Amazon delivers its creative crystal ball for 2026
As 2026 looms large, who better to share their vision than the creative minds at Amazon Ads?
We spoke to Kate McCagg, global head of Amazon Ads Brand Innovation Lab, and Phil Christer, managing director of Amazon Ads UK, to uncover the trends shaping the year ahead.
Creative insight
McCagg believes the ‘science’ of media and the ‘art’ of creativity shouldn’t live in separate worlds.
“The most compelling campaigns I’m seeing are where audience signals inspire the creative process, not just validate it afterwards. Breakthroughs happen when creative teams embrace customer insights because they unlock ideas they wouldn’t have discovered otherwise.”
She warns that brands designing from their own perspective risk narrowing their audience:
“Next year and beyond, we need to return to customers’ passion points and the friction we can help solve. These insights keep campaigns grounded in reality, rather than feeling interruptive when they appear in someone’s experience.”
Outcome-based buying will drive streaming TV
Christer predicts a major shift in how success is measured:
“Advertisers will increasingly judge STV campaigns by business outcomes—sales, sign-ups, bookings—not just reach or brand favourability. Streaming TV ads will compete for performance as well as brand budgets.”
Contextual advertising gets hyper-relevant
Christer sees contextual advertising reinventing itself:
“Imagine pausing an action film mid-chase across an exotic island and being served an ad for flights to that very location—complete with real-time prices and departure times from your local airport. That’s where STV is heading.”
AI behind the scenes
No trends piece is complete without AI. Christer expects its biggest impact to be invisible but powerful:
“AI will find the right audiences, optimise campaigns, and surface patterns that would take humans hours to spot. Advanced analytics will become accessible through natural language, enabling marketers to run complex analysis faster.”
Personalisation, then, is set to dominate the creative game in 2026, and you’ll need a full suite of tools to stay ahead.
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