A Netnography Study on Memorable Cultural Tourism Experiences: Insights from Asian Cultural Heritage Site Tourists

Abstract

Cultural tourism is a rapidly growing industry across the globe. This study aims to contribute to the existing knowledge of tourist experiences at cultural destinations. To this end, the study explores the factors that contribute to memorable cultural tourism experiences at cultural heritage sites, specifically museums. Using WebHarvy, a total of 502 online reviews were collected from a popular tourism website, namely TripAdvisor. The collected reviews concern 14 heritage museums in 10 Asian countries. Netnography was employed as a content analysis technique. The results revealed five contributing factors of memorable cultural tourism experiences: authenticity, engagement, culinary attraction, atmospherics, and quality of service. Theoretically, this study adds to our understanding of memorable cultural tourism experiences by identifying a novel dimension, namely atmospherics. In other words, this research highlights the importance of ambiance and environment in tourism experiences at cultural heritage sites. Thus, the study provides insights for heritage site managers on how to make the tourism experience memorable.