6 Tips to Leverage the Marketing Trends for 2026

Respond appropriately to key marketing trends

The marketing trends for 2026 highlight the industry’s top priorities right now: strategic clarity, responsible application of technology and creative differentiation. To thrive in today’s landscape, marketers must combine these three elements.

Follow our six tips to proactively align your strategy with the marketing trends for 2026 and maximize your success.

#1: Make 2026 your year of smart moves

2025 was intense, audacious and often uncertain. Disruption was the goal, and bold moves were the way forward. But 2026 calls for a new approach: less speed, more substance. Instead of trying to grab attention above all else, the focus now is on making an impact. But rather than being backward steps, smart moves are strategic advances. They’re based on clear priorities, intelligent tools and a real understanding of target groups and processes.

Focus on these 5 smart moves in 2026:

1. Combine concise, meaningful brand messages with data-driven performance. Put an end to silo thinking by defining shared goals that cut across departments.
2. Make AI your go-to assistant. Use it to help with routine tasks and creative processes.
3. Build communities before you scale up. Digital communities tend to be most effective when they’re built on an analog foundation.
4. Trust your creative instincts. Progress is achieved by trying new things. When you keep moving forward, mistakes are just learning steps on the path to success.
5. Embrace diversity. Different perspectives can open up new avenues you might not have thought of before.

Find out more in our story: From Bold Moves to Smart Moves: Strategic Marketing in 2026

#2: Normalize artificial intelligence

In 2026, artificial intelligence is a tool like any other. The days of running pilot projects are over. Making the most of AI in marketing calls for fewer buzzwords and more structure: clean data, clear processes and a team that knows what it’s doing.

What marketing teams need to prepare now:

1. Clean data: Keep accurate, up-to-date records of consents and identities, and avoid duplication.
2. Clear processes: At what stage can AI make a meaningful contribution to your everyday work? Ask this question regularly and respond with specific answers.
3. Experiment (where strictly useful): Implement A/B testing with clear metrics to progressively improve how you use AI.
4. Clear roles: Define responsibilities and establish transparent processes within your team.
5. Documentation: Keep track of what works and what doesn’t. AI can only learn from mistakes if you do too.

Find out more in our story: AI in 2026: Your Marketing Team’s Turbo Boost

#3: Put social empathy at the heart of your marketing

While AI is great at speeding up processes, it can’t build human relationships. In marketing’s new reality, what counts isn’t how quickly you respond, but how well you understand people. Empathy – once considered merely a “soft skill” – is now a strategic advantage.

As any professional marketer knows, a campaign that gets cultural cues wrong will fail. By contrast, brands that take a sensitive, tactful approach will remain relevant – despite (or perhaps because of) AI’s turbocharging effect.

Apply your emotional intelligence where it will have the most impact – in these situations, for example:

1. Tailor your brand language to suit your target groups, timing and tone of voice.
2. Act sensitively in critical situations. Personal experience often carries more weight than any data model can.
3. Build a real community with your customers through emotional and authentic communication.
4. Interpret cultural cues in the right context and understand what lies behind insights.

Find out more in our story: Empathetic Marketing: Why We Need People to Control AI

#4: Combine sustainability with a credible story

Faster, louder, shorter: Marketing is moving at an ever-increasing pace, driven by AI and constantly changing platform trends. At the same time, there’s growing public pressure for companies to act responsibly. If a brand wants to keep pace and stand up for its principles, it needs to leave empty gestures behind and demonstrate real substance.

True brand strength is built on far-sighted decision making, sticking to a consistent message and telling a sustainable story – one that not only makes claims but also backs them up.

Focus on measures that will ensure your brand’s long-term stability and credibility:

1. Use a variety of channels and boost the role of your website as a central, independent platform for your messages.
2. Grow your reach organically by encouraging user-generated content and rewarding recommendations.
3. Check in with your customers regularly to find out what makes them loyal, using short, targeted surveys, for example.
4. Tell a consistent brand story instead of chasing every trend.
5. Try out specific sustainability measures to find out what really resonates with your target group and how you can actively involve them.

Find out more in our story: A New Era of Marketing: Sustainability and Longevity in Focus

#5: Tailor your approach to the latest customer experience trends

Ever-increasing personalization – a strategy that once drew customers in – now often raises suspicion. Data alone is not enough to form a connection. The new currency is trust. To remain relevant, brands need to become more human, not turn up the volume.

Here’s how you can adapt your customer experience to meet these new expectations:

1. Assess CX measures based on whether they build trust, not just how personalized they are.
2. Create meaningful moments with purposeful, targeted interactions instead of bombarding your audience with constant noise.
3. Frame touchpoints in a meaningful context that makes sense to your customers.
4. Intentionally limit your use of AI so that every interaction feels human.
5. Bring CX expertise into your team: A CX architect can break down silos and connect experiences to help build a consistent brand identity.

Find out more in our story: Customer Experience Trends: Creating More Meaningful UX Moments

#6: Lean into community building as a strategic growth driver

At a time when target groups are overwhelmed by the volume of external stimuli, successful brands have communities, not audiences. After all, genuine rapport is not achieved through reach, but by building relationships. Best-practice examples from Nike, Patagonia and LEGO show that co-creation, dialogue and emotional connection are the cornerstones of marketing success in 2026.

Successful community building in marketing requires you to perform three functions on behalf of your brand:

1. Enabling: Create opportunities for dialogue with your community while also encouraging interaction among its members.
2. Hosting: Create formats and experiences that help build genuine connections both online and offline.
3. Learning: Turn community insights into targeted improvements to your offerings, content and strategies.

Find out more in our story: Turning Brands into Friends: Community Building in Marketing

Conclusion: What the marketing trends for 2026 really demand from brands

2026 won’t see a radical reinvention of the marketing industry. Nevertheless, this is a pivotal moment because it’s no longer novelty that counts, but rather how we choose to act on the latest developments.

The marketing trends for 2026 clearly demonstrate that AI, data and automation are now well established. However, reach, efficiency and personalization alone are no longer enough. The context in which we use technologies, the principles that guide our actions and the relationships we form will all be critically important.

Today’s brands must do more than simply roll out content or operate systems. In a world dominated by technology, they must build trust, be relevant and remain human.

This doesn’t mean resisting innovation. It means managing innovation wisely and responsibly. The strongest brands of 2026 won’t blindly follow every trend. They’ll be selective, set priorities and translate marketing trends into principles and actions. And that’s precisely what will give them the edge.