January tends to invite a rush of predictions. A few weeks in, the picture looks a little clearer.

As we close out the first month of the year, across teams, our consultants are already comparing notes on what is shifting, and what that means for campaigns and corporate advisory in the year ahead.

Here are six things on our radar.

#1 AI demands a more strategic role for communications

- By David Rowson, Strategy Director

As AI search reshapes how information is discovered and consumed, much of the debate has centred on generative engine optimisation and the tactical implications for content. But a narrow focus on optimisation risks confusing a technical response with a strategic one. The question is not just how content should be tailored, but more fundamentally what organisations choose to say and how tightly they focus.

AI changes the economics of communication.

When information is routinely synthesised at speed, the marginal value of additional content falls quickly. Volume is secondary. What matters instead is whether a clear and defensible position can be inferred from what an organisation says.

This pulls communications back towards strategy in its strictest sense: being explicit about which stakeholders matter most, what you want to be known for, and how and where you can gain the greatest traction.

Seen this way, this is a huge opportunity.

It gives communications teams a mandate to help organisations achieve the strategic clarity required to succeed in an AI-mediated information environment. And that places communications squarely in the boardroom.

#2 AI is reasserting the media pecking order

- By Beki Elmer, Associate Director

Much has been written about the demise of traditional news outlets, but AI may well see a renewed focus on earned media.

Depending on your source, around 70% of Google searches now end without a click-through, fundamentally changing how audiences discover and consume information. 

What this means for media and how PRs engage with it will be significant. Generative tools prioritise credible, earned sources, typically authoritative, independent and un-paywalled a.k.a old-school earned media. 

It’s good news for traditional news outlets.

GEO is reinforcing the pecking order, placing earned media at the heart of reputation and visibility strategies. While paywalled outlets present challenges, it could only be a matter of time before those barriers fall. 

High-quality national and trade media coverage has always mattered.

Generative AI is making that harder to ignore.

And the brands that understand how to leverage it as a mechanism to influence generative AI will be the winners.

#3 Millennials hitting forty is sparking a wave of demographic intrigue

- By Sam Sharpe, Director and Sustainability Lead

We’re redefining adult milestones, financially infertile and broadly squeezed. But something quieter is happening too. We’re not just having kids later; we’re becoming different kinds of parents - and that shift is showing up in how we judge organisations. 

We spend more time explaining, listening and pivoting than previous generations. Less “because I said so”, more taking the time to explain why. Dads, in particular, are visibly showing up more (thanks, in no small part, to Australia’s greatest cultural export - Bluey).

Those expectations travel. Audiences increasingly judge institutions the way millennials are trying to parent (just take a scroll through parenting advice on Instagram or TikTok): not on perfection, but on behaviour. Do you take responsibility? Do you overreact when challenged? (is my husband reading this?!) Do you apologise properly - or just issue a statement and hope everyone moves on?

A niche but telling example is the quiet rehabilitation of Ed Miliband. His Instagram is gaily self-deprecating; 2026 Ed would own that bacon sandwich. He may be mocked up as a Transformer, but it’s always in service of a serious point. The effect is disarming, signalling self-awareness and growth; traits that increasingly read as competence rather than weakness.

This quietly changes our job. 

It’s less making clients shine at all costs and more showing up like a grown-up: honest, thoughtful and emotionally mature. It’s not new for 2026 - but it’s feeling more acute.

#4 ‘Keeping it real’ is becoming a creative advantage

- By Lewis Wilks, Creative Director

Creative campaigning is entering an era of abundance. 

When it comes to creative campaigning, it feels like AI makes almost anything possible. But audiences are increasingly pushing back against what’s being labelled ‘AI slop’: work that looks synthetic and feels disposable.

Of course, AI’s impact on campaigning has been transformative.

At Lansons, we use it as a creative co-pilot: sharpening insight, stress-testing ideas and scaling execution across channels. That capability isn’t going away.

But in a world where everything feels easy, the creative advantage will increasingly lie in visible craft, human effort and proof that something was genuinely hard to make. Audiences are looking for what is often lazily termed ‘authenticity’.

The question I’m asking as we look ahead is simple: when everything can be made instantly, what’s worth making the hard way?

#5 Authenticity is no longer about tone. It’s about credibility. 

- By Victoria Haworth, Associate Director

As trust in institutions, media and brands continues to erode, audiences are making faster judgements about who and what to believe. At a recent PRWeek event, one theme came up repeatedly: growing scepticism towards content that feels overly polished or managed, not because it looks bad, but because it no longer feels believable.

What cuts through instead is work that feels human, specific and grounded in lived experience, even when it is uncomfortable. In this context, authenticity functions less as a tone and more as a test: do you feel credible, and do you stand behind what you are saying?

That requires choice. The brands and individuals seen as most authentic are rarely trying to speak to everyone. They make clear choices about relevance and accept that not all audiences will come with them.

Lily Allen’s recent album rollout is a good example.

In a world of hyper-produced pop, the record felt raw and exposed. She put her feelings on the line knowing it would not land with everyone. Some tracks would not get radio play. Some listeners would not like it. That focus and honesty is precisely why it resonated.

A similar dynamic is playing out around the Beckhams.

Audiences are not just consuming the story but openly questioning the PR behind it. People understand and accept there is curation on all sides, so much so that the curation itself has become a major part of the story as people search for what feels real.

#6 A fragmented political landscape is raising the stakes for business

- By George Oates, Associate Director, Public Affairs

Westminster’s mood is rarely static, but there’s a particular tension around Labour as 2026 begins. Leadership speculation and now the Mandelson scandal aside, the next flashpoint is the by-election in Gorton and Denton on 26 February.

Given the Andy Burnham debacle there’s now a strong possibility that Reform or the Green Party add another MP to their roster.

This is not an isolated moment.

The results of the May elections could then accelerate a deeper shift away from the traditional two-party system and usher in a more fragmented, set of coalition politics. Welsh Labour will likely lose its century long dominance to Plaid, the Greens will likely eat into Labour’s city seats whilst Reform is set to make gains across Britian.

At the same time, increasingly restless backbenchers are willing to hold the government to ransom over policy detail, while No10 continues to struggle commanding the news cycle, being forced into reaction mode rather than agenda-setting.

For business, that matters.

The result is a political system that is far more fragmented, characterised by internal coalitions and vulnerable to disruption. For business, this compounds the uncertainty created by the policy approach of the last eighteen months.

Those with an eye on how to shape the external environment or future proof their business will begin acting now.