Call for Papers

CMC30 theme

Intelligent Consumer Trends

Artificial Intelligence is rapidly transforming marketing communication, moving beyond automation and content generation toward increasingly intelligent systems that influence how consumers discover, evaluate, and interact with brands.

The 30th International Conference on Corporate and Marketing Communications invites submissions exploring “Intelligent Consumer Trends” and the ways in which AI and emerging commerce infrastructures are reshaping corporate and marketing communication. The conference moves beyond the question that defined the previous AI-focused agenda—what can AI do for marketing? to a more fundamental question: what is AI changing about the relationship between brands, consumers, and communication itself?

We also welcome contributions from both corporate and consumer perspectives, examining the changing relationship between brands, consumers, and intelligent technologies, including but not limited to:

• Beyond Human Communication: Marketing in the Age of AI Agents: This theme examines AI beyond content generation, focusing on its growing role as a co-actor in marketing strategy. It covers generative and agentic AI in campaign development, media buying, CRM, and real-time decision-making, alongside emerging models of human–AI collaboration. Key questions include decision-making authority, accountability, governance, and the evolving relationship between humans, AI, and brands.
• The Creator–Brand–Consumer Ecosystem: This theme examines the increasingly co-produced nature of brand storytelling across creators, communities, and consumers. It covers short-form content, creator marketing, user-generated content, brand safety, social commerce, live shopping, AI hosts, and virtual influencers, with a focus on how these developments are reshaping engagement, trust, and brand equity.
• Consumer–AI Parasocial Relationships and Authenticity in Synthetic Actors: This theme examines consumers’ emerging relationship-like attachments to AI chatbots, virtual influencers, and synthetic brand actors. It considers trust, emotional connection, perceived authenticity, disclosure, and the psychological dynamics underlying consumer interactions with synthetic actors.
• Retail Media, Fintech, and the New Commerce Communication Channel Mix: This theme examines emerging communication environments shaped by retail media, embedded fintech, and quick commerce. It considers how these new infrastructures are transforming consumer discovery, engagement, purchasing journeys, and the communication channels through which brands reach consumers.
• Intelligent Marketing & the Human–Machine Boundary: This theme examines AI across marketing communication as a production tool, decision-maker, brand discovery gatekeeper, and relational actor. It addresses generative and agentic AI, synthetic spokespersons, hyper-personalisation, authenticity, data ethics, AI-mediated brand visibility, and the evolving boundary between AI as a creative partner and a creative substitute.
• AI for Impact: Synthetic Marketing for Social Good: This theme examines the use of generative AI and synthetic media to drive social impact, including charitable giving, sustainable consumption, and public-health behaviour change. It considers AI-generated creative, synthetic actors, personalised appeals, trust, transparency, and the ethical implications of using synthetic media to influence prosocial behaviour.