How successful marketing teams are optimizing performance in 2026 (and what metrics they’re tracking)

HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing report uncovered some good news: 65% of marketers are meeting or exceeding their performance benchmarks. But that success doesn’t happen by accident. Behind those results are clear priorities, rigorous testing, and a sharp focus on the right metrics.

This post explores how the most successful teams are optimizing performance in 2026, and which KPIs they trust most to guide their decisions.

Table of Contents

• Why Performance Optimization Matters in 2026
• The Top Marketing KPIs to Track in 2026
• Marketing Optimization Trends to Expect in 2026
• How to Optimize Marketing Performance

Why Performance Optimization Matters in 2026

Marketers report that their budgets are facing more scrutiny than in past years, and expectations are rising. Leaders want to tie revenue to marketing activities, which means every line item in their budget needs to deliver an ROI.

Major roadblocks to success include:

• Measuring marketing ROI (33%).
• Generating quality leads (29.6%).
• Keeping up with platform and algorithm changes (29.8%).
• Sales and marketing misalignment (27.6%).
• Effectively using AI (25.7%).

That means that marketers can’t afford to set a campaign and let it run for months without checking on the results. Measuring, analyzing, and optimizing should be quick and frequent, allowing brands to double down on what works best.

The Top Marketing KPIs to Track in 2026

Based on HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing report, the top key performance indicators (KPIs) marketers are prioritizing focus squarely on quality, revenue impact, and efficiency. These reflect a shift away from vanity metrics and toward performance that directly supports business goals.

Here are the top five marketing KPIs that marketers cited as critical for success.

1. Lead Quality and Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs)

This KPI measures how well incoming leads align with your ideal customer profile and sales readiness. This metric reflects an emphasis on quality over quantity, with 39.4% of marketers watching this KPI.

Lead scoring can help you rate leads and identify which lead sources are delivering high-quality leads, then optimize for them. Prioritizing lead quality appears to be working, since 94% of marketers say that lead quality improved over the past year.

2. Conversion Rates

Conversion rates (lead-to-customer) track the percentage of leads that become paying customers. With 33.9% of teams prioritizing this KPI, it reflects a strong focus on optimizing the full funnel, not just top-of-funnel activity and vanity metrics. High performers test calls-to-action (CTAs), audience targeting, and messaging weekly to boost this metric.

3. Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI)

ROMI calculates the revenue generated relative to marketing spend. With 31.1% of marketers tracking ROMI, we see an increased pressure to tie marketing spend to business outcomes.

To measure ROMI, use the following formula:

(Revenue Generated – Marketing Expenses) / Marketing Expenses

Multiply that number by 100 for a percentage.

4. Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

CAC calculates the average cost of bringing in one new customer. To calculate it, take the total cost of your marketing activities for a set time and divide it by the number of new customers acquired during that period.

CAC shows how efficiently a marketing team converts spending into new customers, and gives a clear benchmark for improvement.

5. Lead generation volume

While quality and efficiency are the heroes, volume still matters: 29.2% of marketers cite lead volume as a key metric for success. Lead volume speaks to both messaging and reach.

It’s also interesting to look at what’s absent from the top KPIs in 2026. What’s noticeably less important is social media engagement (just 15% say it’s a top KPI) and email open/click rates (8.4%). While website traffic is still important, coming in at number six, it’s almost always paired with conversion or lead quality metrics. The most successful marketers in 2026 will measure what moves the revenue needle, not simply volume or clicks.

Marketing Optimization Trends to Expect in 2026

Optimization sounds complex, but it boils down to two basic levers: cut costs or improve outcomes. Teams can reduce costs by finding ways to produce marketing content more quickly and affordably, notably with AI. They can boost outcomes by identifying which channels and formats are working, then investing more heavily in those.

Our data from over 1,500 marketers reveals four dominant trends shaping how teams optimize today.

1. Real-time Campaign Refinement

Marketing is no longer “set it and forget it.” The most successful teams treat campaigns as living initiatives, adjusting the targeting, timing, and creative based on early signals. Of marketing teams, 67.4% already use AI for campaign performance optimization, and an additional 21.9% plan to start in the next 12 months.

“Because web traffic is declining, A/B tests take nine weeks for significance, and we can’t wait that long. Direct feedback is now essential,” comments Johann Wrede, CMO of UserTesting. “At UserTesting, we constantly ask: ‘What do you think of this campaign creative? How does this messaging land?’”

All signs point to campaigns becoming more iterative, being refined in interactive cycles. The numbers speak for themselves: 27.4% of marketers analyze their campaign performance monthly, 44.2% weekly, and 15.3% daily. Half of marketers say they can implement and measure changes to active campaigns in days, while almost a quarter say they can in mere hours.

Pro tip: Implement Loop Marketing for this kind of constant, live feedback and update cycle on your active campaigns.

2. AI-Powered Production and Workflows

Marketers are using AI for many purposes — 94.6% of marketers use AI in some capacity, and 25.6% say they use it extensively. The State of Marketing data shows that this saves teams time and increases productivity. This comes from both administrative support — drafting emails, posting to social, streamlining workflows — and enhanced production.

AI assistance is becoming popular for content creation, media creation, and content repurposing. Nearly half of marketers (48.6%) are exploring AI to create personalized content, which our research shows has a high ROI. Teams can use AI to tailor messaging by segment, behavior, or lifecycle stage. This trend enables brands to scale personalization without proportional increases in time or cost.

3. SEO Evolution for AI-Driven Search

For two decades, SEO has been the gold standard for optimizing web content. As search engines evolve and searchers skim AI-generated summaries instead of clicking through to pages, marketers are rethinking keyword targeting.

40.6% of marketers are updating SEO strategies for algorithm shifts, and 24% are optimizing specifically for generative AI (like Google’s AI Overviews). Gaining search visibility in 2026 means creating content that answers questions clearly and earns mentions in AI search engines.

Pro tip: Check out our guide on how to create and implement an AI search strategy in 2026.

4. Cross-Channel Content Repurposing

To maximize ROI on content creation, teams are systematically adapting core assets into multiple formats, like turning webinars, reports, or videos into social, email, or ad content. A third (35.1%) are repurposing content across platforms to extend reach and maximize production ROI. For best success, brands should optimize the content for each channel rather than posting the exact same text or images on different platforms.

How to Optimize Marketing Performance

So, how can brands optimize their marketing performance amidst all of these changes? Here’s what the 1,500 marketers we surveyed (and a few experts) shared that works.

1. Prioritize lead quality over quantity.

Teams that produce high-quality leads are far more likely to exceed their goals. Focus on segmentation, behavioral triggers, and tighter ICP alignment so your campaigns will resonate with audiences — and prompt them to respond.

Work with sales to audit your lead sources monthly so you can identify your highest-performing channels. Retire channels or campaigns that drive volume but have poor sales outcomes. Increase your investments in channels and campaigns producing the best leads.

2. Mind the gap.

One of the best ways to improve campaign performance is to look for leaks in your pipeline. When we asked marketers which factors influenced their optimization decisions, their top answers were: 1) Areas with the largest performance gaps, and 2) Stages with the highest dropoff rates.

Essentially, you can reverse-engineer better campaigns by analyzing where prospects are dropping out of the journey and where your content is underperforming.

Then, work to improve campaigns in those areas. You can start with tweaks to your messaging or images, or you might need to overhaul your targeting or channel strategy if that doesn’t work.

