2026: A Marketers guide to the year ahead

Planning for a brand new yr at all times raises the identical questions. Are we specializing in the appropriate channels? Are we utilizing AI in the appropriate means? And the way can we stand out when everybody has entry to the identical instruments?

2026 gained’t be about ripping up the rulebook. However it would reward entrepreneurs who assume somewhat in another way. Those that perceive the place human effort nonetheless issues most, and the place expertise can genuinely assist.

Primarily based on our analysis, testing, and day-to-day work with entrepreneurs, this text explores what’s altering, what’s evolving, and what isn’t going anyplace. When you’re shaping your technique for the yr forward, it is a good place to start out.

New yr, new emails

Yearly, we run the Great British Split Test. We check a sequence of parts of e mail design to see whether or not we are able to enhance the engagement stage of our most essential channel.

Our most vital discovering this yr was a swing in favour of media-rich emails over easy text-based ones.

We aren’t capable of attribute this to any main change in our viewers or our technique. What I feel is happening is using AI. As a result of ChatGPT generates responses by taking the earlier phrase and predicting what’s going to come subsequent primarily based on tens of millions of factors of coaching knowledge, it’s simpler at producing commonplace textual content than e mail code. GitHub CoPilot is a extra code-focused AI that may do a greater job, however its 20 million all-time users is a drop within the ocean of OpenAI’s 700 million weekly usage.

Which means that media-rich emails are a robust indicator of human effort. Elsewhere within the analysis we discovered extra examples that human-written content material outperforms AI-written for now.

Given how shortly AI instruments and AI adoption are transferring, it is a pattern we’ll control.

The altering function of content material

For AI, by AI?

In 2025, 800 million enquiry prompts have been entered into ChatGPT per day. That’s quite a bit, nevertheless it’s dwarfed by the 16.4 BILLION “conventional” Google searches. So, whereas , the way in which now we have been doing issues isn’t lifeless simply but.

A standard query that comes up is “ought to I take advantage of AI-generated content material to rank nicely in AI Search?” It’s not fairly that straightforward; whereas AI is the middleman, the queries are nonetheless in the end coming from people. Human content material writers (like yours really!) perceive the language folks use once they ask questions.

We’ve already seen this by means of the rise of chatbots. After they first appeared on the scene, chatbots used the language of the corporate that created them. Prospects gained’t essentially do the identical; there are normally a bunch of various methods to specific what they imply. CNN’s chatbot, for instance, may solely deal with unsubscribe requests if the person typed “unsubscribe” and no different phrases. As you possibly can see under, most individuals are a bit extra well mannered than that.

Bye-bye branding?

If AI instruments are skimming and summarising your content material, then offering their findings in their very own phrases, multi function window, what does this imply to your model positioning? If a big a part of what you do will also be finished by any individual else (and let’s be sincere, only a few companies are utterly distinctive), however your distinctive voice is getting misplaced, what’s advertising and marketing even for?

I feel it is a knee-jerk response to the velocity at which AI has arrived in our lives. There could also be instances the place a buyer will purchase off the again of single “present me one of the best/most cost-effective/top-rated [item]” immediate, however the majority will do a bit extra analysis than that. B2B particularly, there’s no means the advanced shopping for course of will get diminished to zero any time quickly.

So sure, it is advisable be certain that your content material is discoverable by AI. We happen to have a webinar on this exact topic! However retaining your model voice alive will stay helpful for what comes subsequent.

Understanding aesthetics

If you wish to really feel previous and out of contact, check out Pinterest Predicts. I’ve not seen so many phrases I didn’t perceive since I used to be given a Welsh translation of Harry Potter and the Thinker’s Stone on transferring to Swansea after college.

All jokes apart, Pinterest Predicts has a really robust monitor report. They’ve been 88% correct with their predictions for the final 6 years, and their Global Head of Consumer Marketing says “Predicts tendencies are inclined to have an extended life on Pinterest; actually, Pinterest tendencies final practically twice so long as tendencies elsewhere on the web.”

The purpose is that there’s absolute gold right here for visible methods to attach along with your viewers. You’ll wrestle to spend a day with out coming throughout the artwork type generally known as Company Memphis:

The type itself has a fascinating history; created within the Eighties by the Memphis Group, an Italian design and structure collective, it had a rebirth when Apple dropped skeuomorphic design from its UI in 2013.

Sadly, Company Memphis finally fell foul of the sample that follows each design pattern;

1. Preliminary adoption by area of interest gamers
2. An enormous model notices and takes a threat on it. They reap an enormous reward for being totally different
3. The market latches on and rushes to catch the wave (Suppose “We’re like Uber for [x]”
4. Common use; it’s now the usual
5. Drop-off; begin at (1) with a brand new pattern

Each model desires to be the one at stage 2 slightly than 3 or 4, however inner inertia journeys them up. Bringing Pinterest Predict’s monitor report into the dialogue might be simply the increase you want.

