Marketing News - January 2026

Tristan Dampies
27 January 2026

What happens when your customer isn’t a person? Google’s Universal Commerce Protocol now lets AI agents check inventory, negotiate pricing, and complete purchases without a human visiting your site. OpenAI started testing ads inside ChatGPT. And after a year of limbo, TikTok’s U.S. ownership is finally settled.

On the app side, Apple rolled out new ASO controls that give marketers direct say over which store pages appear for which searches. And regulators in Australia and the UK introduced new rules around age verification and subscription cancellations that will require real changes to how apps operate.

This edition breaks down the biggest platform shifts from December and January.

1. OpenAI Enters the Ad Space

On January 16, 2026, OpenAI officially announced they’re testing the first ad formats inside ChatGPT. This isn’t a rumor or a leaked roadmap. Ads are coming to conversational AI, and the first format is already live.

The rollout introduces sponsored citations. Instead of just organic links from SearchGPT, brands can now pay to show up as a featured, cited source in ChatGPT’s responses. If a user asks for “best CRM for startups,” a paying brand can appear as a recommended answer, woven right into the conversation. It’s subtle, it’s contextual, and it changes the game for anyone who has been counting on organic visibility in AI-generated answers.

Why It Matters

The window of free organic AI traffic is starting to close. Brands that have benefited from being cited in ChatGPT responses without paying should expect that visibility to get more competitive.
This is the clearest sign yet that Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is no longer a nice-to-have. If your content isn’t set up to be cited by AI, and you’re not ready to pay for placement, you risk being invisible in this channel.
Sponsored citations blur the line between ads and information in ways users might not notice right away, which could raise trust concerns depending on how OpenAI handles disclosure.

What To Do Now

If you’ve been putting off GEO, now is the time to start. Audit your content to make sure it’s structured and authoritative enough for AI models to cite, and consider testing sponsored citations early while the format is new, competition is low, and pricing is still being figured out. Most importantly, make sure your SEO, AEO, and GEO strategies are working together so you’re building visibility across traditional search, AI answers, and paid AI placements.

2. Agentic Commerce Takes Root

After much anticipation, Google has launched the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), backed by Shopify and Walmart. This new standard allows AI agents to manage inventory, negotiate prices, and make purchases—no human needed. As the focus shifts from optimizing for SEO (searching for content to rank on Google) to AEO (making content answerable and accessible to AI-driven answers), we’re now adding another layer: making your business readable and trustworthy to AI buyers.

If an agent can’t parse your product data, it can’t buy from you. And if it can’t buy from you, neither can the humans who sent it shopping.

Why It Matters

If your product attributes are inconsistent, your inventory data is stale, or your pricing isn’t accessible in real time, agents will simply route around you to competitors who have their information in order.
Trust signals are shifting as well. As users increasingly delegate purchasing decisions to AI, the agents themselves will develop preferences for brands they’ve identified as reliable data sources.
Early positioning matters here because agents learn over time which sources consistently deliver accurate information, and they’ll prioritize those sources in future transactions.

Action Items

Apply structured data markup to all product and inventory pages.
Assess whether your current infrastructure can handle real-time inventory and pricing queries, because if an agent asks whether something is in stock, you need to be able to answer accurately.
Keep an eye on the Universal Commerce Protocol specifications as they evolve, and start thinking about what an integration with your tech stack would look like.
Develop an AEO strategy alongside SEO and educate teams on the impacts of agentic commerce.

3. App Store Optimization Gets Granular Control

Custom Product Pages (CPPs) have been a go-to tool for app marketers, but with one big limitation: you couldn’t control when they showed up in search results. Apple’s algorithm decided which page to display, and you just had to hope it matched the right creative to the right user.

That’s over. Apple now lets developers assign keywords directly to specific CPPs. So, if someone searches “budget fitness app,” you ensure they see your pricing-focused page, not your feature-heavy one. ASO just moved from passive optimization to active targeting.

Why It Matters

You can now serve tailored App Store experiences based on what users are actually searching for, rather than relying on a single product page to speak to everyone.
Someone hunting for a deal sees your value proposition front and center, while a user searching for specific features gets the deep-dive content they need.
This also opens up retention opportunities, since you can use CPPs to re-engage existing users who search for your brand terms with messaging that speaks to their stage in the journey.

What You Can Do

Review your CPPs and match each to user motivations.
Conduct keyword research focused specifically on intent signals, looking for phrases that show what a user actually wants rather than just what category they’re browsing.
If you spot gaps where high-intent searches don’t have a matching CPP, build new pages to fill them.

4. The TikTok Ban Is Officially Dead

After a year of legal back-and-forth, the deal is done. On January 22, 2026, TikTok confirmed its new U.S. ownership structure: TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC, now majority-owned by American investors. The threat that hung over media plans and influencer strategies for the past twelve months is officially gone.