3. Test extensively, and test the right elements.

Testing is the best way to determine which approach will produce the best results. A/B testing is still a valid testing method, but it isn’t the only one. Consider other methods such as:

• Audience segmentation refinement. This technique converts your broader audience into smaller, more defined groups (e.g., by behavior, demographics, or buyer stage) and tailors content or offers to each segment. More relevant messaging leads to higher engagement, better lead quality, and improved conversion rate.
• Conversion rate optimization. CRO systematically tests and improves elements of the customer journey to increase the percentage of visitors who take a desired action. The higher efficiency you create from existing traffic, the more leads or sales you’ll gain without increasing spend.
• Message timing optimization. This technique adjusts when messages are sent or displayed based on user behavior, time zones, or lifecycle stage (e.g., sending a follow-up email two hours after a download versus two days later). In theory, this increases message relevance and responsiveness, leading to increased open rates, clicks, and conversions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfmY6JaEGGU

“We are constantly asking, ‘What do you think of this campaign creative? How does this messaging land?’” shares Johann Wrede, CMO of UserTesting. “Web traffic is declining, and A/B tests take nine weeks for significance, and we can’t wait that long. Direct feedback is now essential.”

Testing shouldn’t be random — it should focus on high-leverage variables that directly affect conversion. The most-tested optimization areas identified in our survey are:

1. Visual elements (55.5%).
2. Audience targeting parameters (44.2%).
3. CTA wording and placement (43.3%).
4. Landing page design and structure (42.1%).
5. Offer structure and pricing (34.4%).

Perform at least one test per active campaign, and use AI to analyze results and automate improvements. Even small tweaks to copy and design compound over time.

4. Align KPIs with revenue, not vanity metrics.

We already covered the top KPIs teams should be tracking, like lead quality, conversions, and ROMI. Vanity metrics like website traffic, social likes, and impressions are no longer the best metrics to follow. Instead, look for ones that tie to revenue and meaningful actions.

It’s also important to find the balance between pivoting and giving approaches time to work.

“I think the important thing about testing new channels is that we also need to give them time to do their work,” advises Amy Kenly, VP of marketing at The Launch Box. “Investing a few weeks or a month and then not seeing the vanity metrics that we might expect doesn't tell us the whole story. This is especially true if you’re taking an approach with more human touch points — you need to give new channels sometimes a little bit more time. Don’t give up too quickly.”

Map every campaign to at least one revenue-linked KPI. If you can’t tie it to your pipeline or sales, question what it’s doing for your brand. Kenly advises assigning ownership of each KPI to a team member for accountability.

Drive marketing ROI with campaign optimization.

Marketers already work hard, but optimizing performance is a way to work smarter. AI tools give marketers more data points than ever before — but it’s your judgment that’s needed to pivot campaigns according to the data. So measure what matters, test relentlessly, and align every tactic to business outcomes.

Want the full picture? Download the complete 2026 State of Marketing Report for exclusive data on marketing trends, AI adoption, channel performance, and more.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/optimizing-performance-metrics

HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing report uncovered some good news: 65% of marketers are meeting or exceeding their performance benchmarks. But that success doesn’t happen by accident. Behind those results are clear priorities, rigorous testing, and a sharp focus on the right metrics.

This post explores how the most successful teams are optimizing performance in 2026, and which KPIs they trust most to guide their decisions.

Table of Contents

• Why Performance Optimization Matters in 2026
• The Top Marketing KPIs to Track in 2026
• Marketing Optimization Trends to Expect in 2026
• How to Optimize Marketing Performance

Why Performance Optimization Matters in 2026

Marketers report that their budgets are facing more scrutiny than in past years, and expectations are rising. Leaders want to tie revenue to marketing activities, which means every line item in their budget needs to deliver an ROI.

Major roadblocks to success include:

• Measuring marketing ROI (33%).
• Generating quality leads (29.6%).
• Keeping up with platform and algorithm changes (29.8%).
• Sales and marketing misalignment (27.6%).
• Effectively using AI (25.7%).

That means that marketers can’t afford to set a campaign and let it run for months without checking on the results. Measuring, analyzing, and optimizing should be quick and frequent, allowing brands to double down on what works best.

The Top Marketing KPIs to Track in 2026

Based on HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing report, the top key performance indicators (KPIs) marketers are prioritizing focus squarely on quality, revenue impact, and efficiency. These reflect a shift away from vanity metrics and toward performance that directly supports business goals.

Here are the top five marketing KPIs that marketers cited as critical for success.

1. Lead Quality and Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs)

This KPI measures how well incoming leads align with your ideal customer profile and sales readiness. This metric reflects an emphasis on quality over quantity, with 39.4% of marketers watching this KPI.

Lead scoring can help you rate leads and identify which lead sources are delivering high-quality leads, then optimize for them. Prioritizing lead quality appears to be working, since 94% of marketers say that lead quality improved over the past year.

2. Conversion Rates

Conversion rates (lead-to-customer) track the percentage of leads that become paying customers. With 33.9% of teams prioritizing this KPI, it reflects a strong focus on optimizing the full funnel, not just top-of-funnel activity and vanity metrics. High performers test calls-to-action (CTAs), audience targeting, and messaging weekly to boost this metric.

3. Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI)

ROMI calculates the revenue generated relative to marketing spend. With 31.1% of marketers tracking ROMI, we see an increased pressure to tie marketing spend to business outcomes.

To measure ROMI, use the following formula:

(Revenue Generated – Marketing Expenses) / Marketing Expenses

Multiply that number by 100 for a percentage.

4. Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

CAC calculates the average cost of bringing in one new customer. To calculate it, take the total cost of your marketing activities for a set time and divide it by the number of new customers acquired during that period.

CAC shows how efficiently a marketing team converts spending into new customers, and gives a clear benchmark for improvement.

5. Lead generation volume

While quality and efficiency are the heroes, volume still matters: 29.2% of marketers cite lead volume as a key metric for success. Lead volume speaks to both messaging and reach.

It’s also interesting to look at what’s absent from the top KPIs in 2026. What’s noticeably less important is social media engagement (just 15% say it’s a top KPI) and email open/click rates (8.4%). While website traffic is still important, coming in at number six, it’s almost always paired with conversion or lead quality metrics. The most successful marketers in 2026 will measure what moves the revenue needle, not simply volume or clicks.

Marketing Optimization Trends to Expect in 2026

Optimization sounds complex, but it boils down to two basic levers: cut costs or improve outcomes. Teams can reduce costs by finding ways to produce marketing content more quickly and affordably, notably with AI. They can boost outcomes by identifying which channels and formats are working, then investing more heavily in those.

Our data from over 1,500 marketers reveals four dominant trends shaping how teams optimize today.

1. Real-time Campaign Refinement

Marketing is no longer “set it and forget it.” The most successful teams treat campaigns as living initiatives, adjusting the targeting, timing, and creative based on early signals. Of marketing teams, 67.4% already use AI for campaign performance optimization, and an additional 21.9% plan to start in the next 12 months.

“Because web traffic is declining, A/B tests take nine weeks for significance, and we can’t wait that long. Direct feedback is now essential,” comments Johann Wrede, CMO of UserTesting. “At UserTesting, we constantly ask: ‘What do you think of this campaign creative? How does this messaging land?’”

All signs point to campaigns becoming more iterative, being refined in interactive cycles. The numbers speak for themselves: 27.4% of marketers analyze their campaign performance monthly, 44.2% weekly, and 15.3% daily. Half of marketers say they can implement and measure changes to active campaigns in days, while almost a quarter say they can in mere hours.

Pro tip: Implement Loop Marketing for this kind of constant, live feedback and update cycle on your active campaigns.

2. AI-Powered Production and Workflows

Marketers are using AI for many purposes — 94.6% of marketers use AI in some capacity, and 25.6% say they use it extensively. The State of Marketing data shows that this saves teams time and increases productivity. This comes from both administrative support — drafting emails, posting to social, streamlining workflows — and enhanced production.

