🍒 What’s Next? 2026 Marketing Trends with Amanda Laird

Amelia HrubyWelcome to off the grid, a podcast for small business owners who want to leave social media without losing all their clients. Hello, and welcome to Off the Grid. I'm your host, Amelia Hruby. And this week, I've been sharing your twenty twenty six creative marketing toolkit. So far, we talked about SEO, AI, blogging, email marketing, newsletters, local events, low key networking, and much, much more.

And today, I am here for the grand finale of this series, which is a conversation with my dear friend and colleague, Amanda Laird, sharing our predictions for 2026 marketing trends. We did this at the beginning of last year, and it was a fan favorite episode. So at the end of last year, we actually listened to back and asked ourselves, did our predictions come true? And some of them did, some of them not so much. Some of them are continuing this year.

But we are back today with a fresh set of predictions for creative marketing and online business in 2026. Before we get into that conversation, if you want to explore all of the episodes from this series, if you want to find your entire 2026 creative marketing toolkit in one place, I have collected these episodes at offthegrid.fun/2020six. Again, that's offthegrid.fun/202six, which you can also find linked in the show notes. On that page, you will see the five episodes in the toolkit as well as some free resources, some bonus playlists, and other goodies that I've gathered there for you. So I hope you will head to the show notes and check it out.

I also wanted to give you a final friendly reminder that doors to the Interweb are currently open and closing very soon. The Interweb is our annual membership for creatives, artists, freelancers, and small business owners who want support connecting with their values, sharing their work, and making money online without social media. If you want to join, doors are open through the end of the weekend, and then they close again until the spring. So if you're interested, you can head to the show notes to grab all the info and to join us for 2026. I would love to be behind the scenes in your business with you this year, and the only way to make that happen is honestly to join the interweb.

That's where I work with listeners, fans of the show, creators of all kinds, and it's really my favorite place on the Internet. So head to the show notes, get more info. And while you do that, let me tell you about today's guest. Amanda Laird is a growth marketing strategist at Slow and Steady Studio, where she supports creative small business owners who want a more thoughtful, values aligned approach to growth. She is the host of the personal business podcast and is also the author of Breaking the Curse of Menstruation, published by Dunderne Press and nominated for a COBO Emerging Writers Prize for nonfiction.

Hi, Amanda. Welcome back to the show.

Amanda LairdHappy New Year, Amelia.

Amelia HrubyThanks for having me. I wanted to invite you to open us with a prediction from a report you found that kind of sets the scene of what we think might happen in 2026. Could you take us in and tell us about this report and maybe read us a little bit of it?

Amanda LairdSo when I started thinking about trends and I was doing my research, I came across this report from trends forecasting think tank called WGSN. And every year, they put out their future consumer forecast. And I think this is a good place for us to kind of start our conversation because when we're thinking about marketing, you know, we're trying to sell things to consumers. And so starting with an understanding of what your consumer might be experiencing, where they are, what's happening in the economy from their perspective, is always a good place to start. So here's kind of a little summary of what WGSN had to say about consumers in 2026.

So it identified different shopper profiles, but one through line was fatigue. Right? So consumers are burnt out by relentless messaging. They're tired of being sold to, and heading into this new year, they're ready to recalibrate how they live and buy. They're craving simplicity, authenticity, connection, transparency, and joy.

Some are moving offline, and others are searching for a more human online experience. I mean, who could say it better?

Amelia HrubyYeah. That does feel like it pretty much sums up about every trend I'm seeing on the Internet and and in online business right now.

Amanda LairdAnd, like, my personal experience. Right?

Amelia HrubySame. So building out of that, I feel like the conversation that you and I have been having and has honestly just been coming up over and over again already this year is all about trust. I think that as consumers, audience members, users, people on the Internet are tired of being sold to, of feeling lied to by whether it be, you know, in The US, our government, or just like general sort of AI slop and scammers that are floating around. People have, I think, lost some faith, lost some trust, and lost some excitement and joy in the things they used to do online and offline. But it means they're really, like, seeking more of that away from the Internet, which poses an interesting challenge and opportunity for those of us who primarily share and sell our work online.

Amanda LairdAnd, you know, I don't have it in front of me, but there's a global PR firm, Edelman, puts out a trust index every year. And it's funny because I started reading this trust index when I was like a baby PR person. So like many many many many years ago. And every single trust index report that I have ever read from the start of my career has been that trust has been declining. Right?

And so this isn't something that is necessarily new or exclusive to 2025 or coming into 2026. Like, trust has been in decline, like trust in our institutions, trust in corporations, trust in government since the turn of the century, The millennium as they say.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I mean, it really does, in that sense, feel like the more we've been online, the more trust has plummeted. Obviously, that's correlation, not causation that I'm tracking there, but still, there is this sort of shift around that millennium moment that you're describing with the Internet and with trust. For me personally, as I'm thinking about, like, trust,

Amanda LairdI don't know that it's necessarily about, like, bouncing back and regaining that same level of trust or trust in that same way. I feel like this moment is kind of calling us to build a new relationship with trust and with these things. Right? And to navigate something new.

Amelia HrubyYou know, there's a certain way where I think we've all had to confront our personal efficacy versus the state of the world in the past few years. And there's only so much we can do, and we have to work with the state of things, with the fatigue of our communities rather than against it. And so I think this year, a lot of building trust is about, like, working collaboratively with what's happening around us and finding ways to keep going or to, like, quit business as usual because things aren't as usual. So let's talk about the trends that we're forecasting this year, which do all relate to this idea of trust. But our first trend that I think you have kind of called for us, Amanda, is that we are going to see more building in public and more online vulnerability again for the first time.

Tell us a little bit about how you're seeing this manifest in 2026.

Amanda LairdAnd, I mean, I think that this is one of those carryover trends too, because certainly, this was a big thing in the online business world. And like, hey, I made a whole last podcast called personal business, where I spent three months, like, auditing my own business and crying on my podcast about, oh my god, my business is hard. Not working the way that I want. Right? And so definitely not something that is brand new.

