Niche tourism destinations’ online reputation management and competitiveness in big data era: evidence from three Italian cases

This research investigates the importance for niche tourism destinations of investing in big data analytics (BDA) to improve their online reputation management (ORM) and increase their competitiveness. Specifically, it explores how BDA may allow niche tourism destination managers to better monitor their reputation and, in turn, increase the capability of such destinations to attract new tourists. BDA can in fact allow niche tourism destination managers to collect, store and analyze online tourists’ data; thus, BDA may be useful in preventing online reputational damage. Consequently, such systems may increase the competitiveness of niche tourism destinations. In order to explore the aforementioned phenomenon, a multiple case studies approach has been selected. A framework observing how BDA can improve ORM and competitiveness was then developed. Implications for practitioners (i.e. niche tourism destination managers) are also presented.