AI assistance is becoming popular for content creation, media creation, and content repurposing. Nearly half of marketers (48.6%) are exploring AI to create personalized content, which our research shows has a high ROI. Teams can use AI to tailor messaging by segment, behavior, or lifecycle stage. This trend enables brands to scale personalization without proportional increases in time or cost.

3. SEO Evolution for AI-Driven Search

For two decades, SEO has been the gold standard for optimizing web content. As search engines evolve and searchers skim AI-generated summaries instead of clicking through to pages, marketers are rethinking keyword targeting.

40.6% of marketers are updating SEO strategies for algorithm shifts, and 24% are optimizing specifically for generative AI (like Google’s AI Overviews). Gaining search visibility in 2026 means creating content that answers questions clearly and earns mentions in AI search engines.

Pro tip: Check out our guide on how to create and implement an AI search strategy in 2026.

4. Cross-Channel Content Repurposing

To maximize ROI on content creation, teams are systematically adapting core assets into multiple formats, like turning webinars, reports, or videos into social, email, or ad content. A third (35.1%) are repurposing content across platforms to extend reach and maximize production ROI. For best success, brands should optimize the content for each channel rather than posting the exact same text or images on different platforms.

How to Optimize Marketing Performance

So, how can brands optimize their marketing performance amidst all of these changes? Here’s what the 1,500 marketers we surveyed (and a few experts) shared that works.

1. Prioritize lead quality over quantity.

Teams that produce high-quality leads are far more likely to exceed their goals. Focus on segmentation, behavioral triggers, and tighter ICP alignment so your campaigns will resonate with audiences — and prompt them to respond.

Work with sales to audit your lead sources monthly so you can identify your highest-performing channels. Retire channels or campaigns that drive volume but have poor sales outcomes. Increase your investments in channels and campaigns producing the best leads.

2. Mind the gap.

One of the best ways to improve campaign performance is to look for leaks in your pipeline. When we asked marketers which factors influenced their optimization decisions, their top answers were: 1) Areas with the largest performance gaps, and 2) Stages with the highest dropoff rates.

Essentially, you can reverse-engineer better campaigns by analyzing where prospects are dropping out of the journey and where your content is underperforming.

Then, work to improve campaigns in those areas. You can start with tweaks to your messaging or images, or you might need to overhaul your targeting or channel strategy if that doesn’t work.

3. Test extensively, and test the right elements.

Testing is the best way to determine which approach will produce the best results. A/B testing is still a valid testing method, but it isn’t the only one. Consider other methods such as:

• Audience segmentation refinement. This technique converts your broader audience into smaller, more defined groups (e.g., by behavior, demographics, or buyer stage) and tailors content or offers to each segment. More relevant messaging leads to higher engagement, better lead quality, and improved conversion rate.
• Conversion rate optimization. CRO systematically tests and improves elements of the customer journey to increase the percentage of visitors who take a desired action. The higher efficiency you create from existing traffic, the more leads or sales you’ll gain without increasing spend.
• Message timing optimization. This technique adjusts when messages are sent or displayed based on user behavior, time zones, or lifecycle stage (e.g., sending a follow-up email two hours after a download versus two days later). In theory, this increases message relevance and responsiveness, leading to increased open rates, clicks, and conversions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfmY6JaEGGU

“We are constantly asking, ‘What do you think of this campaign creative? How does this messaging land?’” shares Johann Wrede, CMO of UserTesting. “Web traffic is declining, and A/B tests take nine weeks for significance, and we can’t wait that long. Direct feedback is now essential.”

Testing shouldn’t be random — it should focus on high-leverage variables that directly affect conversion. The most-tested optimization areas identified in our survey are:

1. Visual elements (55.5%).
2. Audience targeting parameters (44.2%).
3. CTA wording and placement (43.3%).
4. Landing page design and structure (42.1%).
5. Offer structure and pricing (34.4%).

Perform at least one test per active campaign, and use AI to analyze results and automate improvements. Even small tweaks to copy and design compound over time.

4. Align KPIs with revenue, not vanity metrics.

We already covered the top KPIs teams should be tracking, like lead quality, conversions, and ROMI. Vanity metrics like website traffic, social likes, and impressions are no longer the best metrics to follow. Instead, look for ones that tie to revenue and meaningful actions.

It’s also important to find the balance between pivoting and giving approaches time to work.

“I think the important thing about testing new channels is that we also need to give them time to do their work,” advises Amy Kenly, VP of marketing at The Launch Box. “Investing a few weeks or a month and then not seeing the vanity metrics that we might expect doesn't tell us the whole story. This is especially true if you’re taking an approach with more human touch points — you need to give new channels sometimes a little bit more time. Don’t give up too quickly.”

Map every campaign to at least one revenue-linked KPI. If you can’t tie it to your pipeline or sales, question what it’s doing for your brand. Kenly advises assigning ownership of each KPI to a team member for accountability.

Drive marketing ROI with campaign optimization.

Marketers already work hard, but optimizing performance is a way to work smarter. AI tools give marketers more data points than ever before — but it’s your judgment that’s needed to pivot campaigns according to the data. So measure what matters, test relentlessly, and align every tactic to business outcomes.

Want the full picture? Download the complete 2026 State of Marketing Report for exclusive data on marketing trends, AI adoption, channel performance, and more.

via Perfecte news Non connection

The gentlemen’s agreement that netted 210,000 subscribers. [Steal this play.]

“SMASH that like button,” the host says, and your eyes roll back so far you can see your own medulla. “And don’t forget to subscribe!”

If you make videos, podcasts, or social media posts, you know you should be encouraging engagement. But if doing so makes you feel like you need a shower, this story is for you.

Today, the producer of My First Million shares how they turned boring engagement farming into shared language that their audience willingly (and joyfully) spreads — netting 200k subscribers in the process.

The team calls it “The Gentlemen’s Agreement.” And you should absolutely try something similar.

Gentlemen, behold.

Entrepreneurs Sam Parr and Shaan Puri didn’t set out to be podcasters or YouTubers.

“They were operating in the mindset of ‘We’re creating this for us, and if people watch it, great,’” says Arie Desormeaux. “They weren’t identifying as content creators.”

So when the show started to organically pick up followers, they had to decide whether to do all the things that content creators are “supposed” to do: Ad breaks. Engagement farming. Begging for subscribers.

Desormeaux is a senior producer for HubSpot Media and one of the minds behind the ongoing success of My First Million, which currently boasts almost 900,000 followers.

But it didn’t start that way, and she shares with me the thinking behind one of their early moments of explosive growth.

“Instead of doing something we should be doing, just by default, we decided to make it a funny exchange, and then turn that into a bit that’s also a value add. We’re going to turn it into something that becomes part of the language of the audience.”

So, instead of the typical ‘like and subscribe,’ Parr and Puri came up with the Gentlemen’s Agreement. Here it is in Parr’s words:

“If this is the first episode you’re listening to, you get this one for free. But if it’s the second episode or more that you’ve listened to, here’s our Gentlemen’s agreement. You go to whatever app you’re on, and you click ‘subscribe’ or ‘follow’ or whatever it is.

“We make this for you. We’re your little laboratory rats. We’re doing all this crap for you, just go and do that for us.”

The Inclusion Factor

The effect was nearly immediate, with the show picking up 210,000 subscribers within a matter of months.

And while it’s nearly impossible to say this was the sole reason in isolation, Parr himself described the Gentlemen’s Agreement as “the biggest needle mover.”

It wasn’t simply that listeners were honoring the agreement. They were sharing it.

“You’ll see it in the YouTube comments. You’ll see it on LinkedIn,” Desormeaux says. “It becomes almost inside baseball for people who know. It’s become a proper noun. And that creates an inclusion factor.”

That inclusion factor is what she attributes the success of the tactic to. The very words “Gentlemen’s Agreement” have become a way for listeners to identify with each other. It has transcended engagement farming to become community building.