But, you know, this idea of being more open, more vulnerable, kind of peeling back the onion, showing people behind the scenes. Right? I'm seeing a lot of, you know, people who are saying, like, I'm launching a new brand. I'm launching a new business. Like, come along with me.

You know, I think one of that's really popular on TikTok. I think it's like butter girl or something like that where she's like launching this new butter brand and she's like behind the scenes about it. Right? And I think we're just gonna see more people kind of stating their goals and showing them how they're going to do it and kind of reporting on here's how the launch went. Here's what I'm building.

And like, certainly, this is also not like brand new. Right? You know, we now exist on an internet where like literally anything can be faked. And so building in public and being vulnerable and kind of showing that behind the scenes is one way to kind of prove our humanness or to, like, demonstrate our humanity. Because what AI doesn't have is emotions.

Right? And so by building in public and being open by crying on the podcast mic. Right? Like, that is one way that we can say, I'm a real person. You can trust me.

Amelia HrubyI'm really curious to see if we do, like, go back to some of what I associate with, like, early Instagram days of, like, vulnerability posting of people crying in their feed. I just feel like that was a moment, and then it sort of became this performance of vulnerability, and people were over it. But I think we're gonna circle back to it in that same way this year for the reasons you're describing. It's like in this era when anything can be immediately polished by AI, there is something that feels more human and therefore perhaps more trustworthy in a sort of like unpolished presentation. In the same way, think we're gonna get more day in the life.

That's been such a trend. I think that's gonna keep happening. I think this is why get ready with me posts are so popular because instead of just showing the final polished product, people are showing, like, literally a before and after of their face. Like, they're taking you along the journey of, you know, putting their face on for the day, which is something I don't do, but I am familiar with the trend. And I think that we're gonna see that also, like, for businesses.

Right? It's like, how do you sit down to work in the morning? What are the first things you do? What's happening as you build a new business or a product or an offering? Again, I remember in the earlier days of Twitter how many founders would build in public there.

Amanda LairdYes.

Amelia HrubySo as we're talking about this, I'm like, oh, interesting. This also follows the trend of, like, old Internet is new Internet again. Like, these things we were seeing in, you know, 2012 happening on Instagram or Twitter, I think you're just gonna come back in popularity as ways of like being more human online.

Amanda LairdAbsolutely. I am here for realness, but also, my god, when I just see like Jen Alpha making TikToks from their messy bedrooms or like their bathroom, like put the toilet seat down. Like, that I am just like, I can't believe that you are putting that on the internet. That's my limit. I'm not that real.

Amelia HrubyI do think that this trend also sort of like there's some friction with this and another trend that I wrote about in a recent post in the Off the Grid Clubhouse talking about how we're gonna see an increase in the desire for privacy. Because I do think that, like, being offline is gonna become a sort of new status symbol. It already has been. As well as, like, I think people are realizing how deep the surveillance online goes. And we've seen in The US the very real political ramifications of that, right, especially with ICE presence in different places across The US, especially with the increased surveillance around immigration.

Like, what you put online it used to be that, like, the sort of language around this was like, don't put it online because your future employer could find it. Now it's like, don't put it online because literally the US government is looking at it and flagging it as, like, potential terrorist action. Like, it's really become so clear politically how online surveillance works that I think privacy is becoming more important. And that does sort of rub up against this, like, but yet we're building in public, but yet we're streaming from our messy bedrooms, but yet there's this sort of desire to show more of ourselves to prove that we're human, but also need to protect more of ourselves so things stay private and can't be surveilled online. And I'm intrigued to see how this plays out.

Amanda LairdYeah. That's an excellent point. I mean, up here in Canada, I'm just like thinking about leaving typos in my marketing emails. Right? Not that things are perfect and and, you know, altogether rosy.

But, yeah, that that need for privacy and around surveillance, even corporations surveil you, right, through your through your data. You know, an interesting thing, and this was something that kind of sparked my thoughts on this yesterday, was just over the weekend, there was this AI fabricated hoax that kind of popped up on Reddit, where somebody had posted on a Reddit community that they worked for a food delivery company, and they were blowing the whistle because they were getting ready to leave. And this company, which was unnamed, but I think we can like guess who was implied, had this like algorithm that they called like, a desperation score, where it was like, oh, if somebody, you know, logs on at 10PM and accepts multiple delivery jobs that are only, like, three dollars, then we're going to give them a desperation score, and then we're not gonna give them higher value jobs because why would we when clearly they're so desperate they're gonna do this for $3 anyways? And then, you know, and, like, an actual journalist did kind of reach out to this person and or this poster, and they sent them, like, an 18 page document that was, like, tech specs and all of this stuff.

And as it turned out, all of this was, like, fabricated by AI. Right? And in the supposedly leaked planning document, it was just like outrageous stuff. Right? Like, oh, we're also going to integrate with a Apple Watch so that we can, like, tell people's, like, heart rate and, like, stress level, and we're gonna use the microphone so if they're, like, crying in their car.

Right? And that sounds so outrageous, but also not. And that's the reason why we can get, like, hooked in to this stuff that, like, feels totally outrageous, but also, I wouldn't doubt for a second that a food delivery company would use like a desperation score in their algorithm. Right? Or that a company is listening to me and surveilling me and making sales and marketing decisions based on if they can hear me, like, crying in my car.

You know?

Amelia HrubyYeah. The way cars have become surveillance mechanisms is a whole other podcast conversation in all of the tech that's built into vehicles now and the data they collect on you, especially if you buy a newer car. So much there. But I think it really does just point to, again, the sort of like friction that I'm pulling out of like, there's gonna be an increased desire for privacy, and also, we need to build trust. And one thing that builds trust is sharing our lives and working in public in these ways.

