Do you remember the Magic 8 Ball?

Ask a yes-no question. Shake the large plastic ball and turn it over to see the answer. A 20-sided die would appear with an answer that ranged from the affirmative (“It is decidedly so”) to the negative (“Don’t count on it”) and a touch of vagueness (“Reply hazy. Try again.”).

With all the uncertainty in the world, you may think consulting that toy is preferable to throwing up your hands when it comes to adjusting your marketing strategy.

But we want you to play a better game, so we asked the experts presenting at Content Marketing World: How should a marketing leader adjust their plans and budgets for the rest of 2025 and into 2026?

Spoiler alert: None of their answers is hazy. They talk about what should really matter to marketers now (buyers and ROI), priorities (owned channels), AI as a helper, and the need for flexibility. Watch for the advice from five presenters below, or read on for all the available tips.

Align on what truly matters to the business

Good marketers know their strategies need to target a specific audience. Great marketers in uncertain times know their strategies must go deeper, not broader, into their target customers in the marketplace.

Drill down to customers

Invest in precision over volume. Focus on buyer-validated signals (like qualified intent) instead of chasing vanity metrics or spray-and-pray reach.

Top priorities should include:

If it’s not helping your best buyers find you, trust you, or buy from you faster, it’s probably a nice-to-have, not a need-to-have. — Josh Baez, senior manager, demand generation, NetLine

Don’t make cuts; adjust to prioritize loyalty

Economic uncertainty isn't the time to slash budgets; it's time to reallocate them! Double down on what's measurably working. Kill what isn’t and invest more in your existing customers. The brands that thrive don't retreat; they focus. They build their “loyalty loop” while competitors hide. During every downturn, someone takes market share. Why not you? — Andrew Davis, author, The Loyalty Loop

Forgo the fluff; favor the wins

This is a time in which it's important to review your current marketing strategy to double down on the places where you win and cut the fluff — it's a conversation we continue to have with our clients, which we frame as recession-proofing your marketing strategy. It's essential to really conduct an in-depth review of your analytics to understand what matters to your most valuable customers, as well as where you can reach those high-value customers. — Zontee Hou, managing director, Convince & Convert

Let data inform the priorities

Double down on performance and ROI. In a volatile economy, every dollar must prove its value. That means shifting budget toward channels and campaigns that demonstrate measurable impact, particularly those that directly drive pipeline and revenue — like high-converting paid media, email nurture streams, and content aligned to buying stages.

To do that with confidence, marketing leaders need clean, unified data. Disparate systems and siloed analytics lead to inconsistent reporting, missed opportunities, and wasted spend. A unified data foundation — pulling together platforms like Salesforce, GA4, Pardot, and other business-critical systems — enables accurate performance tracking, cross-channel attribution, and real-time optimization.

With connected data and clear visibility into what’s working, marketing teams can act faster, prove impact more clearly, and make smarter, outcome-driven decisions for the remainder of 2025 and into their 2026 planning. — Jill Roberson, senior vice president of marketing, Velir

Invest in what your organization can control

Now is a good time to reassess what marketing already owns, from your databases and platforms to your relationship with the sales team.

Take ownership of your audience

Given the current volatility in nearly everything, not just the market, you should be adjusting plans (and budgets) in 2025 and 2026 (potentially forever) by investing in your own, direct relationship with constituents, whether that’s prospects or current customers. That means email marketing. This is first-party data that no one can take away because you have permission: Somebody opted in; you send them stuff, and that is OK by nearly every law out there. — Jessica Best, owner and chief strategist, BetterAve

Rev up internal operations

Double down on owned media: Your website, blog, newsletter, and LinkedIn profile are yours — and they don’t require a big budget to make an impact. Now is the time to refresh, refine, and repurpose content across your owned channels. If you have in-house creators or designers, assign them to refresh your core assets.

Strengthen sales alignment: When budgets are tight, sales and marketing need to work closely together. In a downturn, marketing should proactively reach out and become sales’ new BFF. Work together to close deals and accelerate conversions. I wrote a blog post about this. — Pam Didner, founder, Relentless Pursuit, LLC

See SEO and digital infrastructure with a long view

Given the current economic volatility, marketing leaders should prioritize strategies that offer sustainable, long-term value. This means increasing focus and budget allocation toward SEO campaigns and creating a solid website infrastructure to ensure strong performance for transactional content and key product/service pages.

Simultaneously, paid advertising efforts must be tightly aligned and integrated with all other marketing channels to maximize efficiency and impact. The emphasis should be on creating synergy across channels, repurposing existing content across various mediums, and strategically guiding users back to the brand's domain to cultivate direct engagement and conversions rather than relying solely on volatile external platforms. — Zack Kadish, SEO analytics lead, Faire

Use what you already have (or can do)

Organic content marketing is one of the few cheap or even free levers a marketing organization can reliably continue and scale in times of economic hardship. I doubt your company will take down its website, so you’ll have a place to publish a blog. It probably won’t wipe its CRM, so you’ll have a list for email targeting. It likely won’t take down its social profiles, so you’ll have somewhere to pump out videos, carousels, polls, and more.