“‘Like and subscribe’ is such an anonymous way of communicating to people. It’s transactional. I’m talking to you like you’re only what’s on the other side of a button. It’s a signal for the brain to check out,” she explains. “[Whereas,] the Gentlemen’s Agreement is a relationship-building tactic. It’s a goodwill agreement between us and the audience.”

Creating Your Contract

Now, you shouldn’t copy this tactic word-for-word. Not only would that be ungentlemanly, but it would also be ineffective. Your unique audience needs your unique language.

But Desormeaux shared some thoughts on how to find the lingua franca for your listeners.

1. Focus on the essential value exchange.

“Everyone who is creating content on the internet is doing the same value exchange with their audience. Whether it’s entertainment, tutorials, interviews, it’s all the same.” You’re exchanging your content for their attention.

But when you simply ask for likes, you’re presenting it as a one-sided equation. Instead, remind your potential audience that the exchange goes both ways.

Parr and Puri make no secret of the amount of effort they’re offering in return.

2. Stay in character.

By now, you can probably spot engagement farming just by the change in tone, without even listening to the words. So many content creators treat these moments as a chore, so that’s what listening feels like.

“It becomes part of the noise of the internet. It’s the same as, ‘Hey, let’s take a quick ad break.’ They’ve heard it so many times, it’s lost its potency.”

Instead, find the wording that matches the soul of your content.

“What is the tone that your audience responds to? My First Million is entertainment first, nerds second, and business third.”

That’s why the Gentlemen’s Agreement is presented as a funny, kinda-nerdy business proposition. It probably wouldn’t work for, say, a podcast about knitting grannies.

3. Repetition. Repetition. Repetition.

“If we had done it one time, it would have just been a novelty. Doing it consistently is what creates a movement. Bringing it back from episode to episode is what lodges it in the brain.”

And they don’t just mention it in each episode. They also use it in their social media posts, create tongue-in-cheek shareable content, and even slap it on their merch.

The result? “The audience recognizes it and uses it in situ.”

4. Don’t worry about being repetitive.

During one episode, Parr mused that the Gentlemen’s Agreement may have lost its novelty, but Desormeaux isn’t worried.

“It’s novel for whoever is hearing it for the first time, for people who haven’t subscribed yet.”

In other words, if you’ve heard it enough to tune it out, you’re probably already a subscriber. (Or you’re breaking the agreement. Tsk, tsk.)

5. Acknowledge the awkwardness.

“There’s value in the subversive. It IS cringe and unlikeable to ask for subscribers,” Desormeaux admits. “But somehow, making fun of the economics of being a content creator helps to claw away the objections of the audience.”

If you acknowledge that it’s cringey, they can’t call you cringey. Part of the success of the Gentlemen’s Agreement is that it disarms the transactional nature by acknowledging the transactional nature.

And, hey, if you’ve made it this far… do a gentleman a favor? Go click on that subscribe button.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/the-gentlemens-agreement

“SMASH that like button,” the host says, and your eyes roll back so far you can see your own medulla. “And don’t forget to subscribe!”

If you make videos, podcasts, or social media posts, you know you should be encouraging engagement. But if doing so makes you feel like you need a shower, this story is for you.

Today, the producer of My First Million shares how they turned boring engagement farming into shared language that their audience willingly (and joyfully) spreads — netting 200k subscribers in the process.

The team calls it “The Gentlemen’s Agreement.” And you should absolutely try something similar.

Gentlemen, behold.

Entrepreneurs Sam Parr and Shaan Puri didn’t set out to be podcasters or YouTubers.

“They were operating in the mindset of ‘We’re creating this for us, and if people watch it, great,’” says Arie Desormeaux. “They weren’t identifying as content creators.”

So when the show started to organically pick up followers, they had to decide whether to do all the things that content creators are “supposed” to do: Ad breaks. Engagement farming. Begging for subscribers.

Desormeaux is a senior producer for HubSpot Media and one of the minds behind the ongoing success of My First Million, which currently boasts almost 900,000 followers.

But it didn’t start that way, and she shares with me the thinking behind one of their early moments of explosive growth.

“Instead of doing something we should be doing, just by default, we decided to make it a funny exchange, and then turn that into a bit that’s also a value add. We’re going to turn it into something that becomes part of the language of the audience.”

So, instead of the typical ‘like and subscribe,’ Parr and Puri came up with the Gentlemen’s Agreement. Here it is in Parr’s words:

“If this is the first episode you’re listening to, you get this one for free. But if it’s the second episode or more that you’ve listened to, here’s our Gentlemen’s agreement. You go to whatever app you’re on, and you click ‘subscribe’ or ‘follow’ or whatever it is.

“We make this for you. We’re your little laboratory rats. We’re doing all this crap for you, just go and do that for us.”

The Inclusion Factor

The effect was nearly immediate, with the show picking up 210,000 subscribers within a matter of months.

And while it’s nearly impossible to say this was the sole reason in isolation, Parr himself described the Gentlemen’s Agreement as “the biggest needle mover.”

It wasn’t simply that listeners were honoring the agreement. They were sharing it.

“You’ll see it in the YouTube comments. You’ll see it on LinkedIn,” Desormeaux says. “It becomes almost inside baseball for people who know. It’s become a proper noun. And that creates an inclusion factor.”

That inclusion factor is what she attributes the success of the tactic to. The very words “Gentlemen’s Agreement” have become a way for listeners to identify with each other. It has transcended engagement farming to become community building.

“‘Like and subscribe’ is such an anonymous way of communicating to people. It’s transactional. I’m talking to you like you’re only what’s on the other side of a button. It’s a signal for the brain to check out,” she explains. “[Whereas,] the Gentlemen’s Agreement is a relationship-building tactic. It’s a goodwill agreement between us and the audience.”

Creating Your Contract

Now, you shouldn’t copy this tactic word-for-word. Not only would that be ungentlemanly, but it would also be ineffective. Your unique audience needs your unique language.

But Desormeaux shared some thoughts on how to find the lingua franca for your listeners.

1. Focus on the essential value exchange.

“Everyone who is creating content on the internet is doing the same value exchange with their audience. Whether it’s entertainment, tutorials, interviews, it’s all the same.” You’re exchanging your content for their attention.

But when you simply ask for likes, you’re presenting it as a one-sided equation. Instead, remind your potential audience that the exchange goes both ways.

Parr and Puri make no secret of the amount of effort they’re offering in return.

2. Stay in character.

By now, you can probably spot engagement farming just by the change in tone, without even listening to the words. So many content creators treat these moments as a chore, so that’s what listening feels like.

“It becomes part of the noise of the internet. It’s the same as, ‘Hey, let’s take a quick ad break.’ They’ve heard it so many times, it’s lost its potency.”

Instead, find the wording that matches the soul of your content.

“What is the tone that your audience responds to? My First Million is entertainment first, nerds second, and business third.”

That’s why the Gentlemen’s Agreement is presented as a funny, kinda-nerdy business proposition. It probably wouldn’t work for, say, a podcast about knitting grannies.

3. Repetition. Repetition. Repetition.

“If we had done it one time, it would have just been a novelty. Doing it consistently is what creates a movement. Bringing it back from episode to episode is what lodges it in the brain.”

And they don’t just mention it in each episode. They also use it in their social media posts, create tongue-in-cheek shareable content, and even slap it on their merch.

The result? “The audience recognizes it and uses it in situ.”

4. Don’t worry about being repetitive.

During one episode, Parr mused that the Gentlemen’s Agreement may have lost its novelty, but Desormeaux isn’t worried.

“It’s novel for whoever is hearing it for the first time, for people who haven’t subscribed yet.”

