21 Jan, 2026

AI Didn’t Disrupt Work. It Revealed What Matters.

Signals by Deborah Malone — helping leaders make sense of what’s changing, and what endures. Artificial intelligence is no longer hovering at the edges of marketing and advertising. It is moving from tool to infrastructure — embedded in how campaigns are planned, media is optimized, content is produced, and customer interactions are managed. That shift […]

7 mins read

The Hidden Engines of Ad Growth: Why Advertising Is Outpacing Consumer Spending

Five forces quietly reshaping the ad market, according to Madison & Wall. For decades, advertising growth has tracked closely with consumer spending. The logic is straightforward: marketers invest to influence demand, so ad budgets rise and fall with consumption. But over the past several years, that relationship has fractured. Advertising revenues have grown significantly faster […]

6 mins read

Marketing in 2026: From Prediction to Reckoning

What marketers are questioning, reconsidering, and re-prioritizing as the year begins. For much of the past decade, marketing has been driven by anticipation. What’s next.What’s coming.What will change everything. As 2026 approaches, that posture is giving way to something quieter—and far more consequential. Across industry reports, cultural analysis, and conversations with senior marketers worldwide, a […]

5 mins read

SIGNALS FROM THE SEASON

What Christmas Revealed About Trust, Humanity, and Marketing As the holiday season fades and marketers begin shaping the year ahead, a few Christmas campaigns linger — not because they “won” the season, but because of how audiences reacted to them. These questions build directly on themes we explored earlier this season in our holiday advertising […]

5 mins read

Defying Drift: Why Deloitte’s Geoff Tuff and Steven Goldbach Say Leaders Must Hone, Not Transform

The authors of HONE explain how purposeful refinement—not constant reinvention—helps marketers sustain clarity, relevance, and organizational momentum amid exponential change. For years, business leaders—and marketers in particular—have been urged to disrupt, reinvent, and transform. But according to Geoff Tuff and Steven Goldbach, Principals at Deloitte and authors of HONE: How Purposeful Leaders Defy Drift, that […]

4 mins read

LondonAI and the New Advertising Equation

How Michael Moszynski Wants to Redefine Creativity, Value, and Human Intelligence in an AI-Driven Era … When LondonAI launched, it didn’t introduce itself with glossy promises of transformation, magical savings, or instant innovation. Instead, it opened with a campaign showing all the things AI simply can’t do. It was witty, slightly irreverent, and intentionally sobering. […]

8 mins read

GEN MORE+ Signals: How Multigenerational Marketing Is Becoming a Brand Advantage

From Martha Stewart for American Eagle to Gwyneth Paltrow and Apple Martin for Gap to Coach’s cross-age resurgence, brands are learning that the strongest growth comes from connecting generations—not dividing them. Marketers have spent the better part of a decade fixating on generational labels—Millennials, Gen Z, Gen Alpha. Yet the most resonant campaigns of 2025 […]

6 mins read

From Puppets to Vinyl to Dogs: A Holiday Marketing Spirit That Signals a Bigger Shift

Why 2025’s joyful, imperfect holiday ads may be previewing marketing’s next big chapter. Holiday advertising always offers spectacle and sentiment, but 2025 may be remembered as the year marketers collectively embraced imperfection—leaning into instinct, nostalgia, and unpolished humanity to cut through the noise of an AI-saturated world. A Dog With a GoPro Steals the Season […]

5 mins read

Political Ad Rules Need Urgent Reform

Commentary from the European Association of Communications Agencies (EACA). Editor’s Note:As election activity accelerates across Europe and beyond, the unintended consequences of new political transparency rules are becoming a global concern. What begins as regional policy often signals broader shifts in how platforms, agencies, and marketers must operate—particularly when major players like Google and Meta […]

7 mins read

When Media Becomes the Mirror: Tim Love and Richard Gephardt on Truth, Trust, and the Digital Age

In an age when technology reflects as much as it informs, The Medium is the Mirror challenges us to confront one of the most pressing issues of our time—how we see, share, and believe in truth. The new book by Tim Love, former Vice Chairman of Omnicom Group, expands on Marshall McLuhan’s prophetic insight that […]

7 mins read