And so that will be something I think that more and more of us are navigating is like, how do we build in public? How do we be vulnerable online without just like handing ourselves and our businesses over to big tech surveillance. And I think that some of the ways this will manifest is like, I think that we're gonna see small business owners put more and more behind a paywall. I think more and more offerings are gonna be sold only to people who bought something before. You know, these are strategies people have been sharing on the podcast.

I talked to Sarah Gonestein of the Moon Studio about this. I've talked to Jen Carrington about this, that the more pressure there is to be public on the Internet and the more fearful we become of how that information might be used against us, the more we, like, pull back. But then how do we create trust? What is the way that we're being out there? I heard you mention typos.

Do you have a typo strategy for 2026? Give me that. What is that?

Amanda LairdYou know, I have just lowered my own bar. I don't know that this is so much a a marketing strategy as it is perimenopause strategy. And I have noticed an uptick in my typos in my emails. And like, there was a time where I just would have gone right into the, like, shame spiral about that, or like, really built guardrails into like proofreading and editing and things like that. And I just also feel like I'm like, you know what?

I'm leaving the typos in because that's how you know. That's how you know that I'm human. And you know, back to that Reddit hoax briefly, that was actually one of the tells that the Reddit community started to identify, where they were like, this original post was perfect polish. And now the replies in the threads had many more typos and, you know, incorrect grammar and things like that. And that's where was like something that people were using to kind of like sniff out this like fake AI stuff.

And so yeah. So when you're reading so and so emails this year, there might be a couple typos because I just am lowering my bar.

Amelia HrubyI find that really interesting about the Reddit post because I think what that points to is that it's more about like consistently showing up as yourself than it perhaps is about whether you have typos or not. It's like whatever bar you set for yourself in public, that's the one you get to meet. That's the one you get to continue living into and through. And so if part of your brand is to be polished and, quote, unquote, professional in these ways, and that's something you're comfortable with, and you wanna continue, you know, living up to that, I think we're gonna see a lot of actually, like, professional masking as a way of being more private. It's like this is my professional persona, and that is who I am when I'm on LinkedIn, and that's the sort of brand I have.

At the same time, you can also lower your bar and be like, I'm just a human. I may I have typos sometimes, whatever, and that's how you send it. And I think that will also work if there's that consistency. I think that's what's gonna start to get really weird for people is like, your whole public persona is super professional, and then I email you and it feels super different or like a totally different person, that definitely eats away at trust or loses the trust of your audience.

Amanda LairdAnd also, I think that there is, like, a fine line too between, like, a little rough around the edges. Right? And like a sloppy mess.

Amelia HrubyYeah. There's a difference between like making the video in your office and making it in your bathroom, a full view of the inside of the toilet. Yeah. I think you're right. And and honestly, though, like, that is also a fine line that, like, you have to decide and you have to co create with your audience.

Right? Like, some people will never ever ever watch a video made in the bathroom. But to think of it even in email form, right, like, if you want to, like, late night screed all of your emails and they're just coming out, no paragraph, stream of consciousness, whatever, some people will love that. Other people will never ever read it. And so you get to decide, I think, what is your style, what feels true and possible for you, and then you have to go find the people who also vibe with that, who that resonates with.

And some people, it's gonna be a more professional polished style. Other people, it's gonna be a messier, more human style. You can actually be vulnerable in both ways. I think that there is a way that you can be like stylistically more human, but also I think there's just it's about like the content, what you're sharing, how you're showing up.

Amanda LairdAnd delivery. Like, I don't think that like messy is appropriate for delivery. You know? Because if you are super polished, and then I buy your thing and it is the delivery is a hot mess, that's actually not going to keep my trust.

Amelia HrubyRight? Totally.

Amanda LairdAnd I think also that it goes the other way. That's like, okay. If you're marketing and your, like, relationship building and that, like, you're taking this kind of authentic vulnerable tack, right, for your marketing, I still think that on the other side, your delivery has to be seamless and delightful in order to maintain that because you have to go all the way with your trust now.

Amelia HrubyWhat I'm hearing from this trend as we've talked about it is that like building in public and online vulnerability is going to come back in 2026. It's already coming back. That's gonna continue, we think. And what that's gonna look like for many of us is like lowering the bar so that we can more consistently reach it, letting the typos go so that we can literally just be human in our businesses and not try to live up to this like polished level that AI is producing at. I think it's also then gonna look like though making sure that there's a consistency between the sort of, like, public persona of our business and the behind the scenes activity of our business.

If somebody's on the outside versus the inside, that all feels consistent and congruent. And that type of congruency, in my experience, is the thing that builds trust. And I mean, it's how I build trust with other people. It's how people build trust with off the grid. Like, I'm gonna sound the same whether it's on the podcast, in an email, on a call, in my membership, in a one on one coaching.

And that is both so liberating to let yourself be that way, and it's also a skill to cultivate.

Amanda LairdFor sure.

Amelia HrubySo let's move to our second trend, which is like literally the opposite of what I just said. So one way to build trust is, I believe, through congruency and consistency. That's a way that we both build trust and a way that we, like, prove that we're human and not AI. But you came up with another way that we prove that we are human and not just AI in our businesses. So can you talk about the second trend?

Amanda LairdYou know, I think we're at this point where we're kind of like throwing up our hands. The odds just feel stacked against us. Right? And this goes back to finding this new way that we were talking about earlier, which is like, alright. Well, if I'm never gonna win at the algorithm, then who the fuck cares what I do?

And so I think we're gonna see some people, like, leaning into a little bit of, like, YOLO energy or more of, like, chaotic marketing, where it's like, the email goes out when I feel like it, you know? Or I'm just gonna post what I want when I want to, and if it lands, it lands, and if it doesn't, it doesn't. Right? And I think another angle to this kind of chaotic marketing too is, like, one of the things that has really changed in how we use social media in the last couple of years is that no matter which app you're using, it's much more entertainment focused. Where it's like, if I'm going online, if I have five, ten minutes, however long it is, like, I also wanna be entertained, and it has to be interesting, and so and we've seen lots of big brands do things like this, right, where it's just like, they're just doing like crazy things that seems to like not relate to their business at all.

