Did we really need a pandemic to fast-track technology?

Abstract

The Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations had correctly stated that ‘Policymakers should seize the COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity to establish tailormade digital government tools, strategies, and collaborations for the future. The crisis has demonstrated that it is impossible for societies to ignore technological advancements as they are continuing to change business models and people’s everyday lives. Governments should embrace these policy and technological developments and harvest the digital opportunities that can support the long-term sustainable development of their countries’ (UN 2022). With policymakers being asked to prepare for an even greater need of digital tools and technological advancements, corporations need to continue to investing in these areas and are hence needing scholars to progress research in the effectiveness of these tools. Following on the 26th Corporate Marketing Communications International Conference (CMC) held in 2022, the guest editors have carefully chosen six papers and collated this current special issue. The conference theme was entitled ‘Digital Technologies in the light of COVID-19: a changing landscape for Corporate and Marketing Communications’ and sought to attract international researchers to present on a multitude of digital technology-related issues that have mainly been called upon to deal with the last two years both during and after the global pandemic. The topic of the CMC2022 invited for insights into how new technologies are challenging companies today, how new technologies have helped businesses to cope with the challenges created by the pandemic, how the pandemic has shaped the marketing and corporate communications fields, and how these new technologies could be used to offer businesses and customers a more direct and interactive way to communicate with audiences, and especially those new generation consumers who are intertwined with digital technologies. With this special issue, the guest editors are hoping to contribute in the field of communications by presenting a selection of research examining online advertising effectiveness, social CRM capability and online marketing communication, attitude formation and strength in the digital domain, perceptions of hybrid forms of content, organisational listening and customer engagement and consumers’ attitudes towards sustainability within the fast-fashion sector. While previous studies on media multitasking compared a single medium versus crossmedia strategies (Dijkstra, Buijtels, and Van Raaij 2005; Voorveld, Neijens, and Smit 2012) or a single medium versus simultaneous media strategies (Kazakova et al. 2016), the study presented in this special issue by Theodorakioglou, Hatzithomas and Boutsouki focused on the comparison between sequential and simultaneous media strategies. It extends prior knowledge in the field by indicating that simultaneous media exposure causes a higher cognitive load as opposed to single media (Chang and Thorson 2023) and sequential media exposure. Moreover, it expands previous studies carried out by Segijn, JOURNAL OF MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS 2023, VOL. 29, NO. 2, 97–100 https://doi.org/10.1080/13527266.2023.2166239