Relaunching the Topical Collection “The Connected Consumer”

1. Introduction

The digital landscape keeps evolving at an extraordinary pace, prompting profound transformations in marketing schemes and changing how consumers discover, assess, and engage with brands, value propositions, and one another. These developments are redefining both the motivations and behaviours of what is now widely referred to as the connected consumer, as well as their complex psychological interplay with brands, marketing communication initiatives, and e-retailers.

When this Topical Collection, “The Connected Consumer”, was first launched in the Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research, our central aim was to direct scholarly attention to consumers who actively leverage digital technologies, communicate through social media, and increasingly rely on AI throughout their consumption journeys. That aim has not only proven well-founded but has become even more pressing in the intervening years, as connected consumers are now at the core of contemporary markets—characterised by high information availability, pervasive algorithmic mediation, and fluid, adaptative touchpoints and interaction formats.

This editorial therefore marks the reactivation of the Topical Collection and extends a renewed invitation to researchers working at the intersection of digital marketing, consumer behaviour, and e-retailing to advance research on consumers who actively participate in, shape, and co-evolve with digital marketing ecosystems. Consumer journeys are increasingly shaped by hybrid processes in which human judgement interacts with algorithmic recommendations, generative AI tools, and data-driven interfaces. As a result, consumers play an even more dynamic role, reflecting heightened consumer agency and algorithmic influence, and contributing to how digital marketplaces evolve.

In parallel, brands, e-retailers, and other business actors continue to strive to design digital marketing strategies that effectively reach and engage connected consumers. However, the success of these initiatives depends, to a large extent, on having a fine-grained knowledge of consumers’ new emotional expectations, the ways in which they form their views of brands and value propositions, and the novel mechanisms through which they interact within automated and data-rich marketing settings.

2. Research Published to Date

Since its inception, the collection has published six peer-reviewed contributions that collectively shed light on the many-sided nature of connected consumer behaviour. The earlier contributions focused on the experiential and relational dimensions of online consumption and pointed out the importance of interactive experiences, social influence, and user-generated content (including e-WOM) in forming perceptions and behavioural intentions.

Subsequent research extended this perspective by exploring how consumers navigate increasingly complex digital environments and stressed the relevance of informational cues and communication approaches in reducing uncertainty and influencing evaluation processes.

More recent contributions reflect a shift towards the growing role of AI-enabled and data-driven mechanisms, examining how information transparency, platform design, and algorithmic mediation influence consumer appraisals and perceived control in consumer journeys.

3. Relaunch and Future Directions

The reactivation of this Topical Collection comes at a particularly significant moment. Advances in generative AI and algorithmic recommendation systems are enhancing and fundamentally reconfiguring consumer journeys. In addition, developments in spatial computing and highly immersive technologies are facilitating new forms of interaction that expand the boundaries of digital consumption experiences.

In parallel, evolving forms of social commerce—such as live-stream shopping, creator-driven marketplaces, platform-integrated purchasing, and community-based commerce models—are reconfiguring marketing strategies and value propositions and transforming how companies design and communicate their offerings, while also raising new concerns for consumers regarding privacy and data ethics, as well as digital well-being.

4. Renewed Call for Submissions

This Topical Collection is open to a diversity of disciplinary views, methodological designs, and industrial approaches that look closely at the main targets for the digital marketing initiatives: connected consumers. We invite researchers to submit original, high-quality papers about the transformative dynamics of connected consumers; the inner processes that make consumer experiences especially engaging, fluid, and enjoyable; the new windows of opportunity for brands to engage consumers; and their impact on purchasing decisions and brand loyalty.