Amelia HrubyYeah. It's more like guerilla marketing. It's like a viral stunt marketing. Yeah.

Amanda LairdYeah. Exactly. And like, you know, things trickle down. And so now I think we're gonna start to see maybe some more creative small business owners kind of leaning into that talk, kind of taking a more chaotic approach, just doing crazy things like, you know, the way that you put it was like AI would never, right? And so what might that look like?

Amelia HrubyYeah. I think that there's gonna be a lot of fuck around and find out energy in the marketing space in 2026 because 2025 was definitely a year when so many of the best practices just crumbled. Many of the tactics we used to rely on just kind of didn't work. And so there are some people stepping in to say like, these are the things that will work now, but I just don't think we know yet. I don't know if we're ever gonna get back to a point where things work consistently and clearly because there's no more monoculture even on the Internet, and so I think that we're gonna be in a world where the only way to figure out what works is just to try it, and what works for you is not gonna work for other people.

So it has to be things that you try. And that definitely to me leads to this kind of YOLO energy in our marketing. Now something that's interesting here is, like, how to create trust with a chaotic marketing style. And

Amanda Lairdthere's a part

Amelia Hrubyof me that's like that's like inherently contradictory, but I don't I don't actually think it is. Something I said in my three email rules episode in this series is that as long as you are always showing up with value, and you're always showing up with your audience in mind, I think that you will be like embraced, accepted, and people will be excited that you're there. And so when we say chaotic marketing, we do not mean like steamroll your audience, disregard their feelings. We don't mean spam their inboxes. We don't mean do things that are icky, sticky, harmful in the space.

What we mean is, like, throw the weekly newsletters out the window. This is something I said in my my email episode. If you've been sending a weekly newsletter and you're like, why? Stop. Send six emails in ten days and then none for twenty five days.

Like, try different things. But when you do try those things, be clear about what you're doing, be kind to your audience members, and provide value and have fun. Like, that's how I think chaotic marketing or YOLO energy can work. What do you think about that?

Amanda LairdYes. I love this. There is no silver bullet. There is no secret magic formula. And there never actually really was.

I think more folks are recognizing that, you know, because we've all been burned. We've all bought the 10 step formula to 10 x our audience size revenue, whatever. And this is what I teach every single day at Sloan Steady, which is like, try it, did it work, what do we learn from that, try it again. Right? Or like try something else.

Amelia HrubyIt's an experimental iterative process. That's the only one there is.

Amanda LairdExactly. Exactly. And I'm gonna hold your hand through it all because it's very scary to do that, actually. It's very it's but also, that also goes back to trust. Right?

Where it's like, as business owners, we need to trust ourselves ourselves. And we need to trust when we get that ping or that pull. And maybe this is the kind of YOLO chaotic energy. When you have an idea that you're like, I don't know, I just wanna do this thing, like, try it. That's the kind of energy that we should be bringing because when nothing is certain, anything is possible.

Amelia HrubyYeah. As I'm hearing that, I think like two things are coming up for me. One is just like an emboldening permission slip yet again to just try the things. I do think that as creative business owners, one of our jobs is to stoke those sparks within us and to say yes to the ones that we can. And then I'm also thinking of the type of listener that I hear from often, where like, they have tried a lot of things and nothing has worked.

And that's where I think, like, I mean, so many of us have been in that place in the past few years. And what I would say there is like, for me, when I'm like really at the bottom, scraping the barrel of self trust and there's like nothing left, it's just self doubt everywhere. Like, that is actually where I go back to like the small consistent steps. When I'm in that place, I'm not acting out of YOLO energy because it so quickly becomes desperation energy. I'm actually acting out of like, alright, I can send a weekly email from here.

I'm just gonna go back to a basic. I'm just gonna do a small consistent thing. And through consistency, I can always rebuild my self trust. And then that's when I take those bigger swings. That's when I can get a little more all over the place again.

But I find that, you know, as we've been talking about, like, there are different times for these different energies. There are different ways to build trust. There are different types of audiences that are gonna vibe with different strategies more. But I just wanted to kind of speak to that person who maybe feels like I did a lot of YOLO stuff over the past twelve months, none of it seemed to really work. And for me, that's when you kinda go back to what are your foundations?

What are you building on?

Amanda LairdAnd I also think that your stage and phase of your business is also important. Right? So when people come to me with like brand new baby businesses, and they say, what should my marketing strategy be? I say, it's fuck around and find out. You have to spend a year trying a lot of stuff.

And then once you have tried some stuff because I also question when if somebody is like, well, I've tried a lot of stuff and nothing worked. I would say, really?

Amelia HrubyI always wanna know how long you tried it for.

Amanda LairdHow long did you try? And also, what do you mean did it work? Right? Like, are you telling me that, well, I I sent a weekly newsletter and I did not book out my membership or I did not book out my clients. Right?

And I would say, okay. Did you sell to them? You sent a weekly newsletter, but did you actually plan for sales and run a sales campaign and, like, actually market all the way through your funnel to actually bring people into sales. And so I talk to small business owners every day who tell me that their marketing doesn't work. And then when I look at it, I'm like, well, some things are working.

It's just that we're not clear on goals. Right? And we're not clear on what exactly we're trying to do. And I think when you are first starting out and you're first building your business, like, can't out strategize your way out of that throwing spaghetti at the wall, trying it this way, trying it that way, doing this, seeing what's gonna happen. And then once you have been around the block once or twice, right, once you've tried enough stuff and you kind of like have enough data from your experiments, then you can start to kind of lay the foundations.

Amelia HrubyI think there are just some different types of fucking around and finding out that we're laying out here. Like, in a certain sense, when you're just starting, you have to try a little bit of everything, see what works for you, see what works for the people you wanna work with. And there's a certain way where that is, like, fucking around and finding out. There's a certain way where that can feel a little chaotic because you might, like, start a podcast and abandon it because you don't like making it. You might, like, send emails and then realize you have to change your cadence three different times till you figure out what's going on.

