An Experience Warehouse on the Internet. What Happens in Tourism?

Management scholars widely documented the importance of experience for the evaluation of tourist products. The evolution of the Internet and, above all, the digitalization of economy influenced considerably competition and consumer choices. This is particularly evident in the tourism industry, where tourists can access information based onthe experience of others and can report their experience, potentially conditioning the choices of other tourists. On the other hand, firms can also benefit from consumer reviews, for example, by triggering recovery mechanisms and identifying opportunities to improve or enhance their service. This article investigates literature on tourist experience conveyed by the Internet. Its objective is to investigate the contributions on the topic from a methodological point of view and identify the main areas of exploration. To search for papers to be considered, we referred to the «business, management and accounting» journals included in the Scopus database, considering the following keywords: tourism, experience, review. We selected papers published on management journals included in the Anvur list of «classe A» journals and examined their content. Then, we performed a Multiple Correspondence Analysis and a Cluster Analysis. In this way, once outlined the characteristics of the phenomenon and its evolution, through the use of multivariate statistical techniques we interpret the literature, focusing on specific methodological approaches as well as the variety of areas of exploration. As regards the results, two groups of articles were identified, reflecting different methodological approaches, which were then described considering their editorial destination, reference markets and focus of the research. Our results could be useful, in particular, to scholars who approach the topic, helping them to find their way in the depths of literature on tourist ex- perience on the Internet, but also to practitioners, who could approach some critical aspects of the management of the reviews with a more scientific approach.