[AISWorld] Special Issue of Technological Forecasting and Social Change: Social Customer Journey — Behavioural and Social Implications of Digitally Disruptive Environment

[Yogesh K. Dwivedi]

 Call for Papers
Social Customer Journey - Behavioural and Social Implications of Digitally
Disruptive Environment [Short title (VSI): Social Customer Journey]
Deadline for submission: 31 Dec 2021
Journal: Technological Forecasting and Social Change (
https://www.journals.elsevier.com/technological-forecasting-and-social-change/call-for-papers/behavioural-and-social-implications-of-digitally-disruptive
)  Background and Motivations

Since the last few decades, consumer behaviour and consequently consumer
behaviour research are going through a transition and gradually adapting to
the technological advancements and the digitally disruptive environment.
However, recent unprecedented developments due to *COVID-19 pandemic* have
completely shaken the businesses and customers alike. This hostile
environment has pushed most of the customers to a forced digital experience
adoption. Particularly, customers’ channel preferences and their customer
journey have seen a significant change that has resulted in high online
activity and increased online sales. Though some of these trends may be
temporary, many will have more long-lasting effects on daily consumption as
well as on social interactions and communications. This pandemic has served
as a catalyst to this already fast-changing customer journey; hence,
stressed the need to recognise, understand and utilise this transition.

Additionally, digital disruption and transformation have greatly influenced
the ways of interaction both at the individual and organizational levels,
eventually leading to a notable social change. This change is much more
visible in the individuals interacting in the virtual environment.
Moreover, this social change does not only affect the society as a whole
but also customers at the individual level resulting in several important
consequences for consumer research. The relevance of *social media websites*
(SMW), in this regard, is of particular importance as these SMWs play an
important role in shaping an individual’s path to purchase. Generally,
individuals use SMWs – due to their public nature – to initiate social
change or be a part of it (Bhatti et al., 2020). Therefore, the social
change due to disruption or accelerated digitisation – as a consequence of
this recent pandemic – should be studied and explored to understand how
individuals (as customers or members of society) tend to be a part of it.

*Artificial Intelligence (AI)*-based technologies, such as *Amazon’s
Alexa, Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant*, and *Chatbots* are entirely
revamping customer experience by replacing social others (Nam & Kannan,
2020). These technologies are changing customers’ behaviours with respect
to their individual or group decision making (Shareef et al., 2020).
Moreover, emerging social technologies and societal changes have led to new
type of  *digital influencers* which are revamping customer path to
purchase into social customer journey (Hamilton et al., 2020). However, the
increasing influence of AI-Based technologies, such as *Chatbots* and *Virtual
Agents* and their integration with social media in forming customer
experience throughout their social customer journey demands new behavioural
and societal research both from theoretical and managerial perspectives (Duan
et al., 2019; Roy et al., 2017).

Recent literature has highlighted academic and managerial issues related to
consumers’ switching behaviour towards disruptive technologies  (Kamolsook
et al., 2019) and social change; however, there is a clear gap between the
amount of research on social customer journey and marketing response (Argo
& Dahl, 2020; Bhatti et al., 2020). Especially, the literature has not
paced up on the behavioural and social consequences of digital
transformation and rapidly changing environment (Ossewaarde, 2019). We
expect this special issue (SI) will address these contemporary
topics/problems by providing conceptual foundations and offering an
exciting roadmap for social change and social customer journey. This SI
will address these wide-ranging issues by inviting research ideas –
focusing on social change and social customer journey – employing variety
of qualitative and quantitative methods, such as case study, empirical,
experimental, and theoretical research. We especially encourage studies
offering novel research debate in this area rather than the ones offering
incremental contributions.
Major themes and issues

Following are some of the suggested topics for the potential contributions
to this special issue, but these are not limited to:

·         Significance of digital influencers in social customer journey

·         Digitally disruptive environment and social change

·         Marketing response to behavioural changes due to digitally
disruptive environment

·         Individual and organisational level consequences of digital
disruption

·         Implications of digital transformation for behavioural and social
theories

·         Ethical considerations of digital disruption

·         Consequences of digital transformation for consumer involvement
on social networking sites

·         Users’ active and passive engagement in social media platforms

·         Consequences of COVID-19 pandemic for consumer behaviour and
social research paradigm, such as automation, behavioural attitude, and
social distancing

·         How is the e-commerce and social commerce facilitating customer’s
social journey through various stages of marketing funnel?

