Brand marketing builds long-term awareness, trust, and differentiation, but in 2026 it faces a measurement reckoning. Economic uncertainty and tariff-driven caution are pulling budgets toward performance channels that deliver immediate, trackable returns. C-suite support for brand building is declining even as marketers acknowledge its critical role in sustainable growth. This FAQ examines why the brand-versus-performance tension is intensifying, what the data reveals about budget shifts, and how marketers can prove brand marketing's value in an era of heightened accountability.

What is brand marketing and how does it differ from performance marketing?

Brand marketing is designed to shape perception rather than drive immediate action, while performance marketing targets measurable outcomes like clicks, conversions, and sales. While brand builds the foundation that makes performance spend more efficient, performance captures demand that brand creates.

The distinction matters because budget allocation reflects which objective a company prioritizes. Marketers worldwide prioritize lead generation and conversions (48.2%) more often than brand awareness (20.5%) and brand trust (11.2%), according to a December 2025 CoSchedule survey.

Why are marketers shifting budgets toward performance and away from brand in 2026?

Economic instability is pushing marketers toward channels that prove returns quickly. Some 84% of CMOs cite marketing ROI as their primary metric for budget allocation, per NIQ's 2026 CMO Outlook.

Working with creative agencies requires an average of five rounds of creative development, according to a March 2025 BetterBriefs report. Lengthy processes combined with brand marketing's long payback period makes it harder to defend when budgets face quarterly scrutiny.

C-suite support for brand building is declining. Only 69% of CMOs say their CEO and CFO believe in long-term brand building value, down from 80% in 2024, according to NIQ's 2026 CMO Outlook. Confidence in brand mission and purpose dropped from 83% to 71% over the same period.

The contradiction is striking: 83% of CMOs still view their brand as a commercial asset, and 75% remain optimistic about future growth. But only 55% allocate 60% or more of their budget to long-term brand building, down from 59% the prior year, per NIQ.

The top reasons for increased marketing investment among US senior decision makers are supporting growth and business expansion (40%) over increasing brand awareness (32%), according to a January 2026 Haus survey. These findings show that these decision makers aren’t equating brand marketing to ROI.

This gap between stated belief and actual investment signals that CFOs are winning the internal budget debate. Marketers who cannot connect brand spending to business outcomes risk losing the resources to fund it.

What is the right budget split between brand and performance marketing?

There is no universal ratio, but the data points toward rebalancing. Among B2B marketers, 45.5% would allocate more than half their marketing budget to brand if budgets were not a constraint, per a 2025 EMARKETER and StackAdapt report. That 40% plan to increase brand-building budgets indicates the shift is underway.

The constraint is measurement, not conviction. One in four B2B marketers say that if their budget grew by 20%, they would invest the extra directly into brand awareness within existing channels, per the same survey. The right split depends on category, growth stage, and competitive dynamics, but the trend is clear: marketers want to invest more in brand and are held back by their inability to prove its return.

What are the biggest barriers to brand marketing investment?

Measurement dominates. Proving ROI is the single biggest barrier to brand marketing investment, ranked above budget flexibility, economic uncertainty, and short-term pipeline pressure among B2B marketers, per a 2025 EMARKETER and StackAdapt report. Drew Panayiotou, CMO of Keurig Dr Pepper, framed the challenge at Advertising Week New York: "The question is very simple that comes from the CEO: Is marketing driving sales?" He added that marketers feel confident "plus or minus 10 to 15%" but face limitations from walled gardens and fragmentation, per EMARKETER.

Additional barriers:

• Short-term pressure. 74% of CMOs face increased scrutiny to prove marketing ROI, per NIQ, compressing time horizons for investment payback.
• Economic uncertainty. Tariff threats and inflation drive marketers to prioritize platforms with measurable outcomes, per EMARKETER.

How should marketers measure brand marketing impact in 2026?

The measurement model is evolving beyond return on ad spend (ROAS). Andrew Lipsman, independent analyst at Media, Ads + Commerce, argued at Advertising Week that applying ROAS to upper-funnel campaigns "actually understates, and sometimes hurts, the value" of brand marketing, per EMARKETER. He recommended causal modeling and incrementality testing instead.

Three approaches are gaining traction:

• Marketing mix modeling (MMM). 46.9% of US marketers plan to invest more in MMM over the next year, per a July 2025 EMARKETER and TransUnion survey. MMM provides a holistic view of how all media, including brand channels, drive business outcomes.
• Incrementality testing. Controlled experiments isolate whether brand campaigns drove results that would not have occurred otherwise. 36.2% of marketers plan to increase incrementality spending, per the same survey.
• Combined frameworks. Dan Kelley of Snap recommends integrating sales lift measurement with MMM because both measure total sales outcomes, connecting immediate performance with long-term brand impact, per EMARKETER.

Which channels are most effective for brand building in 2026?

Channel effectiveness for brand building depends on the ability to reach audiences at scale with resonant creative. Retail media networks (RMNs) are moving beyond lower-funnel performance. RMNs deliver 1.8x better performance than standard digital ads and nearly 3x better results for purchase intent, according to Kantar's Marketing Trends 2026 report, positioning them as brand-building vehicles powered by first-party data.

Creator marketing is another growth area. A net 35% of marketers plan to increase creator content investment in 2026, per Kantar. However, only 27% of creator content strongly ties to brand messaging, indicating an opportunity to align creator partnerships with brand strategy.

CTV remains effective for upper-funnel reach but is losing budget share as tariff-driven uncertainty pushes spend toward channels with faster payback, per EMARKETER. Marketers willing to hold CTV positions during the pullback may find lower costs and less competition.

What is the long-term cost of underinvesting in brand marketing?

The data points to a compounding loss. Kantar's analysis of the BrandZ database found that innovative brands created $6.6 trillion in value over 20 years, demonstrating how sustained brand equity drives financial returns at scale.

EMARKETER's analysis of the current performance-first shift warns that it may lead to short-term overperformance in measurable media and long-term challenges in brand equity. The risk is structural: brands that cut upper-funnel investment erode the awareness and trust that make lower-funnel spending efficient. Performance campaigns convert demand, but brand campaigns create it.

Despite declining investment, 75% of CMOs remain optimistic about future growth, per NIQ. The gap between optimism and actual funding suggests a correction is likely once measurement improves and economic conditions stabilize. Brands that maintain brand investment through the downturn will emerge with stronger positioning.

How should marketers build a brand marketing strategy for 2026?

Start with measurement. The biggest barrier to brand investment is proving its value, so building a measurement framework comes first. 46.9% of US marketers plan to invest more in MMM, per EMARKETER and TransUnion, reflecting growing recognition that brand's impact requires new tools to quantify.

Four priorities:

• Connect brand to business outcomes. Use causal modeling to demonstrate how brand campaigns drive sales, not just awareness.
• Align creator content with brand strategy. Tighter creative briefs and brand guardrails can improve the return on creator partnerships.
• Invest counter-cyclically. Brands that maintain upper-funnel spending during downturns emerge with stronger positioning.
• Build coherent cross-channel campaigns. Coherent, cross-channel ideas are 2.5x more important to campaign success than individual executions, per Kantar. Design campaigns for consistency across brand and performance touchpoints.

We prepared this article with the assistance of generative AI tools and stand behind its accuracy, quality, and originality.

EMARKETER forecast data was current at publication and may have changed. EMARKETER clients have access to up-to-date forecast data. To explore EMARKETER solutions, click here.