For three years, brands competed to be the most chaotic.
Being aggressively weird became a marketing strategy, and for a while, it worked.
Then the strategy became mainstream. What started as differentiation became saturation.
By late 2025, performative chaos was everywhere.
The content strategy that made you stand out when you were one of ten doing it doesn't have the same impact when you're one of ten thousand.
The entrepreneurs who built audiences through performative content are discovering a conversion dilemma between followers who came for entertainment and buyers who need to trust expertise.
Now the CMOs behind some of the fastest-growing brands are predicting a shift.
What CMOs are Saying
"This whole unhinged social media manager, 'I'm posting this and legal doesn't know' thing is really overplayed," Nicole Weltman, head of social and PR at Taco Bell, told Marketing Brew in early January. "My biggest prediction is that it's going to fizzle out and it's going to create a white space for a new sort of persona."
Krista Dalton, CMO of Tecovas, pointed to the deeper shift: "The ironic viewpoint of marketing of the 2010s is turning into people wanting a true connection. I expect a lot of emotional Super Bowl ads this year instead of the joke-heavy content of three years ago." Source: Inc.
George Felix, CMO of Chili's, made it even more direct: "The brands that show up with a real voice rooted in who they are will continue to win. That requires experts in the space that use instinct and speed." Source: Marketing Brew
Audiences are fatigued with performative chaos. They want substance.
When Performative Chaos Works (And When It Doesn't)
The unhinged approach worked initially because it solved a specific problem.
In 2022 and 2023, brand content had become too polished, too corporate, too safe. Brands that broke the fourth wall and posted like humans got attention because they were different.
That's still true for brands where the chaos is authentic to who they are. If performative content reflects your actual personality and your business can sustain an audience that came for entertainment, keep doing it.
The problem shows up in conversion.
Attention and conversion are different games.
Chaos gets eyes. Clarity gets buyers.
When someone is deciding whether to hire you, buy from you, or trust you with their business, they're asking "does this person know what they're doing?"
If your content answers that question while being entertaining, you've found the balance.
If your content only entertains without demonstrating expertise, you've built an audience that won't buy.
Entrepreneurs who built their entire voice around manufactured personality (rather than personality that emerges from their actual expertise) now face a specific conversion problem: followers came for entertainment, not expertise. When it's time to buy, those followers move on to someone who can demonstrate they actually know their field.
What to Ask About Your Content Approach
This isn't about choosing boring over entertaining.
Ask yourself: does my voice reflect who I actually am and what I actually do, or am I performing a character that doesn't connect to my expertise?
Nicole Weltman said the brands that will win online in 2026 are the ones with "ownable and distinctive" voices. Source: Marketing Brew
That means distinctive in what you say, not just how you say it.
Look at the difference:
The performative approach: "POV: You spent $200 on skincare that doesn't work and now you're mad at me for saying it 💀"
The substantive approach: "We tested our serum against three leading competitors. Ours increased moisture retention by 34% in 48 hours. Here's the third-party lab data."
The first gets attention through provocation. The second builds trust through proof.
One entertains, one converts.
Both can work depending on whether your audience makes buying decisions based on personality alignment or product performance.
The question is: which one moves your specific audience from follower to buyer?
What to Audit in Your Own Strategy
If you're using performative content, ask:
Does this chaos reflect my actual personality, or am I performing someone I'm not?
Are the people engaging with this content the same people who would buy from me?
Can I trace a path from "they liked my chaotic post" to "they became a customer"?
If the answers are yes, yes, and yes, don't change anything. You've found alignment between personality, audience, and conversion.
If the answers are no, you have a choice to make. You can keep building an audience that entertains but doesn't buy, or you can shift toward content that demonstrates the expertise people need to see before they trust you with their business.
Get your substance clear first. What you offer and why it matters.
Then figure out how to say it in a way that sounds like you, whether that's chaotic or calm, provocative or measured.
What You're Trading
The entrepreneurs shifting away from pure performance are losing followers who were never going to buy anyway.
They're losing engagement from people who liked the entertainment but didn't trust the expertise.
They're gaining buyers.
People who see their content and think "this person knows what they're doing." People who convert from follower to client because the content demonstrates competence, not just personality.
The brands winning in 2026 aren't performing personas disconnected from their expertise. They're communicating who they actually are and what they actually know.
The question isn't "should I be performative or substantive?"
It's "does my content move my ideal customer/client closer to trusting me enough to buy?"
That answer shapes your next 12 months.