In other words, if you’ve heard it enough to tune it out, you’re probably already a subscriber. (Or you’re breaking the agreement. Tsk, tsk.)

5. Acknowledge the awkwardness.

“There’s value in the subversive. It IS cringe and unlikeable to ask for subscribers,” Desormeaux admits. “But somehow, making fun of the economics of being a content creator helps to claw away the objections of the audience.”

If you acknowledge that it’s cringey, they can’t call you cringey. Part of the success of the Gentlemen’s Agreement is that it disarms the transactional nature by acknowledging the transactional nature.

And, hey, if you’ve made it this far… do a gentleman a favor? Go click on that subscribe button.

via Perfecte news Non connection

Why Loop Marketing matters in 2026, according to our State of Marketing report

HubSpot’s latest State of Marketing data shows that 65% of companies exceeded their goals last year, and 93.7% improved lead quality. Should the industry celebrate and prepare for a relaxed 2026? Barely.

The current state of marketing mirrors what happens to an Olympic athlete who hits a personal best — the reward is a higher bar. Coaches expect more. Training intensifies. When everything goes well, expectations and performance pressure keep rising.

So marketing teams succeed, but they succeed inside systems that demand speed, iteration, and tight data feedback cycles. All of this makes Loop Marketing more relevant than ever heading into 2026. Here’s what teams need to know.

Table of Contents

• What is Loop Marketing?
• Why Loop Marketing Matters for Teams.
• How Teams Use the Loop (Without Even Knowing It).

What is Loop Marketing?

Loop Marketing is a repeatable, four-stage approach where every marketing action feeds the next one, creating continuous, compounding growth instead of one-off campaigns.

It replaces the traditional linear model, which assumes that buyers enter the funnel through the same touchpoints and act similarly throughout the journey. Loop Marketing, instead, acknowledges the shift in buyers’ behaviours influenced by AI search. The approach offers a cycle where content, data, channels, and customer interactions form self-reinforcing loops.

How does Loop Marketing work?

Loop Marketing works by cycling teams through four repeatable stages. These stages are not new marketing ideas. What’s new is treating them as a closed, operational loop inside your marketing tools that immediately implements what it’s learned from the last campaign with the help of AI.

Stage 1: Express

Oftentimes, marketing teams skip this stage and rush into tactics. Wrong. Loop Marketing forces teams to slow down and align before execution. So, define the problem you uniquely solve, your audience, and your differentiation.

Stage 2: Tailor

Make the message relevant to each audience — at scale, with AI, to deliver experiences that truly feel personal to each customer. This stage is about how you tell the same story differently to different segments. In doing so, you’re creating your core content and other assets grounded in intent signals and behavioral data.

Stage 3: Amplify

Get the message out, everywhere it needs to be. This includes:

• Paid media.
• Social.
• Email newsletters.
• AEO.
• Events.
• Trade shows.
• Outdoor, physical, and digital spaces.
• LLMs.

Stage 4: Evolve

This is classic “test and measure,” but iterate quickly with AI. Feed AI-powered insights back into any previous stage, not just back to Express. Simply put, this stage is continuous optimization for:

• Testing campaigns.
• Measuring performance.
• Learning what works.
• Feeding insights back into earlier stages.

Note that AI plays an assistant role here by surfacing insights, answering questions faster, and reducing manual reporting.

Why Loop Marketing Matters for Teams.

1. AI personalization creates more signals than teams can handle without loops

AI personalization is the top trend of this year, with 49% of marketers already using AI to tailor content. On its own, personalized content performs well. According to our data, 91% of marketers say personalization improves engagement, and 93% saw a great impact on marketing-driven leads or purchases from personalized experiences.

But as teams ship more targeted content, the volume of data (a.k.a. signals) grows fast. That’s where AI personalization can start to break down.

Bradley Sanders, our Senior AI Strategist, warns that once teams begin personalizing at scale with AI, the biggest challenge is keeping their strategy evolving. Without a looped system, personalization becomes static, signals fragment across tools, and outputs are no longer informed by what actually works. Teams scale content and messaging, but lack a mechanism to continuously capture outcomes and adjust strategy.

AI-powered loops make personalization scalable. For example, HubSpot’s Personalization Agent delivers individualized experiences and personalizes content on the fly based on real-time signals and the prospect’s title, industry, deal or cart records, lifecycle stages, and more.

2. Repurposing overwhelms teams unless loops turn one asset into many

Content repurposing is now the backbone of marketing efficiency, with 35% of marketers repurposing assets across channels. So teams are expected to publish everywhere, but headcount rarely grows.

Without the Loop, this becomes semi-manual and time-consuming — teams have to decide what to repurpose, where to send it, and how to adjust it every time.

Loops make this simpler. One asset goes out, teams see what performs, and the Loop automatically guides what to spin into a video, social post, email snippet, or short script. This is Amplify in action.

Tools like HubSpot’s Content Remix make this even easier by turning long-form assets into multiple formats in minutes. A podcast into a blog post, short clips, social posts? Say no more.

3. Brand-value content gets harder to manage as channels multiply

Almost half of marketers now create content tied to their brand’s values. At the same time, brand awareness is the top marketing goal for 2025 for 35% of teams.

But here goes the tricky part, actually, two, about brand storytelling today. Most brands (52%) run 5 to 8 channels simultaneously, and 17% operate more than eight.

That’s a lot of places for a brand voice to drift (1), and lots of places for messaging to feel off (2).

And the people? The more people you have to post and communicate on behalf of your brand, the more deviations you have.

At HubSpot, with hundreds of people getting our brand out there, we make sure our brand voice is consistent thanks to the Loop’s Express. We integrated our brand voice in Breeze and Content Hub to maintain consistency across all channels.

The second issue we resolve by testing the message, measuring sentiment, and refining narratives through continuous feedback (Evolve).

As a result, we make each brand iteration stronger.

“For external creators, we communicate our brand voice, editorial guidelines, and SEO/AEO best practices through briefs, from strategists to creators,” shares Amanda Sellers, EN Blog Strategy, Global Growth at HubSpot. “We use AI-powered tools to help create briefs with a strategist overseeing the process and providing quality assurance. Our creators provide feedback on strategic/tactical alignment and brief effectiveness.”

4. Search disruption requires real-time Loop adjustments

Search is in the middle of its biggest shift in years. AI overviews and LLMs now sit between brands and their audience, changing how people discover, compare, and evaluate products. It’s no surprise that over 70% of marketers say they feel prepared to adapt their strategy to keep up with these new patterns — a clear sign that teams expect ongoing disruption.

But is that enough?

Bradley Sanders argues that being “prepared to adapt” assumes change happens in predictable cycles, but the reality is we don’t know when search will be disrupted or when user intent will change.

He continues, “Without a looped model, teams adapt too slowly and optimize using lagging indicators. Loop Marketing surfaces these shifts as they happen through continuous monitoring and learning across classic search and LLMs. Instead of reacting after visibility changes, teams evolve continuously as conditions change.”

The Loop serves as both Discovery and Amplification layers and assumes that:

• Buyers enter at different points.
• Learn continuously from AI, people, and platforms.
• Re-encounter brands repeatedly before converting.
• Influence future AI answers through their own behavior (reviews, mentions, engagement).

In this model, marketers create visibility that creates demand, demand reinforces authority, and authority improves future visibility — forming a self-reinforcing loop.

5. Consumer behavior shifts too fast for manual strategy updates.

Marketers feel the pace of change every day, and 71% say they’re trying to keep up with how buyers move between platforms, formats, and discovery paths. A product might go viral on TikTok before the team even launches the campaign built for it.

That’s why teams ranked “creating content that receives high levels of online engagement (clicks, shares, comments, etc.)” as the biggest challenge they’ve been facing throughout this year.