If you’re looking to adjust your budget anywhere, I’d say that organic content marketing is somewhere you should either protect or scale. If you can’t throw as much money behind paid ads, then use those creatives to support your organic social. If you can’t leverage paid media opportunities as often, use those copywriters to draft long-form blog content or start up an executive thought leadership program via social media. These are all low-cost, high-return channels that can maintain brand visibility and dynamism even on lower budgets. — Jack Meeker, content marketing team manager, Healthee

Refocus your marketing lens on value

The best marketing leaders I know rarely cut — they clarify. Budget pressure is a forcing function. It reveals what’s noise and what’s necessary.

That said, this is the moment to invest in owned media, deepen audience relationships, and build capabilities, not just more campaigns. Ask what creates lasting value, not just quick wins.  It's long-term thinking, and that can be hard in a world that lives in quarterly results. But if you can, it's worth it.

And remember: Volatility rewards the ones who move with intention. The brands that stay present, useful, and unmistakably themselves are the ones still standing when the noise fades.  — Robert Rose, chief troublemaker, Seventh Bear

See the possibilities of AI and external support

In today’s environment, AI tools are often seen as THE solution. Well, they can play a role, but don’t expect them to do everything.

Let tech help you do more

Continue to focus on automation and AI-supported processes in marketing to do more with less and always be willing to learn/test/try a new tool, channel, etc. — Chad Gilbert, vice president, content marketing, NP Digital

Explore AI opportunities

Shift some of your time and budget to focus on AI awareness, education, and integration. The efficiency and scaling opportunities that AI will create can save you budget and time, which can be reallocated. And your employees will be ready for what's on the horizon. — Brian Piper, owner and consultant, Brian W Piper LLC

Don’t use AI as a cheap replacement

I see leaders eliminating large numbers of marketing roles right now. Moving fixed budget to variable is a worthy move in this era, but eliminating marketing departments wholesale on the theory that AI will do their work is premature. AI is currently a tool marketers are using to become more efficient, but it's not at the stage where it can actually replace people quite yet. — Stephanie Losee, content leader, Dell, Visa, and Autodesk

Sign up contractors

I've spoken with a ton of CMOs lately, and many are telling me the same thing: They are expected to deliver more even as headcount is getting reduced (or at least not growing). AI can help, but only to an extent. The reality for many of them is that they are increasingly relying on contractors to plug the gap. — Abdul Rastagar, CEO, Sirona Marketing

Make flexibility the name of this marketing game

Of course, even with this great advice, you can’t plan for every internal or external event. That’s why you have to prepare to adapt.

Subtract or add to adapt

Check on the health of your rainy-day fund, and make sure you have enough to adapt and adjust to changes in the economy. Based on changes that have already occurred to date, consider your options to either be more cost-effective or position yourself as a go-to brand for people and companies who have bigger budgets. — Ruth Carter, evil genius, Geek Law Firm

Make adjustable plans

The ability to adapt and react in agile ways to external factors is the hallmark of a strong marketing leader — whether it’s economic volatility, regulatory challenges, shifting consumer expectations, or external factors like weather or trends.

Impactful marketing plans are built with contingencies for changing market environments and are paired with processes to revisit plans quickly as needed. Make sure you have a plan in place and align that plan to economic markers that define how the resources, tactics, and budget will shift based on different scenarios. If you build these hand in hand with your business, it will ensure that you can pivot quickly, no matter how the market changes. — Tiffany Grinstead, vice president, Nationwide

Get creative about more than the creative

It is possible to create more with less, but it means creating differently. Plan to market harder in places that cost less. Plan to get more ROI out of the content that you create in a way that doesn't cost more. Examine what activities you've always done but were afraid of letting go. Now is the time to experiment with letting go of traditional marketing tactics and push hard on new ones, especially those that cost less to incorporate. — A. Lee Judge, co-founder and chief marketing officer, Content Monsta

Prepare for multiple budget scenarios

It's important to prepare for the worst but hope for the best. So, there should be a Plan B and a Plan C based on revenue forecasts. Talk to your clients and executives now. Build the relationship and expectations for pivoting now. They're not blind to what may come in the future, but you should help them understand what impact taking away certain parts of the budget will have on the business. — Ahava Leibtag, CEO, Aha Media Group

Pull back but don’t stop

During times of economic uncertainty, the very best policy is not to shut off your ad spend completely but pull back to a conservative level while you wait for a more certain outlook. Don't take yourself out of the game, but tighten things up while you wait. In a situation where most brands pull back or shut off entirely, it can become a huge opportunity for brands to invest heavily to get outsized attention for less money. — AJ Wilcox, founder, host of the LinkedIn Ads Show, B2Linked.com

Ready for the future?

Your brand’s marketing can survive in this ever-changing world. However, you can’t wait for the next shoe to drop, whether that’s a global event or an internal budget cut. You must take steps now to future-proof your marketing strategy.

Visit the Content Marketing World website for the latest on all things CMWorld.  

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