·         Consumers’ decision making over multi-channel versus omni-channel
platforms

·         Cross cultural implications of digital disruption for social
change and customer behaviour

·         Issues related to customers engagement through digital and social
media marketing

·         Role of showrooming and webrooming behaviours in social customer
journey

·         Issues related to trust in virtual agents and source derogation
during social customer journey

·         Effects of AI-based digital technologies at various stages of
customer journey

·         The association between customers social/ digital identity and
online decision making

·         The role of individuals’ cultural orientation and socioeconomic
factors in social customer journey

·         Digital and social media strategies and tools to achieve
marketing objectives, such as acquisition, conversion, retention, and growth

·         The effects of brand credibility and social presence on
customers’ decisions in different stages of the customer journey

·         Effects of virtual agents, such as chatbots in augmenting
customers’ virtual experience

Important dates

The timeline of this special issue is as follows:

·         Submission dates: Nov 01, 2020 — Dec 31, 2021

·         Review process: On a rolling basis from Nov 2020 to Jun 2022

·         Possible publication: 2022

Guest Editors

*Muhammad S. Akram*

Essex Business School, University of Essex, Colchester, UK (Email:
mshakaib.akram at gmail.com)


*Yogesh K. Dwivedi *(Managing Guest Editor)

Emerging Markets Research Centre (EMaRC), School of Management Swansea
University Bay Campus, UK (Email: ykdwivedi at gmail.com)



*Mahmud A. Shareef*

School of Business & Economics, North South University, Bangladesh (Email:
mahmud.shareef at northsouth.edu)


*Zeeshan A. Bhatti*

Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, UK
(Email: xeeshan at gmail.com)
  Submission guidelines

Kindly submit your paper to the Special Issue category (VSI: Social
Customer Journey) through the online submission system (
https://www.editorialmanager.com/tfs/default.aspx) of Technological
Forecasting & Social Change. All the submissions should follow the general
author guidelines of Technological Forecasting & Social Change available at
https://www.elsevier.com/journals/technological-forecasting-and-social-change/0040-1625/guide-for-authors.


References

Argo, J. J., & Dahl, D. W. (2020). Social Influence in the Retail Context:
A Contemporary Review of the Literature. *Journal of Retailing*, *96*(1),
25–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2019.12.005

Bhatti, Z., Arain, G., Akram, M., Fang, Y. Y., & Yasin, H. (2020).
Constructive Voice Behavior for Social Change on Social Networking Sites: A
Reflection of Moral Identity. *Technological Forecasting and Social Change*,
*157*(May), 120101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2020.120101

Duan, Y., Edwards, J. S., & Dwivedi, Y. K. (2019). Artificial intelligence
for decision making in the era of Big Data – evolution, challenges and
research agenda. *International Journal of Information Management*,
*48*(January),
63–71. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2019.01.021

Hamilton, R., Ferraro, R., Haws, K. L., & Mukhopadhyay, A. (2020).
Traveling with Companions: The Social Customer Journey. *Journal of
Marketing*, 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242920908227

Kamolsook, A., Badir, Y. F., & Frank, B. (2019). Consumers’ switching to
disruptive technology products: The roles of comparative economic value and
technology type. *Technological Forecasting and Social Change*, *140*,
328–340. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2018.12.023

Nam, H., & Kannan, P. K. (2020). Digital Environment in Global Markets:
Cross-Cultural Implications for Evolving Customer Journeys. *Journal of
International Marketing*, *28*(1), 28–47.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1069031X19898767

Ossewaarde, M. (2019). Digital transformation and the renewal of social
theory: Unpacking the new fraudulent myths and misplaced metaphors.
*Technological
Forecasting and Social Change*, *146*, 24–30.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2019.05.007

Roy, S. K., Balaji, M. S., Sadeque, S., Nguyen, B., & Melewar, T. C.
(2017). Constituents and consequences of smart customer experience in
retailing. *Technological Forecasting and Social Change*, *124*(2017),
257–270. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2016.09.022

Shareef, M. A., Kapoor, K. K., Mukerji, B., Dwivedi, R., & Dwivedi, Y. K.
(2020). Group behavior in social media: Antecedents of initial trust
formation. *Computers in Human Behavior*, *105*, 106225.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2019.106225


Kind Regards

Yogesh
---------------
Professor Yogesh K. Dwivedi, PhD
Professor of Digital Marketing and Innovation
Director of Emerging Markets Research Centre (EMaRC)
Co-Director of Research
School of Management, Room #323
Swansea University, Bay Campus
Fabian Bay, Swansea, SA1 8EN, Wales, UK.
TEL (Office): +44 (0) 1792 602340
Email: y.k.dwivedi at swansea.ac.uk ; ykdwivedi at gmail.com
Home Page:http://www.swansea.ac.uk/staff/som/academic-staff/y.k.dwivedi/
Google Scholar:
https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=SQ_uDYIAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yogesh-dwivedi-6a477a4/
Twitter: @YogiD15

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*Editor-in-Chief,* *International Journal of Information Management *(
https://www.journals.elsevier.com/international-journal-of-information-management
)
*Associate Editor,* *Journal of Business Research*
*Associate Editor, **Government Information Quarterly*
*Associate Editor,* *European Journal of Marketing*
*Senior Editor (Europe/Africa/Middle East), **Journal of Electronic
Commerce Research*
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*Call for Papers *
*Technological Forecasting and Social Change* (TFSC) - *Social Customer
Journey — Behavioural and Social Implications of Digitally Disruptive
Environment*; Submission Deadline - *31 Dec 2021*;  For further details
please visit -
https://www.journals.elsevier.com/technological-forecasting-and-social-change/call-for-papers/behavioural-and-social-implications-of-digitally-disruptive