Marketing Trends to Watch in 2026

As December rolls around, it’s natural to pause and reflect on the year that’s come and gone. But this season isn’t just for retrospection. It’s also the perfect time to look forward and consider how the events and lessons of the past twelve months will shape what’s ahead.  

While you’re weighing your marketing plans and budgets for 2026, it’s crucial to look at the bigger picture: Which trends are rising to the forefront, and which might fade away? What new hurdles could challenge us as marketers, and where do the greatest opportunities lie? 

To help you prepare, we reached out to a few of Mod Op’s 470+ experts across every corner of marketing services — from website development and creative, to paid channel marketing and strategic communications — to gather their insights on what’s in store for the year ahead. Here are some of the key marketing trends they shared for 2026. 

Customer Obsession Replaces AI-First as the Real Differentiator  

2023–2025 were the years of AI demos, hype, and efficiency claims. 2026 is the “so what?” year.  

Marketing leaders will no longer win by declaring they are “AI-first.” They will win by showing customers how AI makes their experience better.  

Experiences will need to adapt to emotion and deliver consistent, personalized value across channels in a way that feels human. Instead of AI at the forefront, it will need to become invisible while not violating trust and transparency.  

Tessa Burg, CTO 

Brands Will Continue to Learn that People Don’t Like AI-Created Ads.  

Companies will keep hoping we’ve reached the point where consumers will accept generative AI-produced spots. But while the novelty of AI-generated content still exists, the amount of slop is going to grow and the pushback against it will harden. We’ll likely reach that tipping point where it’ll just be the way most content is made, but it won’t be next year.  

Steve O’Connell, Co-Chief Creative Officer  

AI Search Will Drive Investment in Influencer as a Strategy for B2B 

Next year, B2B enterprise marketing folks will be spending more on influencer marketing and relations, as well as PR.   

As buyer groups continue self-educating and self-servicing (and increasingly using AI to do so), external voices become even more important: POVs from analysts, subject-matter experts, operators with opinions—these are becoming the primary, non-technical reasons that deals move forward.   

On top of that, both humans and LLMs feed off social proof and proof of success, meaning those formats offer a stacked benefit on top of the visibility these tactics traditionally have offered.  

To me, this makes influencer investment in B2B more important as AI search continues to be a tool in finding and cross-checking outside perspectives.  

Tomas Madrilejos
Director, B2B Digital Marketing Strategy 

The Need for LLM Visibility Means All Eyes Will Be On GEO 

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is becoming as vital as SEO for brand visibility and in 2026, we will see a surge of brands prioritizing GEO as part of their PR and marketing strategies. As AI-driven engines like ChatGPT and Gemini become gateways to information, brands must ensure their content is not just searchable – but citable. GEO focuses on structuring thought leadership, PR content, and earned media so generative models recognize and surface them as authoritative sources. SEO still builds the foundation through technical precision and discoverability, but GEO adds the layer of credibility and contextual relevance that fuels AI-era awareness.   

For PR leaders, the future lies in integrating both; creating AI-ready narratives, structured data and measurable ‘AI citation visibility.’ In the next phase of PR and communication, visibility means being part of the conversation, not just the search results.  

Sasha Dookhoo
VP, PR 

Enterprise Content Platforms Will See Accelerated Demand  

During 2026, organizations will increase investment in enterprise content platforms that support global scale, unify content and commerce, and integrate native personalization. Marketers will gravitate toward ecosystems that centralize automation, workflows, and orchestration. This will drive vendors to evolve toward modular, API-first architectures with embedded AI capabilities.  

Fabio Fiss
VP, Technology 

Respondent Experience is the Key Ingredient for Better Market Research   

In 2026, market research success hinges on a simple truth: respondent experience matters. When researchers prioritize how participants interact with surveys, participation rates climb and data quality improves.  

This secret isn’t complicated. Participants expect more than ever from survey experiences including an engaging look and feel, mobile-friendly design, and gamification where appropriate. Respect respondents’ time. Ask only what’s necessary and use jargon-free language. Explain why their feedback matters and how it will drive real action.   

Remember also that every survey is a brand experience. Organizations that make participation in market research accessible, meaningful and even enjoyable will collect reliable insights, make smarter decisions, and build lasting relationships with their audiences.  

Lauren Schmidt 
VP, Market Intelligence  

Speed-to-Market Wins — Packaging Becomes the Accelerant  

In 2026, AI will expand its role as an always-on partner in packaging — accelerating the labor-intensive middle stages (adaptation, mechanicals, multilingual versions, hundreds of SKUs) so agency teams can focus more creative energy on strategy and concepting.   

Packaging now plays a central role in a brand’s speed-to-market strategy, and speed is increasingly the competitive edge. Brands supercharging their creative teams with tech in their adaptation workflows — under human creative supervision — will reach the shelf faster, respond faster, and win the sale. 

Philip Congello
EVP, Client Success  

Leaders Will See Marketing as Part of the Business – Not a Separate Function 

Leaders who will accelerate through 2026 are rejecting the idea that marketing is a separate function. They are building organizations where marketing, sales, product, and operations act as a single team with one mission: growth that is scalable, repeatable, and rooted in audience value.  

When marketing operates as one with the business, audiences feel the difference. They trust more. They choose faster. They stay longer. That is the winning path.  

Jenelle Maddox
VP of Client Success 

As for me, I’m going to be watching who’s investing in research and thought leadership. In 2026, the primary competitive advantage in marketing will shift from AI implementation (aka who uses the best tools) to data ownership.  

As the “data wall”—the point where high-quality, public internet data is exhausted—becomes a reality, the AI arms race will pivot. The winners will be those who can feed their AI models with new research and “dark data” (the undigitized, offline, and institutional knowledge that currently lives in file cabinets, archived recordings, and the minds of senior experts). 

What trends are you watching as we head into 2026? Meet us over on LinkedIn to share your thoughts.