Between the brand new dominance of media-rich e mail, and AI engines drawing on extra sources than ever for the solutions to questions, highly effective and distinctive design might be crucial it’s ever been.

Bonus – 3 issues that HAVEN’T modified (and aren’t going to)

Advertising groups have to stability their priorities

Our search engine optimisation companions, Publicity Ninja, deal with the stability of lead era vs. gross sales enablement early on of their 2026 technique session:

Dale: It looks as if b2b is quite a bit about gross sales enablement… Does that imply the advertising and marketing crew’s time ought to go in direction of creating this materials… or ought to or not it’s extra centered on lead era, on model consciousness?

Charlie: You want each! When you don’t have something producing leads, who’re you giving the advertising and marketing materials to?!

I’d prefer to take this argument additional. Advertising isn’t solely about short-term wins. It additionally has to account for a way at this time’s work will drive leads 6, 9, and even 12 months down the road.

My favorite private expertise of it is a Head of IT at a mid-size resort chain. He determined to purchase from the telecoms reseller I labored for on the time, on the proof of his expertise at 5 annual conferences. At any level as much as that day, we’d have dismissed him as an informal browser, potential extra within the little sandwiches than within the newest developments in Ethernet First Mile telecoms!

Goal the appropriate folks, not all of the folks

Irrespective of how good your product is, it’s not going to be for everyone. And that’s good!

Understanding precisely who your product is for is the keystone of promoting. As soon as that, you possibly can uncover the place they spend their time, and that’s your channel technique within the bag.

The best approach to discover out the place your clients spend their time is to ask them! A easy “the place did you hear about us” type can yield nice outcomes. Occasion registration pages are a very good place for this: individuals are typically anticipating to fill out a number of fields for an occasion, whereas for a obtain you need to actually keep on with e mail tackle solely.

Your different finest pal on this endeavour is UTM tracking.  Merely put, a UTM is somewhat bit of additional size in a URL that you simply tailor to every place you utilize it:

When you’ve had this in place for some time, you’ll have a clearer understanding of what content material every viewers is fascinated by. Possibly your e mail record is generally weblog readers, whereas webinars carry out finest on Instagram. That is your information to what content material to publish the place for finest outcomes.

Nevertheless, whereas there can be distinct variations between channel audiences, don’t ignore the crossovers. No one cares about your model as a lot as you do, so reaching your viewers at a number of touchpoints will make you more likely to face out.

Throughout 2025 we noticed a marked rise within the energy of WhatsApp as a marketing channel, and it’s exhibiting no signal of slowing down. A multichannel technique provides you one of the best likelihood of success right here; “Hey [name], because you downloaded our information to advertising and marketing aesthetics, right here’s a podcast on the identical matter” is way extra partaking than a chilly message with no context.

Our Digital Advertising Supervisor, Andy Gilhooley skilled the facility and comfort of WhatsApp as a business channel on his summer season vacation to South Africa. Instructions, check-in choices and baggage monitoring all on an app he already makes use of each day, as do many people.

Relating to crafting your message, bear in mind that you’ve entry to a unique useful resource: your personal clients. Reasonably than guessing how folks speak about discovering and utilizing what you promote, hearken to the folks already utilizing it.

E-mail is the standard workhorse

All entrepreneurs (together with yours really!) are magpies; we love love, LOVE shiny new issues.

Do you bear in mind the Clubhouse app? It supplied mass live-broadcast podcasting, (which at all times sounds quite a bit like FM radio to me). It was hailed as the brand new the whole lot app, though even in its first yr the BBC have been highlighting potential pitfalls.

As we bought again to regular after COVID, each downloads and Google searches for Clubhouse dropped quickly from their preliminary peak.

Not solely that, however this peak was additionally skewed in direction of a white, male, 18-34 viewers:

Evaluate this to e mail, which is sort of equally used amongst all ages cohort:

To place it in easy phrases, my niece isn’t on Fb, and my mother-in-law doesn’t use TikTok, however they each have e mail addresses.

Your finest yr ever?

With a lot change occurring so shortly, it’s straightforward to really feel such as you’re falling behind. The excellent news? You’re most likely not.

There isn’t sufficient area right here to dive into the whole lot that’s developing in 2026. Companies of every type will battle with how one can undertake AI successfully, whereas sustaining a real human reference to their viewers. Shoppers’ expectation will continue to grow as social commerce delivers an “always-on” purchasing expertise, and predictive marketing will present clients what they want virtually earlier than they’ve considered it.

Most of the issues that drive outcomes at this time will nonetheless drive leads to 2026. Clear messaging. Robust design. And channels that attain the appropriate folks on the proper time.

AI will proceed to form how advertising and marketing works. However it gained’t change the necessity for human judgement, creativity, and expertise. If something, these expertise will matter greater than ever.

Plan for the long run, however don’t panic about it. Advertising has at all times developed. That is simply the following chapter.