world's version of Custer's mistake. A bigger budget doesn't make up for not knowing the terrain.
Why does the owner need to understand the strategy?
Niccolò Machiavelli, in Chapter XIV of The Prince, warns that a prince who does not understand the art of war will not be respected by his soldiers nor will he be able to trust them. The modern version: if you don't understand your own business strategy, you can't lead your sales team or evaluate your agency. It's one of the reasons why Many businesses don't attract customers even though they already have a website, social media accounts, and an agency..
How to Apply "Want, Can, and Know" in Your Small Business: 5 Steps
- Write down a measurable, time-bound goal. Ejemplo: “20 clientes nuevos de mantenimiento industrial en Querétaro en seis meses, con ticket promedio de 35,000 MXN”.
- Measure your love. Set a written goal for your budget and the number of hours you'll spend managing the project, even if you don't see results in the first 60 days.
- Review your power of attorney. Check your cash flow, delivery capacity, and dependencies. What happens if your ad account gets suspended or your supplier raises prices?
- Test your knowledge. Who’s going to handle this? Do you keep your customer data in a CRM or scattered across notebooks and WhatsApp chats? If you’re not sure, hire someone, train your team, or form a partnership.
- Choose the course of action. Based on the results of the assessment, decide whether it's best to tackle the problem head-on, proceed in stages, or wear it down. We'll explain it in strategic models, and then it all drops to a marketing plan.
Common Mistakes When Defining an SME's Strategy
- Confusing strategy with activity. Posting daily on social media isn't a strategy; it's a tactic that may or may not work for you.
- Copy the big competitor. Él tiene otro “poder”. Tu ventaja suele estar en la especialización y la velocidad.
- Do not leave a deposit. Spending 100% of the budget in the first month leaves you unable to react.
- Engage in price wars. Sun Bin, estratega chino cuyo tratado se redescubrió en 1972 en Yinqueshan, advertía que quien se deleita en la guerra termina perdiendo y quien busca lucrar con la victoria acaba en la deshonra. Bajar precios para “ganar” suele destruir el margen de todos.
Next step: Ground your strategy in data
If you want to find out how much you want, can, and know about digital marketing before investing another peso, schedule a free diagnosis with Metamedia. We review your goals, your channels, and your dependencies, and let you know what's missing to make your strategy work.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is business strategy in simple terms?
Business strategy involves deciding which goal to pursue and how to combine the company’s resources (money, time, people, and reputation) to achieve it in the face of competition. It is not a list of activities, but rather the choice of where to compete, against whom, and with what advantage, so that the goal is achieved while spending as little as necessary.
What do “wanting,” “being able,” and “knowing” mean in strategy?
These are the three pillars of any strategy. Will is the determination to achieve the goal and sustain the effort. Ability is the freedom of action and the resources available to carry it out. Skill is the capacity to execute effectively. If any one of these three is missing, the strategy fails even if the other two are solid, as historical cases such as that of Israel in 1973 demonstrate.
What is the difference between strategy and tactics?
Strategy defines which goal to pursue and with what resources over the long term—for example, positioning your brand over the course of a year. Tactics define how to succeed in each specific action within that strategy, such as a campaign, an ad, or a sales call. Strategy wins the war; tactics win the battles that must contribute to that goal.
How do I know if my small business has a good strategy?
A strategy is good if it achieves its objective and does so efficiently. Check to see if you have a measurable objective with a deadline, a committed budget, sufficient resources without relying on a single channel or provider, and a team that knows how to execute. If you can’t explain in one sentence what you want to achieve and why your customers would choose you, you don’t have a strategy yet.
Who defined strategy as a dialectic of wills?
It was French General André Beaufre, in his book *Introduction to Strategy*, published in 1963. He defined it as the art of the dialectic between wills that use force to resolve their conflict. The central idea—useful for any business—is that strategy always unfolds in the face of another will that also makes decisions and reacts.
