There have been some truly baffling marketing decisions in 2026.

And I don’t mean campaigns that just didn’t perform particularly well. I’m talking about the kind of marketing where you watch it and think, surely somebody saw this before it went live.

As a North Carolina commercial photographer and brand photographer, I spend a lot of time thinking about how businesses present themselves visually. Good commercial photography and video can make a brand feel instantly recognizable. But sometimes the problem isn’t the photography, the video, or even the marketing strategy.

Sometimes somebody just made a really bad decision.

Callaway’s Golf Ad That Went Very, Very Wrong

The Callaway/Good Good Golf ad from this week is probably the freshest example.

The ad was supposed to promote Callaway’s new driver. Instead, it showed Good Good Golf creator Garrett Clark aggressively shoving fellow creator Alexis Miestowski to the ground after she reached toward his golf bag, followed by the line, “Do not touch my new driver.” in a pretty threatening manor. The video was pulled after widespread criticism that it depicted violence against a woman, and Good Good apologized, saying the content didn’t align with its brand values. However, the internet is forever and there’s no living this one down.

And I keep coming back to this one because I genuinely don’t understand how it made it through the process.

Someone had the idea. Someone wrote it. Someone filmed it. Someone edited it. Someone approved it. Someone posted it.

At no point did anyone apparently say, “Hey, this might read less like a joke about an expensive golf club and more like making light of domestic violence.” That’s not a lack-of-creativity problem. It’s a lack-of-judgment problem.

And honestly, I think we’re going to see more of this as brands get increasingly obsessed with being funny, edgy, shocking, relatable, viral, culturally relevant, whatever the word of the quarter is. Because somewhere along the way, “people are talking about it” became a marketing goal all by itself.

It’s also worth noting that the Callaway marketing executive team is all men and that golf culture is notably hostile towards women. This campaign genuinely may have been a warning.

BMW Put an Ad Inside Your Car

BMW recently pushed a Spider-Man promotional experience onto the infotainment screens of compatible vehicles in more than 70 markets. When drivers started their cars, they could get a notification promoting Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which opened into a full-screen animation with music and even the car’s ambient lighting. BMW maintained that it wasn’t technically an advertisement, but rather part of a broader brand partnership with the movie.

This is one of those marketing decisions that probably looked very cool in a presentation.

“Imagine Spider-Man appearing inside the BMW.”

Great. Except there’s a tiny detail missing from the presentation: the person who bought the BMW didn’t ask for an ad.

There’s something about paying a lot of money for a luxury car and then having a movie promotion pop up on your dashboard that feels… not very luxury. The technology isn’t the problem. The assumption that every available screen is now an advertising opportunity is. Not every piece of real estate your brand controls needs to be monetized, however these companies have consumers signing over their rights to be advertised to in the fine print.

even thought it’s technically ‘allowed’, consumers will still revolt.

Starbucks’ “Tank Day” Disaster

Starbucks Korea launched a promotion called “Tank Day” for a new line of large tumblers. The timing and language unintentionally evoked some incredibly painful moments in South Korean history, including the anniversary of the 1980 Gwangju massacre.

The campaign sparked intense backlash, including people destroying branded products and demanding refunds. Starbucks Korea’s CEO was fired and the company issued multiple apologies.

This one is a good reminder that localization isn’t just translating your marketing campaign into another language.

You can have a perfectly innocent idea in one market that carries a completely different meaning somewhere else.

And sometimes the problem isn’t the idea itself. It’s the date. The wording. The cultural reference you didn’t know existed.

That’s why I will always take a slightly boring second opinion over a brilliant campaign that nobody bothered to sanity-check.

When Brands Try to Talk Like the Internet

Another one I find interesting this year is the growing trend of brands grabbing whatever internet slang is currently exploding and trying to turn it into advertising.

“Looksmaxxing.” “Mogging.” “Maxxing.”

Brands including CeraVe, Carl’s Jr. and Marriott have been playing with this language as they try to connect with younger audiences. The terminology has exploded online, which makes it incredibly tempting for marketers.

But there’s a difference between understanding internet culture and borrowing someone’s vocabulary.

Sometimes a brand using a meme feels genuinely funny. Sometimes it feels like your dad discovered TikTok.

And the more brands try to sound like the internet, the more valuable an actual human voice becomes.

The Bigger Problem: Everything Is Starting to Look the Same

This might actually be the biggest marketing problem of 2026, even though it isn’t one specific campaign.

Everything is starting to look the same.

AI can make a beautiful image in seconds. It can write a caption. It can make a video. It can clean up the copy. It can make your brand sound polished.

And that’s wonderful until everybody starts using the same tools to make everything polished.

We’re ending up with marketing that is technically very good and emotionally completely forgettable.

Perfect lighting. Perfect copy. Perfect grammar. Perfect little hook.

And absolutely nothing to say.

‘AI slop’.

I think that’s why some of the most interesting marketing right now is actually the stuff that feels a little less perfect. A person talking to a camera. A founder saying something slightly weird. A photo that doesn’t look like it came from a giant campaign. A brand with an actual opinion. That’s why we’re in the era of UGC and influencer marketing, however those industries are hurting as brands are seemingly exploiting their audiences more and more.

This is also why I think brand photography and commercial video still matter so much, especially for small businesses and service-based brands. Your audience doesn’t need another perfectly generic stock photo or AI-generated version of what a “successful business owner” supposedly looks like.

They need to see you.

Your actual space. Your actual people. Your actual work.

That’s where good NC commercial photography can do more than just make a website look pretty. It gives people something real to connect with before they’ve ever picked up the phone or filled out a contact form.

Related Reading: What’s Next After UGC? Why I Think High-Quality Brand Video Is Coming Back

What These Marketing Fails Have in Common

That’s really what I keep seeing in these marketing fails.

The problem isn’t that brands are trying too hard to get attention.

It’s that they’re sometimes forgetting to ask what they want people to feel after they get it.

Callaway got attention. BMW got attention. Starbucks got attention.

But attention isn’t the same thing as affection. I’ll take a brand people actually like over one everyone is talking about for the wrong reason.

Trust is the new marketing currency

As a Raleigh brand photographer and NC commercial photographer, that’s probably the part of marketing I find most interesting right now. The brands that are going to stand out aren’t necessarily going to be the loudest ones.

They’re going to be the ones that actually know who they are and have the ability to build trust.

And the quickest way to do that is to have photography, video, and a brand presence to show it.

That’s where I come in

If you’re realizing your own brand could use a little more you in it, that’s kind of my favorite problem to solve. I create commercial photography and video for North Carolina businesses that want their marketing to actually feel like their brand, not something they pulled from a template.

If that sounds like you, you can take a look around at my commercial work here, or reach out and tell me what you’re working on. We’ll figure out what makes sense from there.

Sarah
Gold + Sage Branding