Unpredictability has become marketing’s new pet peeve.

Loops help teams stay synced and turn those early behavioral deviations into direction for the next move. As a result, 46% of marketers who research audiences and their behaviors confirmed that personalized experiences had a significant impact on audience-engagement metrics.

6. Loops help you build the consensus AI models need to cite your brand

AI search has changed the rules of brand visibility. Today, a single Reddit thread or a community comment can influence how (sentiment) and how often ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Gemini describes your brand.

Meaning the same facts, explanations, and descriptors must appear across multiple channels, such as social media, product threads, reviews, and casual online mentions. They all feed into one ecosystem.

Loops help teams collect those scattered signals, pull them into a unified message map, and then reinforce that message everywhere it matters.

Reddit plays an outsized role here.

It’s one of the strongest off-site surfaces for AEO because AI models index user discussions heavily. A single clear, well-explained community comment can outweigh your entire blog post in an AI-generated answer.

Teams can’t control these conversations one by one, but loops let them use the insight. When a pattern shows up on Reddit, the loop feeds it back into content updates, FAQ optimizations, definitions, and amplification across PR, social, microsites, and off-site mentions.

7. Loops help fix messy data by filling in the gaps that teams can’t

For all the dashboards and tools marketers use, data quality is still one of their biggest obstacles. Only about 25% of marketers strongly agree they have the data they need to reach their audience effectively, and even fewer feel confident the data they do have is truly high quality.

As you’ve already guessed, the fix is Loop Marketing, where real-time data and AI processing are central to the method.

How Teams Use the Loop (Without Even Knowing It)

When we first introduced Loop Marketing, many teams weren’t sure how to recognize it in their own work. But, some teams are already running loops without realizing it.

1. Turning one idea into a multi-channel content pack with AI

This is the easiest loop teams run today. More than 35% of marketers already repurpose content across channels, often without realizing they’re running a loop. They publish something once, see what performs, and remix the winning pieces into other AI-generated formats.

Teams think they’re just “repurposing,” but they’re actually running the loop in four stages:

1. Create — Develop any starting content asset to fuel the following.
2. Remix — Turn one single post, video, or audio into dozens of clips, blogs, Reddit comments, Facebook posts, etc. AI tools like Breeze: Content Remix make the process easy.
3. Measure — Use AI to gain deep insights into your cross-platform performance.
4. Repeat — Feed the insights back into AI and ask it to refine your strategy.

Hint: Use HubSpot’s Loop Marketing Prompt Library with field-tested 100 prompts tailored to each stage of the Loop. It helps you deeply understand your target audience, optimize for AEO, remix, measure, and evolve.

2. Using AI to research audiences and build messages that kickstart the Loop

Nearly 40% of marketers use AI to research audiences and summarize insights. Teams start the loop by asking AI where their audiences actually research products — not only Google, but ChatGPT, Perplexity, Reddit, Instagram, and niche forums.

Marketers gather prospects’ shopping habits, where they consume content, employment information, basic demographic information, and more.

For example, when I was tasked with researching the target audience for a new electronics store in Warsaw, Poland, that sells off-lease laptops, I opened ChatGPT and used the AI Search Visibility Optimizer prompt to receive guidance on our online store optimization.

Here’s a prompt sample:

# ROLE

You are an AI search optimization strategist and AEO (AI Engine Optimization) expert who specializes in optimizing content and brand presence for AI search engines like ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overview to increase brand visibility and citations.

# CONTEXT

I need to optimize our content strategy and brand presence for AI search engines, ensuring our brand gets mentioned and cited when potential customers ask AI tools questions related to our industry, solutions, and expertise areas.

# TASK

Create a comprehensive AI search optimization strategy that increases brand visibility in AI search results through content optimization, topic authority building, and strategic content creation that AI engines cite and recommend.

# AI SEARCH OPTIMIZATION FRAMEWORK

Optimize across:

1. **Content Authority:** Building topical authority that AI engines recognize

2. **Citation Optimization:** Creating content that AI engines cite and reference

3. **Query Coverage:** Covering questions customers ask AI engines

4. **Source Credibility:** Building credibility signals that AI engines trust

5. **Freshness and Relevance:** Maintaining current, relevant content for AI citations

3. Using AI to optimize for answer engines

About 24% of marketers are already updating their SEO for generative AI, asking LLMs how to optimize for answer engines. They use prompts to:

• Find high-intent questions.
• Generate short question-first blogs.
• Rewrite FAQs.

Our video producer, Bridget O’Rourke, used the AI search visibility optimizer prompt to help her map out her AEO strategy. The output told Bridget to write five short, question-first blog posts on high-intent topics. Mention her brand naturally and link each post in FAQs.

Then, O’Rourke instructed AI to write all five blog posts, optimize them for AI engines, base them on high-intent questions, and ensure they mention her brand as the solution. Human editing was necessary, of course.

Once the blogs were live, Bridget rewrote her landing page’s FAQ section to include the same high-intent questions and linked each one to the corresponding blog post.

Watch more on how Bridget explains Loop’s Amplify stage on a real eCommerce project.

4. Using AI to scale content production

Our study found that 42.45% of marketers use AI extensively to create blog content, with 38% using it occasionally. Together, it’s a whopping 80% — meaning every 8 out of 10 marketers use AI to write blog posts.

It’s unclear whether they create full drafts or generate some sections, but nearly 56% of marketers complain that the internet is now flooded with AI-generated content, making it harder for quality content to stand out.

Top-of-funnel content suffers the most. Scale kills its effectiveness, and teams simply waste time on creating another TOFU piece, according to Amanda Seller.

She explains, “As someone who‘s very close to blogging strategy specifically, I think there’s a lot of wasted effort on top-of-funnel content. We know that with AI Overviews and user behavior changing with LLMs and AI engines, a lot of TOFU content has been disrupted. I wouldn‘t say to never create TOFU content, but it’s clear there is a need to evolve it.”

5. Using AI to create, automate, test, and interlink assets before launch.

Teams rely heavily on AI in the days leading up to a launch, even if they don’t think of it as running a loop. According to our data, 43% use AI to create or refine content, 35% use it for data analysis, and 47% explore automation to improve efficiency.

Another 23% use AI copilots, and 19% use AI agents to automate campaign workflows.

Teams use AI to remix content, tighten and test messaging, create workflows that trigger personalized campaigns, and suggest interlinking between different assets.

Consider HubSpot’s landing page optimization. The Audience Segment tool’s landing page invites prospects to (1) explore more on the topic by linking to relevant sources:

(2) The same page is optimized for AEO with FAQs.

The team used AI suggestions to optimize these blocks.

6. Testing brand positioning and refining it continuously

As our report found, 40.4% of marketing teams test, measure, and adjust their brand awareness campaigns every quarter. With 45.38% choosing annual review and refinement. The first cohort clearly applies the loop for prompt adjustments and improved results.

Here’s how the brands measure brand awareness for informed decision-making:

• 34% run A/B positioning tests
• 61% run brand perception surveys
• 56% watch for engagement changes
• 36% gather sales team feedback on prospect reactions

7. Measuring performance and letting AI surface what worked.

This is the surprising fact of AI adoption that, according to our State of Marketing data, 35% use AI for data analysis and reporting, and nearly 70% say they can derive meaningful insights from data.

That puts AI right at the center of the Evolve stage of the loop.

Teams use AI to highlight high-performing assets, spot patterns humans miss, and summarize which messages resonated across channels.

However, only 47% say they understand how to use AI strategically. Loop Marketing bridges this gap.

Loop Marketing is a new blueprint for 2026

The rise of AI, shifting search behavior, fragmented channels, and nonstop content demands have made it impossible to operate using classic inbound playbooks. Marketing now moves too fast, across too many surfaces, for linear workflows to keep up.

