There are two distinctly different strategies you can use to grow your business. As you take a look around the marketplace, you’ll see that different companies decide to use one or the other. Lately, it seems that Microsoft is very much pitching itself toward a marathon rather than a sprint.

That’s precisely the terminology that the company used when it introduced the Zune lineup of portable media players in Canada. The Apple iPod is still very much the dominant force in this arena, but the Microsoft Zune was able to carve out some market share. It has since fallen back into the background.

Microsoft is once again saying that it’s going to take the marathon approach for the new Windows Phone 7 smartphone platform. This launch has a bigger “ramp up” than the Zune, offering multiple devices from multiple manufacturers on multiple carriers, but Microsoft is adamant that they’re in it for the long haul. They’re not as interested in an overnight success, it seems.

Is this really the best strategy to take, particularly in the fast moving world of high technology? Based on the tremendous sales numbers that Apple is able to produce with the launch of each new product, a series of sprints may be more effective than an extended marathon. It may be different in other industries, though. What do you think?