Our B2B marketing predictions 2026 (from a search-first digital agency perspective)

2025 shook up digital marketing as we know it. What’s to come in this piece include:

• AI disruptions (and lots of them)
• SEO changing…a lot
• Design blending the old and new

We want to share our marketing predictions for 2026 from design, to search, to paid, to web development.

Here is what we think is coming next year.

Design

Design in 2026 is set to combine creativity with practical purpose, mixing vibrant palettes and dynamic layouts with smart, user-friendly functionality.

AI-generated design & videos: AI will increasingly create design elements and generative videos, speeding up production and enabling brands to scale creative output, without sacrificing consistency. From automated layouts and image generation to dynamic video variations tailored by audience, platform, or context, AI will make it easier to test, personalise, and iterate at speed. The opportunity isn’t just efficiency, using AI as a creative accelerator, freeing teams to focus on big ideas, storytelling and brand direction, while the machines handle the execution.

Colour, contrast & retro revival: High contrast designs and clashing colours will be popular, we have already seen the return of red and pink (a big no no in the 2000s). It is the return of the neons (ummm hellooo, are we in the 90s??) from luminescent greens, fluorescent yellows, painful eyeburning corals, and electric blue- bold, vibrant, and digital-first reflects a revival of the old in the new.
Y2K and early internet design elements, pixel art, gradients, chrome textures will also see a comeback, refreshed for modern use.

Motion & 3D interfaces: Motion posters and immersive 3D interfaces will become more common, especially in tech and SaaS marketing, to create richer user experiences. This includes sharp motion, scroll-led animations and interactive 3D that actually helps explain the product, not just look cool. If used well, motion can add depth, guides users, and makes experiences feel more intuitive and engaging.

Dark mode & glassmorphism: Dark mode with neon accents remains popular,especially for digital-first brands, products and interfaces. High-contrast UI, glowing highlights and subtle colour pops help content stand out while reducing visual noise. While glassmorphism will evolve into a more subtle and functional design approach- as we have already seen in the new Apple update (is my iPhone broken?)

Search

If you thought 2025 brought major changes to SEO, 2026 is set to push things even further. As we know from 2025, Search is shifting firmly towards substance, credibility, and genuine usefulness – not content produced simply to fill space. This will be reinforced in 2026.

Brand reputation will be a top metric
Brand awareness stops being a “nice to have” and starts behaving like a real performance metric. Google (and basically every other platform) is paying far more attention to what’s being said about you elsewhere, on reviews, mentions, influencers, and how people actually respond to your brand off-site. Where you rank for a single keyword matters less than whether you’re visible across the platforms your audience uses. It’s no longer just about search results, it’s about share of search (organic interest as a percentage of the total searches for your industry as a whole, acting as a proxy for brand health, awareness, and future market share by tracking consumer interest).

Continued search diversification beyond Google & the rise of E-E-A-T
Search no longer happens in one place. TikTok, Reddit, Instagram, YouTube, niche communities and forums are all now part of how people discover brands. If your audience uses these platforms to research and compare, your presence needs to extend beyond Google. The move away from content for content’s sake isn’t new, but in 2026 it’s unavoidable.

E-E-A-T will become the standard (finally), shifting from “important” in 2025 to essential in 2026, with quality finally beating quantity. It’s no longer about pleasing an algorithm, but creating valuable, authentic content people actually want, in the formats they prefer, from video and audio to tools and interactive content. If AI wouldn’t cite it or users wouldn’t save it, it’s not good enough. Read more about what you need to do in 2026 in our blog.

Content will become more action led
Less “here’s some information”, more “here’s what to do next”. Expect to see more content encouraging users to: download something, try something, watch something, save something. Search journeys become practical, not passive.

Hyper-personalisation and local precision
Search results will become increasingly personalised, driven by AI Mode. What you see will be shaped by:

• what you watch
• what you follow
• what you interact with
• what you almost buy
• where you are

The SERP will no longer look the same for everyone, even for the same query. As AI reshapes discovery, search becomes tailored across platforms, not just within Google.

Paid

The biggest shift we see coming for paid ads in 2026 is the full rollout of AI Max and the knock-on effects it will have across every platform.

Google’s advanced AI filtering is pushing automation further than ever, while Meta has already stated plans to fully automate ad creation and targeting by the end of 2026. Paid media becomes less about manual setup and more about how well your foundations are set.

Here’s what that actually means in practice:

Automation and control
AI Max automatically builds ads using your landing pages, URLs and real customer queries. This pushes automation further while reducing manual control over targeting and structure, making strong foundations and clear intent absolutely essential.

Targeted landing pages
Highly targeted, intent-led landing pages outperform generic ones. The better your pages explain value, relevance and next steps, the better the automation performs.

ChatGPT will start serving ads to free users
As AI platforms like ChatGPT begin introducing ads for free users, paid placements shift directly into AI-generated answers. Ads appear at the point of recommendation, not just after a search, influencing decisions earlier in the journey and often without a traditional click.

Impact on CTR
With more answers delivered upfront, fewer users need to click. Both paid and organic CTRs are likely to drop, shifting focus towards visibility, influence and assisted conversions rather than pure traffic.

Competitor comparisons
With AI-driven insights and automated placements, competitor comparison ads become more sophisticated, helping brands differentiate in an increasingly automated ad landscape.

Transparency
AI Max introduces a new source column in search term reports, giving more visibility into whether traffic came from landing pages, URL inclusion.
How Google plans to monetise this properly remains to be seen – but rest assured, they’ll have a plan.

Web development

Web development in 2026 is leaning heavily into performance, security, and genuinely better user experiences – but it could also be heading straight into a messy year thanks to the rise of vibe coding. Here’s what we think is coming:

Security by design
As cyber threats are getting smarter and more complex, web builds have to match. Security is now moving from “something checked at the end” to “something built from day one”. The priority for web builds will be tighter authentication, stronger encryption, automatic patching and web developers working closely with security, not around it. In short, web developers will be taking fewer shortcuts, for more resilience.

The rise of low code or no code
People are turning to drag and drop platforms like Lovable or WixSite which allows users to build their websites and full stack web applications through describing their ideas in plain language. Instead of having to write complex code, users can outline what they want to build, and the platform automatically generates the underlying logic and design. This shift is empowering entrepreneurs, small businesses, and hobbyists to bring their ideas to life quickly without needing deep technical expertise. But web developers do not fear, as you will be aware of…

…The vibe coding problem
Vibe coding opens a can of worms which you can read about in our blog, and unfortunately it will only get worse and more common in 2026. Essentially, it is where people use AI-generated code straight into their website build without testing or reviewing it, which can break your entire site. Our web devs will be needed more than ever, getting calls left right and centre. We’re expecting more broken builds, more emergency fixes, and more “why doesn’t this work on mobile?” moments – all because vibe coding looks fast, but causes problems that take 10× longer to unpick. Find out exactly what this is here.

Wrapping up our 2026 predictions

And that’s our roundup of what we think is coming in 2026.

From the chaos of design trends to the shifts in search, the evolution of paid, and whatever web development is turning into next year. If 2025 was loud, fast, and slightly unhinged, 2026 looks set to be more of the same… just with better typography, smarter algorithms, and lots more neon. None of this is about chasing every trend, it’s about understanding where things are moving so we can make better, more intentional work. Here’s to another year of adapting, experimenting, and pretending we’re not scared of AI tools that definitely weren’t here last week.

Bring on 2026.