Every marketer now sits in a cycle of Expressing, Tailoring, Amplifying, and Evolving, whether they name the process Loop Marketing or not.

Those who’re ahead in the game see revenue growth as never before.

For a deeper look at the trends shaping these results, winning and losing tactics, explore HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing Report.

from Marketing https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/loop-marketing-trends

HubSpot’s latest State of Marketing data shows that 65% of companies exceeded their goals last year, and 93.7% improved lead quality. Should the industry celebrate and prepare for a relaxed 2026? Barely.

The current state of marketing mirrors what happens to an Olympic athlete who hits a personal best — the reward is a higher bar. Coaches expect more. Training intensifies. When everything goes well, expectations and performance pressure keep rising.

So marketing teams succeed, but they succeed inside systems that demand speed, iteration, and tight data feedback cycles. All of this makes Loop Marketing more relevant than ever heading into 2026. Here’s what teams need to know.

Table of Contents

• What is Loop Marketing?
• Why Loop Marketing Matters for Teams.
• How Teams Use the Loop (Without Even Knowing It).

What is Loop Marketing?

Loop Marketing is a repeatable, four-stage approach where every marketing action feeds the next one, creating continuous, compounding growth instead of one-off campaigns.

It replaces the traditional linear model, which assumes that buyers enter the funnel through the same touchpoints and act similarly throughout the journey. Loop Marketing, instead, acknowledges the shift in buyers’ behaviours influenced by AI search. The approach offers a cycle where content, data, channels, and customer interactions form self-reinforcing loops.

How does Loop Marketing work?

Loop Marketing works by cycling teams through four repeatable stages. These stages are not new marketing ideas. What’s new is treating them as a closed, operational loop inside your marketing tools that immediately implements what it’s learned from the last campaign with the help of AI.

Stage 1: Express

Oftentimes, marketing teams skip this stage and rush into tactics. Wrong. Loop Marketing forces teams to slow down and align before execution. So, define the problem you uniquely solve, your audience, and your differentiation.

Stage 2: Tailor

Make the message relevant to each audience — at scale, with AI, to deliver experiences that truly feel personal to each customer. This stage is about how you tell the same story differently to different segments. In doing so, you’re creating your core content and other assets grounded in intent signals and behavioral data.

Stage 3: Amplify

Get the message out, everywhere it needs to be. This includes:

• Paid media.
• Social.
• Email newsletters.
• AEO.
• Events.
• Trade shows.
• Outdoor, physical, and digital spaces.
• LLMs.

Stage 4: Evolve

This is classic “test and measure,” but iterate quickly with AI. Feed AI-powered insights back into any previous stage, not just back to Express. Simply put, this stage is continuous optimization for:

• Testing campaigns.
• Measuring performance.
• Learning what works.
• Feeding insights back into earlier stages.

Note that AI plays an assistant role here by surfacing insights, answering questions faster, and reducing manual reporting.

Why Loop Marketing Matters for Teams.

1. AI personalization creates more signals than teams can handle without loops

AI personalization is the top trend of this year, with 49% of marketers already using AI to tailor content. On its own, personalized content performs well. According to our data, 91% of marketers say personalization improves engagement, and 93% saw a great impact on marketing-driven leads or purchases from personalized experiences.

But as teams ship more targeted content, the volume of data (a.k.a. signals) grows fast. That’s where AI personalization can start to break down.

Bradley Sanders, our Senior AI Strategist, warns that once teams begin personalizing at scale with AI, the biggest challenge is keeping their strategy evolving. Without a looped system, personalization becomes static, signals fragment across tools, and outputs are no longer informed by what actually works. Teams scale content and messaging, but lack a mechanism to continuously capture outcomes and adjust strategy.

AI-powered loops make personalization scalable. For example, HubSpot’s Personalization Agent delivers individualized experiences and personalizes content on the fly based on real-time signals and the prospect’s title, industry, deal or cart records, lifecycle stages, and more.

2. Repurposing overwhelms teams unless loops turn one asset into many

Content repurposing is now the backbone of marketing efficiency, with 35% of marketers repurposing assets across channels. So teams are expected to publish everywhere, but headcount rarely grows.

Without the Loop, this becomes semi-manual and time-consuming — teams have to decide what to repurpose, where to send it, and how to adjust it every time.

Loops make this simpler. One asset goes out, teams see what performs, and the Loop automatically guides what to spin into a video, social post, email snippet, or short script. This is Amplify in action.

Tools like HubSpot’s Content Remix make this even easier by turning long-form assets into multiple formats in minutes. A podcast into a blog post, short clips, social posts? Say no more.

3. Brand-value content gets harder to manage as channels multiply

Almost half of marketers now create content tied to their brand’s values. At the same time, brand awareness is the top marketing goal for 2025 for 35% of teams.

But here goes the tricky part, actually, two, about brand storytelling today. Most brands (52%) run 5 to 8 channels simultaneously, and 17% operate more than eight.

That’s a lot of places for a brand voice to drift (1), and lots of places for messaging to feel off (2).

And the people? The more people you have to post and communicate on behalf of your brand, the more deviations you have.

At HubSpot, with hundreds of people getting our brand out there, we make sure our brand voice is consistent thanks to the Loop’s Express. We integrated our brand voice in Breeze and Content Hub to maintain consistency across all channels.

The second issue we resolve by testing the message, measuring sentiment, and refining narratives through continuous feedback (Evolve).

As a result, we make each brand iteration stronger.

“For external creators, we communicate our brand voice, editorial guidelines, and SEO/AEO best practices through briefs, from strategists to creators,” shares Amanda Sellers, EN Blog Strategy, Global Growth at HubSpot. “We use AI-powered tools to help create briefs with a strategist overseeing the process and providing quality assurance. Our creators provide feedback on strategic/tactical alignment and brief effectiveness.”

4. Search disruption requires real-time Loop adjustments

Search is in the middle of its biggest shift in years. AI overviews and LLMs now sit between brands and their audience, changing how people discover, compare, and evaluate products. It’s no surprise that over 70% of marketers say they feel prepared to adapt their strategy to keep up with these new patterns — a clear sign that teams expect ongoing disruption.

But is that enough?

Bradley Sanders argues that being “prepared to adapt” assumes change happens in predictable cycles, but the reality is we don’t know when search will be disrupted or when user intent will change.

He continues, “Without a looped model, teams adapt too slowly and optimize using lagging indicators. Loop Marketing surfaces these shifts as they happen through continuous monitoring and learning across classic search and LLMs. Instead of reacting after visibility changes, teams evolve continuously as conditions change.”

The Loop serves as both Discovery and Amplification layers and assumes that:

• Buyers enter at different points.
• Learn continuously from AI, people, and platforms.
• Re-encounter brands repeatedly before converting.
• Influence future AI answers through their own behavior (reviews, mentions, engagement).

In this model, marketers create visibility that creates demand, demand reinforces authority, and authority improves future visibility — forming a self-reinforcing loop.

5. Consumer behavior shifts too fast for manual strategy updates.

Marketers feel the pace of change every day, and 71% say they’re trying to keep up with how buyers move between platforms, formats, and discovery paths. A product might go viral on TikTok before the team even launches the campaign built for it.

That’s why teams ranked “creating content that receives high levels of online engagement (clicks, shares, comments, etc.)” as the biggest challenge they’ve been facing throughout this year.

Unpredictability has become marketing’s new pet peeve.

Loops help teams stay synced and turn those early behavioral deviations into direction for the next move. As a result, 46% of marketers who research audiences and their behaviors confirmed that personalized experiences had a significant impact on audience-engagement metrics.

