Opportunities for Sustainable Entrepreneurship under Marketing 5.0

Dear Colleagues,

In the new context arising from the COVID-19 pandemic situation, the Marketing 5.0 approach is likely to provide companies with a way to integrate the latest developments that the evolution of technology has brought with the changes in consumer behavior that have been observed in recent times (Kotler, Kartajaya and Setiawan, 2021). Indeed, the implementation of the Marketing 5.0 approach can potentially enable business managers to respond to customer needs related to sustainability in the most convenient way possible, thus making a difference in an ever-changing world that increasingly values the preservation of the environment and natural resources.

Marketing 5.0 builds on the foundation of its closest predecessor, Marketing 4.0, with the addition of emerging precepts relating to the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence algorithms. In this new approach to marketing, the consumer is in the driver's seat; he or she is immersed in an entirely digital, intelligent and flexible environment, engaging in full interaction with AI. In addition, Marketing 5.0 is characterized by several key aspects, which make it unique from previous approaches (Zozul'ov and Tsarova, 2020), and which potentially can contribute greatly to sustainability.

These aspects are likely to provide numerous advantages to companies, including the continuous emergence of new possibilities for real-time research on consumers' sustainability needs. This can enable sustainable marketing strategies to be carried out "24/7"—i.e., 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and endless segmentation strategies—even at the individual level. Another advantage is that Marketing 5.0 makes it possible for the business model to take on an "everything can be offered as a service" style. In this model, traditional goods can be replaced by services, which means that the efforts required to operate traditional products (and the problems associated with their maintenance) are considerably reduced; in addition, this contributes to a reduced use of material resources and/or recycled and, hence, more sustainable resources.

Taking into account the numerous business opportunities that will emerge in the coming months as a result of the emergence and diffusion of Marketing 5.0, this Call for Papers aims to encourage research in the following areas:

- Emergence and development of new technology devices (e.g., nanotechnologies), and their implications in terms of sustainability in the different phases of the distribution and/or marketing chain.

- Proposal of new sustainability strategies, both in terms of the study of consumer purchasing habits and behaviors, and segmentation.

- Proposal of sustainable businesses based on the promotion of the substitution of tangible physical goods by services.

Dr. Ana Isabel Jiménez Zarco
Dr. Maria Pilar Martinez-Ruiz
Guest Editors

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• Marketing 5.0
• Industry 4.0
• sustainability
• artificial intelligence
• internet of things