Like, I think there is just, a chaos in figuring out what works. And that to me feels like the type of chaos that's probably happening when you are building in public. Like, you can combine these two trends there. But then I think there's another kind of fucking around and finding out that is more the, like, intentional selection of the chaotic marketing style perhaps, which is less like I'm just building so this is the only path for me at this stage. And more like I have built a foundation in my business.

Maybe I have some offerings. I know my website works for me. I've got a newsletter that people love. And then from that place, doing something different, interesting, out of the box, never before seen that becomes a fun experiment, and then maybe even a calling card. I think I'm just trying to get at this difference between, like, the beginner stage of fucking around and finding out where every single thing in your business is an experiment.

You have no clue if anything works, and so you gotta try it all. And then the further on in business stage, which is where I feel pretty lucky to be right now, where I know what works for me even in this time where it feels like nothing's working like it used to. I know that off the grid podcast works for me, but I can do some fun experiments. I can do something weird. I mean, in some senses, this five episodes in five days is a little bit of, like, chaos on the feed.

Right? Like, I don't normally do this. So I think that for listeners, it's really just about knowing what stage you're at in business. Of course, everything is always an experiment, but are you in the beginning stage where it's all spaghetti, it's all the wall? Or are you perhaps in a more advanced stage where you've already set the table?

The spaghetti is out there ready to be served, then you're gonna throw in a weird side dish, a weird sauce, a weird something else because you wanna lean into the YOLO energy of 2026. Hey there, lovely off the grid listener. We're taking a quick break from this episode because I want to make sure that you know that you can become an off the grid sponsor and share your work here on the podcast during a mid roll ad like this or in a pre roll ad that airs before every single episode on our feed. In past seasons of the show, I have shared some of my favorite affiliate partners. If you've heard the Flodesk ad, you know what that's all about.

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Okay. Enough about our sponsorship opportunities. Let's go ahead and dive back in to this episode. Okay. So to maybe summarize these first two trends, essentially, I think what we are talking about is that in 2026, we are going to see these different strategies for cultivating trust.

The first one we talked through was building in public, sharing vulnerably online, cultivating trust by kind of going back to old school authenticity. Trying to be authentic, that's going to be one way people cultivate trust. And with that, it's gonna be a lot about consistency and congruency. In a totally different way, people are gonna cultivate trust through this YOLO energy and chaotic marketing, and by just doing the things that, as we've said, AI would never. So if you are throwing the best practices out the window, doing stuff that you're like, okay, I everybody says this won't work.

Let me see if it will work for me. That's gonna be another way that we see people sort of do that in public, maneuver differently, and we're like, oh, interesting. I wanna see what that person's up to, and maybe I trust them because of that. So I really like these two, and I think people can like really sort of mix and remix them in interesting ways in any like channel strategy platform you're working with next year. You could find a way to utilize this trend.

Amanda LairdYes. I am nodding in agreement.

Amelia HrubySo the next three trends we have, I think, are actually a bit more like about topics or specific platforms that we kind of wanted to think about this year. So our third trend is that in 2026, all things offline and analog are going to be raved about again. I'm already seeing this with so many people on Substack or YouTube, which are kind of the only two platforms I'm ever really looking at, writing posts about how to build an analog art kit, how to set up your offline media library. I wrote about this a bit in my predictions post for the year. So I'm curious, Amanda, what are you seeing in terms of how offline and analog is showing up for creative small businesses?

Amanda LairdAs I'm thinking and planning, I'm very aware of, like, how do I do business in real life offline? I have been thinking, like, do I run like a like a cohort, an in person cohort of my small group program? If you're in Toronto, let me know if you would actually wanna do it in person. You know? And I think this is something we might see more of.

Right? Like, yes, the in person events. So networking, coworking meetups, which, you know, I I did a lot of that last year too. Right? Just working with other small business owners and finding ways to bring our business offline.

And that also might be something like a zine that gets mailed, or monthly mail subscriptions and things like that, you know? And I think we might see more of that this year.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I definitely think we're gonna see more of, like, the return to doing things by hand. So whether that be, like, sending the actual mail or putting a zine together, I think we're gonna see things that were digital for a while go back to being tactile. And I think we're gonna see that in some interesting ways. I think we're gonna see blends of in person of, like, online and offline.

So I think there will be virtual memberships who start having knitting circles. I think there will be some of that again, especially for folks like me who like I I will not be going to in person events. I don't live somewhere where happening. And that's just like my business is not going IRL at all. But I see ways that even though it will stay online, I might be pulling in more just like tactile handcrafted experiences.

Another trend that I see here that I have found so interesting is like within the sort of indie web world, there's all of this language now about handmade websites, which is like so interesting as someone with sort of a background in craft and, like, who loves the Internet. Like, I think what people mean by that is that, like, they've coded it or, like, they're creating it themselves. It's like a personal endeavor. It's not built on a Squarespace or sometimes it is on WordPress, but more hand coded there. And I think that we're gonna see a rise in that as well.

Amanda LairdAre we going back to building frames in the in notepad? I mean, that's how I built Amanda's page of stuff in 1997.

Amelia HrubySo My gosh. That's fun. I was definitely an angel fire GeoCities person. I don't think that businesses at large are gonna go back to that, quite honestly, because you can't process payments on a handmade website. Let's be honest.

I am not a lawyer, but I would just not legally recommend that with all of the privacy regulations globally. But I think we're gonna see more creative business owners start to spin up sort of like offline analog personal brands or personal projects to sort of go alongside or separate from their business. Because I'm hearing from a lot of clients and interweb members that, like, they want that sense of, like, tactile creativity back. They're tired of pouring all of their creative energy into their online business.