6. Loops help you build the consensus AI models need to cite your brand

AI search has changed the rules of brand visibility. Today, a single Reddit thread or a community comment can influence how (sentiment) and how often ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Gemini describes your brand.

Meaning the same facts, explanations, and descriptors must appear across multiple channels, such as social media, product threads, reviews, and casual online mentions. They all feed into one ecosystem.

Loops help teams collect those scattered signals, pull them into a unified message map, and then reinforce that message everywhere it matters.

Reddit plays an outsized role here.

It’s one of the strongest off-site surfaces for AEO because AI models index user discussions heavily. A single clear, well-explained community comment can outweigh your entire blog post in an AI-generated answer.

Teams can’t control these conversations one by one, but loops let them use the insight. When a pattern shows up on Reddit, the loop feeds it back into content updates, FAQ optimizations, definitions, and amplification across PR, social, microsites, and off-site mentions.

7. Loops help fix messy data by filling in the gaps that teams can’t

For all the dashboards and tools marketers use, data quality is still one of their biggest obstacles. Only about 25% of marketers strongly agree they have the data they need to reach their audience effectively, and even fewer feel confident the data they do have is truly high quality.

As you’ve already guessed, the fix is Loop Marketing, where real-time data and AI processing are central to the method.

How Teams Use the Loop (Without Even Knowing It)

When we first introduced Loop Marketing, many teams weren’t sure how to recognize it in their own work. But, some teams are already running loops without realizing it.

1. Turning one idea into a multi-channel content pack with AI

This is the easiest loop teams run today. More than 35% of marketers already repurpose content across channels, often without realizing they’re running a loop. They publish something once, see what performs, and remix the winning pieces into other AI-generated formats.

Teams think they’re just “repurposing,” but they’re actually running the loop in four stages:

1. Create — Develop any starting content asset to fuel the following.
2. Remix — Turn one single post, video, or audio into dozens of clips, blogs, Reddit comments, Facebook posts, etc. AI tools like Breeze: Content Remix make the process easy.
3. Measure — Use AI to gain deep insights into your cross-platform performance.
4. Repeat — Feed the insights back into AI and ask it to refine your strategy.

Hint: Use HubSpot’s Loop Marketing Prompt Library with field-tested 100 prompts tailored to each stage of the Loop. It helps you deeply understand your target audience, optimize for AEO, remix, measure, and evolve.

2. Using AI to research audiences and build messages that kickstart the Loop

Nearly 40% of marketers use AI to research audiences and summarize insights. Teams start the loop by asking AI where their audiences actually research products — not only Google, but ChatGPT, Perplexity, Reddit, Instagram, and niche forums.

Marketers gather prospects’ shopping habits, where they consume content, employment information, basic demographic information, and more.

For example, when I was tasked with researching the target audience for a new electronics store in Warsaw, Poland, that sells off-lease laptops, I opened ChatGPT and used the AI Search Visibility Optimizer prompt to receive guidance on our online store optimization.

Here’s a prompt sample:

# ROLE

You are an AI search optimization strategist and AEO (AI Engine Optimization) expert who specializes in optimizing content and brand presence for AI search engines like ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overview to increase brand visibility and citations.

# CONTEXT

I need to optimize our content strategy and brand presence for AI search engines, ensuring our brand gets mentioned and cited when potential customers ask AI tools questions related to our industry, solutions, and expertise areas.

# TASK

Create a comprehensive AI search optimization strategy that increases brand visibility in AI search results through content optimization, topic authority building, and strategic content creation that AI engines cite and recommend.

# AI SEARCH OPTIMIZATION FRAMEWORK

Optimize across:

1. **Content Authority:** Building topical authority that AI engines recognize

2. **Citation Optimization:** Creating content that AI engines cite and reference

3. **Query Coverage:** Covering questions customers ask AI engines

4. **Source Credibility:** Building credibility signals that AI engines trust

5. **Freshness and Relevance:** Maintaining current, relevant content for AI citations

3. Using AI to optimize for answer engines

About 24% of marketers are already updating their SEO for generative AI, asking LLMs how to optimize for answer engines. They use prompts to:

• Find high-intent questions.
• Generate short question-first blogs.
• Rewrite FAQs.

Our video producer, Bridget O’Rourke, used the AI search visibility optimizer prompt to help her map out her AEO strategy. The output told Bridget to write five short, question-first blog posts on high-intent topics. Mention her brand naturally and link each post in FAQs.

Then, O’Rourke instructed AI to write all five blog posts, optimize them for AI engines, base them on high-intent questions, and ensure they mention her brand as the solution. Human editing was necessary, of course.

Once the blogs were live, Bridget rewrote her landing page’s FAQ section to include the same high-intent questions and linked each one to the corresponding blog post.

Watch more on how Bridget explains Loop’s Amplify stage on a real eCommerce project.

4. Using AI to scale content production

Our study found that 42.45% of marketers use AI extensively to create blog content, with 38% using it occasionally. Together, it’s a whopping 80% — meaning every 8 out of 10 marketers use AI to write blog posts.

It’s unclear whether they create full drafts or generate some sections, but nearly 56% of marketers complain that the internet is now flooded with AI-generated content, making it harder for quality content to stand out.

Top-of-funnel content suffers the most. Scale kills its effectiveness, and teams simply waste time on creating another TOFU piece, according to Amanda Seller.

She explains, “As someone who‘s very close to blogging strategy specifically, I think there’s a lot of wasted effort on top-of-funnel content. We know that with AI Overviews and user behavior changing with LLMs and AI engines, a lot of TOFU content has been disrupted. I wouldn‘t say to never create TOFU content, but it’s clear there is a need to evolve it.”

5. Using AI to create, automate, test, and interlink assets before launch.

Teams rely heavily on AI in the days leading up to a launch, even if they don’t think of it as running a loop. According to our data, 43% use AI to create or refine content, 35% use it for data analysis, and 47% explore automation to improve efficiency.

Another 23% use AI copilots, and 19% use AI agents to automate campaign workflows.

Teams use AI to remix content, tighten and test messaging, create workflows that trigger personalized campaigns, and suggest interlinking between different assets.

Consider HubSpot’s landing page optimization. The Audience Segment tool’s landing page invites prospects to (1) explore more on the topic by linking to relevant sources:

(2) The same page is optimized for AEO with FAQs.

The team used AI suggestions to optimize these blocks.

6. Testing brand positioning and refining it continuously

As our report found, 40.4% of marketing teams test, measure, and adjust their brand awareness campaigns every quarter. With 45.38% choosing annual review and refinement. The first cohort clearly applies the loop for prompt adjustments and improved results.

Here’s how the brands measure brand awareness for informed decision-making:

• 34% run A/B positioning tests
• 61% run brand perception surveys
• 56% watch for engagement changes
• 36% gather sales team feedback on prospect reactions

7. Measuring performance and letting AI surface what worked.

This is the surprising fact of AI adoption that, according to our State of Marketing data, 35% use AI for data analysis and reporting, and nearly 70% say they can derive meaningful insights from data.

That puts AI right at the center of the Evolve stage of the loop.

Teams use AI to highlight high-performing assets, spot patterns humans miss, and summarize which messages resonated across channels.

However, only 47% say they understand how to use AI strategically. Loop Marketing bridges this gap.

Loop Marketing is a new blueprint for 2026

The rise of AI, shifting search behavior, fragmented channels, and nonstop content demands have made it impossible to operate using classic inbound playbooks. Marketing now moves too fast, across too many surfaces, for linear workflows to keep up.

Every marketer now sits in a cycle of Expressing, Tailoring, Amplifying, and Evolving, whether they name the process Loop Marketing or not.

Those who’re ahead in the game see revenue growth as never before.

For a deeper look at the trends shaping these results, winning and losing tactics, explore HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing Report.

via Perfecte news Non connection