Every new year is filled with hope and expectation (just look at gym memberships that skyrocket in January and crash in February). Though the world and business climate make it harder to predict what will happen…

We know a few things:

There are 5 AI LLM companies competing for world dominance.

• OpenAI
• Google DeepMind
• Anthropic
• Meta (Facebook)
• Microsoft

The deluge of AI companies riding their coattails will start to thin out or consolidate. There are close to 100,000 companies that offer AI tools or are integrating AI infusion. As specific tools gain popularity, LLMs will incorporate what these companies do and improve on it, making it better, faster, and cheaper. They have billions and much bigger staffs—and may also start to acquire the most popular and profitable companies.

It's the DOT-BOMB era of the 90s all over again, but much more focused and better funded.

AI companies are evolving to replace search, hence why Google Gemini will ultimately be more integrated into Google's search engines. This will change the way we look and use search in our daily lives.

Change is inevitable, yet we as humans are not as quick to adapt. What follows are some predictions of other changes I see coming in 2026 for internet marketing.

WARNING: This Is Satire!

Business Coaches: Will Become AI Business Coaches

Since workers will be replaced in unprecedented numbers in 2026 by AI and robots, business coaches will have a shrinking audience in which to practice their craft. Since fewer humans will mean fewer customers and fewer leadership candidates, coaches will have to learn to prompt and program.

Robots will need to develop emotional intelligence to better lead and communicate with both emotionally neutered droids and the few humans they will be forced to interact with.

AI agents will need to deal with the complexities of their relationships with human clients. They will also need to learn skills like dealing with greed, office romance, hiring, delegation, accountability, and creating systems so the business runs without depending on one person.

Both robots and AI agents will need to improve their skill set in mindset and confidence—overcoming self‑doubt, reframing problems, and building self‑trust to make bolder, cleaner decisions.

Finally, business coaches will need to learn AI-prompting and complex programming languages such as Fortran and Assembly Language.

Subscriptions: Insert Your Credit Card to Talk with a Human

Since companies will have fewer humans to talk to, they will start offering basic and premium subscription plans to communicate with a human. The free ride will continue for those who are willing to navigate multi-level phone prompts and chatbots that use circular logic to make you go away.

The basic plan will include access to people in foreign countries who speak very broken English and read from prompt books.

Mid-tier plans will include more skilled foreign humans with computer prototypes that replicate AI agents and bots, but have a real human who will actually understand your problems, while offering self-service options for fixing them.

The Gold plan will be expensive, but you will be directly connected to a human with experience and troubleshooting skills, increasing the chances that your problem will be solved in under 24 hours.

Companies will find new cash-flow opportunities to replace more humans with bots, agents, and robotics, all while making customers feel they are understood by helping them solve problems created by the technology replacing other humans.

Unemployment: What to Do with Your Newly Found Spare Time?

Multiple companies already have chips that can be implanted in your brain to control failing or malfunctioning body parts. But it's the peripherals that will help you live the life you could have only dreamed about before AI.

I believe you will begin to see AI-powered, designer body parts. If you want to play basketball better, you can get a knee replacement that will allow you to reach a standard rim.

Want to go on ‘Dancing with the Stars'? You will be able to program your legs to perform merengue, salsa, jitterbug, or any dance you desire by downloading the program.

Your shoulder replacement will allow you to program in the perfect football spiral, golf swing, and even let you do calligraphy better than a computer could.

Who needs vocal cords? Just upload your voice and a picture, and AI will make you an overnight singing sensation, making karaoke night much better for drunk people at Japanese steak houses throughout the world.

Finally, I believe this will be a late 2026 innovation since many of our bionic AI-powered body parts may need to be regulated and/or registered by the FDA, EPA, NRA, and ATF!

Closing Thought

In all seriousness, I can predict with confidence that we will see things that were never dreamed of or expected.

The more AI-powered stuff that we invent and use, the more power and data centers we are going to need. I believe you will see a massive boom in construction jobs to build the infrastructure required to feed this innovation.

On the downside, it's all fun and games until we see an AI attack or a DDOS attack that compromises the power grid, or it just can't handle the growing demand.

Case in point, last week in California, there was a fire at a PG&E substation that triggered a large blackout that cut power to about 124,000–130,000 customers, roughly one‑third of San Francisco.

With traffic lights dark and infrastructure disrupted, numerous Waymo self‑driving taxis froze in place at intersections and mid‑block, hazard lights flashing, causing traffic backups but no reported injuries or crashes. Tow trucks and support teams spent hours retrieving stalled vehicles overnight, and the app showed Bay Area service as paused in at least seven cities until power was restored and operations were brought back online the following day.

I hope you have a fantastic New Year's, and I look forward to interacting with you as a human in 2026!

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Comment below and share your thoughts, ideas, or questions about business-to-business sales and marketing today! Do you have a sales or marketing communications strategy that works for you? What tips or techniques can you share that work for you and your business?

To learn more about this and other topics on B2b Sales & Marketing, visit our podcast website at The Bacon Podcast.