Amanda LairdYeah. I definitely hear that. And, you know, I think crafts are also, like, making comeback. Not that I think they ever went away, but, like, I am a crafter. I mean, this morning, I actually spent some time reorganizing my craft inspo Pinterest board because it is now at a point where I have to kind of group it by topic and interest.

Right? Because it's like embroidery, it's felt, it's crochet, it's, you know, literally every hobby I have it. And, you know, I have always tried to maintain kind of an offline creative practice because I see how that energizes my creative business. And I think making something literally with your own two hands, I I could never. Right?

And so there's something to that.

Amelia HrubyYeah. And I think where this becomes a marketing trend is that like many of us have these personal practices, but I think that this year, our communities and audiences are gonna be more interested in hearing about them than they have been before. And so that means it's on each of us to decide if we are willing to pull that personal practice into our brand or our business or not. And I think that's gonna be an important decision to make. But I definitely think there's a way where, like, two years ago, if some online business creator I followed had written to me about their knitting, I would have been like, why are you telling me about this?

And I think in 2026, I'll be like, tell me more. I think this is where, again, it gets back to that, like, what's the purpose of a trend? You know, I'm not saying people need to, like, hop on trends, but I think trends provide opportunities for resonance in moments when otherwise that may not have happened. So, like, if people are primed to want to hear about your crafts, then that's probably gonna resonate a little more than if you're just trying to tell them about your craft when that's sort of something that you haven't brought into the conversation before.

Amanda LairdI also can see this handmade trend kind of coming in in a bit of a different way too around, like, visuals. Right? Mhmm. And thinking about, like, aesthetics, and, your brand identity, and what it looks like. And, you know, certainly, as, you know, I was a a nineties Riot Grrrl zine kind of girly, and so I love the kind of cut and paste look, and so I have like, you know, little stickers and things.

And I love like the Channy app and how it's got that kind of like collage. Right? I think we might also kind of see some of that handmade and some of that like crafty element coming into our brand identities as well. I always talk about Julia Tershin, the recipe developer, cookbook writer. She has a great substack called Keep Calm and Cook On, which I just love.

And, you know, for many, many years now, her kind of brand identity is literally just her writing with a Sharpie on a white piece of paper and taking a picture of it, and that is the podcast cover or and it even, like, made its way into her last cookbook. Right? And I think that literally handwritten, handmade kind of aesthetic will also I think we're gonna see a little bit more of that too.

Amelia HrubyI feel like once again, it's just like the 2013 Internet's coming back.

Amanda LairdOh, 100%. You know what? That goes well beyond 2013. Right? I mean, I have been making websites since the late nineties, and I have literally used, like, graph paper as, like, a part of my aesthetic in, like, those websites I used to design back in the nineties when I was, like, hand coding in notepad and things like that, you know, a little like ripped piece of newspaper in the corner.

And that's I mean, if you go to Slow and Steady, you'll see lots of that on my current website too. Like, I just love it. Yeah. I just love it.

Amelia HrubyYeah. Okay. So speaking of old things becoming new again, we also have a platform to watch on our list of trends this year. And this is something we talked about in our recap episode at the 2025. But do you wanna talk a little bit about Patreon and why you are calling that our platform to watch for the year ahead?

Amanda LairdYou know, something that we noticed kind of towards the end of the summer was some big Substack creators leaving Substack for Patreon. And it's also very obvious by their marketing that Patreon is really investing in kind of positioning themselves as an alternative to Substack for creators. Like, they had billboards in Times Square talking about, you know, we've got newsletters now. I was really, really, really intrigued to see, you know, a couple big Substack writers that I followed, like Virginia Soul Smith and and Helen Peterson in particular that I followed on Substack for a long I I think Burnt Toast was the first Substack maybe that I subscribed to many many years ago. And to see them leave, like, was big.

And, I mean, I think if you asked Patreon that they would agree with us that they are the platform to watch in 2026. But I guess the big question too is, like, will it be successful? And, you know, I will say so those two big creators that I've had followed on Substack, they all moved over to Patreon. I took them up on their offer for a free month of, premium membership or whatever. And I actually even paid for Big Undies for a couple of months too after they moved.

I have unsubscribed from all of those. And maybe I am just like an old dog who cannot be taught new tricks in 2026. But it's just not it's not the same. It is not the same.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I mean, one piece of this conversation that I think we've said before, but you didn't bring in this time that I do think is important is that, like, people are leaving Substack, and they're saying explicitly that they're leaving because of the values misalignment issues. So they're saying, like, Substack is platforming Nazis. It's platforming white supremacists. We're seeing, like, an influx of misinformation and really problematic creators here, And so therefore, we are leaving.

That's some of what these creators are saying or the gist of it.

Amanda LairdAnd also that, like, Substack is stealing my audience. And

Amelia Hrubythe platform is and we are noticing. And so there have also been many big creators who've talked about how, like, their growth has slowed down so much. Substack is not bringing them subscribers the way it used to. Like, we are quite literally seeing Cory Doctorowes and Chitification process happen on Substack. And so these creators have left and gone to Patreon.

And, you know, on the homepage of Patreon right now, like, what it says is your newsletter, your rules is the first header, like above the fold part of that page. And so Patreon is definitely trying to position itself as the I'm thinking of it as kind of like the alt substack, although it wants to be even more mainstream. It doesn't really wanna stay alt anymore. And Patreon has been around for a long time, I believe, longer than Substack. I've been aware of it for much longer than I've been aware of Substack, largely because it's a place that many podcasters have, you know, gathered their communities for a long, long time.

And for me, Patreon is definitely the platform I will be watching next year. But my big question for them is like, can they find their footing? Because I feel like what's happening right there right now is they're just trying to become the place for everybody to share everything, and I'm not enjoying that from any of the creators that I'm even paying to subscribe for.

Amanda LairdInteresting. I was not enthusiastic about people who moved. Like I said, those creators that I'd followed for a long time, like, I ended up unsubscribing. I just did not like the format. Couldn't find my way around.

