Pace

Imagine your financial institution has 50 million clients. Now imagine 12.5 million of them walking away to work with a competing brand. This isn’t an exercise in cautionary math. This is what happened in 2024, when a quarter of consumers switched banks. The 2024 exodus represented more than four times the average churn rate for financial brands. 2025 saw high signals of account change as well, with close to 20% of banking clients opening first-time accounts with new organizations.

If there’s one thing brands should take away from last year , it’s that the trust economy is here, and content is the currency. In 2026, we predict winners will be brands that invest in content as an integral, strategic part of establishing trust with audiences early and often. In this article, we’ll look at content consumption, how to create content that moves audiences and strategies for senior marketing leaders to evolve their content toward building trust.

Everyone has problems content can solve. Most of us are proactively looking for valuable, relevant information via social media feeds, generative AI, search engines and other sources. Yet consumers rarely—if ever—set out on a journey hoping to encounter content marketing along the way. We’ve learned—through more than 50 years of content creation, activation and optimization—that effective content moves people. People, in turn, move business.

GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA (January 7, 2026)— Pace, the largest independent, woman-owned content marketing agency in North America, has announced the appointment of Rosemary Calderone as its first-ever Chief Growth Officer, reinforcing the agency’s commitment to a purposeful growth strategy. Rosemary will be charged with overseeing both the marketing and new business teams.

From clever subject lines to personalized content, here’s what you should know about crafting emails that drive engagement and maximize return on investment. When your inbox is flooded with emails, what prompts you to open one promoting a product, service or business? Is it a too-good-to-be-true deal? Or is it one that offers a timely tip? Does a more personalized email marketing approach get you to click for more? I’m a sucker for a good deal, so that’s one way to get me.

The business-to-consumer (B2C) model relies on connecting with your audience and encouraging interaction with your brand. Where the intersection of B2C and content marketing thrives is in engaging and connecting with the audience in a meaningful way. Here, we’ll delve into a few examples of how content marketing can significantly impact B2C strategies and contribute to business growth. Before we start, let’s get on the same page about a few things.

The probability that you’ll bump into someone you know at the grocery store when you’re wearing your ugly sweats also applies to the likelihood of coming across AI-generated content when you’re online. AI has set up shop in every digital nook and cranny, but even as the technology continues to look smoother and better, consumers can still spot a fake. Remember Coca-Cola’s universally panned Christmas commercial, Holidays Are Coming?

Content marketing purpose defines the return on investment (ROI). This is why—no matter the brand, audience, marketing budget or channel involved—content should have a defined purpose, whether it’s a measurable goal or a softer objective. Deviation from that purpose is a missed opportunity, at best, or a customer turnoff in some instances. Here’s a real-world example. Imagine picking up a novel and finding a cigarette ad printed directly in the middle of it. The novel is content. So is the ad.

You might be losing customers without even realizing it. Many brands focus heavily on acquiring new customers but overlook what happens after the sale. The result? A poor customer experience (CX), disengaged consumers and lost revenue. Who owns CX? Traditionally, CX has been seen as a function of customer service. Today, marketing leaders are realizing that the customer journey does not end at acquisition. It continues through onboarding, engagement, retention, expansion and advocacy.

Will it stay or will it go? We recently passed TikTok’s third extended deadline to sell to a U.S. owner or be banned for good. A few companies are supposedly in talks to take over the reins, though no deals have been set in social media stone just yet. Whether TikTok is able to lock down a Supreme Court-approved owner and stay scrollable to its 150 million American users or not, brands can learn some valuable lessons from the TikTok ban saga.