Abstract
This paper presents the results of a bibliometric analysis of published academic research on innovation in hotels. In particular, it aims to analyze the conceptual structure of the field, covering the period until October 2020, and predict emerging trends. This approach provides an exhaustive analysis of 334 papers collected from the Scopus database. Co-word analysis used to identify the conceptual structure reveals four clusters: (1) technological innovation, (2) innovativeness and innovation strategy, (3) knowledge and employee innovative behavior, and (4) performance as an outcome of organizational capability to innovate. The present study contributes to the literature by increasing the accumulation of knowledge on research topics, providing an up-to-date review on hotel innovation literature, and setting forth an agenda for future research.
Highlights
Conceptual Structure of the ResearchInnovation has been widely accepted as a key factor for tourism firms and destinations and is recognized as a strategic issue to be addressed in order to be competitive and, to face the intense competition currently found in the tourism sector, as well as to achieve growth and long-term success (Agarwal et al 2003; Campo et al 2014; Njoroge et al 2019; Pikkemaat et al 2019).Innovation research in tourism has experienced increased attention; innovation is a scarcely discussed and explored subject in the hotel industry (Meira et al 2019; Nieves and Segarra-Ciprés 2015)
Since innovation plays a central role in increasing the competitive advantage in a global market, especially in times of crisis (Campo et al 2014; Shin and Kang 2020), the hotel industry benefits from research focused on innovation and its detailed analysis
The goal of this paper is to assess the conceptual evolution and research streams in the innovation in hotels, answering the following research questions through co-word analysis and visualization maps: (1) What is the conceptual structure of the innovation in the hotel literature? (2) What are the dominant, fading, and emerging topics in the field?
Summary
Conceptual Structure of the ResearchInnovation has been widely accepted as a key factor for tourism firms and destinations and is recognized as a strategic issue to be addressed in order to be competitive and, to face the intense competition currently found in the tourism sector, as well as to achieve growth and long-term success (Agarwal et al 2003; Campo et al 2014; Njoroge et al 2019; Pikkemaat et al 2019).Innovation research in tourism has experienced increased attention; innovation is a scarcely discussed and explored subject in the hotel industry (Meira et al 2019; Nieves and Segarra-Ciprés 2015). Since innovation plays a central role in increasing the competitive advantage in a global market, especially in times of crisis (Campo et al 2014; Shin and Kang 2020), the hotel industry benefits from research focused on innovation and its detailed analysis. The goal of this paper is to assess the conceptual evolution and research streams in the innovation in hotels, answering the following research questions through co-word analysis and visualization maps: (1) What is the conceptual structure of the innovation in the hotel literature? This study contributes to the literature in three major ways. It extends the literature on hotel innovation offering a deeper analysis of the knowledge accumulated, in terms of output and impact, to understand the current state of this field. The paper helps actual and future researchers to handle the inherent complexity and challenges of the innovation process and to better direct their research
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