Now, I recently subscribed to new Patreon, however. And this is also something I've been noticing is there have been a couple of people, or like in particular, there's this one artist that I follow on Instagram, but I think she's technically bigger on TikTok, and she does like drawing tutorials, and she just started a Patreon. Which is interesting because I feel like one or two years ago, she probably would have started a Substack. And then I just subscribed to another Patreon, which has been around for a while, But this is like my first time kind of like paying for this creator's work and interacting with this creator. And because this is like where I'm meeting them for the first time, I'm like, okay, yeah, I get this.

Like, makes sense.

Amelia HrubyI think what you're describing in your personal experience is just that, like, switching costs are high. And I think that that's why it is important to be intentional on where you set up these sort of gathering places in your business. Because this sort of interface switch from Substack to Patreon, it feels super different. And, you know, I experienced this personally not in this space, but, when I left Spotify and started using Apple Music. I was like, what is this?

I hate this. And then after I used Apple Music for a year, I've like started doing a few more things in Spotify again, and I'm like, oh, now I hate this interface. Now this makes no sense to me.

Amanda LairdOh my gosh. Humans, we are such creatures of habit.

Amelia HrubyExactly. And so I feel like that is a piece of it is like, if you are trying to create some kind of membership, listener supported, reader supported newsletter, podcast, whatever right now, be thoughtful of whether you're setting up in Patreon or Substack. Because I think it is hard to translate people over time, or you definitely just lose people in that process. But as we discussed before, like, four years ago, a bunch of Patreons moved to Substack, and now they're moving back to Patreon. And four years from now, they'll probably go somewhere else.

Like, this is part of the cycle.

Amanda LairdExactly. And like, I'm interested to see what happens with Patreon from like a business model perspective as well. Because this is also like the cycle of venture capital. Right? Where it is literally growth at all costs.

Like, highly recommend watching the that fictionalized Uber TV show that was on a couple of years ago that will, like, I don't know how real it is, but it's definitely believable. That shows, you know, how Uber was trying to grow at all costs. Right? We just need to get users. We need to hook people in.

We need to get them to rely on us. We're gonna give free rides. We're gonna give free vouchers. And, like, that's the same thing that we see with Substack. Right?

Like, when Substack was emerging, it was in their best interest to prioritize organic traffic. Right? We saw this with Instagram in the olden days when you could go on Instagram, throw up a hashtag, a single hashtag, and grow your following. Right? And that's because it was in the platform's best interest to prioritize your organic growth because then you're going to become invested.

You're gonna be spending more time on the platform. It becomes part of your routine, yada yada yada. And then eventually, these tech companies have to start paying out their shareholders. Right? And so now they don't have to please you.

Right? You're hooked. Your business is built on this platform, and so they can and this is the engineification decline as well. Right? So now we don't have to be serving you a thousand new followers every month or whatever, and you're hooked.

So it'll be interesting to see, like, what happens with Patreon and with their business model. You know, I didn't look to see if they've received any investments or anything recently, or I don't even know what their ownership structure currently is because, you know, if they received, like, an injection in capital in order to fund this new market positioning and whatnot, Who knows? You know, this also, I think, relates back to what we're talking about with trust too, which is let us not trust the platforms. Like, let's just assume that when you are using platforms that your best interest is not really the tech companies.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I mean, my understanding of Patreon's ownership structure is that they have raised venture capital. They've done a number of those series of rounds. I'm don't think they have done like a specific one recently to raise money for these changes. But I also know that like one of the cofounders is still the CEO, so they have maintained that, like, line of leadership since their origins.

But I think all of your points still stand. It's like this is still a tech platform, and it is VC funded, and that means that it is just like in line for the engineification pipeline. And so I think that for me, when we say like Patreon is the company to watch or the platform to watch in the year ahead, I think the questions I'm asking are like, will they be able to become an exciting place for creators to be, and will they be able to stay true to this sort of promise that they will be creator first, and that they will have stronger moderation guidelines that keep these, like, bad actors off their platforms. And I still wanna know what they really mean by their Instagram bio, make art not content, because I feel like what Patreon is selling is the ability to make content about your art to make money. And so, you know, they're really presenting themselves as artists first, and I wanna believe in that, but I think I personally feel just a little too jaded by all the other platforms.

So I have like like, a squinty eye out at them all year.

Amanda LairdAlso, like, content can be art. If you've ever read The Artist's Way, you know that marketers are just shadow artists. Right? And, like, in the systems and in our culture, like, my skills and my creative aptitude comes out in marketing.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I mean, I definitely think, like, living under the constraints of capitalism, like, our work has to provide, like, value for an end user, and therefore, like, we have to, in a certain sense, make more content.

Amanda LairdI always just get my back up a little bit when people kind of like, are like, content, you know, because it's like, okay, like, don't be so rude. I have seen amazing content.

Amelia HrubyYeah. Absolutely. I think that everybody carries a different kind of wounding around this. Like, either you've been told you're not an artist because you're a content writer, and so you're like, but I make art. Or you've been told you're an artist and you can't make content, and you're like, of course I can make content.

Like, this all comes up for all of us. And I felt every way about this sort of argument, which is why I think it's bold of Patreon to put this as just like a quippy Instagram bio. But we have talked for quite a while now. We still have one more trend. So let's go to our last trend and wrap up our conversation.

I am very excited to hear from listeners what they think of all of these. But the final trend of the year is something you and I were just talking about kind of in these same conversations around time and value and what people are willing to pay for. So the way I've been thinking of this trend is that people are buying their time back in 2026, and something that you brought up is that you think that done for you offerings will be popular again kind of for this reason. So could you talk a little bit about that? Like, why do you think done for you is making a comeback?

Amanda LairdOkay. So I've seen a couple folks say, oh, I just did my year end for 2025, and I spent x amount of dollars on coaching or courses or, like, skill building. And in 2026, actually, I'm just gonna, like, hire somebody to do something for me. I'm gonna take that money and hire somebody to do it for me. And like, I think this also goes back to some of these other things that we talked about earlier too.

