First Footers 2026: Why Connection Must Come First

​​First footing is a Scottish Hogmanay (or New Year) tradition. The first person to cross your threshold after midnight is your 'first footer', and who they are and the gifts they bring set the tone for the coming year (you want someone bringing coal, money, whisky or food!). With that in mind LBB is inviting the advertising and marketing world's first footers to set the tone for the industry this year with op-eds that look to tomorrow – rallying cries for issues the industry needs to tackle, future-casting insights for the trends and themes we'll likely come across and reflections on how they plan to navigate the shoogly, shifting path ahead. Neda Whitney, president of MATTE Projects, is up next. You can read other entries from the series here.


Every year, I choose a word to anchor how I think about what lies ahead. Not a trend forecast or a resolution, but a lens for decision-making. A reminder of what matters when the work gets noisy.

For 2026, that word is connection.

Not as a buzzword or a KPI, but as a human need the marketing industry has been dancing around for years and should embrace. In a landscape defined by fragmentation, fatigue, and choice overload, connection is not a nice to have, it is the work.

At MATTE Projects, we build experiences people actively choose to step into. Across fashion, entertainment, sport, and culture, we see how sophisticated audiences have become, especially when brands are involved. People can sniff out the BS. They know when they are being sold to. They scroll past perfection, walk right by, and tune out anything that feels familiar or forced. What still cuts through is feeling.

We have been fortunate to work on collaborations deeply anchored to brands, and the truth is those moments would not exist without meaningful partnerships behind them. Brand involvement is not the problem; irrelevance is. When a brand shows up with intention, creativity, and respect for the audience, it can unlock connection at scale.

People want to feel something. That feeling is what drives decisions that matter. What to buy. What to support. What to talk about. That is the opportunity of first footing into a new year that already feels uncertain and fast moving. As brands and marketers plan for what comes next, the question should not be how we show up more, but rather, how we show up in ways that actually matter to the people we are trying to reach – table stakes.

That requires boldness and bravery. It requires raising the bar beyond what feels safe or familiar. Our industry is more than capable of this, but only if brands are willing to embrace the same mindset. Innate to MATTE, we hold ourselves to high standards creatively, culturally, and experientially. In 2026, I hope to see that ambition reflected across the industry. And watch this space, because we’ll be tackling just that.

Let’s create experiences the media genuinely wants to cover. Not because they are flashy, but because they say something worth paying attention to. Experiences fans actively choose to participate in. Not because they were targeted, but because they were invited. And let us never forget that while this is our job, it is also what consumers choose to do on their own time.

If we fast forward to December 2026, I believe we will look back on this as a turning point. A year when blue chip brands, especially those that historically struggled with live or experiential marketing, finally took the leap. Brands that once relied on tightly controlled messaging will experiment with new platforms, new formats, and new ways of bringing ideas to life.

The ones who succeed will not be the ones who played it safest. They will be the ones who let go of perfection and embraced participation. Who built spaces for community instead of broadcasting at audiences. The path ahead will remain shifting and unpredictable. Platforms will change. Technology will evolve. Attention will continue to fragment. But the human desire for connection will not. It is the one constant we can build against.

First footing into 2026 is not about chasing the next trend. It is about committing to a mindset. Designing experiences that make people feel seen, included, and moved, even if only for a moment. I’m excited to see which brands take the bold leap.

If we get that right, we will not just look back on 2026 as a successful year for marketing. We will look back on it as the year the industry remembered why this work matters in the first place.

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Neda Whitney is the President of NYC-based MATTE Projects, an experiential-led creative company that brings brands to life through culture, storytelling, and live experiences.