That said, the resolution comes with trade-offs. New Terms of Service went into effect immediately, and they expand TikTok’s data collection practices. Users are now subject to more precise location tracking, and all content uploaded to the platform gets scanned by AI to feed the recommendation engine. The ban may be dead, but the platform’s data policies are worth keeping an eye on.

What this Means

The uncertainty that made long-term TikTok investment risky is gone. Brands can now commit to Q3 and Q4 2026 budgets without worrying about a sudden platform shutdown.
Influencer partnerships and creator strategies that were paused or kept short-term can now move forward with longer commitments, and Moburst can help you build a winning influencer strategy.

5. Android 16 Cracks Down on Accessibility Abuse

Google’s December security update introduced a significant new feature for Android 16: the Accessible Data Sensitive flag. This addresses a persistent attack vector in which malicious apps exploit accessibility permissions to scrape sensitive on-screen data, such as 2FA codes, passwords, and private messages.

The new flag allows developers to lock down specific UI elements from unauthorized access. When applied, only verified accessibility services can read the content. Third-party apps with accessibility permissions, often the entry point for malware, receive nothing. It’s a meaningful win for security without breaking the experience for users who genuinely rely on assistive tools.

Why It Matters

Brands handling sensitive user information now have a standardized, Google-endorsed method to protect critical UI elements from screen-scraping attacks, removing the guesswork that came with previous solutions.
This approach blocks bad actors while keeping TalkBack and other verified accessibility tools fully functional, so you don’t have to choose between security and inclusivity.

Action items

Evaluate your Android app and identify every UI element that uses sensitive information, including one-time passwords, login credentials, financial figures, health data, and private messages.
Add flag implementation to your Android 16 update roadmap.
Test with accessibility tools to ensure users with disabilities aren’t affected.

6. The UK Clamps Down on Click-to-Cancel Requirements

The UK’s Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act (DMCCA) is implementing its strictest consumer protection measures this spring, and it affects a wide range of businesses: SaaS platforms, streaming services, fitness apps, news publishers, and any company relying on recurring revenue from UK customers.

The new legislation mandates that canceling a subscription must be as straightforward as signing up for one. If a user can subscribe with one click, the cancellation process must be equally simple. No more burying the cancel button, no more forcing users through phone trees, and no more dark patterns designed to frustrate people into staying.

Additionally, companies must now send clear renewal reminders before charging for long-term auto-renewals. The Competition and Markets Authority will begin enforcement in spring 2026, meaning businesses have a narrow window to get their offboarding flows compliant.

What To Do Now

Audit your current cancellation flow and map every step a user must take to end their subscription, then compare it to the steps required to sign up.
Remove any friction that doesn’t exist in your onboarding process, including mandatory phone calls, chat requirements, excessive confirmation screens, or confusing navigation.
Ensure your billing setup sends renewal reminders before auto-renewal charges.

7. Australia Enforces Under-16 Social Media Ban

As of December 10, 2025, Australian law required social media platforms to block users under 16 from creating accounts. Developers must deactivate existing under-16 accounts and actively prevent the creation of new ones. If your app qualifies as social media and operates in Australia, compliance is mandatory.

Apple has rolled out tools to help, including the Declared Age Range API for age verification, updated age rating questionnaires, and new product page options for displaying compliance information. The infrastructure is there—now it’s up to developers to use it.

Why It Matters

Australia is almost certainly not the last country to implement rules like this, with legislators in the UK, EU, and several US states already watching closely and discussing similar proposals.
Passive compliance, such as burying age requirements in your terms of service, is no longer sufficient. You need real, functional age-gating built into your product flows.
If you have existing users under 16 in Australia, you’re required to identify and deactivate those accounts, which carries community management and public relations considerations.

What’s Next

First, determine whether your app falls within the scope of Australian law, as the legislation has a specific definition of “social media platform” that you’ll want to review carefully.
If you’re covered, integrate the Declared Age Range API to implement age verification at account creation.
Audit your existing Australian user base and develop a compliant process for deactivating accounts, including clear, respectful communication with affected users.

The Takeaway

The theme across all of these updates is pretty consistent: more control, more compliance, and more machines in the mix. Apple is handing marketers better targeting tools while tightening the rules around age verification and commerce. Google is locking down security and building infrastructure for AI agents to shop on your behalf. And regulators are making sure that if you make it easy to sign up, you have to make it just as easy to leave. The businesses that adapt early will have an edge, and now’s the time to start building it.

Stay tuned for our next roundup. For more marketing insights, visit the Moburst blog or explore our full range of digital marketing services.