Right? It's like, how do I wanna be spending my time? Do I want to learn how to do every single function in operating a business? I mean, I think for people like you and I, the answer actually is yes.

Amelia HrubyYeah. We do. Right. But we're we're we're not the the typical. Exactly.

Amanda LairdExactly. And so people are thinking about, like, how do I wanna spend my time? Do I want to just be, like, investing in, like, business skills and learning how to do everything myself? Or, like, do I want to be learning how to crochet? Or do I wanna be offline touching grass or whatever?

And so also, we talked a little bit too about kind of buying stuff that wasn't that great, like courses, collecting digital dust, buying courses, never doing it, or buying programs or buying things that didn't deliver. Right? And, like, I'm also hoping that this, like, done for you resurgence could also be related. My hope is that we're, you know what? We're not deficient.

Right? And it's not just a matter of, like, we can't just, like, coach ourselves into, you know, being a better bookkeeper. I just need to manifest my way into

Amelia HrubyQuickBooks proficiency.

Amanda LairdYeah. Yeah. Exactly. You know, I'm just gonna hire the freaking bookkeeper. Right?

And so I hope that there's a little bit of of that too. And then I loved what your perspective on kind of buying your time back was too about, yeah, if I'm going to invest in something, then I'm I'm not just gonna buy a course that sits in my Notion dashboard. Right? Like, I want time to I want part of what I'm buying to be that structure and that time to actually do the thing.

Amelia HrubyYeah. Exactly. Like, I completely agree with you. I think we're gonna see more popularity of done for you offerings. For the people who can afford it next year, it's just like they wanna buy back that time.

They wanna be off their computer. They wanna be knitting, crafting, touching grass, all the things we've talked about. Going to in person events that are non business related. Like, people, I think, are gonna want to just pay somebody else to do things so they can do more of that. And also, I think a lot of businesses are coming into this year without funds for that.

Like, they're not gonna have the budget. There is definitely a set of businesses who don't. So for those folks and for all of us, like, I think programs and courses will do well when they include the time to do the thing they're selling inside the course. So we've already seen a lot of courses start to include, you know, coworking sessions start to include sort of, like, even as you do in your programs, like, gap time for feedback in Slack or, like, asynchronous support times. I think that kind of gone are the days of the self guided course where there's, like, you buy the course, but then you have to find all of your own willpower, time, and accountability to do it yourself.

I think now when people buy a program, they want space within that program to actually do the work of the thing. So, like, they're not necessarily buying their time back, but they're kind of, like, buying the time on the calendar to actually get shit done. And I think that all of those types of offerings are gonna do really well in 2026.

Amanda LairdI love buying time on my calendar.

Amelia HrubyIt provides a certain degree of just like commitment and accountability to me. And like, I can definitely sometimes fall into the trap of like, you know, buying all the tools and accoutrement for the hobby instead of doing the hobby. So you have to kinda watch yourself here, like, just buying the podcast course doesn't actually mean you will make the podcast, but I really prefer when that course includes the time with the instructor and other students to make the podcast instead of just being like, come to class every week and then do all the work on your own time. I feel like that's just it's a hard sell. And this all weaves back into the trust piece.

Right? Because when you help your program participants, your students, your clients, your customers actually get the results you promise, then you can show those results in your testimonials, and you actually are selling things that have value because they have proven results for people. And like, I think doing more and more of that is gonna be more important. Like testimonials, more important than ever in 2026.

Amanda LairdI mean, social proof.

Amelia HrubyThat is like the best type of trust, right, that you can build. So I feel like in this trend conversation, we have pinned conversations about testimonials, about Patreon, about memberships, about so many things. But we will just have those in the future on this feed and in the clubhouse. So just to recap these trends very quickly for folks, what we are saying for 2026 is that trust is more important than ever. And as a result, we are gonna see more people building in public and sharing vulnerably online.

We're gonna see more people embracing a YOLO energy that proves they are not AI because they're being a little chaotic, and AI would never do that.

Amanda LairdUntil AI starts stealing our chaotic content.

Amelia HrubyYeah. And then it weaves it in the same way the algorithm wove in randomness. So, this trend probably has a limited lifespan, folks. Get in while it's hot. For something that doesn't have a limited lifespan, offline life and analog practices are gonna be trendy in 2026.

Many of us have been doing this on the side of our business because we are creative people, but maybe you wanna consider weaving it in to the story you're telling about your business this year, either in your marketing or in your visual brand, as Amanda mentioned. And then in 2026, we think Patreon is gonna be the platform to watch, and we think that people, especially in the b to b space, are going to be buying back their time. So done for you offerings are gonna be popular, and your programs and courses are probably gonna wanna include that time to do the thing that you're selling in the course. Get your clients results, get them testimonials, and that will make everything easier to sell because you will have built that trust.

Amanda LairdYes. And I think the take home message, if you're like, okay, how do I apply this in my day to day, is asking yourself. Right? How is this building trust? Is this building trust?

And also observe it in how you interact with other people too. I think that's a good way to see it. Like, think about who you trust and why and how you came to trust them, and then maybe start applying those principles to your own business.

Amelia HrubyYes. Beautiful. Well, thank you, Amanda, for joining me again for this conversation. I can't wait to recap these trends at the end of the year. So folks, join us in the clubhouse for that.

But until then, we are so grateful for you, for your time, for everyone's energy, and we will see you off the grid. Bye. Okay. That was an abridged version of social media by Surfer Boy and Rectangle. To hear the entire song, find Surfer Boy on Spotify or head to the link in the show notes.

Thanks so much to them for sharing the song with us, as well as to Melissa Kaitlyn Carter, sings our theme song that you hear at the start of every show. I'm your host, Amelia Hruby. And if you enjoyed this episode, I hope you will download the free leading social media toolkit at offthegrid.fun/toolkit. Until next time, I will see you off the grid.