
Codes of Consumer Choices
Chapter from the book:
Yılmaz Uz,
C.
(ed.)
2025.
The Anatomy of Silent Decisions: Digital Consumers, Perception, and Strategic Impact.
Synopsis
Digitalization has permeated every aspect of businesses and consumers, contributing to the transformation of contemporary consumer behavior. The rapid adaptation of physical consumer behavior to virtual environments has led to new perceptions and attitudes in the purchasing decision process. Big data, which is generated as a result of users' identities and activities on social networks, websites, digital platforms, or their interactions with media elements belonging to companies' digital marketing strategies, creates data sets that provide important information about users' demographic characteristics, geographic data, interests, or lifestyle habits. (Dwivedi, Johnson, Wilkie, et al., 2019). Furthermore, the way we communicate and connect has significantly changed in the modern world under the influence of social networks, providing the opportunity for constant contact with brands and other consumers in a multi-channel environment. However, consumers in the digital world distrust the advertising and marketing strategies implemented by brands and, thanks to the easy access to big data, can shape their behaviors based on online platforms that offer user experiences. Consequently, consumers in the digital age have become more active, demanding, more inquisitive, and therefore more knowledgeable about the products they purchase. In the study, firstly the fundamentals of consumer behavior were discussed and then the codes that shape consumer choices were examined. In the digital age, it has been revealed that social media, big data analytics, algorithms and the influencer trend have created new consumption codes, and with sustainability, consumption trends have turned towards a modern consumption culture.