Get Ready for 2026: Depth Over Output

If you've felt like the last year has been one long balancing act, tight budgets, slower buying cycles, clients staying cautious, you're not alone.

In a recent roundtable with Carey Evans from Relationship Audit, we dug into what clients are really thinking and what agencies need to prioritise to head into 2026 in strong shape.

Here's a summary.

Clients are operating in deep uncertainty

That makes it harder for them to commit to budgets, timelines or long-term planning. Add the pressure to prove ROI on every piece of activity and a growing shift toward short-term focus, and you've got the environment agencies are selling into right now.

Retention and expansion is your growth strategy

New business is taking longer. Budgets are smaller. Clients are "trying you out" with smaller initial projects before they decide if they want a long-term partner.

Agencies that double down on delivery alone, without elevating the experience, are going to look exactly like their competitors. Not where you want to be.

We talked a lot about the difference between over-servicing and over-delivering. Over-delivering is a scope problem. Over-servicing, when done intentionally, is how you create the kind of experience clients stay loyal to. The kind that makes switching feel costly.

And this is where Crispin dropped a phrase I absolutely loved:

"The cost of disinvestment."

In other words: how painful would it be for the client to walk away from this relationship? What would they lose, not just in output, but in insight, connection, context, and momentum?

If you want to increase stickiness in 2026, that's the question to keep coming back to.

Practical things agencies can do now

• Build broader relationships, not single-point dependencies. If one stakeholder leaves and they're the only person who knows you, you're instantly on shaky ground. You need a wider sphere of influence inside every account to protect revenue and build resilience.
• Ask better business questions. "How's business?" needs to become second nature in every conversation, not an optional extra. It's how you shift from supplier to strategic advisor, the role clients are desperate for agencies to step into.
• Add value clients can't get elsewhere. Share insights from one client to another. Cross-pollinating ideas is one of the simplest, most powerful ways to elevate your value in the eyes of senior stakeholders.

The AI conversation

We couldn't avoid it, it's influencing everything. The message from clients is clear: they expect you to use AI, but they don't want it used blindly or everywhere. Many are uncomfortable with AI-generated creative. What they do want is for agencies to use it as a thought partner, a tool for deeper analysis, smarter insight and more streamlined processes.

But here's the trap I'm seeing inside teams: over-reliance on AI means knowledge is going down, not up. When people stop listening in meetings because the note-taker will "capture it," or send AI-generated research without reading it, they lose the critical thinking that makes them valuable in the first place. If you want your team to become strategic advisors, this is something to tackle now, not later.

The big picture

If you want your agency in great shape for 2026, focus on depth, not just output.

• Depth of understanding.
• Depth of relationship.
• Depth of value.

Jo