Strategic SEO

Strategy rather than tactics lead to long term SEO success.

Strategy is a broad long-term, systematic plan designed to accomplish a desired goal, unfortunately it's somewhat of a rare animal in the SEO environment where easy and quick are the usual preferred choices.

In SEO strategic planning consists mostly of devising a natural linkage plan and then designing the optimum site architecture to achieve it.

Strategic SEO can be compared to a slow but steady broad envelopment that's difficult to counter, tactical SEO being a deep penetration on a narrow front more vulnerable to counter-measures.
Both methods can achieve the goal but only one is likely to retain it.

Strategic SEO

This rarity of strategic SEO I'd put down to a number of factors, mainly:

Little SEO/Design integration - coming up with an integrated strategy is near impossible when design development and SEO aren't working in conjunction.

Impatience to see results - clients are often "unsure" about SEO and want to see quick results, particularly so when the SEO is brought in post haste to quickly "fix" the site.

Option of SEO tactics - the touting of linkage as the answer to all SEO problems has devalued the other important factors that are not quite as quick or easy.

SEO Tactics

In the past most Seo tactics have revolved around the artificial acquisition of links, mostly exchanged in one form or another or bought/leased.

While these tactics continue to work for some, Googles' present take on bought/exchanged links makes them a risky liability for the newcomer while open to be devalued at any time for the established player.

Today most SEO tactics revolve around acquiring links that may fly under the Google "radar", and so we have that fairly recent arrival social media marketing.

This latest tactic works quite well at the moment but SEOs have a nasty habit of shooting themselves in the foot, so its longevity must be under some doubt.